Learning to Shortboard in San Diego Area

La Jolla Shores is a good beach break for shortboards. On issue is that the LJ cove blocks it from numerous swell angles. Sometimes the shores will be flat and you look 400 yards North to scripps pier and its going off... The lineup at scripps is very tight though....

If you want to shortboard, do ocean beach (beach breaks) and South PB. Tourmo is mushy almost always and unless there is a sizable swell, its a LB spot... Del mar is okay as well. At any rate, you will want to hit Blacks when its a reasonable size. Sit on the north peak until you ge better. Way less crowded and still a fun wave.

Once you get good at shortboarding, move on to the reefs and points breaks. They are all much more difficult to paddle into, and if you dont know what you are doing you will never get a wave... But once you have your wits about you, wait for a 5-7 foot day and go to the cliffs, that is where you will perfect the art of shortboarding.... You will have waves that last 30 seconds and allow you to turn up to and more than 10 times on each wave....

You can try and learn on beach breaks all day and there are only a few opportunities per session to get a good wave and really turn until you are a much better shortboarder....

You will see what i mean when you get there, but once you get a wave and get to practice your cutbacks and floaters a dozen times on the same wave, you will be hooked and you will learn more from that one session than you would in a months time surfing a mediocre beach break....

 

Now that's some good advice!
It will probably take some time for floaters but it's supposed it be fun while learning, right...good call on the spots. I'm wondering why would a reef be harder to paddle into than a beach break..

 

South PB = Law Street in addition to any streets named after precious stones (Diamond, Emerald, etc.). All are great places to learn, without the crowds of LJ Shores or OB. A beginner will probably get mowed down out there. On the other hand, the Shores will be overwhelmed with beginning surfers during the summer, so you would fit right in.

PS---reefs are generally easier to paddle out to over beach breaks, because most reefs have at least one channel where waves break softly (or not at all). Do not (I repeat) do not attempt to learn to surf at a reef break. Although some reefs would be good to learn at, usually only experienced surfers will be surfing reefs. Beginners will be hassled thoroughly.

 

when you move to the short board be careful about your choice. a board too short/narrow/not enough thickness
will ruin the stoke fast and, being a beginner, you may blame it on yourself which may not be the case.

put another way droid rips but on his go-to stick you probably won't.

 

Just keep at it!! don't paddle out at the peak and try to paddle battle for the better waves at the peak... then you could just about paddle out anywhere...

Have you ever heard of Belmar, NJ??? Great place to learn with EPIC waves

#AlwaysEPICinBelmar
#LearntoHPSBinBelmar

 

oh ya- get the right board- buy something beefy to start, like the other guys mentioned. Like a standard thruster- nothing special... just beefy

like something in the 6'4 to 6'8 range- like a basic al merrick flyer or something. I would get that over a fish.... it will be better suited for the hollow days

 

Let me clarify... Once you are "used to" reef breaks, they are super easy to paddle into. But they roll MUCH slower and have a WAY more gentle slope. As you are learning on a shortboard, you will notice that if you go out to a reef break, you really have to sit right under the pitching lip and really take off at the right spot. It is much more difficult to nab a reef break shoulder, because you have to paddle really hard and have your shortboard angled very well and inline with the slope of the wave face.... Beach breaks give you that last moment of pitching force, that unmistakable moment when that board picks up and takes off... It is just much harder to achieve this on a reef or reef/point as a beginner.... Once you are dialed in, its easy as pie...

But just go to Sunset cliffs, even on a big day and watch how many shortboarders are missing waves. Its insane. Even decent surfers.... You will see them paddling hard as hell and the wave just rolls right under them.... That is also why, on most days there are more longboards than shortboards on the reefs. Because they just pick right up on the waves. Super easy with a longer board, especially on those bigger days....

