“The more waves you catch, the more fun you’ll have and the faster you’ll progress”

Obvious though it may sound, it’s worth pointing out that the more waves you catch, the more time you’ll spend actually surfing, thus the more fun you’ll have and the faster you’ll progress. When you’re just starting out your paddle strength will be relatively low and your knowledge of where and when to catch waves limited, so it would be wise to compensate with something user-friendly. The most common mistake people make is going too short too soon, usually due to pride and/or exaggerated notions of their own ability. They end up catching maybe two waves per session if they’re lucky and making it to their feet on neither.

Surfboard Types: The Shortboard

Generally speaking any surfboard under 7’ can be considered a shortboard, although the cut-off point I’ve suggested is arbitrary and flexible. Within the basic shortboard category are numerous sub-categories of surfboard, the main ones being…

The hybrid/funboard

The step up, or rather down, from the mini-mal to the standard “high-performance” shortboard is extremely steep, and trying to tackle it one go would be foolish. By combining elements from the mini-mal, the thruster and the fish (see below), the “hybrid” or “funboard” enables greater manoeuvrability and a more advanced style of surfing while still providing sufficient float, stability, and wave-catching power for intermediate surfers, or indeed advanced surfers in small and gutless waves. If downsizing from a mini mal, look for something with a rounder nose and plenty of width and volume to help ease the transition.

The fish

“95% of the people that were surfing in the ’90s were probably on the wrong surfboard,” reckons style guru and former world no. 2 Rob Machado in Fish: The Surfboard Documentary. The “wrong surfboard” he’s referring to is the very narrow, very thin thruster design that was in vogue among top pros — and consequently among the general surfboard-buying public — during the early years of Kelly Slater’s long reign. On these “banana boards”, so called because of their exaggerated rockers, even the most skilled surfers struggled to generate speed when the waves were small. The fish, by contrast, is much flatter and wider and thus planes across the water with speed and ease. The predecessor to the thruster, the original fish had a blunt nose, a wide “swallow tail”, and two large fins (hence the synonym “twin fin”), but nowadays people tend to apply the term to any stubby shortboard with lots of volume towards the nose. Lending itself to a smooth, lyrical style of surfing, the fish tends to struggle in heavy, barrelling waves but comes into its own at long point breaks or the kind of small, sloppy beach break often found in the UK.

“95% of the people that were surfing in the ’90s were probably on the wrong surfboard”