🏄‍♀️ You could paddle like a pro, but do you want to? 😉

👋 Happy Slow Down Month! You know it, we know it. Your brain is already in 2026, you’re just catching up. This is our penultimate newsletter this year, because by the end of next week we will all mentally switch off. 😎

P.S. We were going to share more on the Wee Surf Shoppe with you, but alas, we’re having a few minor issues, so it will need to wait until next week. It will be worth it though! 🏄🏻‍♀️

🏄‍♀️ Let’s surf:

• You really wanna paddle like a pro? 😉

• Surf dogs are better than surf nazis 🐶

• WTF is glassed in 🤓

• Surf news round the globe 🗞️

^SURFODRAMA

😱 You really wanna paddle like a pro? 😉

How’s your paddle? Mine’s meh. But we can all now apparently paddle like the pros, because a group of Australian scientists analyzed pro surfers to figure out what they do differently. The question is: do you really want to?

The scientific paper’s title is a bit of a mouthful: “Monitoring sprint-paddling technique in elite and sub-elite surfers using inertial sensors,” but I guess that’s what makes it legit.

We just love how they designed the experiment.

Picture 22 competitive surfers (female = 9, male = 13), motion sensors strapped to their backs and boards, sprint-paddling across an outdoor pool. Each used their preferred shortboard configured as a “thruster” (three-fin setup) to preserve natural movement.

And now picture being in the not-so-elite test group. Oh what a shame. 😜

They all lay prone on their boards in an outdoor pool, then sprint-paddled 15 m at maximum effort for two trials. During each stroke, they wore inertial measurement units (IMUs) mounted on the thoracic spine (T3–T4), the base of the sacrum, and the nose of their surfboard. Too much science, honestly.

📢 The important stuff

Turns out, elite surfers rotate their upper backs more effectively during each stroke. So it’s not just about shoulder reach—this is super coordinated thoracic rotation through the spine, helping drive the board forward with less strain and more flow. They also keep their boards impressively stable, minimizing bounce and side-to-side roll. That kind of control matters—less energy wasted means more efficient paddling.

Interestingly, they didn’t necessarily paddle faster than sub-elite surfers (feel better about them now!). What they did better was maintain speed between strokes. Less deceleration = smoother gliding. Who knew! So it’s not about paddling harder—it’s about not losing steam.

🏄🏻‍♀️ Women wobble more

The study also observed that female surfers, across the board, showed slightly less control in rotational stability.

The authors suggest this might reflect differences in body mass or upper-body output rather than skill or intent, but it’s a finding worth exploring further. If I had to guess—I’d say it’s down to upper-body composition, also known as boobs.

But, you’re probably wondering: what does this mean for me?

🤨 What do I do now?

We often think paddling is about arm strength, but this study reinforces what many seasoned surfers already know: paddling is a full-body operation. Core control, balance, rhythm, and spinal mobility all play a part—and the best surfers make it look easy because they’re working with their bodies, not against them.

The authors also floated a juicy idea: what if tech like these IMU sensors became a regular part of surf coaching? Imagine being able to measure your trunk rotation, board roll, and speed maintenance in real time—not from video or vague cues, but with actual data. Hmm. Not sure if that’s just going a tad too far.

Now imagine surfing becoming so obsessed with performance and the science of it all that it stops being fun. Wouldn’t you rather be just a sub-elite surfer after all?

^{SURFING THRU HISTORY}

🐶 Surf dogs are better than surf nazis

This is one of those stories that start as one thing and thankfully turn into something completely different. Because, let’s face it, who wants to hear about surf nazis or Nazi surfers?

Honestly, I was going to dedicate an entire story to the Nazi symbolism in surfing throughout the years. Because… it’s surfing history, right? But you know how deep these rabbit holes go—deeper than anyone ever wants to go. For now, at least.

🐶 The complete opposite: surfing pets

So what’s the exact opposite that would be a better subject? Easy: surfing pets.

Whenever I covered a surf news story about yet another surfing dog competition, I always felt a bit uneasy. When I see a video of a dog or cat surfing, I’m always suspicious: are we doing this for the cat/dog/budgie, or are we doing this for ourselves?

I am pleased to report that after multiple hours of research, hearing out “how my pet boar got into surfing” origin stories, and watching a plethora of surfing-animal footage, I can report back that it's okay. Some animals genuinely enjoy a wee surf. And some take it to the next level.

🐕 Meet Ricochet, the original SURFice dog

Let me introduce you to Ricochet the Golden Retriever. The dog that started it all.

Ricochet didn’t start out as a surf dog. She started out training to be a service dog through Puppy Prodigies, a nonprofit early-learning program for dogs destined to support people with disabilities. She was smart, gentle, incredibly intuitive—everything a future service dog needed to be.

But she also had one small issue: she loved chasing birds. Too much. Enough that she was ultimately dropped from the formal service-dog track.

What nobody knew at the time was that she was never meant to be a traditional service dog. She was meant to be a SURFice dog.

