Hey guys,
I am riding a shortboard now and land about 8 out of 10 o fmy popups. With that said, I would like to be better at them. I ussually try and do the normal pop up method where you use your arms to support your weight and where you swing both your legs through underneath so that for a short second both your legs are airborne. With that said, I have seen an alternative method called teh chicken wing or back foot prop method (refer to first video below) where you kink one of your legs out at a 90 degree angle so that your back foot is lying gently across the board before you begin your popup and you can use it as support during your pop up. Obviously when you get better at this it becomes more fluid, but in essence it means that your backfoot doesn't really go airborne while your front foot does. So, this post is a two part question. Do any of you have experience with this method, would you recommend it or would you say its a bad habit? I am not interested in being the most technical surfer and am more interested in maximising my ability to get up onto my shorty.
At the risk of being incorrect,:
You get your front foot forward, but your weight is going back.
The backward weight shift means that you need to plant the back foot early, therefore the toe stance.
Also your back foot is pointing forward on landing, so you will either need to get a whole lot more ankle dorsi flexion, or you will go to the toes. Try turning your back foot out a little more, into the position that you go to on you second foot movement.
I think part of the solution to your problem is more forward momentum on the pop up, to get your weight over the front leg. I am guessing that your weight is behind the midpoint between your legs....
Others may have an opinion, but sometimes learning on the fatter waves depicted in the video's means that you can take time to pop up, and that's where weight shift laziness develops and becomes a habit...
Hi Lachy how tall are you out of interest? I had the same issue with back foot landing on ball of foot when i was first learning I worked on my flexibility around my hips and groin area and that helped a massive amount.
Oh really? I am a little bit over 6ft 2. Thanks for both of your replies. Another fellow said that I need to focus on twisting my hips more. WHat type of hip flexibility excersices were you doing? It's funny that you mention that as I actually have an unaligned right hip which is where my back foot is. Maybe that has something to do with it?
Practice pop up surf burpees at home
that will sort you out
Film it with your phone and analyse
Done
As Tim says............also get some card board and make a cutout of your board then draw where you think your feet should be and the angle you want them to land.
Make sure the back foot is right back most surf with it to far forward when starting.
Then just practice putting your feet where they should go
In the vid you are placing your feet then moving them as part of getting up.
The popup should be one motion without the feet touching the board until they land in exactly the right spot setting you up for the rest of the wave.
Practice this at home and get it right, don't over do the practice take it easy at least at the start or you will damage your shoulders or at your age maybe not.
To start with don't rush the pop up but do focus on the correct feet position.
Hope this helps
Select to expand quoteTimKay said..
Practice pop up surf burpees at home
that will sort you out
Film it with your phone and analyse
DoneSelect to expand quoteLachyd333 said..
Oh really? I am a little bit over 6ft 2. Thanks for both of your replies. Another fellow said that I need to focus on twisting my hips more. WHat type of hip flexibility excersices were you doing? It's funny that you mention that as I actually have an unaligned right hip which is where my back foot is. Maybe that has something to do with it?
I'm also 6ft 2 191cm. I had issues getting my legs under my chest in one swift motion due to a lack of flexibility with being a tall fella. TimKay is spot on with the burpees advice. It's a great exercise to improve the muscles needed to pop up. Yoga / Pilates go hand in hand with surfing these days for a reason, really makes you limber up and helps your pop up technique. If you google image hip flexor stretches the first few that "pop up" :) would be a good start.
