i recently got my hands on some old school, canvas covered mats. i know they are not nearly as refined as your crafts, but they were very, very cheap and i wanted to try them out before investing top dollar. now if you’d be kind enough to disclose a couple of pointers on how to get the mat on rail, so i can do more than go straight down the face of the wave. i’m hoping that these will be a viable alternativewhen the surf gets trashed out by the dreaded tradewinds…thanks in advance
just go out and ride 'em
you’ll figure it out.
if not, hope the ride was worth the price of admission.
Nomotuman:
Here is a resource for you to browse, it may quench your thirst. I think most agree that learning to ride a surf mat is more about learning how to “not ride” it. In other words, the harder you try the more frustrated you can get. The mat will find a balance on the wave face with very little effort from the rider. For me it is about learning body positioning, balance and placing your appendages to maximize control. I still rank as a beginner but what seems to take place is a kicking takeoff with me way behind center of the mat, as I feel the wave pick me up I use my forearms and momentum from the kick to spring off the mat and slide slightly forward of center. Dropping in is adjusment of balance and weight placement, inside rail is stiffened by my forearm. Weight and unweight off the the inside rail using your R/L hands to grip the rail, your arms and elbows are used to stiffen your edges as needed. I avoid dragging my legs and fins for maximum speed. The speed you can generate from a mat will shock you, dragging legs, hands or fins is your throttle. Good luck with the drugstore mats. I did the same thing while mine was on order. First session I blew a hole in a seam. My Neumatic has seen several years of use with no failures. The workmanship is outstanding and Dale delivers a surfcraft that performs like no other.
Tom S.
http://groups.msn.com/InflateAbleDreamSpeed/general.msnw?action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=702
Dale’s matts are so far beyond the old canvas matt that’s it hard to compare the two.
Having ridden my Nue for over a year now including in the islands I’d have to say I’m still in the learning stages but can crank some pretty hard bottom turns and cutbacks. Squeezing the outside front corners on your matt to turn will harden up the inside edge/corner giving you pivot point. The trick is when and how much to squeeze and when not to squeeze at all. I never did this on the old canvas job so I don’t know how well it will work.
WHERE DO I GET ONE OR TWO OF DALE’S MATS? I’D LIKE TO KEEP THEM IN THE CAR WHEN I NEED A FIX AND I DON’T HAVE A BOARD WITH ME!
Nowadays I tend to take off down the line and stay high until I build up speed. One of the main mistakes I used to make when I was beginning was to drive too deeply before my first bottom turn, which I was able to do on a hardboard. Once you’re squirting along, you’ll feel your positive control increase and you can fade deep down into the pit and crank some pretty good turns. I also try to keep my glide speed up and constant; that kinetic potential translates into control.
they cost mucho dinero senor.
Key: lower inflations about 75%,
takeoff and at normal standup position, hop or move your
head to align your mouth with the top of the mat or something
close to that.
On takeoffs try to start angling as much as possible,
i.e. dont drop straight in with a bottom turn, they may work
like that but only after your very experienced.
Quote:
i recently got my hands on some old school, canvas covered mats. i know they are not nearly as refined as your crafts, but they were very, very cheap and i wanted to try them out before investing top dollar. now if you’d be kind enough to disclose a couple of pointers on how to get the mat on rail, so i can do more than go straight down the face of the wave. i’m hoping that these will be a viable alternativewhen the surf gets trashed out by the dreaded tradewinds…thanks in advance
ahhh, like my seester.
I have been riding my -neumatic alot lately! It takes a few sessions to start to" get it" -very different than a hard board but that is exactly which makes it fun and challenging to ride! I’ve been riding mostly beachbreaks in the ventura area and really having a great time after work .It’s been really hot at the beach with really warm water and not big waves but Iam having soooooo much fun learning to riding this thing!!!------The best $295.00 I have spent in along time!! The things are built so well! Very beautiful simple FUN. I was blown away today how at low pressure, the mat molds to your body as you paddle it.
After having my mat for almost a year and riding it infrequently, I finally decided to try to get with it. It took about 15 waves in so-so to pretty good small rock reef waves to finally get that ah-ha! wave - and then one right after that! And more. And a lot of flubs. But I come home smiling about the number of waves I got or the involuntary sideways ride after the free-fall rather than bitching about the crowds. After using the matt exclusively for the past three weeks, I finally took my 7-6 out so I don’t forget how to paddle a board. I have a long way to go, but I think it’s been money well-spent.
namotuman…
At first, I`d become comfortable with various paddling techniques and body positions, catching waves, dropping in and simple trimmming.
