Subtle Dynamic Surfing Balance Training on NOHO Surf Balance Trainer

Aloha Tribe,

Yesterday was an interesting and fun day of training. I spent about 6 hours or so working on subtle movement awareness. I used my NOHO Surf Balance Trainer since I can get so much practice time on it for such training.

For example, let's say that a typical surf ride is, oh, perhaps, 8 seconds. And, let's assume it typically is about a half our wait between rides, what with paddling out, and waiting for the right wave and of course, honoring etiquette by allowing other surfers to catch waves when it is their turn. So, given that, one actually "practices" surfing, perhaps 8 to 10 seconds per half hour, or, in  about a 6 hour session, roughly, 10 or twelve rides. Now, compare that to 6 solid hours of training on a NOHO or Indo Board or balance disks or slackline or whatevers.  In such a case, the 8 seconds then spread out is like what, 3600 rides or so? That's like years and years worth in a day.

Thus, training is valuable. The key, of course, is that it needs to be fun. And, for me, trying to perfect extremely minute and subtle surfing movements and the awareness of each, is radically fun.  Consider it a character flaw of mine, I guess. I'm way totally into movement, what can I say?

The funny thing is, after about 6 hours of intense highly focused internal training, when it finally came time for me to do my home chores, namely, to check on my chickens out in their chicken coup, the walk out to them of 50 yards or so made me feel like the most uncoordinated girl on the face of the planet.

Why? Because I walked with awareness.

You see, when we walk, we actually are simply falling forward out of balance in a case of complete abandon. We're damn lucky we don't fall with each step we take. But, as babies, we learn to master walking, and, unless one trains like I did yesterday, we typically forget about how we walk and we mindlessly meander here or there in our lives, giving our actual walking style and techniques, let alone bringing full body awareness to each step, simply, out of our minds.

With every walking step, we actually are falling forward briefly, as our bodies pass our centerline of balance.  And, it's only by swinging our unwaited foot forwards, that we can catch ourselves and seemingly, walk gracefully.

Interestingly enough, with attention to detail, I noticed in myself extremely tiny lateral shifts as I walk, shifts, I'd normally never even notice. But, because I worked so intently on subtle dynamic surfing balance movement training yesterday, my ungraceful and unintentional body shifts of "normal" walking, SCREAMED to my brain that I was damned luck I didn't topple over with each step.

A simple way to try this yourselves is to merely close your eyes, and, walk forwards as slowly as you can. For many of you, I'd imagine, it'll feel like your world is turning on end and it's the end of the world as we know it.

Pretty cool physical sensations actually. Rather trippy, I must say. Trippy is good.

So, yesterday, I worked with muscle groups, such as the rotation of my forward arm to see how it would effect balance, or a raising or lowering of my thighs or arms. Each muscular movement created different subltle sensations on my surfboard as I dropped my nose or tail or dipped a rail left or right, focusing on 9 directions of movement, namely center, left, right, forwards, backwards, forward left, forward right, backwards left,  and backwards right, then, to various degrees of movement such as a 1/2 inch drop in the nose or tail or a 1/4 inch dip of a rail. Interestingly enough, I used a carpenters level to work on the subtleties visually. It has bubbles that can shift forwards or backwards and left and right, so I simply laid it on my board and worked for hours with it. The hours flew as I was completely in the zone.

Bodaciously Stoked,

Lily of the Valley