Top tips for catching your first waves

Top tips for catching your first waves

Nov 17, 2020 | SUP Advice

While most Stand Up Paddleboard owners are happy enough to paddle on lakes and rivers, flat water coastal waters and beaches, catching waves on your SUP is a lot of fun!

While most Stand Up Paddleboard owners are happy enough to paddle on lakes and rivers, flat water coastal waters and beaches, catching waves on your SUP is a lot of fun!

But before you attempt to take your SUP in the waves, make sure you are well practiced and confident on flat water first.  The water is a LOT more dynamic in a wave environment, so you need to feel comfortable and stable with the additional movement your SUP will make, and know how to counteract or ‘go with the flow’ to stay on your board.

It’s also important to choose the right kind of board for SUP surfing.  While you can (in theory) ride a wave on most types of SUP, long and narrow touring or race boards, and inflatable boards, aren’t designed with wave riding in mind.  Yes, there are some iSUPs that are better at riding waves than others, but if you really want to surf then a hard SUP is the answer.  Surf SUPs can be any size from 11 foot down to 7 foot, but in reality, those short low volume surf SUPs are suitable for very few people.  If you want a board you can paddle comfortably on flat water, and enjoy carving a wave in a cruisy longboard style, we would recommend our Freshwater Bay Classic SUP board as that is exactly what they are designed for!

If you’re just starting out with your first forays into SUP surfing, then choose a quiet location away from crowds.  Not only does it let you practice without being a danger to other water users, it also takes the pressure off you so you can enjoy getting used to being on your board in that environment without having to contend with others.  It’s also important to make sure you are wearing a good strong leash so your board doesn’t get away from you if you fall off, or if you have to push your SUP over the top of a breaking wave. 

If you’re feeling confident you can paddle out from the beach standing up, but you can also paddle out on your knees, or lying in the prone position with your paddle tucked under your torso and paddling with your arms like a regular surfer.  We would recommend standing up as soon as you are able to as it helps you develop your balance faster, and you have a better vantage point to see the waves coming towards you. For the first few paddle outs, it’s best to be in waist deep water before you attempt to stand, so you don’t injure yourself if you do fall off.  

Rather than having your feet parallel, as you would for flat water paddleboarding, try staggering your feet slightly so the foot you would naturally place at the tail of the board when surfing is slightly further back.  This will help stabilise you as the board not only pitches back and forth, but also rolls side to side.  Ideally you want to get through the breaking wave zone as quickly and efficiently as possible, and you may well make it out to the line-up in one go with dry hair; however, there are a couple of techniques to help you get through the waves that you can’t just paddle over normally.

If the wave is about to break, or has just broken in front of you, then get yourself into the surf stance.  This is where your front foot is placed centrally in the middle of the board, and your back foot is on the tail.  As the wave is coming for you, take the weight off your front foot and apply weight to the back foot.  This will lift the nose of the board slightly to allow the white-water to pass underneath. At the same time, take a long powerful stroke with your paddle to help propel yourself over the breaking wave.  As the wave passes beneath you, lean forward slightly applying weight to your front foot, which will bring the nose of the SUP back down, and stop you falling off the back. At the same time bring your back foot forwards into the staggered stance. Again, use the paddle to take a powerful forward stroke, which will also act as a brace to steady yourself.   For the first attempts at this technique, you are VERY likely to fall in.  Don’t worry about it, this is why you have chosen a nice quiet location to practice.  As the saying goes; if you’re falling, you’re learning! 

If you do fall off, keep hold of your SUP paddle.  It should soon become second nature to never let go, although fibreglass and carbon paddles will float indefinitely, so if you do let go just swim over and retrieve it.  However, it’s much better to be in the habit of keeping hold of it. If you’re in the water and another wave is coming towards you, grab hold of the tail of your board or the rail-saver (flat webbing part) on your leash and pull down slightly as you duck under the wave.  This will help the wave pass over both you and your board. Climb back onboard your SUP and continue to paddle out.  

Once you have paddled out to the ‘lineup’ – the area where you want to be to catch the waves – either face out to sea to keep an eye on the incoming waves, or stay parallel to the waves. 

The advantage of staying parallel to the waves is that you don’t have to do a 180° step-back turn to paddle for the wave you want to catch, which loses speed and momentum.  If you stay parallel and paddle you can time when to put in a couple of extra strokes to turn the board as the wave approaches.  This means you keep your speed up and maintain stability for catching the wave.

For the last few strokes into the wave, change the cadence of your paddle stroke from the usual deep long powerful stroke, to a faster shorter motion – almost circular in technique. 

As you feel the wave picking up the tail of your board, and you start to drop down the face of the wave, step back from your staggered stance into the surf stance, turn your head and lean into the direction you want to travel.  As you reach the bottom of the wave, you can put the paddle in the water and use that to pivot the board round and back up the wave.  If all goes to plan, you are now up and away, surfing your way down the line!

