Unfortunetly I moved away from being 20 minutes from the beach to about 40-45 now and havnt had much opportunity to surf in the last 4-5 months. Anywho, I’ll be getting back in the water soon enough and then back to maui for the summer so I was wondering what thoughts you guys had for my next board. Last time I surfed consistently I was around 160 at 6’1 surfing a 6 '3 shorty… now im closer to 185. I usually prefer thinner and wider to thick and narrow. Any ideas for a new size and shape? been out of the loop for a while just looking for new ideas, it told me I had 13000+ new threads since I last checked sways :P.
Hey bobmarley,
I work with quite a few surfers in the same situation, either have been away from surfing
for a while or are rehabilitating an injury. What seems to work very well is a sequence of
boards.
The first (few) times a large board and mellow waves works quite well. Probably not the
custom board you are anticipating for your comeback. Maybe borrow a longboard. I admit
it is hard to gauge how “out of the loop” you are at the moment, so bare with me.
After a few times back in the water:
Your sense of the custom board for yourself is right on. Wider and slightly fuller template
will keep you in the groove once you get some of your surf mojo back. Dimensions sound
good for your present weight. Really, just subtle “bumps” in your old numbers, nothing drastic.
As a last suggestion, if you are good with your equipment, is to make the new board as light
as possible. That way the added volume will come to you with less penalty.
Hope this helps,
George
Thanks for the reply, im worse off on a long board then I am on a short board :P.
But I get your drift and ill definetly have to give that try…
You think the current dimensions are pretty good? I feel like I put the thing to the ocean floor after I put on this weight haha… not looking to go too long so I guess your right I’ll just have to try a bunch of random stuff and see what feels best.
seriously just a couple of inches longer, maybe 1/2 inch wider and no more than 1/4 inch thicker. Same shortboard shapes that you’ve been ripping on.
BUT,
before getting on the new board, borrow some other big boards to ease yourself back into the groove where you once were. Your success on the borrowed stick will dictate how long before you get on your new custom…
Good Luck!
I actually have the opposite problem. I’ve lost weight to an unhealthy degree! I’m trying to get some weight on and am working out. On the same note, I know there was an excersize thread a while ago. Any suggestions on getting back in shape?
Go to the pool at least twice, ideally 3 times a week. Find a pool with a pace clock.
High output training = good power to grab peaks that would otherwise slip by you. Do 50 meter sprints, on the clock. Do a couple to find out what an average time for a 50 is and then give yourself 25-35 seconds rest in between each 50. So if you do 50’s on 40 seconds, you should give yourself ~1m10s for each one. Leave on the red top, get to the end, leave on the next red 10, then the next red 20, etc. If you can do this for around 500M, and you warm up properly to get your heart rate into the “training zone” (60-80% of 220 bpm-your age), it’ll give you 12-15 minutes of training zone time doing marvels for your cardio. Bonus is that it’ll improve your stamina and paddle strength. Concentrate on stroke dynamics, particuarly on the finish of the stroke as this is where the power is in your paddle and the mechanics of this part of the stroke are similar, regardless if you have a board under you or not. A really good way to do this workout is to try and have max output over the 300-400M interval; it’ll hurt at first but after 2 weeks @ 3x/week you should feel significant improvements through that stretch. Give yourself at least 200M to cool down and stretch thoroughly afterwards. I’ve used this formula for about 3-4 weeks before surf trips with very solid results; as you get in to better shape, push your total distance out to 600M, then 700M, eventually working up to 1km. Remember; rarely are you swimming more than 50M to get to a peak and you’re faster over the same stretch with a board underneath you.
Also; if you can aim to work up to 100 push-ups/day (sets of 10-15, interspersed throughout the day, whenever you’ve got the motivation) and the same number of sit-ups, you’re going to be well on your way back to having your strength back. Don’t worry about your weight.
Paddleboarding is great too if you’ve got a place and a board to do it with.