Surfing is an excellent way to boost mental and physical performance without all the strain and stress of hitting the stuffy and overcrowded gym every day. The health benefits of taking up surfing, even as a hobby, are incredible! Not to mention the view of the shore from beyond the breakers is beautiful.
Here are a few ways that surfing can help your mental and physical help:
Balance and Coordination
Your balance and coordination are really important aspects of daily life; without them, you’d be stumbling all over the place. Literally. Surfing is known for its use of core strength, proprioception, and reflexes, which ultimately assist in training your balance and coordination.
As laidback as the sport is, it requires a lot of muscle memory which is learned through practice. Small, almost unseen adjustments are made whenever you catch a wave, and the more you surf, the easier it becomes. This is because your balance and coordination start to improve.
Focus and Concentration
When you’re out on the water, as relaxed as you feel, your brain is going through a new set of motions that you may not even notice. Surfing requires quite a bit of mental prowess, and like with balance, it’s subtle, and sometimes you don’t even notice it.
The distraction-free environment allows your mind to concentrate on specific details, and it’s all about the detail in surfing. Before you know it, your mind will be focusing on subtle changes in waves, quietly observing your surroundings, and making more of an active effort to concentrate than you did in 5th Grade Maths Class.
Surfing is Great Cardio
Cardio is the bane of any gym-goers existence, but at least with surfing, working out that cardiovascular system can be a tranquil experience. Surfing requires the use of multiple muscle groups in one go. As much as people watching from the sidelines think it looks easy, this can actually be quite demanding.
The increase of oxygen and circulation through the body to support these muscle groups can be quite the workout for your cardiovascular system. Surfing requires plenty of endurance, and in the long run, your heart and lungs will start to reap the benefits of the sport.
Improved Strength and Flexibility
If you’ve ever watched a surfer before, it seems like their legs move completely separately from their bodies, which is flexibility.
The quick, curated movements of surfing have been known to increase your flexibility and strength; after all, surfing has plenty of core work which is why a surf bod is almost synonymous with washboard abs!
It requires the use of multiple muscle groups and joints to shred that wave perfectly, so of course, you’ll slowly start to notice bending down to touch your toes doesn’t feel like a baseball bat to the hamstring!
Stress Reduction
The ocean has always been a calm and peaceful place for some (unless you have thalassophobia, then what are you doing here?). Surfing, being a completely water-based sport, offers a sense of calm and relaxation that people often find addictive.
The ocean provides a stress-free environment, with the gentle currents tickling your skin and the lack of distractions keeping you mentally present and balanced at the time.
You’ll feel at one with nature and slowly feel the tension in your muscles fade as the stressors of everyday life are forgotten. The world revolves simply around you and your surfboard. -100
Strengthening Social Connections
Mental health often goes hand in hand with social interaction, and people often find making friends difficult and scary. We get caught up in silly motions where finding your people has become hard.
But surfing? No matter where you hail from, the surf community is an incredible bunch of people. There’s not a time out on the water where the stranger on the board next to you won’t strike up a conversation. And that’s what our mental health needs: pure, non-judgemental interactions with others to boost our self-esteem and make us feel good. Humans are, after all, a social species.
An Unbelievable Confidence Booster
Confidence and self-assurance tend to go together with our mental health, and people who suffer from confidence issues tend to struggle with depression, anxiety, and stress-related illness.
Surfing is a great way to boost your confidence in a calm and relaxing environment. Not only are the people of the surfing community incredibly supportive and friendly, but they’re encouraging too.
Surfing can help you face and overcome challenges in the water; it’ll push you to take risks, and trust us, you’ll reap the rewards and help you gain a sense of adventure.
All of these aspects can help your confidence get a much-needed boost, and the world of dryland won’t seem like such a scary and unforgiving place anymore.
A Non-Supplemented Means of Getting Much Needed Vitamin D.
When your parents tell you to take your vitamins, they only seek what’s best for you. But in a time when most people spend upwards of 9 hours of daylight hidden in the shadows of an office or school, we can sometimes find ourselves suffering from a Vitamin D deficiency.
Vitamin D is incredibly important to human health and assists our immune systems, bones, and overall mental health, keeping us healthy and balanced. And where does Vitamin D come from? Good old unfiltered sunshine. And what better way to soak up the rays than out on a surfboard in the cooling ocean waters?
Conclusion
So as you can see, surfing offers a myriad of health benefits, from improving mental stamina to helping you get that summer body in a way you never expected. It’s one of the best sports out there, and there’s a reason you’ll often find professionals saying they live and breathe surfing. There’s nothing better!
So if you’re looking to start or want to exercise in a way that doesn’t feel like a chore, why not take up surfing? We offer the perfect place to start out! North Shore Beach Boyz has all you need to get you on a board and out into the big blue, searching for the perfect wave! -111
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