While it might be tempting to try and surf alone until you get the hang of it, that approach never works.
As well as being a lot safer to surf with a group on your first few tries, it’s also helpful for your form and technique, as a lot of bad habits can be created in the first hour of surfing.
The easiest way to stop this is to have a more experienced surfer with you to call them out. Don’t be shy!
While any surf lesson is better than not having one at all, there are many different levels of surf school out there.
Before signing up to a class, make sure you use the powers of the the internet and trip adviosr to make sure you’re getting a quality lesson.
We know, you don’t want to stay on the beach and practice, you want to get in the water just a few feet away from you. If more people spent time perfecting their pop on the beach before getting in the water however, surfing would have many more success stories.
Spend a half hour with a friend and take turns doing your pops and critiquing each others form. By the time you get in the water you’ll be shocked how quickly that pop feels like second nature.
One thing that beginner surfers never seem to take into consideration, is the end of beach you should go to, to make your surfing easier.
Because of different types of break and different conditions, some beaches are just a lot easier to surf than others. Do your research and make sure you’re not making everything a lot harder for yourself.
You might thing that surfing is a lot to do with your legs and core, while you’re not wrong, the most important part of the body to build strength in for surfing is your upper body.
In order to be able to last a surf session, strength in your back and arms, as well as a good core is particularly necessary. Have a look around for surfer targeted weight training routines and build up those biceps!
So many people keep their legs super straight when they finally stand up, but this is the first way to fall straight off.
Keep those knees bendy and soft people!
Another mistake people make is to bend from the back when riding a wave.
While this might feel like the right pose to stand in, the reality is that your actually just throwing out your centre of gravity! Keep that back straight and your weight on the board.
Yes, foamie boards are big. They’re bright and they more often than not have a lot of flowers printed down the middle of them. When you’re learning to surf however, they’re basically your new best friend.
Learning to surf on a fibreglass shortboard is the quickest way to look foolish in front of the other surfers. Stick with the foamy for a while and you’ll be ready to upgrade to a better board before you know it.
We know the guys out back look way cooler than the people falling over themselves at the front, but you’ve got to earn your stripes before you move into the green waves.
Suck it up and stay in the whitewater until your successfully catching every wave!
You never realised how tiring surfing is until you’re out of the water and getting changed. Truth is, surfing tires you OUT.
The never ending paddling, the being hit in the face with cold water, the popping up and falling down. It’s a real workout.
If you get over tired, you start making mistakes and that’s when we all get angry with ourselves. Keep your sessions short, sweet and regular.
Similar to our point about building up your arm strength, but paddling is such an important and overlooked part of learning how to surf that we’ve decided to give it it’s own number.
Not only is paddling hard to master, its bloody tiring. Spend time in your local pool building up your front crawl and you’ll notice a different in your surf sessions almost immediately.
There’s a code in the ocean. Learn it and you’ll never be caught out.
This may sound like an inspirational quote about visualising your goals, but in this case we actually just mean it literally.
Look down the wave and your board will magically follow. Easy!
Finally, the best way to learn to surf. Spend seven days on it.
A couple of days surfing is not going to make you into a surfer, it’s a hard sport! Spending a week or a fortnight somewhere beautiful and making it your only goal of the week?
We bet you’ll be pretty happy by the time you head back to the airport….