How to Windsurf (Beginner's Guide)

In this video I'm going to show you what you might expect from the first time you go windsurfing. Whether you've booked your first lesson or you're on holiday and you want to try windsurfing for the first time, I'll take you through what you could be learning on day one. You're probably going to start off with some practice on the land but I'm going to jump straight on the water and show you from here. So step one is the setup. So make sure your back is to the wind with your equipment downwind of you. That way if anything goes wrong your equipment will move away from you and not towards you. It doesn't really matter which way the sail is flipped just as long as it's on the downwind side. So before we get on the board you're going to want to put the dagger board down. This will help you stay stable and stop you from slipping sideways. Okay now let's get onto the board. Put your hands either side of the mast base then climb onto the board and put your knees where your hands were. Next grab the uphaul or rope and get to your feet. Try to have your feet shoulder width apart over the center of the board. Then lift the sail out of the water. Try to use mostly your leg muscles to avoid straining your back. The sail will feel heavy at first but once you lift it out the water it will feel much lighter. Keep pulling the sail up until you can reach the mast. Place both hands on the mast underneath the boom. Try to bend your knees and extend your arms to have full control over the sail. Okay so on to the next part which is learning to move forward in the sailing position. So you're going to take your front hand the one that is closest to the nose of the board and place it on the boom. Then step back with your feet so that both feet are behind the mast base. Your back foot should be pointed across the board and your front foot should be pointing towards the mast base. Now before you grab onto the boom with the other hand make sure you move the sail slightly into the wind so that the mast is upright. Then you can grab on with the other hand. Let's now take a quick look at the stance. So first of all look at my legs. The front leg is completely straight with the foot facing forwards. The back leg is bent with the foot facing across the board. Now take a look at my arms. So the front one is straight whilst the back arm is slightly bent controlling the power in the sail. Your hands should be about shoulder width apart. Also if you look at my posture my back is straight and I'm leaning back against the power in the sail. A good stance basically looks like a backwards seven. It's so important to take your time to get the stance right as it will help you progress much faster and you'll have much more control this way. Okay so at this point you should be moving forwards in a straight line. If you pull the sail in with your back hand you're going to have more power and if you want less power just let the sail out. If you generally want a bit more control you can try moving both your hands a little bit closer to the front or closer to the mast. It's important that you keep your front hand strong and that if you were to let go of any hand it must be the back hand. Once you've got the hang of going in a straight line the next step is to try turning around. There are two ways you can turn around either by turning into the wind or by turning away from the wind. Let's start with turning away from the wind. So the first step is to take off your back hand then you're going to move the sail forward and towards the wind. This will get the board turning away from the wind. Keep pushing to turn the board. Once the board is facing with the wind or straight downwind this is when you need to switch your feet. Make sure to keep pushing the sail towards the wind to continue turning. Wait until you've turned completely so you're facing in the new direction across the wind. Then at this point you can move your hands to the new side. You want to make sure that you get back into a good stance to get going now in the opposite direction. Okay so now for the other way to turn around. I personally think that this is a bit harder but if you're making good progress it's a very important turn to be able to do. So this time we're going into the wind. Start off by steering towards the wind. You can do this by bringing both hands towards the front and placing them together. Then lean the sail towards the water and then to the back of the board. You should now be starting to move towards the wind. As you're approaching the wind move your feet forward and specifically your front foot just in front of the mast base. Keep moving the sail across the tail of the board to keep turning. Once the board is passing through the eye of the wind this is when you should cross your back hand over to the new side. Do this and also bring your other foot up to the mast base. Now continue moving your feet around the board. You should almost be there now. So to complete the final bit of the turn push the sail forwards and towards the wind. This will rotate the board under you and get it to point in the right direction. Move your feet back to correct the position on the new side and place your hands shoulder width apart back to that original stance. Pull in with the back hand to power up the sail and get going again. So that's it, that's all I'm going to cover for now. If you manage to do all of this on your first lesson or even the first few you're progressing very well but if not don't worry. The main thing to focus on in that first lesson is just getting onto the board and moving in a straight line. Wind surfing is one of those sports which looks a lot easier than it actually is. So keep going, it's really worth it when you finally get the hang of it and you get that feeling that we're all addicted to. As always thanks for watching, have a great rest of your day and I'll see you in the next video.