CROCHfishing Australia, unit 32, 105 Cochranes Road, Melbourne (2026)

07/12/2021

How to get to your feet in the optimal position

In this article, we’ll analyze how intermediate surfers can refine their take off technique. In order to land on their feet with optional body position to surf down the line, this tutorial is not about the take off technique itself or how to practice it, it’s about the surfer’s body position at the precise moment they get to their feet. Once surfers fix the technical issues with their take off, their feet land in the optimal position to ride the wave, helping them go down the line faster.

How experienced surfers land on their feet
First, let’s learn how experienced surfers are positioned right at the moment when they get to their feet. There are few key elements to notice. If you look at a backside take off, you can notice that, the surfer is looking where he wants to go, his shoulder is squared towards that direction, his front foot is landed in between his hands, his front knee in between his arms and pointing in the direction he wants to go and he is compressed down.

Many different experienced surfers, even though they have their own individual style and slightly different take off technique, their position is quite similar at the moment they land on their feet.

Common variations & mistakes
Now let’s learn the different variations from optimal body position caused by technical mistakes or bad habits. Lots of surfers keep their hands on the surfboard for too long instead of releasing them as soon as their front foot is correctly placed on the surfboard’s deck. The consequence of this is often that, the surfer rides the wave too low instead of starting to generate speed right away. If you look at experience surfers take off, you will notice that their hands are released from the surfboard as soon as their front foot lands on the board. Another way how a lot of intermediates end up dropping down the entire wave is by looking down. Where surfers look is where they’re going to end up going as the rest of their body will follow. Most likely, if a surfer is looking down, their shoulders will be parallel to the wave instead of them being square. When surfers look at their surfboard or directly down the wave instead of looking to the right or to the left. They will most likely drop too low, the landing of the front foot and the position of the front knee right when the feet get onto the deck can be a great indicator of the quality of the surfer’s take off technique. If the front knee doesn't land in between the surfer’s arms or if the front foot doesn’t land centered on the width of the surfboard near the hands, then the surfer will need to readjust their feet once they’re up. These adjustments can make surfers lose precious time or put them off balance. Most experienced surfers keep their knees bent and pointing in the direction they’re heading to with their back knee lower than their front one. They only decompress once they’re balanced and they’re in the optimal position. This doesn’t take them much time as they have the experience required to get their feet in the perfect position quickly. To help them twist their body towards where they want to go. Some surfers like to keep one of their hands lower on the surfboard when they push up. For example, if they wanted to go left, their left hand would be lower and their right hand would be lower to go right. Without this twist, surfers take off with the hips aiming straight to the beach. Without landing in the correct position with the knees pointing towards their target on the wave, something to notice is that while advanced surfers pop up, their hips also twist slightly in the direction that they want to go. On the other hand, some intermediate surfers don’t always land with their feet in the optimal spots and by decompressing too fast they can lose their balance. The challenge for a lot of these intermediates is that these small technical mistakes usually have become bad habits and those are sometimes really hard to get rid of. After months or years of taking off in a certain way, it’s hard to suddenly unlearn it and force yourself to pop up in a different way. For this reason, we highly suggest getting yourself filmed for at least one session. You might be doing some of the mistakes in the tutorial without knowing it and videos can expose those to you.

04/12/2021

How to surf better

Is it all about practicing for hundreds or thousands of hours? It is a common saying that the key to improving your surf skills is to spend a lot of time in the water.

“You can shoot eight hours a day, but if your technique is wrong, all you become is good at shooting the wrong way. Get the fundamentals down, and the level of everything you do will rise.” Of course, practice is one of the major differences between you and expert surfers. Through years of practice, the brains of expert surfers produce highly specialized mental representations. That allow them to make faster more accurate decisions, responding to many types of waves. If you think about it to surf a wave properly, experienced surfers need to read the future. To do a maneuver like a roundhouse cutback, surfers need to predict how the wave is going to peel in the next few seconds. This way they can estimate how they are going to draw their line and get back to hit the lip. A quick analysis is only possible once a surfer has surfed a massive number of waves.