You will see what I mean. Its hard to describe, but you have to really position yourself properly have commit to get a wave on a reef out there. If you dont commit, you wont get it. And its a different paradigm. On bigger beach break days, your brain usually tells you to avoid that critical part of the wave as its pitching over your head. Nature tells you to move down the line so you can have a safer takeoff. You have to abandon that way of thinking when surfing reefs and points. You have to position yourself in that critical spot, of you simply wont have the momentum to paddle into it with a shortboard... More often than not, this also requires you to "backdoor" the wave, meaning to paddle in way deeper than you think you should be, because you will quickly realize that as soon as you get up on the wave, you can more times than not outrun the section, almost to a fault, so you can take off behind part of the wave that is already breaking, pump a little, bottom turn around the section and you will then have caught up to the section of the wave you want to be on, and then instinct will kick in because the reefs break slower, and your normal surfing technique will outrun the wave, and that is when the instinct to start your cutback will kick in. Its like evolution. It will just click. You will realize you are going to fast, you will naturally turn your body and board in a figure 8 to get back to the force of the breaking lip and then you will pump a little, get that speed back up and then find your self too far out front again and then cut back....

Surfing spots like that will increase your skillset by lightyears... It just allows you to react and naturally do what the wave needs you to do... On most east coast beach breaks, they are such a short ride and everything happens so fast, you dont have time to think. You just do. You just react... On a nice reef break on Sunset Cliffs, you can litterally plan out your next turn before you finish your current turn. You can be doing a roundhouse and say you know what, Im going to take a steep bottom turn, come back up vertical and snap this time instead of a roundhouse... Then after that, Im going to do a roundhouse and cut way back behind the wave and setup for a floater. Its crazy....

And like the other guy said, reef breaks are way easier to paddle out to. Just stand up on the cliff and you will notice to either side of the wave, there will be flat ocean where the waves arent breaking. Those are your deep water channels. You just paddle out right there. Some of the spots there, I had my own way of paddling out and I was the only person that did it. It took me a little longer, but I was guaranteed to get out on a 12 foot day with dry hair. Just stand and watch for a bit....

Another common mistake... Dont freak out by the thought of surfing over top of a reef. Very few of those spots are really shallow. No surf is a shallow slab and needles (right next to it) gets SUPER shallow on the inside, but you can see it coming, you see how shallow is gets cause its a point that hits the cliffs and you just pop over when you realize you are in about 1 foot of water. Pesky's inside reefs at the boat ramp are shallow and there are a few more random inside reefs, but all those spots are so far out, I have gotten pitched off of a 15 footer head first and not hit the bottom. Those reefs are deep.... At least at Sunset Cliffs...

Now if you go to the northern most reefs in the La Jolla Reefs, well buddy, thats a different ballgame. Those are death slabs on a bigger day and they will mow you down like a weedwacker and you can find yourself getting the swiss cheese treatment if you arent careful. They produce Hawaii like barrels, but you get what you pay for. The pic in my avatar is one of the good places I was in that day, but I also have a picture of myself getting tossed head first over an inverted 10 foot wave face. Its not all fun all the time. You gotta pay the price if you want the best waves sometimes.

 

Ohh, and scripps and La Jolla shores are just fine... From a scientific standpoint, Ocean Beach picks up every swell angle, 365 days of the year. It is exposed to NW, WNW, W, SW, SSW etc. Other than Blacks and the La Jolla reefs, they are more fickle. Just look at a map and you will see how they are not exposed to certain swells, but like the other guy said, OB beach breaks are ridiculously crowded and the locals are nasty as hell. I lived there for over 10 years and became an honorary local after a while and the things I would see were crazy. Too many people, not enough space. Pro surfers scattered through the lineup along with Meth Heads and brazillians. I mean, it can be a real sh** show. Sunset Cliffs too. If its big and perfect, choose your spots wisely, cause some of the older guys on the cliffs will ruin your day really fast. Ive seen fist fights there, the spear trick, ive seen the board to board tackle, ive seen guys intentionally run a guy over and god forbid one of the locals paddles into the lineup and points at you, you may as well go home or somewhere else. That is the official "Burn that guy" call and everyone out there will literally burn you. Its a ton of fun when you are the burners, but if you are the burnee, not so much. Every wave you go for, they will drop in. If you get to close or call them out, you will either get punched or pushed off their boards. I have seen 12 years old get in on the burn sessions, and if you mess with one of those kids, they older guys will pull the "east Bound and down on you" Cut the leash, probably punch you and then launch your board at the cliffs. Then you can swim in with your tail between your legs as you watch your beautiful surf board slap up against the rocks...


