Duck diving

So what is the shortest, oops I mean longest, length and type of board that you can duck dive? Maybe not a good reason to want to surf a shorter board, but it would be cool to just go under the wave.

I actually got in the pool this morning before I skied and swam like 10 laps. We'll see how sore my arms get from that little bit. :tongue: I'm getting excited to get back in the ocean, think about surfing a lot. Just a couple more months.

Oh and I've been looking into Matzatlan because it supposedly has a lot of lefts. Anybody got any experience there? I used to spend a lot of time in Mexico back in the day and really enjoyed it.

I can only tell you that I mostly can't duck dive a 7'6" Bonzer egg. I can until it becomes critical that you duck dive and then I get fucked. Love the board, but thinking of going shorter for the exact purpose you mention.

Can't speak to Mazatlan, but the area north of Zihue has taken on fancy for nice lefts, elbeit more longboard oriented. Mazatlan area sounds fun, but google Cardon surf resort and thugs to see what they are up to before booking anything there or trying to surf "their" wave. Certainly sounds fishy, and with everything else going on in Mex these days, not something homey needs to get in the middle of.

Shorter easier, longer floatier board harder to stuff under the wave...

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Originally Posted by comish

I can only tell you that I mostly can't duck dive a 7'6" Bonzer egg. I can until it becomes critical that you duck dive and then I get fucked. Love the board, but thinking of going shorter for the exact purpose you mention.

Can't speak to Mazatlan, but the area north of Zihue has taken on fancy for nice lefts, elbeit more longboard oriented. Mazatlan area sounds fun, but google Cardon surf resort and thugs to see what they are up to before booking anything there or trying to surf "their" wave. Certainly sounds fishy, and with everything else going on in Mex these days, not something homey needs to get in the middle of.

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OMG, yeah I read about that when I was googling for lefts. New surf camp running off long time locals and visitors and using violence. Really sad. And it sounded like those breaks were pretty remote and uncrowded so there was really no point in running off one or two people on the wave so that five campers can have it to themselves. Just didn't make sense at all. Do you think the owner is gonna end up getting shot or something? He was claiming important connections to the Mex mafia or something like that.

Haha it kinda reminds me of when I lived in Alta and would get up early and rush across the road to beat the heli to the goods. Man that was fun. :D

I do need a longboard break and I could be going alone, so a camp format where there's somebody taking you to the best break for the day and keeping an eye on you so you don't drown would work well for me. Bad karma notwithstanding. Another thing with Mexico years ago was a chick had to be "escorted" as a matter of culture. Don't know if that's changed at all and maybe I don't even care anymore now that I'm older.

7'6"... depends on a few factors.

How much foam does does it have. I can (relatively) easily duck my mini gun, but it is a lot more work to get my egg of the same length under the wave.

Shape of board. You need to first push that nose under, so a wider nosed board is generally more difficult to duck. Rocker also seems to come into play, once you have kicked the tail under with your foot. I finded more rocker makes it easier for me to get a nice rounded dive.

How strong and skilled you are. Practice, practice, practice. As a kooky little kid in Maine, I used to go out for paddles on flat days. I would paddle the length of the beach, ducking into flat water every 10 yards or so. Great workout.

Generally, I feel that when I am riding my sub- 7' boards, they should never leave my hands, they will duck under pretty much everything. My 8'4" gun I have successfully ducked under waves fewer than 10 times. I'm talking about actual duck dives under the lip, and not pushing under white water that is way on the inside. OTOH, I usually ditch this board when there is any kind of real energy coming at me otherwise I get hammered and lose too much ground.

So, around 7', but I would suggest finding a board that may be harder to dive and plenty of fun to ride. With practice, one should be able to get a 7'6" egg under most waves one would want to ride with an egg.

I learned a different approach to duck diving larger boards, with two hands on the rails
and your back foot on the stringer at the tail, you submerge the rail and slice it
deep as you can get it, flatten board, kick with your free leg and push with your other
and hang on, when you get the timing just right it's a pretty cool feeling popping out
the back of the wave. it helps if you use the knee of the leg that you have anchored
to the stringer to help get the board on edge and shove it down.

I first saw a guy with a 9' Longboard surfing OH Oceanside, after watching him
negotiate the white water using the duck dive, I knew it was something I had to
learn, as Ottime sez, practice, practice, practice

RE; Cardon resort thugs, I also read that some of the mex nationals who had been run
off that break had got together and gave the Phillips guy a beating to show what they
thought of his claim to the break, the incidents that I had read about seemed to reference
2010 , I wonder if the situation had been resolved?

