Longboard

We built this for Dennis, he has a great time walking the board, it's 6'2". I'm getting a wild hair up my @$$ to walk the nose. Anyone riding a longboard behind the boat? I'd bet we could get an 8 foot board in the pocket, I'd love to hang 10

Jeff,
Haven't seen you try on Yellow. You should try it.

I started wakesurfing back in '99 or so on my 9'-2" Santa Cruz longboard. I've been thinking about taking it out again lately to try going doubles, with the second person riding it on the off side or the second wake on the good side. We've had 4 people up and riding on it at once before, and I've also towed someone at like 42 mph on it. Fun fun!

James and Billy did some doubles riding on the board above, it was funny, they would coordinate top and bottom turns by shouting out loud: On Three! 1...2...3 TURN!

I'd like to try something like you have Trace, a 9'2" is doable

Jeff, I've surfed almost all of my beater surfboards behind the boat at some point or another.. fish, gun, longboard, you name it.. I think the best board to nail some 5's and 10's is an egg shaped board, around 6'10"-7-6". A 9 footer is too long for the pocket, a 6'0 does not have enough volume... Either way, find one you like and get after it..

I surf on an EGG 7'6.
I can do take offs, hang 5 and even small aerials.

On my Tige we can easily get 15-18 feet of usable pocket, so a 9 foot board will fit. I can do 5's on my 4'6" What I want to do is walk the nose and I'd love to bury the tail and actually hang 10. Think all those surf movies from the 60's

I was trying it a lot this summer on my landlock (orginal 5'6") Stick the tail in the wash and step forward, I've gotten closer then this pick, pretty much to the end of foam.
http://www.wakepics.com/view_single.php/working-the-nose_wakeboarding-photos.html?medid=20284
The boats a 01 elite v with 550 in the rear locker and 550 in the bow, i think three people in the boat.

Jeff, once I get my boat, I plan to use all my boards. Last time out, I used my 8'8" board, but the wake was so small, my board filled up the entire pocket! I'd love to surf an 18' pocket. Post a pick of your next(or first?) hang five on a long board, I can't wait.

(Message edited by Jimgalloway on September 23, 2006)

Jim you are the man I need to be talking with. Can you keep your eyes open for a nose rider for me? It doesn't have to be in great condition, I have at least 50 gallons of resin in the shop to fix dings

Just goof'ing yesterday I took that shuv-it board that James and I shaped and buried the tail in the curl at the back of the pocket, it held the tail down pretty well, enough so that I could walk up to within the front 18 inches of that board (it's 56" LOA) and then it perled. I really believe that with a properly shaped noserider, you can hang 10, probably only until you hit the first roller

Jeff, if I find a deal on a fixer upper noserider, I'll let you know. I think the ideal noserider for wakesurfing should have a moderate amount of rocker in the nose. A flatter nose would tend to accelerate ahead of the sweet spot, and you might run into the boat. My 8-8 was way too fast, and I had to constantly weight my back foot to keep from hitting the boat.

However, it might have been perfect for a faster run, say 12-13 mph behind the Tige!

Yeah, I think you're right, Jim. Dennis just picked up a 10'2" that he'll be using for his surfing adventure, we intend to try that behind the Tige this Saturday. We've had the Tige up to...shoot 14+ but beyond 13 or so we get some pretty significant prop cavitation with all that weight.

I think I may try to overweight the side we are riding to get a significant curl at the back of the pocket. I'm thinking if I can bury the tail just long enough to RUN to the nose I can hang ten before smacking the transom.

Thanks for the eagle eye on the noserider!

Dennis picked up a 10'2" Infinity Longboard for use in the ocean and I bugged him to bring it out on the boat. I know several folks thought it wouldn't work, wouldn't fit in the pocket behind the boat...and as this picture shows, it's a reasonable concern. Is that a big board or what? Dennis is 6' +.

I dunno, sure looks like the pocket is long enough.

Shoot I did something wrong, and can't seem to delete it. I'll try again.

James?

This is about as far back as we could get without falling out the back, Dennis was able to walk the board and recovered.

My turn!

We found we had to do a few things. It would have been nice to have added 5 foot to the rope, I left the extra link at home. Another is that it was easier to start off at about 11.7. Then gradually bump the speed up to 12.7. It's a HUGE BOARD and flipping it up at start tended to give the board a mind of it's own. James was able to start prone easily, and also started standing up on the board from a stand still.

At speeds less than 11 the pocket is pretty tight, but 12.7 was just right, you could walk the board and literally bury the tail in the curl and recover. My estimation of the "usable" pocket at this speed was pretty close to 30-35 feet.

It was also best to drop the rope just about as soon as you could. The board isn't real responsive rail to rail and the tendency while holding the rope was to try and LEAN into the rail, which just caused you to fall.

Overall, THIS was great fun, get your hands on a 10 footer and give it a try.

(Message edited by surfdad on September 30, 2006)

James didn't even need a wake to surf!

I had to add a few more pictures. The board was incredibly stable. James walked around the board, and was easily able to switch from regular to switch, certainly a testatment to his balance and control, also.

The nose rocker is noted in feet! The max thickness is a touch over 4 inches. It does NOT fit in a rack.

This was an interesting sequence, check how far the board is into the flats when Dennis completes the top turn and readies for the next bottom turn.

Nose riding proved to be a bit problematic. Dennis and James both experienced a phenomenon where the board would basically just STOP as they started getting close to the nose. I found that as I inched forward, the tail would pop up out of the water, then the whole board would start to turn sideways and the ride was over.

