Surfing is a term that comes from English and refers to a maritime sport. Surfers climb on a board and try to maintain balance while taking advantage of the waves to move.
Origins
The goal of surfing is to stand as long as possible on the board while making turns and pirouettes as waves occur. In its competitive mode, a jury is responsible for awarding scores to each surfer according to their technique.
The origins of surfing go back to pre-Columbian times in Peru. The native peoples of some Peruvian regions used boats known as Totora horses, which resemble current surfboards.
Modern surfing derives from a practice carried out by aborigines from Hawaii and Oceania. In the twentieth century, surfing became popular in California ( United States ), especially since 1960.
Today, this sport has many followers in the United States, Australia, Spain, Portugal, France, Brazil, Puerto Rico, Peru, Argentina, Venezuela, and the Caribbean. Some beaches identify with the practice of surfing thanks to its waves.
Over the years, the boards changed their countenance, and regulations were established to turn surfing into a sport. Also, this sports is considered a culture, which associates surfing with specific clothing, a style of music, and even ideas or principles.
Surfing One of the parameters that we can use to classify surfing is precisely the size of the board, and this leads us to the following two variants:
- Short Board: also known as short board surfing. With measures ranging from 1.5 to 2.1 meters, it allows athletes to perform a higher number of maneuvers, but they are charged at speed;
- Longboard: another name it receives is board surfing. The range of measurements starts from 2.75 meters and exceeds the previous ones also in width and thickness. Put in action, they give rise to maneuvers of more excellent smoothness and superior speed.
On the other hand, surfing is classified according to the characteristics of the sea in which it is practiced, and so we can talk about surfing large waves, which must exceed 2 meters in height, to distinguish it from the rest, which can be called surfing.
Subcategories
- Windsurf: a thick board with a sail is used and is based on the force of the wind to navigate the water;
- Kneeboard: It is mainly characterized by the position of the athlete, since he must kneel on the board to practice it, in addition to using fins (a shoe sometimes called frog legs, which mimics the shape of the fins of a fish and allows people move more skill in lift water);
- Boogie Board: also known as cork. A 1-meter board made of foam rubber is used, on which we must lie down. As with the kneeboard, it is also possible to use fins. It should be noted that this type of surfing is one of the most popular, and this is because it results in a large number of maneuvers with a much lower risk than others;
- Paddle Surfing: it differs quite a bit from the rest since it requires the use of a shovel with which the surfer must paddle while standing on the board;
- Jet Sky: it is the only one on the list that is based on the use of a motorized vehicle, the well-known jet skis.