If there is one sport that suits plenty of athletes who live by the beach it’s surfing. Surfing holds a special mystique within culture, and most people will think of the surfer Bros they see on the American movies from the 90s when they hear the word surfing in the first place. It’s been commercialized and parodied over and over again throughout our culture, but surfing goes beyond those stereotypes of hipster guys with surf shorts down to their knees. 

It’s a serious sport to the point that there is competition every single year for surfers around the world, and while you can go out and get the best surf lessons California has to offer, you should think about whether you should start surfing in the first place. If learning to surf has been on your mind but you haven’t got round to booking just yet, we’ve put together a list of the reasons you should stop dithering and go ahead and book. Let’s take a look.

• Build your fitness.

• Surfing is as physically demanding as any sport out there, but often it can be more dangerous and more demanding! How many other sports are there that involve you potentially encountering wildlife that could bite you under the water? How many other sports are there that see you rolling in the waves and being smashed down by the ocean? There aren’t very many! Surfing isn’t for everyone, but those who do it enjoy it and they know that it’s like a drug; They want to go back again and again.
• Any given surf session will provide a huge full body workout, not only do you have to paddle, you have to pop up onto the board while you carve wave faces. As a surfer, you will work your upper body and your core strength as well as give your hips more mobility and your thighs more strength along the way. You’ll be able to maintain a higher level of physical fitness when you become a surfer.

• To build your confidence.

• Physical fitness often brings confidence because you feel more at ease in your own body. The confidence that comes when you learn to surf isn’t always rooted within your ego, because learning to surf is not easy. Not only are you learning to balance your body on a thin slab of wood on moving water, you can’t press pause on the ocean full of stuff when you learn to play tennis.
• You can stop and re-calibrate whenever you want too, but you can’t do that when there is a wave crashing over you. It’s the kind of confidence you have to build that makes you feel slightly fearless when you are on the water. Knowing that you have just popped up onto a board and road natural energy on moving water can give you an adrenaline boost like nothing else.

• Learn respect for the ocean.

• If there is one thing you’ll learn very quickly as you learn to surf is that you will be open to a new respect for the environment. There’s something very calming about sitting on the ocean at the crack of dawn and conquering big waves as they come. You’ll be able to connect differently to the world around you and while it can feel difficult to feel anything other than battered and bruised after your first lesson, with enough time on the water it will start to build for you.

• It’s a huge release.

• Everybody on the water is equal no matter which background you come from or when you learn to surf. You learn to appreciate something much greater than you when you’re facing the ocean every time you head out there to get some exercise. You are focusing so hard on this new sport you have learned that you let go of everything else while you are in it. This kind of like wave therapy; the adrenaline and endorphins that come with it can really help after a good session.

• The culture.

• Those who choose to learn to surf will be involved in a whole new culture they didn’t know existed. You’ll make new friends, you’ll have people surrounding you who want you to succeed because they are the ones teaching you and learning alongside you. Depending on where you decide to surf, you might find a different vibe and style of suffering from one beach to the next.
• As you become more confident on the water, you can join surf teams and groups that you can take out with you on the water whether you are doing it competitively or you are casually surfing. There’s nothing quite like the community that you build when you decide to surf.

• The chance to travel.

• One of the best reasons out there to learn to surf is due to the fact you should feel like you can travel the world just to compete in your sport. Not every surfer likes to compete and not every competitive surfer likes to go to different places; They like the beach that they know. However, surfing in Hawaii is very different from surfing in surfers paradise on the Gold Coast. There’s something different no matter where you go, which means that surfing is always going to help you to reach new heights.

• For peace.

• While we talked about surfing being an excellent way to build a community and build friendships, there is some solitude in learning how to surf. You can surf in contests and you can head up and down the beaches around the world to join teams and compete for trophies, but there is some solitude about sitting on the water early in the morning or late in the evening and just being on your own. Not everybody who surfs spends the entire time riding the waves. As you catch your breath and you look back at the coastline while you’re out on the water, there is a feeling of peace that you will be able to embrace that you can’t get anywhere else.