Compare the Infinity logo in the first picture to where James has his feet in the second picture...there is about 7 feet of board behind that logo! It's hard to see, but if you trace the outline of the board you can see that the tail is pretty much out of the water at this point. We need a NOSE RIDER!

A blast from the past. Jerry writes:

Here is a longboard shot of me from 1965, It was taken riding the wake of the life Guard boat.
At time the waves were so small, the best waves were the wakes sent in by the Lifeguard making there morning rounds. We surfed them when they rolled into shallow water and jacked up a bit not directly behind the boat.

Thanks for the contribution Jerry!

Jeff, awesome display of pocket length. I thought you might be exaggerating when you described an 18' pocket, but lo and begrunt, your pocket is a lot longer than that! I had a 9' longboard 6 years ago that would just stop as soon as I got to the nose. The board had too MUCH rocker. The board I have now accelerates when I get to the nose. It has too LITTLE rocker. What you need to noseride the wake is some rocker, but not too much. There is really no reason why the board should stop if the rocker is just right. Just one man's oppinion.

Hey Jim, we don't normally ride at this speed, we are usually ride around 10.5 to 11, but up at 12.7, with a little less ballast and the pocket length was incredible!!!! Interestingly enough I think we were close to 40 feet in length on the Starboard side, and could only get about 30-35 on the Port side.

James and Dennis both experienced the STOP issue that you described. I never felt it, but I'd guess you are accurate in your assessment of the nose rocker issue. I should talk Jerry Price in to building me a Nose Rider!

From what I've read, a decent nose rider has a pretty minimal nose rocker and since we aren't dropping in, that really shouldn't be a problem. If you look at that one picture of James riding backside, you can see that James has about 2 foot of clearance between the water and the nose of this board.

Dennis feels that a good 8 foot board would be perfect for nose riding behind the boat. We had enough pocket length to run to the nose and run back, I think, but a board that didn't accelerate too fast wouldn't hurt either.

I'm going to hang ten behind the boat!!!!

This Infinity is also 10 feet

Here is a run to the nose sequence by a goofy footed senior citizen

Back to talent and walkin tha nose

I can't remember when any of us wanted to surf a shortboard behind the boat. Now we all surf and miss the ocean. my friends surf shortboards and rip in the ocean then borrow my equipment and school me behind the boat. friends, real team players. at least they give me set waves every once in a while.
only one more week until a week in gaviotas....thats baja for lake locked surfers

"Gimme the ringer, Chop, Chop"

"Mark it 8, Dude" This is not 'Nam" this is alot of board to throw around. Jason - this agression will not stand, MAN

if you miss tha wave. drop down and paddle in. it will work until we can figure out how to run the masterraft on bio-diesel.

after mexico, WE - tha royal we will begin to work on the boat to produce a better wave. depends on the swell forecast in MEX on how quickly we will respond to build artificial. if it's overhead the glow will private gate community will delay the venture and produce celebritory beer consumption. thanks for giving us a place to post what we enjoy. mahalo

Sweet pic's James. Have you ever had both feet off the nose? It doesn't look like it, but you certainly got further up than we did. When I got within - maybe 2 feet of the nose, the tail popped free and the board slid sidewise, promptly catching a rail and pitching me on my butt. From what I can tell, your longboard has more of a pintail shape, less thickness and less nose rocker than Dennis' board.

Hey Dad... you were right... that looks like a bunch of fun... next time you need to try with more then one person on the board..I can't wait to get on that board... Great pics... I wish I was there...

Brea!!!! Is that you? How fun to see you posting. We all had a great time, I particularly enjoyed giving Dennis grief that his vessel didn't have a proper display of CF numbers nor navigation lighting!

That's nice. I've wondered about riding a longboard behind a boat. I surf 99% of the time in the ocean. I've yet to try wakesurfing. I want to real bad. One board that will float you like a longboard but will surf more "rail to rail" so to speak is a Cheyne Horan Nugget. It's almost replaced my longboard. Almost. I still like knee paddling into a wave. But with the nugget, the tail is thick and wide and will hold you in the wave very nicely. Now if you like throwing tail slides and such, the board is not for you. I ride a 7'2 and feel this is a little big for me. I've surfed shin high waves on this board too. I'm looking at my first boat this weekend. An 05' enzo. One question, can you be pulled lying prone into the wake and then stand up like in surfing in the ocean?

A prone start is possible. This is James on a 4'6" wakesurfer. He can snap up, but I was trying to get some photos for a manual, so I had him go to his knees first. AND I lost the last frame somewhere - sheesh, not my best work.

You merely lie prone and edge out while waiting for the pocket to form. Then edge back into the pocket. Toss the rope OVER the lip and you're good to go.

Matthew, I've wakesurfed only a few times, but always do the prone start. Also, when I fall, I have instructed the driver not to turn around. I paddle back up to the back of the boat. That way I get the total ocean style workout, and enhance my conditioning for ocean surfing. I'm also looking for my first boat. Good luck.

Here's a picture of me surfing about 40 years ago on my 9'6" Gordon and Smith. I think the wake on Jeff's boat is bigger than this wave in Redonda Beach circa 1962

Here's a picture of me surfing about 40 years ago on my 9'6" Gordon and Smith. I think the wake on Jeff's boat is bigger than this wave in Redonda Beach circa 1962

Hey Dennis, those trunks look very similar to the pattern on Surfdoor. Great picture!