If you happen to surf in a crowd regularly, maybe you want to team up with your friends and work on your party waves. Here is a selection of party waves from our surf coaches over the last couple of months to give you some ideas.
On a recent advanced retreat in Costa Rica, I asked the group for suggestions on classroom session topics. One of the guests suggested a talk about how to have good style.
Style is one of those things that you know when you see but is hard to describe. One of the most stylish female surfers, Stephanie Gilmore says “there’s no right or wrong, you do what feels good to you.”
For the talk, I listed a handful of generally considered stylish professional surfers and then created a slideshow of photos of them. One thing we noted that almost all had in common was a tendency to do a “soul arch”. A soul arch is when you usually have your feet relatively closer together and you thrust your hips out, arch your back, and lean your head back. Whether it is in the tube, on a bottom turn, or during a nose ride, a lot of stylish surfers will go for this move. It looks cool, it feels cool. I encouraged the Amigas to try it on their next session.
Inspired myself to take my personal soul arch to the next level, I really went for it one session. I was paddling out with a local friend and we were talking about surfboards. She wanted to try mine and suggested I try hers. She weighs a bit more than I do so her board was quite a bit thicker and stiffer than what I’m used to riding. This is a video of my first wave riding her board. After a few turns, I went for the soul arch, into a cheater 5 nose ride soul arch, into a head-dip tube. Does it look cool? It felt amazing. In the end that’s all that matters!
I dare you to try a soul arch on your next session. Let us know how it feels!
Introducing one of our newer surf instructors – this is Britney Taylor from Australia. She enjoys gluten free meals, long lefts, ab-burning workouts, and handstands.
We recently had a young surfer from Australia named Kasey Martin join the Surf With Amigas team. She came down to help us out from May til August and was shredding the whole time. We’re hoping she’ll come back again and help us out in 2016. Until then, here are some highlights from her trip.
Two Emilys for January to March 2015? You better believe it!!! You may have already met our first Emily – now to be known as “Em-dogs” who worked with us Nov-December 2014 and is returning for another season with us starting in January. We met this Emily on a retreat in Costa Rica last year that she attended with her awesome mom. She was everything we look for in an instructor – energetic, smiling, happy, super stoked, frothing, shredding, and awesome. She also happens to be smart and skilled in lifeguarding. Bonus! Here’s what she’s all about in her own words…
We like to keep the energy fresh at Surf With Amigas which means bringing in new instructors occasionally. We met Sherrie last season when she was working for another surf camp in the area. She was always smiling and her moves in the water definitely caught our eye. We were excited when she offered to join our team for October and November! Read on to learn about Sherrie:
Surf. Travel. Lifestyle: Sherrie’s favorite things. Growing up on the beaches of the Central Coast of NSW Australia, her dad taught her to surf at a young age and she was hooked, always trying to figure out how to sustain a surfing lifestyle. Sherrie has entered in surfing competitions on and off since 1999, with some of her best results at the NSW State and Australian National longboarding Titles and recently winning 1st place at the 2014 Canadian National Longboarding Titles.
Surfing and the need for adventure has taken Sherrie all over the world, on her own solo surf missions in search of dream waves and tropical paradise. She has surfed in Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam, Canada, USA, Hawaii, Mexico, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Peru and Chile.
After completing a Bachelor Degree of Naturopathic Medicine and Massage Therapy in 2009 she moved to Canada to become a snowboarder and work as a Massage Therapist in Heli Ski lodges. After a few winters in the mountains the ocean was calling her name and she headed west to the Canadian Surf town of Tofino and became a Surf Instructor.
Sherrie has been surf instructing for the past 4 years and discovered that she can combine her love of surfing, traveling and living a healthy happy lifestyle by becoming a surf coach at surfcamps and travel the world doing so. She has taught for a few camps throughout the world and is stoked to be joining the Surf with Amigas team, show guests around some of her favourite surf breaks while happily teaching some longboarding style and afterwards mixing guests a mean cocktail during Happy Hour.
Jackie George is my new best female friend. Last November I got a random email from her saying she was a lifeguard, raft guide, and enthusiastic surfer looking for a couple weeks of work in Central America. She had just graduated from Humboldt State and was planning to take a big trip through Nicaragua and Costa Rica and wanted to pick up some extra money along the way. I happened to be on a road trip through Northern California at the time and met up with her for a few minutes over-looking the Humboldt surf spot called Camel Rock. My boyfriend Kim and I had slept in our truck the night before and showed up around 9am with coffee looking disheveled. Jackie was in her wetsuit, having already surfed, all bubbly smiling happy energy and I knew right away that she would be a perfect addition to our commune in Nicaragua! She started out with two weeks in January and after that I was determined to do whatever I could to not let her leave! Fortunately, it worked and she stayed the whole season and has agreed to come back in Fall. Stoked!
Everyone who meets her absolutely loves her. She is a gorgeous free-spirit with infectious positive energy who can smile through anything. You’ll love hanging out with her. Check out this video and you’ll see what I mean…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dg6TEFkuy6Q]
Jackie George is hanging out with Suave Dulce and ready to become your new favorite amiga! She learned to surf as a kid at San Onofre, growing up in the wave rich town of San Clemente, CA. After graduating high school, she moved up to the cold waters of Northern CA to attend college at Humboldt State, partly to be closer to her namesake “Aunt Jackie”, an awesome woman living solo on 300 acres in the woods who has made friends with wild stallions and eats daily out of her organic garden.
Jackie has worked as a lifeguard in San Clemente and a rafting guide in NorCal, but is loving her current job in Northern Nicaragua. She is always smiling and laughing. She can cross-step to the nose, and crank a bottom turn on a green twin-fin.
Come down and surf with us!