There is no denying that practice can help a surfer improve, whether it is learning to recognize which unbroken waves are catchable or being able to anticipate when a wave’s about to barrel. As surfers progress, the decisions need to be made faster with more precision and this doesn’t happen without practice. However, if it was just about hours of practice and experience, why do some golfers, tennis players or surfers who have been practicing for decades, stayed at the exact same level for years. If it was just about practice, wouldn’t anybody that surfs or plays golf often automatically excel at these sports. One major reason why people stay at the same level is the illusion of knowing. For an example, are you sure you know how to efficiently paddle on a surfboard? Do you really know how to generate speed on a wave or set yourself up for a deep bottom turn? After digging a bit, you might realize that, there were some key things that you overlooked and that was preventing you from progressing. Surfing is a complex and fascinating sport. We know that on our side, our team members are still learning new things even though we’ve all been surfing for more than a decade. Looking back at our surf progression we notice the same pattern over and over. It has often caused us to hit a plateau. Our brain tricks us by making us believe that we’ve already got a technique figured out when in reality there’s lots of room for improvement. Being aware of this pattern will help you switch your mindset, the more you train yourself to be open to new information and relearn or to add to what you thought you previously knew, the faster you progress.

One of the best things you can do is to acquire quality knowledge on surfing techniques to build strong foundations. Asking questions and sharing experiences with other more experienced surfers will help you make new connections and discover different learning paths. Sometimes you can discover a new technique, for an example, a change in the way that you paddle can dramatically increase the amounts of waves you catch. This is why we’re passionate about surf progression.

03/12/2021

How to pop up on a surfboard

A proper take off technique makes it easier for you to stand up quickly with your feet in the perfect position. The pop up we’re about to show you has been the most successful with beginners at barefoot surf travel. This technique works for long boards and foam boards. Here’s the take off step by step.

First, paddle until you have really caught the wave. If you’re not sure if you caught it completely, give two extra paddles. Once you’ve caught the wave, place both hands flat on the surfboard next to your pectorals. Do a push up with your toes tucked on the tail of the surfboard. This creates space between your body and the surfboards. Your knees, legs and waist should not touch the board. First slide your back foot forward on the board. Your back foot should be brought to the position of your opposite knee, then slide your front foot forward in between your hands. Notice that, until now you should keep your hands on the board whilst doing your pop up. Keeping your hands on the board helps stabilize a surfboard and maintains the speed. Once you feel stable and comfortable, stand up. Make sure your feet are well positioned before you take your hands off the board. Keep your knees bent and look where you want to go.

Common mistakes
Don’t grab your rails, it makes it harder to keep your balance and creates drag underwater. Keep your hands flat on your board. Don’t bring your knees on to the surfboard, it will throw you off balance. This is a bad habit because in bigger steeper waves, you won’t have time to slide your knees before popping up. Don’t bring your front foot first, your feet will land too far back on your lawn board hitting the brakes and slowing you down. Bringing your back foot first then your front foot is the easiest way to keep your speed and stay with the wave. Keep your knees bent and compress your lower body. Don’t look your knees as soon as your legs are straight, otherwise it will be very hard to keep your balance. Don’t bend your upper body, this is one of the most common mistakes we see in beginners trying to keep their balance. In most cases, surfers end up falling off their boards. Don’t look your feet when you’re doing the take off. It makes it harder to keep your balance. You want to look where you want to go.

The keys to a proper take off
Paddle until you’ve caught the way. Push up, slide your back foot first, slide your front foot in between your hands. Stand up and keep your knees bent, look where you want to go.

01/12/2021

How to generate speed

In this article, we’ll focus mostly on how surfers use a technique commonly referred to as pumping in order to generate speed.

Pumping is the act of surfing up and down on the face of the wave in a smooth flowing motion. Before getting technical, the first thing that is essential to understand is the type of line experienced surfers draw to generate speed. If you look at videos of experienced surfers, you’ll notice that they use a lot of the waves face when pumping and then usually come back up to the top third. If they need speed, they don’t ride further down the bottom of the wave into the flats as they know they can easily lose momentum there. Also, they don’t just wiggle in the middle. If they wouldn’t benefit from good propulsion during their bottom turn as they set their rail, neither would they gain extra speed as they drop back down. So, the first thing to notice is that surfers usually pump by using lots of the waves face and then often come back up to the top third.

