Take a look around you at the surfers in the line-up catching more waves than you, and as a general rule they’ll either be bigger cunts than you, more local than you, surfing a bigger board than you, fitter than you, or better than you.

Good surfers get more waves than bad surfers for a number of reasons. They almost always have superior wave knowledge — a product of their greater experience and/or superior genetics. You’ve no doubt remarked at some point that the best surfers seem to possess some sort of mysterious wave magnet, drawing the bomb you’ve been waiting all session for away from you and directly towards wherever they happen to be sitting. Of course this is largely an illusion; the better waves don’t go to them but they to the better waves, for they know where to find them. Some of this is pure talent, a natural “feel” that only few possess, though it’s also a skill that can be developed and honed through time in the water. What’s more, their greater skill and confidence enables them to sit deeper and take off later on waves lesser surfers wouldn’t even consider, and this widens their options significantly.

But in addition to this better surfers tend, rightly or wrongly, to be granted more respect and leeway, and it’s generally considered more acceptable to impose yourself on the line-up if you’ve got the skills to back it up. Some take advantage of this leeway, in the mistaken belief that their ability to land an air-reverse every seventeenth attempt entitles them to all the waves they damn well please; others show admirable restraint in taking only what’s rightfully theirs and nothing more.

Ah, but how to get really good at surfing without getting heaps of waves in the first place? Therein lies the eternal dilemma…

Words by Norm Bellingdon