Why — And How — To Watch Women’s Surfing in the Olympics — Part 5 — The Surfer
What’s at Stake: The Surfer
The World Surf League announcers do an awesome job guiding you through the nuances of scoring, difficulty level, and details about how the surfer is surfing the wave on your screen. But it may help to back it up just a little bit and learn about surfing on a more fundamental level, to better understand the surfer’s challenges.
Stance: Surfers are either “regular/ natural” or “goofy foot”, which means they stand with their right foot back (regular/natural), or left foot back.
Some suggest that surfing “Goofy” was coined after a Mickey Mouse cartoon where Goofy surfed left foot back. More likely, it was because when modern surfing was resurrected, kids were still getting their knuckles rapped by schoolmasters for writing with their left hands. It’s just goofy.
Like everything in surfing, boundaries are being pushed and new athletes are challenging the norm. But the bulk of today’s crop of top competitors ride with their natural stance — with the notable exceptions of Caroline Marks, an Olympic competitor for the US (watch her backhand attack here), and Tatiana Weston-Webb, an Olympic competitor for Brazil. Surfboards, unlike snowboards or skateboards, do not go in both directions. A surfboard has a nose and a tail, with fins on the back. The reason this matters is because the mechanics of surfing front side (facing the wave) and backside (with your back to the wave) are different.
If you want to know your own stance, and you haven’t been on a skateboard lately, the accepted test is to have someone push you from behind and see which foot you put forward. I did that, and rode with my unnatural stance for a year until I borrowed my nephew’s skateboard and found out I was wrong. By then, it was too late to change. I recommend the skateboard test, even if you need someone to hold your hand.
Frontside Vs. Backside:
At the pro level, like tennis, surfers need to be proficient in both frontside and backside. That said, the pro circuit is heavily weighted with rights (waves that break right) so a goofy-footed surfer will need to have a wicked backhand to consistently rival the natural footers.
Learning to surf, there are advantages and disadvantages to both, which change as your level progresses. You might be able to take off steeper backside because you can grab your rail, for example, but mastering a bottom turn may be easier for you frontside.
The pros are far beyond any of these concerns, but most athletes have an affinity and strength for one approach over the other. It might have developed naturally, or depending on where they grew up. Every kid has a local break, and if they were goofy, and the break was a right, then they probably have a wicked backhand.
This comes into play depending on where the contests are held, and which way the waves are breaking.
In the opening contest of 2019, at the Margaret River Pro with its clean, pumping rights, Caroline Marks took down reigning 7-time World Champion, Stephanie Gilmore with her lethal backhand. Tatiana Weston-Webb, another goofy-footer, took the prize at Margaret River in 2021. (They both rip on their forehands, too.)
Carissa Moore, Hawaii and US’ Olympian, has arguably the most dominating forehand in recent history, along with Australia’s Stephanie Gilmore. Tyler Wright is ferocious either way.
The way the wave breaks, its steepness, its power, whether it barrels — all of these factors come into play to potentially favor forehand or backhand.
Of course, the greatest surfers shred these expectations, and that is a big part of the fun of watching!
Athletic Level of Surfers:
Because so few of us have real experience with surfing, as I said in the beginning, it’s hard to gauge the athleticism and skill level of surfers. It’s obvious when we watch basketball, or gymnastics, or high jump, that these people are superhuman.
What you don’t see with the surfer:
Reflexes — insane. Thousands of pounds of wind and water are steamrolling, shifting, changing, morphing, in an ever-changing environment, and the surfer is adapting instantaneously through every second of the ride.
Decision making — nuts. With all the variables described so far in this article, the surfer brings their thousands of hours of water experience, training, and talent to every moment of every wave. There is never a second that it relents. Decisions are made from the moment they see the wave on the horizon, until they have completed, or not completed, the ride.
Consequences — unparalleled. If you miss a ball in basketball, you disappoint your team. If you fall in gymnastics, snowboarding, pairs ice skating, you can be badly injured by the cold hard ground, but you still can at least assess your environment. If you misjudge a 10-foot wave, you could be drilled by the lip into a jagged reef, held down by the wave, cut, concussed, or drowned.
You could also, as Bethany Hamilton was, be attacked by a 14 foot Tiger Shark.
Mic drop.
Commitment — complete. It’s true that every great athlete has to commit fully in the moment. They just don’t have the same stakes. For the surfer, they did not get a practice run on the ski jump. They have not ever seen the track before. They have to hurl themselves over the ledge, into the pit, into the air, into utterly unknown territory.
Wave knowledge — ever-expanding I have been talking as if every wave is a giant wave. Many are not. The Tokyo Olympics may not actually serve up these kind of waves. But this is the knowledge that each surfer brings with them.
In order to qualify for the Olympics, these athletes have surfed and triumphed in every imaginable condition the ocean can offer. They have surfed the surreally terrifying barrels of Teahupoo and Pipeline. They have survived massive wipeouts and been held down in multiple wave sets. Their leashes and boards have broken in mountainous surf, leaving them tiny and vulnerable as they make their way to safety. They have battled the long lulls of the sea, their own minds and anxieties as they have sat waiting for mother nature to finally offer up a chance to score. They have won and lost and won and lost and beaten the greatest athletes in the world enough times to be champions. All over the world. In cold water, warm water, reef break, shore break, point breaks, 15-foot sets, 2-foot sets, through injuries, they have shown up.
Links to the whole series:
Part 1: Why — And How — to Watch Women’s Surfing in the Olympics — What is Really Happening in the Water?
Part 2: What’s at Stake — Navigating the Ocean — The Wipeout
Part 3: What’s at Stake — Navigating the Ocean — The Paddle Out
Part 4: What’s at Stake — The Wave Itself
Part 5: What’s at Stake — The Surfer
Sheila Gallien is a writer, channel, conscious creativity coach and soul surfer. Her screenplay, Dropping In, inspired by her own story of finding true courage through surfing is soon to be a major motion picture. She lives on the Big Island of Hawaii, where she dreams of someday getting barreled. Visit www.sheilagallien.life to find out more about her transformational work.