Another important thing to notice is that the line they draw is close to the pocket, also called the curl because the wave is steeper in this area they can get more acceleration. Experienced surfers don’t pump far out on the shoulder or very low down on the flats. The art of generating speed is done by moving to precise parts of the wave while shifting your body weight at specific times. It isn’t just about pumping up and down in the right area of the wave, you need to know when to compress and when to decompress your body to maximize your acceleration. Think about advanced surfers as they start going back up towards the face. They unbend their knees, stand high and throw their arms towards the direction they want to go to. Once they’ve gone up the wave their board starts turning back down towards the bottom of the wave. At this moment, they bend their knees and compress their chest down towards the front knee. If you skateboard, think of when you want to drop down a quarter pipe, you need to lean your upper body down and forwards to let gravity push you down the ramp. Understanding the physics of pumping can give you some key insights on what needs to change in your technique. Did you ever wonder how skateboarders can start from the bottom of a half pie and basically pump themselves higher and higher on the ramp? In theory, shouldn’t a skater dropping in on a half pipe get no higher than where he was on the other side of the ramp. It would make sense to think this way making a comparison to a pendulum which will never get higher than its starting point once released. During the drop, all the gravitational potential energy converts into kinetic energy and then the kinetic energy gets converted back to gravitational energy on the other side. If anything, the skater should go lower on the other side when considering friction from the wheels and air resistance. As a wave has a similar shape to a quarter pipe, consider the following as a hypothesis that makes a lot of sense in practical terms but has not been researched fully in the waves to our knowledge. We do apologize if the physics aren’t 100 correct and we understand skateboarding and surfing are different.

29/11/2021

10 angling the take off mistakes
#1 incorrect positioning
The first one is misreading the situation before angling the take off, resulting in bad positioning. If a surfer misreads how the wave will peel and ends up in the wrong peak position. For example, being way too deep, it won’t matter how or when he angles his take off, he won’t be successful in keeping up with a wave. A good way to avoid this is to keep glancing over your shoulder as you position yourself into a wave to be aware of what it’s doing and how it appeals.
#2 not angling
The second mistake is not angling at all. This frequently happens when surfers look down towards their board’s nose or towards the bottom of the wave. If you look down, you will end up going down the wave. It also happens to surfers who want to stand up too soon instead of choosing to first angle and then get to their feet. Here’s something to practice, think about surfing the wave to the right or to the left for a second or two before standing up.
#3 not angling enough
The third error is not angling enough especially on fast breaking waves, surfers need stronger angle towards the shoulder. If they drop down to the bottom, they will get stuck in the white water. You might want to get some footage of your surfing to make sure you’re actually riding the shoulder as high as you think you are. Many beginner, intermediate surfers don’t angle their take off as much as they think they do and actually ride the shoulder more towards the bottom.
#4 angling too much
Next there’s an opposite mistake: angling too much. This is often a problem on soft slow breaking waves if the shoulder line has a steep drop the wave will peel more slowly, so you will need to angle less. If you angle you take off too much, you will end up going over the shoulder. Make sure to read the shoulder and adjust your angle accordingly.
#5 angling front side instead of back side
When surfers first learn to angle their take offs, they tend to angle themselves to ride the wave front side because it feels easier to surf the wave when they face the wave. The ocean dictates if the wave will peel towards the left or the right. So you need to practice angling toward both sides.
#6 angling too soon
Then there are timing mistakes such as angling too soon. If a surfer is paddling at five kilometers per hour of 45 degrees, it’s the equivalent of paddling only 3.5 kilometers per hour in the wave’s direction. The more and the sooner you angle your take off, the harder it is to catch the wave. When you first start angling your take off, it’s recommended to paddle perpendicular first. Make sure you catch the wave and only start angling during the last few paddle strokes.
#7 angling too late
The opposite time and mistake is to try to angle the take off too late without having done at least a few paddle strokes towards the right or the left. This situation usually happens to long borders on steep fast breaking waves. On fast breaking waves, surfers need to enter the wave with a strong angle, trying to go from being perpendicular to having a strong angle. Just by leaning in the cobra pose won’t be enough on a long board. These boards are too big and take time to turn, you need to paddle with slight angle first to be able to really engage the rail by leaning towards the shoulder in the cobra pose.
#8 issues with the cobra pose lean
Just before popping up, surfers often get in a position that we call the cobra pose lean. In this position, surfers place their hands below their pictorial’s, lift their upper body and lean right or left. We often see technical issues such as not extending the arms or putting the hands a bit further on their surfboards, which doesn’t give surfers much leverage to angle their surfboard efficiently.
#9 not keeping the head & chest pointing towards target
Even amongst intermediates, a very common mistake is to stop looking towards a target or turning the chest back towards the bottom. Even for just a fraction of a second, angling the take off is crucial. It dictates the rest of your ride. If you need a strong angle towards the shoulder, you will need to keep your head and your chest pointing towards where you want to go all the way until you get to your feet.
#10 post take off position issues
Lastly, even though a surfer might angle perfectly, thing can go wrong during the take off. Surfers need to keep the line they wanted to draw when they started to angle their take off.

