Catching a Ride
Assume that you have successfully gotten through the shore breakers and are sitting in your craft in the surfing area facing seaward. Suddenly you notice a large swell coming toward you. It appears that the wave will make up steep just about where you are, so you turn your boat shoreward, keeping an eye on the wave that is rapidly bearing down on you from behind.
When the wave is about 5 to 10 feet away, start paddling hard, straight for shore. As the wave begins to come underneath you, you will feel the boat begin to rise and pick up momentum. At this point, paddle even harder and >throw your body forward. As you feel the boat begin to slide down the surface of the wave, apply a stern rudder to hold the boat at right angles to the wave. If you oversteer and
the boat starts to turn to the rudder side, immediately apply your rudder on the opposite side and bring her back to about 90 degrees, and so on into shore. Just before the shore is reached and the wave breaks, apply your rudder vigorously to broach the kayak, and turn out to sea again.
As you gain in experience you will find that once you have caught the wave you can let your boat turn more nearly parallel to it, picking up tremendous speed and covering much ground. This is called “sliding the wave.” To do this you must have a boat with lots of fore-and-aft rocker, or surf your boat well over on its side.
Eventually you will find that you can go almost anywhere you wish on the wave. You can “slide” right, turn and “slide” left, run it off straight, etc. for an exciting water activity.
Tags: water sports
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