Do not ride in the common prone craft position: head and chest raised up, weight on elbows and abdomen.
Do ride with chest down on the mat, head and chin lowered, no weight on elbows. Aim for a balanced, forward position.
While surfing, your legs and swim fins are a useful (above water) counter-balance. You don`t need to drag them to hold a high trim line or to carve a turn.
Use your inside hand/forearm, palm pressing down and back about 8" from the front corner. Feel your elbow near your hip. Try forming a body line with hand, arm, hip and thigh.
Use your outside forearm/hand to wrap around the rail, holding the front edge and corner. When necessary, increase your mat`s internal pressure by pressing inward with your forearm and squeezing with hand.
Try inflating so that your mat can easily bend on center to 90 degrees. Between waves, experiment with various air volumes. While riding, feel the performance effects of squeezing and releasing your mat`s front edges and corners.
Time a sudden increase in grip pressure at the same moment you`d drop down the face and roll over into a carving turn, as when weighting/pumping a surfboard. Accelerating out of that arc, try releasing your grip to allow the mat to flatten and skim across the wave face.
Less inflation means less control, but more speed. More inflation means more control, but less speed.
Explore adjusting (“tuning”) a mat`s air volume to suit the surf conditions, and then learn to manually play the differences in air pressure within that specific range.
After much concentration and effort, one day you`ll relax, forget, and just let go… your mat, free to follow those invisible lines of energy… to surf (almost) by itself.
dale-
thanks for the detailed description of forearm placement and when and how to squeeze to adjust the air volume during turns…graduate level course work to read and incorporate…
jim
I`m flippin through mags in the local deli rag rack. I see a pic of Rasta riding a mat somehwere in Indo! Wheres his wake? The article said Rasta has two mats in his quiver. Pretty cool pic cause Rasta had the funnest smile. Check it out- Sept. 2004 Transworld Surf Mag, page 116, top pic.
Ssshhhwwwoooosssh!!! Does it look like Rasta`s having any fun on that thing??
Yeah, he looks bummed about the whole experience. 
I was just noticing it looks like he’s doing a 5-finger pushup with his left hand… Wonder what the fins are he’s using as well…
David`s swim fins of choice:
http://www.lagunafin.com/main.htm
http://www.ozresort.com.au/neofins.htm
Similar water footage of Rasta on Dale’s mats are included in the opening of Tho. Campbell’s new movie Sprout. It’s a really good movie of a wide variety of surfers riding anything that floats.
Trim is in.
Thomas Campbell’s Sprout Premier: Review
"Last night (31 July) Thomas Campbell premiered his new movie Sprout in the funky little city of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The Portsmouth Music Hall was choice venue for the highly anticipated follow up to The Seedling. Four songs of live music from one of the groups performing on the soundtrack preceded the movie. (Didn’t catch their name).
The movie in it’s current state ran about 85 minutes and Campbell explained that there is still editing to go before the final release. So cool to see an unfinished edit; there were some disjointed bits but these were still of highly stylish surfing combined with great music. Thomas talked about the “ride everything” approach mats to longboards to bodysurfing being the basis for the movie as well as the joy we feel as surfers.
The movie began with a long inside the tube looking out ride ala Greenough followed by Dave Rastovich surfing one of Dale Solomonson’s mats. What followed was some of the most stylish surfing in any movie. Good old-fashioned hot dogging is alive and flourishing. Trim is in. Sprout included it all. Eggs, fish, bodysurfing, boogie boarding, tri-fins, mats, Bonzers, and boards with no fins! Everything.
Some highlights: CJ Nelson cross-stepping backwards to the nose; the first big hoots were for Mike Stewart riding his boogieboard on a huge right; brief but spectacular underwater photography and inside-out tube rides; Joel Tudor in Costa Rica perfectly trimmed on the nose with the curl tubing over the back half of this board just behind his legs; Tom Wegener’s family and life in Australia; the big waves and long tubes from the Indonesia (as seen in the current Transworld Surf); Rasta surfing a 5’2” fish; Mark Cunningham bodysurfing Pipe.
Portsmouth is a very cool tiny city only a few miles from a coast line dotted with a variety of breaks that matches the diversity of the boards ridden in Sprout. I definitely need to surf in NH more often.
Great movie; great venue. Build a quiver."
http://www.trimyourlifeaway.com/index2.html
Dan Malloy trying to decide what to ride…
