Session 4.234: Now I can go eat as much as I want!

This morning looked non-promising, in terms of the condition, as I passed Montara nothing significant seemed to be going on, and when I descend the hill just before entering Pacifica, there is a good panorama of the beach where I can usually figure out the overall state of the things, and it also looked rather flat. But the buoy reading all indicate some good condition, 6-7 ft at 14 seconds, so I was still hopeful.

As I parked the car I found David and Ken changing, and that was great. I also met a recent addition to the Stokemasters, Jen. So there were some committed Stokemasters out this morning to make room for the turkey on this Thanksgiving day!

I was almost going to take my 9'0 foamy, but "heck, I rode it yesterday, so Fish today." So I took out my Surftech Fish for the rides today. I figured that if the waves do not pick up, I will sit way way inside and catch beach break sort of waves, and if I don't catch any, I would continue to work on the paddling.

Speaking of paddling, these days, I am feeling much more comfortable paddling with shorter length boards. Somehow, I feel I can stroke deeper and follow through each stroke all the way to the back, and I kind of like the feel of pushing the water using more parts of the body. On a longer board, I am paddling more like in a "digging" motion as the width of the board prevents a deeper stroke especially the front half of the stroke.

We started out in front of the parking, and caught a few, then I saw that the north end of the beach breaking better so I gradually paddled up north, Ken followed. Then there was a sweet spot where soft breaks were happening in a shoulder high size. These are just some of my favorite waves because they don't throw you yet, if you paddle hard for them, you'd catch and the wave will increase the size rather gradually. They are perfect for all sizes of boards!

I saw Ken picked up some nice ride. He also came a long way since I know him from his early days of surfing.

I had several great rides too with some very satisfactory turns. Moving forward, I would like to work more on;

• More powers in turns. Digging the rails even deeper than today and gain more speed.
  
• More accuracy. Sometimes, by trying to overpower, I would mess things up. Sometimes, I need to make a smooth transition especially when the power and speed is insufficient.
• Smoother motion and links between each move. I think I still look awkward and stiff.