PRIVATE LESSONS

THOUGH THERE ARE OBVIOUSLY LEVELS OF SKILL
IN ANYTHING YOU DO, THE ONLY WRONG WAY
TO SURF IS IF YOU’RE NOT HAVING A GOOD TIME.
YES, SURFING CAN BE A CHALLENGING SPORT—
BUT ONLY IF YOU WANT IT TO BE. WHETHER YOU’RE
A PRO OR A NOVICE, WHEN YOU’RE ON A WAVE,
YOU LEAVE THE CARES OF THE WORLD BEHIND.
DEPENDING ON WHAT LEVEL YOU’RE AT, HERE ARE
SOME THINGS YOU WANT TO THINK ABOUT.

BEGINNERS : THE WATER’S EDGE Everybody thinks the most important part of surfing is some technical move you make on the board, like learning how to carve a turn or do a cutback or whatever. Wrong. The most important skill for anyone who wants to surf is to be comfortable in the ocean. And not just on a nice day. What happens when you find yourself tangled up in the whitewater, which can happen on even the smallest wave? Do you panic—or is it fun? You want to be relaxed and confident in turbulent conditions, so before you even think about buying a board, the first order of business is to become a strong swimmer. No swimming, no surfing.

One way to work on your swimming skills while becoming more acquainted with waves and how they behave is to spend some time bodysurfing. It’s the purest, simplest thing: just you and the water. If you’re sensitive to what’s going on, you’ll be able to feel the energy of the wave and learn how and where it breaks. Go somewhere with a sandy bottom, practice diving beneath the waves, and find out what it feels like to get hit by them. Watch other people doing it, get some fins, and play around.

Once you’ve done that groundwork—you’re at home in the water, you understand where the current is, you’ve got some idea of how the waves work—then you can start thinking about a board. Start with a boogie board. After you’ve ridden some small waves on it, get yourself a surfboard.

Initially, I recommend something like one of those soft-top longboards so that when you get hit by it, you don’t get hurt. It’s discouraging to go out for the first time and get whacked in the head or split your lip open—and it happens. That’s what the soft tops are for—so that your experience is a less damaging one.

Next, go to a place where there are other people in the water bodysurfing, boogie boarding, or surfing. Watch how they make their way out through the surf break and how they paddle to catch a wave. Notice what happens when they make a mistake. Study how they pop up onto their boards once they’re on the wave. Before you even get into the water, try popping up on the sand. When you do that, you’ll know right away what stance you are (which foot leads and which foot trails). One way will feel totally comfortable, and the other way will feel like you’ve got your hands tied behind your back. If you’re a regular stance, your right foot will be back. If you’re goofy, it will be your left. Another way to find out what someone’s stance is, is to have them stand with their feet parallel and then push them. Whatever foot they put back first to steady themselves, that’s their stance. And 90 percent of everyone will put the same foot back every time if they’re allowing it to happen naturally.

Ideally, when you’re starting out, you’ll have access to well-shaped small waves that break over a sandy bottom. Waikiki’s a good example of this. The best places for learning are shallow because that means the waves can break over a long distance. If the bottom changes abruptly from deep to shallow, then the waves break faster, and that makes things harder. One thing you want to remember if you’re surfing in shallow water is to land flat when you fall. Lead with your butt. Sit back on your board. I call it an elegant dismount.

 

INTERMEDIATES : IN THE WAVES Once you can get up on your board and ride small waves, it’s time to refine your board. A good transition would be to swap the soft top for a similar-shaped board that’s made out of an epoxy or fiberglass. You might consider a type of board known as a mini tanker, which is really a downsized longboard, about 8 or 9 feet long (longboards are defined by their nose shape, which is round). As far as fin configuration goes, I think it’s good to learn on a single fin. You’re going to be riding flat; you’re not going to be on your edges that much when you’re learning. Single fins are faster, and they teach you good foundational skills.

Probably the most counterproductive thing that people do when they’re learning is to go out and get pro equipment. They’ll look at the magazines and see Kelly Slater and Andy Irons riding little 6-foot boards that it’s taken them 20 years to perfect. They’re the best in the world; they can ride these things that are hard to paddle, hard to get up on, and need very aggressive waves to work functionally, among other issues. Things like the soft top and mini tanker, while they might not be what you consider “cool,” are making it much easier for people to learn. People fall victim to getting an expert’s equipment and not using the beginner stuff. Get over that, and learn how to surf.

