Choose a Surfing Bodyboard

Video Transcript

"Hi, my name is Mike Sanders, and I'm going to be talking a little bit about how to choose the right body board for you. What it really comes down to with body boards, is your weight, your height, and what you're doing on the waves.If you're just going to be floundering around in the white water, all you really need is something to hold you up, and keep you afloat. Now, on the other hand, if you're going to be out where the waves are breaking, you're going to need a little sturdier bottom of a board. You need to make sure that it can hold it's rail, and keep you in control of the wave. One thing that I've noticed about body boards, is if you get a bad one from a garage sale. The top is all worn off, and it may seem like a good deal for five bucks then, but you take it out a couple of times, and the rash on your stomach, will say otherwise. You' really got to be careful. You don't want it too slick, because you'll be sliding all over the place. Some people wax them up. I like to keep them clean, but you also don't want it too rough, because then you get rashes when you go out, just your body, so really, you're looking for floatability. These boogie boards that they have now are like, they're pretty nice. They're pretty smooth on the bottom. They get you some good speed. They have some nice rails to hold you into the wave. There's some old sponge ones that don't really do much for you, if you're just floundering out there, but usually the hard bottoms are the good choice to make, unless you're going to be dropping in on some twenty foot faces. Then, you might need some little fins back there, but mostly with a body board, you're doing most of the control with your feet, that are behind you. Hopefully,you've got some swim fins on, and more or less leaning into the rails, is how you're going to be turning, so when you're choosing it, you want to float, and you want to keep it controlled, and that's pretty much what you've got to keep in mind, when you're choosing a body board."