26/11/2021

15 tips for intermediate surfers

#1 Surf the right surfboard for your level and for the conditions
Riding the wrong surfboards can slow your progression down like nothing else. At an intermediate level, you should make sure you understand elements such as the surfboard’s volume, the surfboard’s rocker and the surfboard’s dimensions. As you get to a more advanced level, you might want to read more about surfboard fin set ups, bottom contours and tail shapes. Your progression will be much quicker with the proper equipment for your level, for your weight, and for the conditions that you're surfing.

#2 Positioning on the wave
Often, intermediate surfers focus mostly on their technique, but underestimate their positioning on the wave. Where you are surfing on the wave is very important. As you progress to get more comfortable with different parts of the waves, you start to realize nothing happens far out on the flat shoulder. Stay close to the pocket, generate speed and try to do a maneuver on the steeper part of the shoulder.

#3 Improve your bottom turn
Even after years of practice, most surfers still have room for improvement on their bottom turn. A proper bottom turn is a big part of the difference between a mediocre maneuver and a great one. Shift the focus from the maneuver itself to how you try to set it up with your bottom turn. You most probably will find ways to improve your surfing drastically.

#4 Your head is your steering wheel
Where you look and where you direct your head is where you will go. Lead with your head and keep it centered over your body to ensure proper balance. Notice here, the surfer’s head leads his turn. Before his surfboard or body starts turning, his head is already turned towards where he wants to go next.

#5 Turning needs twisting: head, upper body, hips and legs.
When you start doing turns and cut backs, you'll notice it goes in this particular order. First is head and shoulders turn in the direction he wants to go. Then his hips also twist towards that direction, and lastly, his legs follow. It's a misconception that surfers can turn simply by applying weight on their toes and heels. Unlike snowboarding or wake boarding, turning a surfboard requires much more body twisting to do a turn.

#6 Compress the lower body
Bend in the knees gives you mobility for turns, balance, and it helps you absorb shock when trying different maneuvers.

#7 Catch the wave at the peak
It's not just what you do on a wave, but where you catch it in the first place. If you're catching waves far from the peak on the flatter shoulder, it might actually be impossible to do anything interesting on the wave. Catching the wave near the peak usually puts you in a faster and steeper part of the wave where you can generate more speed and practice more interesting maneuvers.

#8 Generate your own speed
One of the biggest difference between intermediate advanced surfers and beginner intermediate surfers is their ability to create their own speed. Surfers do this by throwing their arms forward, decompressing and compressing, up and down the face of the wave and surfing from rail to rail.

#9 Paddle with power
Paddling for bigger, more powerful waves means you need a good paddle technique. Make sure your elbows are high when your hands enter the water and that you go as deep as possible with long powerful paddle strokes.