At eight weeks old, Ricochet climbed onto a boogie board in a kiddie pool and balanced like she was Duke in a previous life. By 15 months, she entered her first surf dog competition and placed third. But competition was never her purpose. She found her calling on August 20th, 2009, when she spontaneously jumped onto a board with a 14-year-old boy named Patrick Ivison, who was quadriplegic.

From that moment on, Ricochet became a canine ambassador for surfers with disabilities, children with special needs, wounded veterans, and people living with PTSD. Her ability to read a person’s emotional or physical state was so precise that researchers at Duke University studied her empathy and communication skills. Ricochet was also featured on ABC for her ability to take commands from a synthesized voice on an iPad from children with autism.

She raised more than $450,000 for human and animal causes, appeared at community events as a therapy dog, and served as an ambassador for organizations supporting disability, resilience, ocean therapy, and adaptive surfing. Her viral video with Patrick has now reached 6.6 million views on YouTube. If you want to watch the video, please please please have tissues handy—and perhaps watch it when no one is about. I’m still recovering.

Ricochet passed away in 2023 at the age of 15, leaving behind a legacy more impactful than most humans achieve in a lifetime.

Who says girls can’t surf good?

^{WORD OF THE WEEK}

🧐 WTH is glassed in?

Glassed in? Oh, that’s glassed-in fins! But do they still have a place in today’s surfing world?

Before glassed-in fins became the norm, surfboards didn’t have fins at all. Surfers used to steer by dragging a hand or foot in the water, which worked—sort of—but wasn’t exactly efficient. That changed in 1935, when surf pioneer Tom Blake attached a keel from a speedboat to the bottom of his surfboard. Suddenly, the board could hold a line and turn with control.

As board construction evolved from solid wood to lighter balsa and eventually to foam-and-fiberglass laminates, so did fin design. By the 1940s and 1950s, board builders were glassing wooden or fiberglass fins directly onto boards as part of the lamination process.

This is what became known as the glassed-in, or "glass-on," fin — a fin permanently attached to the board using fiberglass cloth and resin during shaping and glassing.

📏 The standard for decades

From that point forward, glassed-in fins were everywhere. They were the standard for decades. If you bought a Velzy, Hobie, Yater, Bing, Noll, or just about any other board from the 1950s through the 1980s, it almost certainly came with a single, glassed-in fin.

The construction method fit naturally with the way boards were being built. You shaped the blank, placed the fin, and glassed the whole thing in one process. It was clean, durable, and gave the board a unified feel—surfers often describe it as the board and fin functioning as one, rather than two connected parts.

🦈 Enter: fin systems

The rise of fin experimentation in the 1960s and 1970s began to shift that standard. As surfers explored twin fins, thrusters, and other multi-fin setups, they wanted to tweak their boards more easily. This opened the door for early removable fin systems. Still, it took a few more decades before plug-in fins became widespread.

It wasn’t until the late 1980s and early 1990s that removable fin systems like FCS and Futures became common in surfboard manufacturing. These systems allowed surfers to swap out fins based on wave conditions, travel without snapping off a glassed-in fin, and tinker with flex without needing a new board. By then, most performance shortboards were being made with fin boxes.

Even with that shift, glassed-in fins never fully disappeared.

Many surfers still prefer them—especially on twin fins, single fins, or retro-style boards where feel and flow matter more than versatility.

For some, it's about aesthetics; for others, it's the way the board flexes and drives when everything is laminated together.

^{THE WIPEOUT WEEKLY SURF NEWS ROUNDUP}

🗞️ Surf news is going round the world: East to West

🇵🇹 PORTUGAL: 13-year-old charges Nazaré
Thirteen-year-old Aninha Dagostini stunned everyone by taking on a legit big wave at Nazaré, popping her inflation vest after a heavy wipeout and proving she’s already built for big surf.

🇦🇪 UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: Surfing goes super-luxe
Surf Abu Dhabi, the new Kelly Slater Wave Co mega-pool, is turning non-surfers into superfans with perfect machine-made waves, spa-level amenities, and three Guinness World Records.

🇦🇺 AUSTRALIA: 500 sharks and one very brave surfer
A drone captured roughly 500 sharks in a feeding frenzy off Moreton Island—while one lone surfer sat among them trying to catch knee-high peelers and somehow made it out safely.

🇺🇸 HAWAI‘I: Teens build the future of school surfing
Two Hawai‘i teens are transforming surf education through Cue Collaborative and The Honua Finals, helping make surfing an official high school sport and rallying communities to equip new teams.

🌎 SOUTH AMERICA: The movement to legally protect waves
Chile, Peru, and Ecuador are advancing landmark efforts to legally protect surf breaks as vital environmental and cultural resources, inspiring a growing wave-protection movement across the region.

👉 Read the full news roundup

⬆️ Aaaaaaand that was the last wave of the week!
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^HOUSEKEEPING

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