Basic pumping of the wing can help you gain speed or take off in slightly less wind.
Advanced pumping, on the other hand, makes an enormous difference.
Advanced pumping combines wing pumping and hydrofoil pumping into a unified movement.
This can be quite hard to grasp in one go, so to help you practice we’ll start with
the most basic wing-only technique and then add all the layers of improvement from there,
to get you to advanced pumping.
A small in and out pump of the wing does generate extra force.
Interestingly, you can more than double the force as you pull in the wing.
You can improve that by simply making the pumps larger.
The extra force lasts longer, which gives you a better chance of increasing speed enough
for the board to lift.
This large movement works even better if it follows continuous oval path.
With your arms climbing as they start to move away. Then your arms dropping as they start
to move back in.
Up and out. Down and in.
Exactly why this movement works, I’ll explain shortly.
First, let’s make that movement larger by using a full-body movement rather than just
arms.
You straighten your body as you begin extending your arms upwards.
You contract your body as you begin pulling your arms down.
Up and out. Down and in.
This movement gives a good pump of the wing, and includes the first element of pumping
the foil.
But why does this particular wing movement help set you up for hydrofoil pumping?
Why not cycle the other way?
Why not move the wing in and out at a lower angle where we know we get more sideways pull?
To understand why, we need to look at what makes a pumping take off so effective.
The key is that you have a climb, which is immediately followed by horizontal acceleration.
The climb phase helps lift the board, and less board in the water reduces drag.
If this is immediately followed by sideways acceleration, you will be able to reach higher
speeds than before thanks to the reduced drag.
Then, thanks to that extra speed, during the next climb phase, you’ll get a bit higher
than before.
You then have even less drag than before, so you can move faster in the acceleration
phase.
Each climb phase should yield less board in the water than before and then enable higher
speeds than before.
Until there is no board left being dragged in the water and you can foil away.
So you see it’s fundamental to have a climb phase, followed immediate by horizontal acceleration
phase.
And that is what this movement enables.
Just after you extend, as you start to pull down the wing and contract your body, you
get a period of feeling almost weightless.
This temporary weightlessness is a big part of what helps the board climb during foil
pumping, since it doesn’t have to lift all of your weight during that period.
This weightlessness or climb, is then naturally followed by horizontal pull from the wing
as it drops lower and gets pulled in.
So we have reduced weight to help the board climb, followed by sideways pull to help the
board accelerate.
Now we have strong wing pumping and the first element of foil pumping built into it.
Next we just have to add one more movement to complete the foil pumping side.
If you alternate foot pressure, this can greatly improve your foil pumping.
As you start extending your body and arms, pressure the back foot and lift the front.
You can see the front heel is lifted.
You then feel weightless as the wing drops and you start contracting your body.
This is when the board climbs easily.
But then as you weight drops back on the board, try to push down on the front foot and lift
the back instead.
You can see the back heel is lifted.
After you drop down on the board, you then shift this pressure to the back foot again
and start the whole cycle over.
Back-foot. Weightless board climb. Front foot. Back-foot. Weightless board climb. Front foot.
This alternating foot pressure helps a lot with the climb and accelerate phases.
That’s because if you pump the back foot at the start of extension, then you can get
the foil pitched upwards slightly.
Then as your weight comes off the board the pitched up foil can climb quite easily.
Then as you drop back on the board and you’re entering the acceleration phase, front foot
pressure will then help by lowering the pitch of the foil.
The more you lower the pitch, the more the hydrodynamic force on the foil will enable
you to accelerate forwards.
If the foil remained pitched upwards that would slow you down.
Let’s run through it all on the water.
It’s worth starting with a few basic pumps for the little extra speed that generates.
From there build to advanced pumps, putting in more and more energy.
Start to lift yourself and your wing, pushing off the back foot.
You then start contracting and pulling the wing down.
The board should climb easily since it’s pitched up and carrying less weight.
You then drop on the front foot and pull in the wing at a low angle.
You should accelerate easily.
You then shift from front foot pressure to back foot pressure, as you start extending
the wing, and the whole cycle starts again.
Climbing for less drag then accelerating for more speed.
Let’s look at that riding the other way.
Push off the back foot.
Extend your body up and wing away.
Cycle the wing down and start contracting your body.
The board should climb and loose drag.
Drop on the front foot and pull in the wing at a low angle.
The board should accelerate.
Shift to back foot pressure and start extending the wing away to start the cycle again.
Bare in mind this can be physically very draining, so if this doesn’t work after several pumps
don’t keep going.
Take a break. Get your energy back.
Then it’s a good idea to wait for the next gust of wind to improve your chances.
If your cycle keeps the wing at a high angle throughout, you will get more lift but not
much horizontal acceleration.
You are keeping the wing’s force angled upwards.
If your pump cycle drops the wing closer to the surface that will maximise sideways acceleration.
You are lowering the angle of the wing’s force as much as possible without hitting
the surface.
If the board is aimed upwind.
You will feel power in your wing, but you will struggle to accelerate.
Your board, and importantly the mast underneath it, are turned away from the force you get
from the wing.
Turning crosswind or slightly downwind will improve your chances massively.
Aiming slightly downwind means the board and the mast start to turn towards the force of
the wing.
Your can now accelerate towards the wing much more easily.
From the rider’s perspective the wing’s leading edge roughly lines up with the board’s
nose.
This means the board and mast are turned towards the pull of the wing enough that you can accelerate
more easily.
Of course, you can easily aim too far downwind.
Once you’re moving too far downwind, it will feel like the wind has dropped, since
you’re moving with it.
Thanks for watching and good luck learning to take off in less wind.