Going Mental

Few days ago, I had a chat with my friend Tash about surfing. She is a Durban chick... a pro surfer...a tiny little thing... 1,65m max... for maybe 50 kg.... She works at Surfing SA.
She was the first woman to coach Team SA (girls)!

I was asking her about tips and tricks to get stronger, better and faster in the water. She is not scared of charging 12 feet waves!!! So she knows...

And here is what she said: It is all MENTAL!
It is not about having a mega 6 pack and biceps as big as Mr T...
Fitness is part of it...of course....but as she said, it is all in the head!

And here is what i found today.
A little while ago, i received that old post (May 2008) post from that website "Yoga For Surfer":
http://yogaforsurfers.wordpress.com/about/

"There are those among us who may be new to surfing; those that have been riding waves for years; and those that fall somewhere in between ( that's me!). While we all share the thrill of the ride, some of us – newbie or not – may experience lingering trepidation over facing the power of the ocean, the larger-than-comfortable swells, the new break, the unfamiliar crowd. The trick is how to get past all that so you can truly enjoy each surf session and revel in your own special relationship with the ocean. "

"Surfing is so much like life: ups and downs. Some good rides, some not. Yoga helps learning to experience whatever is going on -- including frustration and disappointment -- from the standpoint of allowing it, of being open to the immediate situation and circumstances, and experiencing it fully. "

I have been practicing yoga since 10 years now. And I have to say that it helped me a lot to get my body and mind in shape. I am still working on the " try not to panic where there is a huge set coming towards you"... but it will come. Surfing is pretty new for me... still need to practice the Yoda attitude in the water!

I know that I will never become a pro surfer like Tash...I might never surf 12 feet waves...but doesn't matter... cause I surf for fun!

So let's go mental....

Fin or Fin

I found this paper the other day on the newly launched Reef Journal website:

“Optimization of Surfboard Fin Design for Minimum Drag by Computational Fluid Dynamics”
Basically: Do glass-on fins induce less or more drag than boxed fins?

and here is a little abstract:

“This paper describes work being done at Swansea University on the design of wave riding surfboards, with preliminary emphasis on the stabilising fins. Two specific CAD (Computer Aided Design) tools are being developed, one for surfboard design and the other for fin design, both of which allow export of NURB (Non Uniform, Rational, B-spline) surface geometry in the IGES (Initial Graphics Exchange Specification) format. The fin design tool has the capability of allowing different National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) foils series to be set at separate cross-sections along the fin.

Fins and surfboard/fin combinations can be imported directly into the CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) package FLUENT and with careful consideration of surfing dynamics to obtain values of critical flow variables, estimates have been obtained of the pressure and friction drag forces, which are thought to correspond to those occurring in practice and will be validated experimentally at a later stage. These results, however, have already been used to examine a number of disputes in the manufacturing industry, one of which is whether glasson fins induce more or less drag than equivalent fins fixed to the board by a box. This component of the research is just a small part of the larger objective which is to bring scientific and engineering advances into the design and manufacture of surfboards. As the project progresses, CFD will be used to resolve more complex drag components, such as wave drag (free surfaces), induced (vortex) drag and cavitational drag, as well as being coupled to a finite element stress analysis to optimize flexural properties of boards and fins.”

Fo those who are not scared of physics/modelling sciences and wanna check it out, here is the link: http://thereefjournal.com/files/7._Lavery_Foster_and_Carswell.pdf

For the others, who just wanna get the answer, well...
Just skip everything and go straight to the conclusion...

The answer is pretty interesting!

SEA surfboards

I currently surf a 7'2 Minimal since 3 years now.
I am getting a bit bored of it...
So i decided that it is time to add a new board to the quiver!
I started to do a search on the net on retro surfboards...
I wanna go shorter but without loosing the comfiness of my minimal...

And here is what i found...
http://www.seasurfboards.com/

LOVE the shape...

LOVE the spray...

Beautiful piece of art...

I want that ONE!!!

Except that:

Dreams will be dreams!

My PRECIOUS is shaped in Australia for a ridiculous price...

So bye bye pretty board...

Will have to go and look for my fancy budget fish in the stocks of the Capetownian surfshops instead!