#10 Move your feet
Moving your feet is a game changer. If you need speed, move your feet forward on the board; if you want to do a sharp turn to change direction, put your back foot far on the end of the traction pad.

#11 Learn from other surfers
Learning from more experienced surfers around you. In the water, look at better surfers and analyze their technique, don't just sit there waiting for waves, look and learn.

#12 Practise rail-to-rail surfing
As you progress, learn to use your rails. Surfing from rail to rail means that your surfboard goes from one edge to the other. This helps you do a ton of maneuvers and helps you with speed generation and bottom tons. Next time you watch any surf videos, notice how much professionals surf on their rails, compared to how much time they spend riding their board, moving flat on the water.

#13 Focus
It's all in your head. Give yourself a goal before entering the water and work to achieve it. Don't forget to visualize yourself doing it.

#14 Visualize
One of the most important progression tips is to see it before you do it. What you are doing on the wave and what you think you're doing is often quite different. Having someone take photos and videos of your surfing can help you spot your bad habits. From our experience, seeing yourself surfing on photos and videos is probably the most efficient way to progress. A surf coach or an experienced surf friend could help you analyze your pictures and videos. This way, you'd have a better chance identifying the most important technical adjustments you need to do. By watching surf videos, you can also compare your surfing and correct some of your techniques by visualizing yourself, doing maneuvers properly.

#15 Have fun
As with most things in life, you get good at what you love to do. Taking things too seriously can take the fun out of surfing and hurt your progression. Life is too short, do like Rex Calderon and enjoy your time in the water.

24/11/2021

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19/11/2021

The take off is one of the rare techniques that surfers can practice and improve any time they wish to. In this article, we will give you advice on how to practice your take off at home. Here's how you can get ready to maximize the efficiency of your practice. You will need tape and you may need a surfboard or yoga mat, a mirror and a phone or a camera.

First, choose on what surface you want to lay on when practicing. You can use a finless surfboard like a poam board, so that you don't damage a more fragile surfboard by repeatedly jumping on it. If you have an old short board or a fish that you don't care too much about, you can also use that. If you mostly ride small surfboards, this will make it easier to get a clear idea of where your feet are landing on the board. You don't need to practice on a surfboard though, you can do it on a yoga mat or directly on the floor. Use your tape to make a straight vertical line, even on the floor or on the yoga mat or on the surfboard if it doesn't have a stringer.

Next, place your feet over the vertical line in your stand position. The distance in between your feet should slightly be wider than your shoulder width. Once you see where your feet are positioned, place a horizontal tape line on those spots as if they were going through the middle of your feet. If you're practicing on the surfboard with the tail pad, only put a horizontal tape over the line where your front foot is. These lines will help you analyze if your feet are in the correct position after your take off. Also, the front horizontal line is where you will place your hand whilst lying on your stomach, getting ready to do your take off. For any take off technique, you'll start in the same prone position at first. Your hands will be flat under your pictorials over the front horizontal line. Your legs together, and your body centered over the vertical tape line or the surfboard stringer. By putting a mirror in front of you, you'll be able to see how you look once you've done your take off and correct your body's position or stands if necessary. Another tool that can help you get a clearer vision on how you pop up is a phone or a camera. Filming yourself ideally in slow motion has the advantage of showing you exactly what you're doing from the different angles. Now, let's see how to analyze your take offs. If you practice in front of a mirror, you'll be able to know if your body's position after take off is similar to this. Looking towards where you want to go. Your left hand should be over your left rail, your right hand over your right rail. Your knee should be bent and your upper body should not be bending over.

When looking down at your feet, they should be centered over the vertical tape line or stringer, meaning half your foot to the left and half to the right. Your feet should also be near the horizontal tape lines you have placed earlier. Note that if, for example, both feet are slightly more forward or backwards from the horizontal lines, this is not necessarily a big issue. Compared to having both feet off center of the vertical line. What you do want to avoid is landing with both feet inside the horizontal lines or outside of them. If you did this in the water, you wouldn't be landing in the optimal stance, and you would have to readjust your feet when riding the wave. A mirror is great for you to check your position after you've done your pop up, but videos are really the number one tool to analyze your take offs in depth.