Once you can ride a wave going straight, the next step is making a turn. Turning comes from your hips and shoulders. What you do is lead with whatever hand you have forward. If you’re a regular foot, your left hand’s forward; if you’re a goofy foot, your right hand’s forward. Put your hand straight out and have it lead you. If you want to turn to the left, move your hand over to your left. Then twist your hips and put pressure on the correct part of your feet (which depends on the direction you want to go). If you want to go in the direction your toes are pointed, put pressure on your toes; if you want to go in the direction your heels are pointed, put pressure on your heels. All of these movements happen in concert.

One common mistake I see is people trying to turn their boards with the upper body only. They’re assuming that if they get enough momentum going with their shoulders, the board will follow. And to some degree it will, but you’re not really turning the board to its optimum performance, and that will only get you so far. You’ll hit a plateau; you can’t progress using that technique. You’ve got to learn how to turn the board by weighting it, pressuring the rail, and leaning into the turn. Your feet are going to move by the nature of it, and if you ride a big board, you’re going to have to move your feet a lot.

 

ADVANCED : THE OUTER REEFS At the end of the day, it’s all about the waves. Good waves make good surfers. If you’re surfing often enough to have become proficient, your next step is to go out and find those hero waves. And make sure your passport’s up-to-date, because serious surfers travel the globe looking for the best conditions. Australia, for instance, is a surfer’s paradise. Indonesia: same thing. There are places in the south of France that are great. Fiji’s got great surf. You go to Namotu Island, and it’s like a dream. That’s a surf camp and it’s private, but even a relatively novice surfer will have the time of their life there.

The other thing that you need is getting out there with even better surfers. At a certain level, if you want to progress, you go to where the best guys in the world are. You watch them, and you surf with them. That will give you a good perspective of what to aspire to and how good you are—really. And then, of course, there’s the “monkey see, monkey do” factor. Surf with people who know what they’re doing, and it’s pretty much impossible that you won’t become better.

Throughout all of it, there are always the basics: your fitness level, your paddling skills, your proficiency in the ocean. How good’s your car? How good’s your motor? When you’re strong and you have good endurance, then you can surf for 4 hours instead of 2. You can do it every day instead of every third day. The more time you can put into doing it and the harder you can do it, the faster the improvements will come.

POINTERS, SKILLS, AND THINGS TO CONSIDER

 READING WAVES AND SETS When you’re waiting for a wave, you have to be patient. Learn to be in the moment, and appreciate everything that’s going on around you. It’s an interactive relationship. After a while, reading the sets becomes instinctual.

A set can be 3 waves or 9 waves or 20 waves. It’s a pulse of energy. You usually never go on the first wave (unless you know it’s the biggest one) because if you fall, there will likely be a bigger one behind it. And certainly, there will be others behind it. Usually the biggest wave is the second or third one in a set, but that changes on every swell.

Reading a swell is subtle, like feeling someone’s heartbeat. Storms are pulsating, and you can actually know a storm’s rhythms by the swell it produces. The Polynesians were the masters of this. They had a close connection to the ocean because their survival depended on it. I think in general we’ve grown too far away from that. But you can develop your observational skills. You can train yourself to become excellent at seeing. The first step is to start watching as carefully as possible.

POSITION ON THE WAVE You can be on the shoulder going straight—but placing yourself 10 feet behind that position is a completely different level. That’s where you’re going to feel the full energy of the wave. Everyone fixates on face sizes, but I’m far more impressed by someone riding a wave that’s a few feet smaller if they’re riding it deeper.

 

CRASHING There’s a real art to crashing. It’s an undervalued skill. The worst place you can be is in the lip because when it breaks, it parts the water’s surface. You can literally feel like you’re falling onto the ground. The safest place to be is inside the wave when it’s barreling because if you fall there, you can come out the back. The good news is that you won’t take such a beating. The bad news is that the next one will be right there. Whatever happens when you fall, relax. It sounds counterintuitive, but fighting the ocean is pointless and just burns up your oxygen faster. If you fall in shallow water, make like a starfish to avoid hitting the bottom—spread your arms and legs to maximize your surface area. Whatever you do, don’t dive off your board headfirst unless you know the water is deep enough.

DROPPING IN

GERRY LOPEZ

I’ve been surfing almost 50 years now. It’s been pretty much my whole life, my career, all I’ve ever wanted to do. Surfing is a personal and private experience: just you and the ocean and your surfboard. And then the wave comes, and it’s just you and the wave. You do have to pay your dues; surfing is a constant process of having the crap scared out of you. It takes a lot of work and a lot of years to get really good at it.

One thing I’ve experienced about surfing is that everything seems to happen faster now. Progress and development—everything is accelerated. Geez, it’s really grown into quite a scene. None of us had any idea that surfing was going to be this big, but I guess it makes sense because everyone who does it understands immediately how great it is. Surfing rocks you to your core—your soul, basically.