Why Your Surfboard Is Probably Holding You Back

I wish every surf shop employee talked about this more.

I'm a huge advocate of delayed gratification when it comes to going shorter on a surfboard. You can progress faster on a shorter board eventually, but buying a shorter, higher-performance board before you're ready just creates frustration and missed waves.

Then you surf less, especially on the average and below average days, which in LA is most days.

You have to fix the foundational bottleneck first. Get reps. Make drops. Learn to turn a bigger board. Do that, and riding a smaller board becomes so much easier and more fun when you get there.

The bottleneck question

My father-in-law has had a 30-plus year career as an aerospace engineer. One day I brought him with me to pick up blanks from the shop that cuts our boards, and he asked me a simple, brutal question.

"What's your bottleneck?"

My brain started running. Every part of the business at once.

But the same question applies to your surfing, and most people answer it wrong.

Spending months building elite paddle endurance in the gym will not help you catch more waves if your real issue is wave selection, or mapping the lineup, or being on a board that doesn't float you.

Working harder on the non-bottleneck feels productive. It isn't.

So be honest. If you were honest about your surfing right now, what part is growing the fastest, and what part is actually holding everything else back?

The tool decides what's possible

Here's a way to think about it that has nothing to do with skill level.

Great surfing is completely individual. Some people love the way Alex Knost surfs. Some people love Mick Fanning. Some love the way Moana Jones Wong charges Pipeline. Some love Ozzie Wright. Others are massive Stephanie Gilmore fans.

All great surfers in their own right. All riding significantly different surfboards, because they're trying to do different things.

So before you ask what board you should ride, ask what you actually want your surfing to look like. The board is the tool. The tool should serve the goal.

For me, the epitome of great surfing is being able to ride everything. I spent most of my younger years learning to do an air reverse in subpar conditions for a score. I more or less got there, and then I hit a ceiling.

That's why I started shaping my own boards. I wanted a different feeling and a different ceiling.

Signs the board is the bottleneck

A few things I look for when I'm watching someone surf:

You're paddling hard for waves and missing them, and it isn't fitness. That's usually volume or foil, not effort.

You're making the drop but the board stalls between turns. That's often weight distribution and being stuck on the back foot, but it can also be too little board under you.

You only have fun when it's good. If your quiver only works on the best four days of the month, you're leaving the other twenty-six on the table.

You surf less than you want to. That's the real tell.

Small waves are an advantage, with the right board

Crowds are lighter. Reps are more available. You have to learn to generate your own speed, which is the skill that makes everything else possible. And you can work on one turn at a time instead of surviving the wave.

But small waves punish the wrong board harder than big waves do. There's less energy to hide behind.

That's the whole argument for riding something with more foam than your ego wants, for longer than your ego wants.

Start with what you want

Pick the thing you're trying to do. Then pick the tool for it. Then put in the reps.

If you want a hand with that part, we build boards made to order and we'll do a free mockup based on what you're actually trying to achieve, not just your height and weight.

Let's keep building.