Often, surfers aren't aware of certain bad habits, such as using their toes for the standard pop up technique. We recommend to learn the following techniques by first doing them slowly. Taking more time to think about each step if you need to. By cutting your take offs into phases and filming yourself, it might be easy to analyze your technique on video. Studies have shown by gradually increasing the speed of quality repetitions, students have better chances of doing them correctly.

As you practice and gain confidence, start increasing the speed of each step until your take offs become more like fast fluid motions. The push up technique is a technique for surfers riding long boards of foam boards and it's one that makes it easy to create space in between your body and the surfboard.

Start from the prone position with your hands underneath your pectorals, look forward towards where you want to go during the take off. First, do a full push up by lifting your whole body up. Your arm should be extended to create space between you and the board. Second, slide your back foot forward towards your opposite knee. And third, slide your front foot forward in between your hands. Once the front foot is brought forward, release your hands from the floor or the surfboard and stand up in your surfing stance. When you feel comfortable with each step and you end up in proper surf stance with your feet in the correct position on the tape lines, you can gradually start accelerating each step at your own rhythm. If it helps, repeat these words in your mind: push up, back foot, front foot, surf stands. Doing multiple take offs, for example, ten in a row if you can, will help you do them faster and with more confidence as the movement will come more automated. Using the knees to take off could be considered if you have strength of mobility limitations that make it very difficult for you to use other techniques in this article. It is the slowest technique to get to your feet but it requires less strength and flexibility.

Start from the prime position with your hands underneath your pectorals. Look forward towards where you want to go during your take off. Push your upper body up to create a bit of space to slide both your knees up towards where your belly button was laying on the floor, or on your surfboard, Then bring your front foot forward in between your hands. Finally release your hands from the floor or the surfboard and stand in your surf stance. When you feel comfortable with each step and you end up in the proper surf stance where your feet in the correct position on the tape lines, you can gradually start accelerating each step in your own rhythm. If it helps, repeat these words in your mind: push up, slide the knees, front foot, surf stance. Doing multiple take offs, for example, ten in a row, if you can, will help you do them faster and with more confidence, as a movement will become more automated.

The chicken wing technique is very popular among beginners and intermediates, and it is a versatile one that works on any type of surfboard. Start from the prone position with your hands underneath your pectorals, look forward towards where you want to go during the take off, bring your back foot towards the opposite knee by sliding and bending your back knee out towards the side. Then push your whole body upwards with only your hands and your back foot touching the ground or the surfboard. Finally, bring your front foot in between your hands to get into your surf stance. When you feel comfortable with each step and you end up in the proper surf stance with your feet in the correct position on the tape lines, you can start gradually accelerating each step of your own rhythm. If it helps, repeat these words in your mind: back foot chicken wing, push up, front foot, surf stance. Doing multiple take offs, for an example, ten in a row if you can, will help you do the much faster with much more confidence as the movements will become automated.

The standard pop up is the quickest way to get to your feet and it's by far the most commonly used among experienced surfers. Start from the prone position with your hands underneath your pectorals, look forward towards where you want to go during your take off. As you prepare to pop up, make sure you remind yourself of pushing up only with your hands and your knees, not with your toes. You can lift your feet slightly to prevent you from using your toes. Push your upper body up, and use your thighs to lift up from the floor, swing both knees up and forward, and have your back foot land on the tail pad, or where the first horizontal tape line is. Next, push your body upwards to create more space between you and the floor or the surfboard. Finally, bring your front foot in between your hands and get into your surf stance. When you feel comfortable with each of these steps and you end up in the proper surf stance with your feet in the correct position on the tape lines, you can start gradually accelerating each step of your own rhythm. If it helps, repeat these words in your mind: push up, swing the knees to the back foot, front foot, surf stance. Doing multiple take offs, for example, ten in a row if you can, will help you do them faster with more confidence as a movement will become more automated.

CROCHfishing Australia

07/12/2021

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