Kiwi Surf Magazine

Red Bull Girls ride reed surfboards

During the high performance camp ‘Red Bull Surfing Girls Only’ in Peru, the World Top female surfers Sofía Mulanovich and Sally Fitzgibbons, together with the special guest, jr. surfer Nadja de Col, changed their surfboards for “Caballo de Totora” (Totora Horses), a traditional Peruvian boat that has thousands of years of history.
Carlos Ucañán, one of the few people knowledgeable in the craft of building the ancient fisher boats, travelled from a town in the far north of Peru to teach the surfers how to ride the Caballito de Tortora.
The handmade boat, used for fishing is locally known as the predecessor of the surfboard. It is built with hundreds of dry plants of Totora, which are cut and wrapped. A regular Caballo de Tortora weights 30 kilos and measures four and a half meters. It also has a small hole in which the fisherman sits and paddles. For the Red Bull surfing Girls Only Camp, Carlos Ucañan built two special Caballitos: they weigh 25 kilos and are 3 meters long.

There are only a few lucky people that can have a rather rare Caballito for themselves; Sofía, Sally and Nadja jumped on this chance and even the swell and wind worked in their favor and enabled them to hit some waves. Just before getting in the water the surfers were very excited, but also nervous. “I never saw one of these before, only the one’s they sell as key chains in some stores,” said Sally Fitzgibbons. On the other side, Sofía, despite being Peruvian and knowing all the tradition of the boat, never had the chance to surf one. “They are huge and heavy, much bigger than a normal surfboard, lets see what happens,” Sofia commented before getting in the sea.
After some paddling and failed attempts, they seeked the help of Mr. Ucañan; eventually Sofia, Sally and Nadja mastered the ancient boards, showing the style of the ancient Mochica-Chimu Culture and all their abilities as pro surfers. “It was incredible. A lot of fun but very difficult to stand up and do some maneuvers with it. It does not have killas, and it’s very, very heavy”, said Sofia. Extraordinary balance was the key to success. The top female surfers were able to stand up on this “new” board within an hour of practice thanks to their talent and practice. Even the coaches Dan Ross and Shane Beschen ran into the water to have a chance to surf on this locally made surfboard.

More on the Red Bull Surfing Girls Only camp:
Looking to be in top shape for the upcoming competitions, Sally Fitzgibbons, Sofía Mulanovich, Maya Gabeira and jr. surfer Nadja de Col worked on specific aspects of there technique and nutrition during the 'Red Bull Surfing Girls Only camp' at the beaches of Señoritas, Caballeros, San Bartolo, Punta Hermosa and Puerto Viejo.
The Red Bull Surfing Girls Only high performance surf camp Red Bull has come to an end. From May 27th-June 1st (days on which the Red Bull Girls Surfing Only was held), video analysis reigned supreme. While the girls were surfing, a coach was videotaping every move they made. As soon as the surfers came out of the sea, they would be shown how they were surfing and what they should work on. According to Dan Ross, head coach for the Red Bull female team, “Instant video analysis is key. The surfers get instant feedback of what they are doing while standing right on the sand, with the wetsuit still on. This allows them to go right back into the sea and try out what we discussed”. However, video analysis does not end there. At a beach house in Señoritas, where the camp held its base, an overhead projector showed the videos on a living room wall. The surfers would sit down with their coaches and go over their moves and mistakes once again.
Even though the whole group practiced together at sea, corrections and analysis were discussed individually. “Each surfer is different and has specific skills in which she needs to work on. The training package we designed for Sofía is different to Sally’s, which is also different to Maya’s and Nadja’s”, states Andy Walshe, High-Performance Manager for the Red Bull surf team. “These days at sea, I’ve been working on technical aspects: be more focused when catching a wave, and going into the wave using more of the rail”, said Sofía. Nadja had different instructions; she worked on lifting up her arms to get more balance, getting a bigger spin on the board and improving her wave vision, while Sally enforced her aerial maneuvers.
Within camp, the girls also had special training sessions designed to improve their aerials, continuing what they learned in the Red Bull Project Air at the beginning of the year in Australia. Under the direction of the expert coach Shane Beschen, the girls used an elastic bed and a skateboard to simulate the action in the water and repeat the way they land and special aerial moves. They also worked on their paddling technique, the criteria for picking a wave and their diet. The grand finale for these intense days of practice was a mock tournament, in which the surfers simulated the heats and rounds that are part of any tour stop, playing in teams to achieve more points doing different surf maneuvers.
Thus, Sally, Sofia and Nadja are fully prepared for the fifth WCT tour stop, which will be held June 5th-10th in San Bartolo, one of the beaches in which the girls have been practicing this week. Maya is taking home some new learning’s to feel more confident in the water and that will lead to a better big wave surfing, while Nadja had a amazing experience training with professional coaches and some of the Top Female surfers in the world. “After this week I feel more confident with my surfing and I feel more prepared for my next WCT that will be at home in Peru,” said Sofia. “This camp has been hard but also a lot of fun, its cool to be only among girls some times, we had the chance to improve our surfing using the video analysis, which I think it’s was the key in this camp”, added Sally.