How are Freshwater Bay hard boards constructed?

How are Freshwater Bay hard boards constructed?

Nov 16, 2020 | Design

When Charlie first started getting his Freshwater Bay Paddleboard designs from idea, to CAD files, to production the main board factories didn’t want to know.  They were too busy making boards for the big brands to consider making them for us.  

By working his way down a list of SUP factories, Charlie finally got one to agree to make some prototypes of his hard board designs.  Time passed and with great anticipation, the boards finally arrived.  The first boards were, quite honestly, terrible…! Construction was poor, the finish was awful and the factory didn’t really care too much about it. Some brands still have their boards made in this factory, and in many factories like it.  But not Freshwater Bay Paddleboards. 

These boards didn’t see the light of day as far as the public was concerned.  But, more importantly, boards had been created and Charlie could now go to other, better factories, and say ‘Hey, I have designs, I have boards, I need the quality to be higher!’.  From this inauspicious start, Charlie started moving up the ranks and now Freshwater Bay Paddleboards are made in some of the best factories in the World, alongside those major brands. It took time and effort to get there -flying out to factories for meetings, working on prototypes with them, and checking construction – all before we sold our first board. But that’s how we do it at Freshwater Bay Paddleboards and that’s what sets us apart!

Our goal has always been to make Freshwater Bay Paddleboards the best boards possible, regardless of expense. Quality starts with the right attitude, and we only work with manufacturers that share our attitude; the boards have to made right, every time!

Hard Board Construction:

The best hard boards start with a great shape.  Freshwater Bay hard boards are designed not only for all-round flatwater paddling, but also to hit the waves.  That comes from our longboard surf heritage, which you can see throughout our style.  Freshwater Bay Paddleboards may have similar dimensions to many other boards, but don’t let that fool you; the bottom contours and thinned out rails at the tail, mean the board is fast and highly manoeuvrable in the surf, while maintaining stability for flatwater paddling. They’re not just another ‘All-Rounder’ SUP! 

Once you have the right shape, you need the right materials.  As with any leisure-sport product, you have to get the right balance between strength and weight.  The more materials you use, the more durable the product (in theory!), but the extra weight makes them less manoeuvrable – not what you want when carving the face of a wave, or even just carrying your board to the water. Many companies add more and more layers of materials to make them stronger, but that isn’t always the answer.  By refining the manufacturing process, and using the right high-quality materials in the right places, you can have a board that is both light and strong. 

We’ve done a lot of testing over the years, and we think we’ve got the balance right!

We start with a 20kg/m3 EPS foam core.  This is CNC machine shaped to replicate our CAD drawings as closely as possible, every time. The machined shape is then finished by hand to smooth out any rough cuts from the machine, and make sure the contours are right.  

Then high-density reinforcements are installed where the fins, handle, and leash will be placed.  Many companies don’t do this as it’s more expensive to manufacture. But we do.

We only use genuine imported surf industry standard FCS and Futures attachments for Freshwater Bay Paddleboards. We could use imitation ones to save money, like a lot of companies. But we don’t. 

Once the attachments and fin boxes are installed, the boards are laminated.

We use a combination of fibreglass weights in the lamination process.  Different weights have a different weave size and thickness, so using a combination of weights gives a higher strength to weight ratio.  We also use a 0.5mm layer of wood between the fibreglass layers to add strength to the laminate.  You may not see it on our painted boards, but it’s there.  

We also add a layer of Carbon Fibre to the standing area of the deck.  This helps prevent any compressions in the area people stand for 90% of the time, without adding too much weight.  The rails, nose and tail are then wrapped in Kevlar to help prevent damage to these areas that are prone to a bashing.  

Once laminated, the boards go through the ‘vacuum bag’ process.  This causes suction that compresses the laminate to the foam core, creating a strong bond while removing any excess epoxy resin.  At the end of this process we have a board that is strong and light, with a hard shell. 

The boards are then painted using high quality urethane automotive paint and put in a warm, temperature controlled room – the ‘oven’ as we like to call it – to cure.  

Once cured, we apply our Freshwater Bay Paddleboard Co logos, the clear resin top coat and then polish for a gleaming gloss finish. Each board takes around two weeks to make, and every stage of the process gets quality checked along the way.  Once the deck pad is installed, they get a final QC and are good to go!

So that is how Freshwater Bay Paddleboards go from CAD to RAD!

Longboard SUP Surf at Compton Bay, Isle of Wight

Longboard SUP Surf at Compton Bay, Isle of Wight

Feb 25, 2017 | SUP Inspiration

Longboard SUP Surf at Compton Bay, Isle of Wight

Here’s Freshwater Bay Paddleboard Co Team Rider, Al Reed, having some longboard SUP Surf fun on his Classic 9’11 SUP.

