Wake Surfing

Wakesurfing is a sport that is played all around the world. It costs a pretty penny to play but it’s well worth the cost. Although it’s best to wake surf in the summer or whenever there is hot weather, you can still wake surf in cold or choppy water or in bad weather if you have a wet suit or if you just don’t mind the cold. Wakesurfing consists of having a wake surfing boat which costs around $140,000+ if you want it to make a good wave that you can do tricks on, but if you don’t mind the wave and just want it for the enjoyment the boat would cost around $100,000. You’ll also need a wakeboard or skimboard which will cost you around $500-$1,000 depending on how high quality you want your board to be. A normal surfboard that is used for just the ride or enjoyment is easier to control while a skimboard is really squirrely and hard to control. Skimboards are mostly used for doing tricks and are what most pros use in competitions. Although this mostly all depends on the fins on your board, more/longer fins allow more control over your board whereas fewer/shorter fins cause you to have less control. You will also need a wake surfing rope which varies in length depending on how far back you want to be in your wave. Being further back allows much more room to do things on your wave but makes for a lot more work to stay in your wave, while a short rope allows you to be closer up to your wave and makes it a lot easier to stay in your wave. There is always a “sweet spot” in your wave, which is hard to find but once you find it, it allows you to be able to sit in that certain spot without having to do anything, and the sweet spot all depends on the type of boat you are using. 

For beginners, you start out using the rope almost the whole time until you get used to wake surfing, and then while you advance and get better at wake surfing you will start to throw the rope which allows you to have more “freedom” to do whatever you want without depending on the rope to keep you in the wave. Wakesurfing is definitely a hard sport to get used to and it’s not as easy as you might think. Some people have beginner’s luck where they can easily get up their first time but for most people, it will take a few runs or days to get up. Now that’s the easy part, now you need to get used to controlling your board. Leaning back is used as your “break” and leaning forward is used as your “gas” and you need to have good stabilization. It will definitely take a few days or even weeks to master the stabilization point, and that is the key point because if you don’t have good stabilization then you won’t enjoy the sport because you will be focusing on staying on your board and staying in the wave. None of that is fun, as you’ll want to be able to stay in the wave and enjoy not having to work and work just to fall off and restart. One of the major factors in wake surfing is leg strength because wake surfing is all about your legs and how strong they are. The weaker the legs the harder it is to stay in the wave and the stronger the legs the easier it is to stay in the wave.

Overall, wake surfing is definitely on the top of the list of my favorite sports and I would definitely recommend it to others. It’s not only fun just to wake surf but you also get to spend quality time with your friends and family teaching them and just having fun.