Big Wave Surfing Training

Good Morning,

I've been thinking a lot about BigWave surfing lately. I think that there will probably be a huge monster wave off Hawaii around Christmas, 2012. And I plan to ride it. No matter its size. So, to do that, I'm training now for it and have been for since last Summer. My training is innovative in that I'm using what I know to help me prepare. I'll also  need a very special surfboard, a gun specifically, and I am in the process of trying to get it shaped (oh how I so hope with all of my heart that the person I have asked to make me this special magical board can make it for me before this year is up -  this is my dream - and, more than just a dream, it is extremely important to me for, sadly, some rather challenging health reasons which I would rather not go into here at this time other than to say it is extremely important and means everything to me).

My training consists of the following...

1. Chi Gung - I believe this is my strongest skill and thus my greatest strength. I have studied this field since the age of 5, training every day, often for most of the entire day. Chi Gung offers me the base strengths in my other skills.

2. Strength Training - Using Chi  Gung, I'm able to lift a lot more than my muscles normally would appear to allow. The reason this works is that Chi Gung fills the muscles with energy or chi and thus gives them tremendous power. As such, I've been able to lift rather awesome amounts of weight at Gold's Gym. I also pull a wagon filled with weight, as well as a large truck tire attached to a climbing harness around my waist.  I also pull and also roll end over end an 8 foot tall, foot in diameter fallen log (my favorite thing to do, inspired by reading about Laird Hamilton).

3. Flexibility Training - This is one of my favorite areas and I use all kinds of fun tools to help me such as several ballet bars, ropes of various sizes, as well as weights and stakes.

4. Freediving: Breath Holding Training - This is a skill that I have trained myself in that I have near the women's world record in once I compete in AIDA (the official freediving association). Currently, I hold my breath under water for over 8 minutes. As I've mentioned in other places, I'm hoping to go over 11 minutes, ideally, by this coming Summer. With focused training, I believe that is within my grasp.

5. Rolling and Tumbling - This exercise comes from remembering what I loved to do as a little girl, namely, roll and tumble down grassy slopes, head over heels again and again and again, as well as to twirl and spin on merry-go-rounds and similar playground equipment. I trained in a more focused way as an adult by taking Aikido lessons every day, 7 days a week, to perfect my rolling and awareness while being thrown in the air.

6. Surfing - This is my favorite thing to do. And, living in the Pacific Northwest, I have access to truly awesomely wild water. In fact, as many of you know, it was in the Pacific Northwest where the phenomenal world's best team of professional watermen  practiced for Billabong Odyssey training because of the rugged environment. I truly love that movie, by the way. Wow those guys were beyond extreme. They all so truly inspire me to train harder.

7. Analysis - I love studying and making connections between seemingly unrelated things. For example, I love to play chess and I see surfing moves on the chess board and chess moves while I surf. The two, seemingly different sports, to me, are truly connected. Using my love of study and playing chess, I focus on surf science and the study of waves, winds, tides, bathymetry and geophysics, currents, oceans, and water temperature and density.

8. Balance Training - I'm constantly working at this in all forms. I use all kinds of wildly fun equipment like Indo Boards, balance balls and spheres, tight ropes, slacklines, balance beams, one legged training, hand stands, single hand handstands, Drunken Style Kung Fu (this is one of the true secrets to balance, I believe), as well as a mechanical/electric horse.

9. Zhan Zhoung Training - And this is more or less the point of this essay today. Big Wave Zhan Zhoung Training. This is, quite possibly, the first time this art has been used for surfing training and it has the potential of offering truly unusual results that utterly stoke me.

Zhan Zhoung is also called the art of Stake Standing or also Standing Like A Tree. It is a form of Chi Gung. And there is pretty much nothing like it. If you want to try something that will utterly kick your ass, then this is it. It seems like the easiest art in the world when you hear about it and even see it, but, to try it, goodness, now that's where the difference comes in. In a nutshell, what you do is to get into a position and simply stand there. That's it. In the broad picture. The entire art is about internal energy and what is happening inside of your body. I've come up with some interesting ways to adapt this ancient Chinese art to surfing and specifically to Big Wave surfing and I'm having such fun training using it.

