How to surf fast, steep waves and make it down the line

Whether you’re surfing a fast, sucky 1-2 ft wave or charging 6-foot barrels, you're going to need speed on your take-off. Here are some key tips to help you take-off faster:

Paddling onto the right part of the wave

For most waves, you want to position yourself just to the side of the peak. Too close, and the take-off will be too steep, causing you to race down to the bottom of the wave with no speed. Too wide, and you'll miss the wave entirely.

Every wave is going to be different and will take some experimenting to find that sweet spot. Before I head out at any break, I like to spend time observing the waves, understanding their patterns and calculating where I should best position myself for the take-off.

Note, for some waves you’ll even want to position yourself behind the peak so that you can enter the tube earlier and maximize your tube time. 

Engage the rail

Like in our video breakdown of Levi Slawson taking off on a fast right-hander, once you’ve matched the speed of the wave and can feel you’ve only got a couple of paddles left, you want to start leaning into your inside shoulder (the one closest to the face of the wave) to engage your inside rail before you’ve even popped up. 

This does a couple of things:

1. An activated rail digging into the face connects with the power and lift of a wave that provides a more stable platform for you to pop up on.
2. Traveling at an angle to the wave before you’ve popped up puts you in the perfect position to begin engaging with the face and building speed as soon as you’re on your feet.

Take the highline

Once you’ve popped up, your focus should shift to taking the highline. The highline is the upper third of the wave’s face, where the wave’s energy is concentrated. By positioning yourself here, you can harness the wave’s power to generate speed. Drop too low, and you’ll risk getting stuck in the slower part of the wave, making it difficult to generate the speed to make the section. 

From here it’s up to you to read the wave. You can either come down for a bottom turn and set up for your next maneuver or pump the accelerator and line up the next section of the wave. Either way, you now have plenty of speed and are ready to make the most out of your wave.