“I Feel Like When I’m Parallel And I Hit A Foamball, I Carry A Lot More Momentum”

“The key factor for this recent run in Hawaii, I believe, was the preexisting ocean state that’s been set,” Mark Healey explained to us recently. “So many storms took almost an identical track that all that energy’s flowing in one direction in the North Pacific. That’s when you see these hyper-consistent swells.” 

If you missed it, Hawaii spent almost all of February in an extended crescendo of remarkable swell, which you can read about in full here.

Above, Tosh Tudor reminds us that he’s quietly developing his status as one of the most barreled people on the planet — producing an entire video part of Hawaiian curtain calls from the extended swell buffet.

“It was pretty wild,” laughs Tosh. “I guess it was something like 13 swells back to back or something. I pretty much surfed every day as much as I could, but it was crazy. The pack didn’t thin out until the very end. It took 12 days of pumping waves for some of the guys to be like ‘okay, I’m gonna chill today.’

“The program for me was to get out there as early as possible before the boys get on it. And then I was just trying to time my windows with the crowd, but sometimes you just have to sit out there for six hours and just wait until your time comes.

“I was eating shit tons of food at night, but no food during the day because you’re just kind of sitting there watching it all day,” Tosh laughs. “I mean, I’m sure there’s way better ways to go about it, but I was having trouble leaving because when one of those windows happens, it’s so crucial to just be out there. Literally. It could be just 30 minutes where a couple guys go in and then boom, you have an opportunity to get one of those waves.”

As you’ll notice, the Tudor familys eldest son continues his evolution of parallel-stance backside tuberide, pushing it to previously unseen frontiers at V-Land, Sunset, Off-The-Wall and Honolua.

“I first tried the parallel-backside stance down at the points in Mexico and I was like, ‘Whoa, this actually works really well,'” he recalls.

“I felt like I could pump better, all my speed was centered and if I needed to get up and go, I was in a good position to do so. Plus, your body is facing straight instead of angled to the beach. And then I went down to some bigger beach breaks in Mex and figured I had to try it in proper tubes. I’ve always watched Torren Martyn do it in his own way on pretty solid waves. I figured there was no reason to not try.

“It ended up feeling like I was able to carry momentum off the bottom so much better than with a normal pig-dog — it worked really good in those beach breaks. So it just became something I got used to, and I’ve spent the last two winters in Hawaii pretty much doing the parallel thing on most rights I get.”

Tosh acknowledges the stance has a few limitations — and you can see him switching between a more standard pigdog throughout the clip.

“Sometimes if it’s a really nuts drop, it’s kinda hard to go parallel,” he explains. “Sometimes you need to Barron Mamiya that thing and get your legs wide to properly airdrop it. And, when you hit a gnarly foamball, I would say it’s easier to be in more of a typical pig-dog, it’ll definitely keep your board from sliding all over the place.

“But, I do feel like when I go parallel and hit a foam ball, if my rail stays engaged, I carry a lot more momentum over it. In normal pig-dogs, my butt can catch sometimes and slow me down, whereas parallel shoots me out of it with more speed instead of getting stuck. I think the big thing is, no matter what, I’m in this little ball with my feet together over the middle of the board — so I’m going to keep my momentum going forward.

His tips for those of you who want to try it at home?

Pack a bunch of closeouts.

“Obviously if you do get a good wave somewhere, you don’t want to just try this parallel thing out of nowhere. It’s nerveracking, but if you do it a couple times, packing some waves and just pulling your back foot up, by the time the waves are pumping it feels so much easier. I’ve been just packing closeouts like that for a while.”

Click above for a free lesson on navigating the inside of waves — directed by Kalani Minihan.