10. Endurance Training - This consists, for me at least, of running (my weakest skill), swimming (one of my strongest skills - I'll often swim up to 4 hours a day), mountain biking, mountainboarding (this is done on a skateboard with 10 inch diameter tires), SUP (Stand Up Paddling), Wrestling Training using a heavy bag as my opponent (I have a truly wonderful dvd on this), kettlebells (hey, it fits my Siberian/Mongolian hertitage) and martial arts with weapons.

11. Sensory Training - Technically, this is linked directly to Chi Gung in that it is one and the same but the focus here is specifically on developing and honing all of my senses to razor sharpness, particularily senses for detecting extremely subtle movement shifts (perfect for surfing and balance).

12. Shamanism - This is my spiritual path. I have followed it since the age of 5 when I had a near-death accident and technically died for about 20 minutes (as such, I did not chose Shamanism as my path or way, it chose me). I utterly love Shamanism and embrace it fully and live it in everything I do, literally in every moment. Shamanism  sees all things, organic and inorganic, that is to say, animals, plants, sky, water, earth, stars, all of it, everything, as not only connected but filled with energy and alive. Thus, it is a truly beautiful way to respect the ocean and waves. In Hawaii, such a path is called Huna, and those who master it are the Kahuna - Specialists,  (a word familiar to most surfers, though in a slightly different form than the original, based on the book and movie Gidget). I feel truly one with the water. I always have. And through out my life, I have spent as much time as possible in her embrace, learning of her ways. I see the ocean as one of the most beautiful marvels that I can imagine and I truly love feeling her pulse and listening to her language and learning her lessons.

13. Speed Training - Here, I focus on muscle speed, as well as mental speed. Freediving, a sport I practice religiously, develops fast twitch muscles in the body. As does shortboarding. And, big wave riding. Longboarding, not quite as much, though the muscles can be used for longboard expression of course. With speed training, I do things like sprinting, moving as quickly as I can in martial arts and gymnastics, and also, and more related to Big Wave riding as I see it, sprint paddling. I am training myself to be able to fly on my board when I paddle (I prefer laying down while paddling). I want to be able to enter a big wave by paddling into it instead of being towed, and, without footstraps. While tow-in is popular today, and certainly the way to go, I need for a few reasons I have not mentioned, to do it my way.  I am also training visual speed and wind skill speed by traveling as fast as I can exposed to the wind and elements in order to acclimate my body to extremely fast speeds, perhaps 50 mph or faster. I am doing this in a number of innovative ways.

14. Emotional Training - Using Chi Gung, one learns to work with their body and thus their emotions by doing various physical and mental exercises which helps one overcome fear as well as to work with and control adrenaline.  This training, along with the previous one of Speed Training, allows your mind to think incredibly quickly, thus, it appears events happen in extreme slow motion (like the fly flying in the first Spiderman movie that came out a few years ago). Some people experience this type of mental, physical, and visual awareness in extremely dangerous situations, sometimes in sports performances where it is called being in the zone, but for the most part, for most who have experienced it, the feeling or awareness is a hit or miss thing and one had no control over when it happens. With proper training, this type of extremely sensitive awareness becomes your primary awareness state and it is fully accessible at any time and once on, is always on in a sense.

15. Extreme Ocean Swimming - I am inspired by the U.S. Coast Guard Rescue Swimmers and find their training truly unbelieveable and  heroic. These people are trained to jump out of helicopters into raging seas of over 20 foot or more waves to rescue all in danger. As such, I am studying them to the best I can and setting up my own training methods for swimming and more so, survival in huge swells while swimming. I don't know how many Big Wave surfers have specifically trained this way but I find it truly exciting the potential that it offers as far as shaping safer Big Wave surfing skills.

16. Cold Water Training - I am doing my best to come up with some innovate cold water training methods in order to be able to surf without a wetsuit. One of the training levels of Chi  Gung is to be able to enter ice water and then to come out and dry off towels by using a combination of body heat and chi. It's a rather advanced level as you can imagine and few get this far in their training.

Using these various training methods, I am hoping to ride that big wave, that Monster Wave that is coming. I can feel it. Sure, it's a Shaman thing, but the pulse is in the air, you can smell it on the breeze, feel it in the water, sense it in the earth. It is coming. And it makes my heart race!!!

Bodacioulsy Stoked,

Lily of the Valley