Speed: Why You Can't Turn a Surfboard Without It

A buddy texted me this week with a great question.

"How do you determine if you're gonna pop up and do a quick little pump at the top, or a deep bottom turn right away?"

My answer was one word. SPEED.

And he came back with the right reframe immediately: "So how do I get speed the fastest?"

That's the question. That's the whole thing.

Here's the part most people skip. The only way to turn a surfboard is if it has lift. And lifting a surfboard in water requires speed. Not style. Not strength. Speed.

So if your turns feel flat, mushy, or like the board is sitting down in the water instead of coming around, the problem usually isn't your turn. It's what you had going into it.

What a bicycle taught me about it

I was reading about bicycles this week and found something that stuck with me.

Everyone says a moving bike stays upright because of the gyroscope effect, when a spinning object resists being tilted or knocked over, keeping itself steady. Turns out that's not really it. Researchers built a bike with counter-rotating wheels, no gyroscopic effect at all, and it still balanced itself above a certain speed.

What's actually happening is that movement lets you steer underneath yourself. On a parked bike, a little tip becomes a bigger tip and you're down. On a moving bike, that same tip is something you can correct.

Lift isn't just what holds you up. Speed is what gives you the ability to correct.

Same in the water. Speed doesn't just give you lift and hold you up, it gives you the ability to move. To pivot when needed. To make good decisions. To correct.

1. Speed comes from four places

Your paddle, the type of wave you're surfing, the board you're riding, and where you take off. That's it.

When you're not generating speed, one of those four is the leak. Most people assume it's technique and go work on their turns. Usually it's where you take off on the wave, or the board.

2. Match the approach to the wave, don't force what you want

If you have speed and the wave is steep, you can deepen the bottom turn.

If you don't have speed, or the wave is running away from you, you have to switch the approach. A slopey Venice left on a high performance board will slow the board down through a deep bottom turn, because you'll lose all your speed and have nothing left. Unless the board is making up for the speed the wave isn't giving you.

3. Build speed from the paddle until the last turn

Even when I'm doing deeper bottom turns, I'm trying to build speed from the paddle all the way through to my final turn.

Here's a competition detail that explains why this matters even if you never surf a heat. Judges look for a point of difference between competitors. Scores go up when there's a committed turn in a critical part of the wave. You need speed to attack that section, and done properly, you come out of the turn with MORE speed than you went in with.

Two quotes

"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving."

• Albert Einstein.

"If everything seems under control, you're not going fast enough."

• Mario Andretti.

One question for you

Where is your speed actually coming from right now? Paddle, wave, board, or takeoff spot? Are any of those four leaking?

Let's keep building.