Thanks for that. James ought to give you a commission, you do such a good job selling his classes. Based on your description, I believe I will sign on to Coach Casey’s club, at least give it a try for 3 months. I’d still prefer to work with someone in person, but what you described seems a close second.
Cool. There’s your first stop. Get to reading haha.
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Yes year round but let’s just say I get more work done in winter. Getting a bit off topic but since fd is a legit learning tool it’ll pass.
When I was climbing a lot and projecting hard routes, a good climber told me you have to work the end of routes particularly well, since you’ll be gassed after the crux and you’ll be pissed if you fall up high. After working the pop up->foot placement → down the line → exit before running aground → start pumping for a while, fd let’s you work the connection turn and actually riding the wave part as if a teacher had you write lines. Btw that part is the point anyway and super fun it turns out! And no once you get the hop up on a wave or in flat water you can shut it off whenever you can. I’ve connected waves by pumping at least as frequently on fd as prone.
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I haven’t got the hop up on a wave yet. That needs to happen before I shut off the FD. The hop up is what I’m missing. Any mental representations of this particular skill you can share with me?
It is similar to an ollie on a skateboard.
- Ramp up your speed agressivly with your trigger.
- Pop the nose up so the motor pod comes out of the water
- immediately level your board and let it glide.
Particularly if you’ve been foiling for a while, the motion of standing on your back foot while ollying feels like a no no, so it takes a little getting used to but it becomes natural quickly. If in flat water for pumping try to speed up first then a swoop up, if on a wave you barely need to do anything. Just press on the back foot a little with a tiny hop. Pumping in flat water is like running with a parachute on. When the battery comes off it feels great.
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This is great stuff! These are the mental representations I’ve been looking for. I was never very good at the ollie, but I’ve got the basic mechanics down. Shifting a lot of my weight to my back foot feels dicey. Apparently, I have to just commit to it.
I’ve been going through James Casey’s Foil Drive course. I see now that I skipped over a lot of the fundamentals, like learning to turn (eyes, head, shoulders, hips, NOT heel-toe) while keeping the board on the water. I may circle back and work on these “foundational” skills.
I need help getting to my feet. I watched the Foil Drive video where Hoskyns demonstrates getting to your feet. I get to my knees, bring my front foot around and place it in a predetermined spot (this usually tkes too long), and then I place my back foot down on the leading edge of the rear deck pad (more or less above the mast). The whole thing takes longer than I’d like. Judging by how quicky my max battery drains, I know I could smooth it out. Speaking of battery life, I’m finding it to be a good source of feedback. I assume that the better I get, the longer my battery will last.
i can’t stress enough how, for learning, physical fitness will help. You don’t have to be in great shape to BE a foiler but for alot of this stuff if your in great shape you can get in 20 good reps a sesssion and if your not you start to loose that form etc around 5.
Work on an exercise that mimics the motion you want to learn. If its popping up i’ll work on burpees (for me in the winter i’ll even do them to dial in pop up in boots). I also really like jumping switch lunges because it dials in balance in conjunction with core strength. And visualize while your doing them, picture the board and water and everything in your brain.
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Okay, I like these suggestions. I’ve always been a fan of functional fitness. I’ll do burpees and jumping switch lunges. Any other workouts to help with foiling? I was surprised how it took it out me, even with the assist.