If you’re looking for a single SUP that’s as happy on flat water as it is on the waves, then the Classic 9’11 is a great choice.  At 31.5″ wide it’s forgiving and stable enough on the flat.  But with it’s rocker line and thinned out nose, tail and rails it also surfs like a classic longboard.  Al Reed has been UK South Coast Longboard Champion for 13 years, as well as British Masters Longboard Surf Champion.  He loves riding his Freshwater Bay Classic 9’11 in anything from knee high rollers to double overhead reef breaks.

The Freshwater Bay 9’11 SUP also comes in Classic Blue and White as well as Paulownia Wood Veneer, with the same great shape and longboard SUP Surfing ability!

Freshwater Bay Paddleboard Co bamboo longboard SUP Surf

Accessible Stoke – SUP surfing Vs Prone Surfing

Feb 24, 2017 | SUP Inspiration

We’ll be honest, the title of this article sounds a little contentious and doesn’t really promote the right image. After all there’s nothing ‘versus’ (or shouldn’t be anyway!) about either of these sports. As far as Freshwater Bay Paddleboard Co. is concerned any type of wave riding activity is good.  Whether it’s SUP surfing, prone surfing, body boarding or Kayaking; it just so happens we’re into stand up paddle boards….

 

Paddleboard SUP Surf UK
As much as we love a flat-water paddle, there’s nothing like dropping down a wave and having as much fun as you can handle. With paddle in hand and 10ft SUP under your feet, you’re primed to catch waves otherwise unrideable on your usual mal or shortboard.
There are still those in the World that may knock SUP surfing, so firstly let’s clarify what we’re talking about when we say ‘stand up paddle surfing’. It doesn’t have to be Jaws or a Mentawai reef break. Any time you catch a wave, of any size, and regardless of whether or not you’re ripping, that’s what we’re talking about. Sure, if you can shred, tear and blow the backs out of waves then all power to you, but most SUP paddlers aren’t that way inclined.

For us at Freshwater Bay Paddleboard Co it all comes down to time spent in the water. After a Summer of riding waves that really wouldn’t have been possible or worth it on a surfboard (and at times even we called them barrel-scraping days), we were still out there – in an almost empty lineup – having fun!

SUP Surf Isle of Wight UK
SUP Surfing opens up a whole range of wave-riding options. Ankle-biting ripples are all good – the waves you wouldn’t think about paddling for on a good wave day, become the Holy Grail between the lulls. And why not? You can still catch them, and still have fun!

Paddling a SUP also offers the chance of riding offshore waves, breaking far from the madding crowd. No need to hitch a lift from a passing boat when you can paddle your SUP.  And no burning out your shoulder muscles before you even start surfing.

Then there are the junkier days. If you’ve got the skills days like these are perfect for SUP surfing. The momentum you generate as a paddle surfer means riders are primed for outrunning crumbly sections, rounding sloppy lips and turning an otherwise lacklustre session into something far more enjoyable.

Flip this towards traditional forms of surfing and we just don’t think the majority will have as much fun as on a SUP. There are definitely those who can light up when perched atop a surfboard, even when the waves haven’t turned on for weeks, or even months – the Isle of Wight certainly has its fair share.

But many who surf do so in a recreational sense only – hitting up wave beaches every now and again to get their fix, life often getting in the way. The reality is that the waves aren’t always there when you have the time, and vice versa. Whichever way you cut it, for most people this isn’t enough time on the water to reap the same kind of rewards as SUP surfing will.

SUP Surf UK
Surf Isle of Wight
On a SUP, riders will be having much more fun, quicker. There’s no faffing about with popping up, paddling out is easier (in smaller and light wind conditions) and SUPs pick up swells earlier. Waves that were out of bounds for surfboards (either because the surf is predominantly too small or too far offshore) are now prime for your SUP surf. And then of course there’s the option of using your stand up paddleboard on the flat – a great workout, and more time in and on the water. SUP’s versatility is another key reason it’s super popular.

We reiterate once again: this isn’t a surf bashing article. In fact it’s quite the opposite. We love surfing. It’s just that we also love paddle surfing and think it’s one of the easiest ways to access waves and get that surfing stoke.

A couple of things to point out, although many who’ve gone before us have done the same; get your SUP skills honed in the flat before venturing into the lineup – the surf zone isn’t a place to try out your shiny new SUP for the first time. With more SUPs entering the water, it’s important to respect surfing etiquette – just because you can see and catch a wave earlier on a SUP, doesn’t mean you have to; you don’t need the best waves to have fun, so let some sets pass you by, or find a peak away from the main lineup. You won’t make any friends or influence people by being a wave hog. Ride with Aloha, respect and you’ll get the same in return.