Riding a wave…

The Felchionary “Definitions for all your skimming needs”

Riding a Wave:

The pursuit for the ultimate line can push the limits and boundaries of what you thought was skimmable territory. The result of pushing too far can be seen in an earlier post highlighting the best bail shots of 2011. Yet if you manage to be on the good side of that knife’s edge the ride is nothing but pure joy. Finding this line can be made much easier with the help of a friend. If properly timed, you can ride on the wake pushed off from a fellow skimmer and use this rush of water to take you to regions unknown. In the skim world we call this riding a wave.

Here’s a shot of Archie riding on the heels of a wave that Emo is tossing out. Besides using this to push water into dry places, it can also be used to take water out of deeper runs or create a small crested wave in which to glide on top of (as shown here).

In this pic, Archie is flooding the bank for Emo. The push of water will allow him to “rob the bank” in ways that are unattainable by a solo ride.

Now before I end this post I wanted to quickly touch on some skim etiquette. All of this riding is done in very close quarters with the other person, resulting in some hairy situations if the front person bails or the rear person gets a faster ride than the front. The general rule when riding someones wave is the front rider always has the right of way. Giving the front rider the right of way is the best way to avoid catastrophic failure should the worst happen. We don’t need any broken bones or boards now do we?

Peace

Felcho