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Originally Posted by tgray

I learned a different approach to duck diving larger boards, with two hands on the rails
and your back foot on the stringer at the tail, you submerge the rail and slice it
deep as you can get it, flatten board, kick with your free leg and push with your other
and hang on, when you get the timing just right it's a pretty cool feeling popping out
the back of the wave. it helps if you use the knee of the leg that you have anchored
to the stringer to help get the board on edge and shove it down.

I first saw a guy with a 9' Longboard surfing OH Oceanside, after watching him
negotiate the white water using the duck dive, I knew it was something I had to
learn, as Ottime sez, practice, practice, practice

RE; Cardon resort thugs, I also read that some of the mex nationals who had been run
off that break had got together and gave the Phillips guy a beating to show what they
thought of his claim to the break, the incidents that I had read about seemed to reference
2010 , I wonder if the situation had been resolved?

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Ok I understand, that is cool. I'll practice. It'll be nice to surf somewhere that I can kick around and not worry about wrecking myself on coral. I can push a big board under the white and get my body up high to let the little waves pass between, but I know that's not saying much.

I'll look into Mexico some more later in the summer as that's when I'm thinking of doing a trip after I've improved in San Deigo. I swam again yesterday. Feels good. But I suck at holding my breath. Super lame.

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Originally Posted by Ottime

Generally, I feel that when I am riding my sub- 7' boards, they should never leave my hands, they will duck under pretty much everything. My 8'4" gun I have successfully ducked under waves fewer than 10 times. I'm talking about actual duck dives under the lip, and not pushing under white water that is way on the inside. OTOH, I usually ditch this board when there is any kind of real energy coming at me otherwise I get hammered and lose too much ground.

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You ditch your board?! My Hawaiian(Tongan) friend always said to do that but I thought it was really bad form. And the couple of times I've tried it I felt like I had an anchor dragging me back to shore and I made no headway at all. Probably I need to swim out stronger or something. And I'm so inefficient at getting my board back, turned around, getting on, etc. Wasting time while the next wave is bearing down.

It is something I really only do in big waves with my 8'4". I'm talking about occasional 12 footers, but more so when bigger. It is just impossible for me to get my gun deep enough under water to get under the turbulence. It has a 10' leash, so I dive straight down and get just about 10 feet under. The board/wave will pull me, but I act as an anchor. Once back up top, a wank with the foot, pull the leash with a hand and back on the board for a few paddles before the next one hits. When I am doing this, I am paddling parallel to the wave to get to the channel. Not straight out. And you have to position yourself so no one is behind you. Watch video o big surf and you will are sure to see folks doing this. OTOH, it would be bad form to do so at a small, crowded break.

Tgray's method works, but only on shallow waves. Once the lip is throwing hard and penetrating deeper under water, you need to get several feet under the wave. That is best done with a low volume nose and generally lower volume board. The side slip only gets you 6-18" under. Great for most point breaks, but not great for most hollow waves. But maybe I just suck at it. My longboard turns 50 this summer, has no leash, weighs about 30#, and has maybe 3" of rocker. I just use the paddle hard, bull my way through the wave and lift myself up method. Works fine for the surf I take that thing out in, which is sub head high.

Idk...looks easy enough.

http://i1238.photobucket.com/albums/...ps66316062.jpg

Frankly I wouldn't sweat it. Getting spanked is part of the process, and as your risk tolerance increases, your awareness will follow suit.
The terror we feel when getting caught inside is a pretty good teacher. As others have said, sometimes you gotta bail. No shame in that. I was watching the first stop on the tour this week and saw Kelly bail in 5' Kirra. You gotta do what you gotta do, and it 'aint always pretty.

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Originally Posted by SheRa

So what is the shortest, oops I mean longest, length and type of board that you can duck dive? Maybe not a good reason to want to surf a shorter board, but it would be cool to just go under the wave.

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Biggest board I can duckdive is a 7'6 mini gun (19" wide, 2 1/2 thick). Anything beyond that then you gotta find channels and time it perfectly or turn turtle.

I have a habit of using my foot to push on the tail block. If it's big and gnar, I use this technique to go deeper by using both feet (assuming you've already pushed the board down as deep as you can go using the standard method) to keep kicking and get further underwater.

For you, if you want to dabble in shorter boards, find something like a fish or egg shape (google "Walden Compact Disc" or "Firewire sweet potato" to get an idea of the shape)

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Originally Posted by Superstar Punani

For you, if you want to dabble in shorter boards, find something like a fish or egg shape (google "Walden Compact Disc" or "Firewire sweet potato" to get an idea of the shape)

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Not ready to dabble yet, but will keep in mind. Thanks. :)

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Originally Posted by BraddA

Frankly I wouldn't sweat it. Getting spanked is part of the process, and as your risk tolerance increases, your awareness will follow suit. The terror we feel when getting caught inside is a pretty good teacher.

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Haha, yeah, I feel that.