But when you see 100 guys on one reef break, go to another. there are dozens of them... Not trying to freak you out, Im am just saying that guys have been surfing those spots their whole lives and take it really seriously so just be respectful. But if you are a guy learning to shortboard, I doubt you will be out there when its 10-12 feet, offshore and firing... Im just giving you some heads up

Long story short: Every beach break in san diego is fun. They are all great places to learn... OB does have a lot of closeouts because it sucks up more swell than other spots and gets much bigger too. It will be 3-5 feet in PB and OB will be 7 foot and draining. It gets super deep about a mile off OB and the cliffs and it delivers a lot more power...

Central Mission beach surprisingly hold up very well in most conditions... There are usually good peaks and wave faces on them....

And if you are a goofy footer and want to ride an automatic barrel machine, go to the south mission jetty. A complete novice can get a stand up barrel there. Its a freaking wave machine... Dont mind the nasty, meth-head locals there. They arent really locals, they are just guys from Claremont and La Mesa that have jacked up pickups and drug problems... They act hard, but they arent... Only a few of them can actually surf...

And if you are regular footed and want the automatic barrel machine, do the OB jetty on the other side of the river mouth... It too is a perfect barrel machine... The locals there are equally as bad, but I would rather get into a pissing match with a Hippy on a single fin in OB than a methed out roid freak in South Mission.

 

zach619, re: your avatar....the Rock or the Shoe?

 

This is a priceless southern california tip. Always surf between 7am and 10am. Tides dont really matter as much out there. They dont swing 8-10 feet at high and lows like here in the SE. It barrels a little more at the mid tides etc, but I never, ever based my beach break session on things like that. Just go early in the morning. Almost all year round, the winds pick up around 10-11am. You will have the marine layer and calm winds almost every morning. If you are surfing in PB, there are no beach/guard designations until 11am. Thats when they blackball things, so you will be one happy camper pretty much every day. Yes, weekends can get crowded but like I said, in PB the crowds will be at Crystal Pier, up at PB point and Tourmo/Law street. There is plenty of room all over PB to not mess with them. You will never have issues with crowds until you get better and post up and more recognized spots.

And remember, meth heads are up at 6am because they never went to sleep.... =)

I always told people that talked about Socal and the crowds... if you find yourself crowded all the time, complaining about all the "kooks" then that means you are actually the "kook", cause if you cant find uncrowded surf along 80 miles of perfect beaches, its your fault, not everyone elses.

But again, remember: ALWAYS surf between 7-10am. Sheet glass almost every time... You can throw in the occasional sunset session, cause winds CAN drop down at that time... but those are just bonuses.

Offshore usually come in the winter from the Santa Anas and the surf is usually really big around then, which makes for perfect conditions, but in general, what you want in San Diego is little to dead wind. Almost every afternoon, most of the year (sometimes not in the fall) the onshore flow will pick up until almost sundown....

Other reminders, the coast bends a lot. Places like Scripps and LJ Shores can be sheet glass when all the beach in PB/OB are getting hit by cross winds. Study your map, monitor the wind. When you have a great session, go back to your computer and look at the direction of the swell, the wind direction and speed and your tides and kind of get that as a "mental note" so as you look at forecasts, you can remember where it was really good in similar conditions.

 

Shoe. I always tell people, it was right next to the "Hospitals"

 

Surf Del Mar. I rented a 5.8 quadfin surfboard when I stayed there for a week. The waves there are perfect to learn on. I dont recommend that you surf places like salt creek because those types of waves are steeper. GL

 

Epic thread. I've never been there, but now I am drooling and making plans for October. Keep us posted on your progress surfero93, and thanks for the knowledge zach619!

 

No problem... As you can probably tell, I miss my San Diego =)

 

Love the sound of the wave sucking off the reef while inside the tube at that place. Kind of a "deadly silence".