91 Rob Case - Paddling Coach

Oct 13

Are you really surfing… or just surviving your sessions?

Whether you’re getting back in the water after an injury or chasing efficiency in crowded lineups, this episode with surf paddling expert Rob Case dives deep into what makes good surfers great—and why most people overlook the fundamentals like paddling technique, takeoff timing, and wave strategy.

Learn why the pop-up is a maneuver, not just a transition—and how timing it wrong can ruin the whole ride.
Discover how surfing bigger boards can radically rewire your takeoff decisions and boost confidence in beach breaks and point breaks alike.
Get a behind-the-scenes look at how Rob’s new Level 1 & 2 coaching format blends pool drills and ocean sessions for lasting progress.

If you're ready to rethink your surfing from the water up, hit play and learn why a smarter paddle out leads to better waves and less burnout.

Episode 12 with Rob: Spotify & Apple

Rob's Website: https://www.surfingpaddling.com/ & https://surfmastery.com/

Key Points

Introduction of Rob Case and recommendation of his courses for improving surfing skills and efficiency.
Discussion of Rob Case's adaptation of his surfing courses to one-on-one sessions to better understand clients' ocean habits.
Rob Case describes how his philosophy for pop-up movement in surfing is based on gaining control and unconscious movement.
Discussion on the strategy of planning the paddling back out after catching and riding a wave, emphasizing efficiency and energy conservation.
Rob Case and Michael discuss the advantages of surfing with a larger board, such as an 11-foot glider, in terms of learning wave positioning and rhythm.
Rob Case mentions that for duck dives, people often dive deeper than necessary and suggests experimenting without a board to find the optimal depth.
Rob Case and Michael critique the World Surf League (WSL) for scheduling competitions on smaller, less challenging waves, impacting the viewing experience for fans.
Rob Case discusses his upcoming surf trips, including Surf Ranch in late February and a surf camping trip in California.
Rob Case emphasizes the importance of pop-up technique in surfing, noting its overlooked complexity and variability based on wave conditions and board behavior.
Rob Case advises against relying too heavily on surf forecasting technology and emphasizes the importance of experiencing and adapting to real ocean conditions.

Outline

Rob Case's surfing courses

Rob Case offers two levels of surfing courses: Level 1 and Level 2.
Rob has shifted to primarily one-on-one sessions for both levels, with two sessions in the ocean and two in the pool.
Rob's courses now include training on the pop-up movement, based on requests from clients.
Rob emphasizes the importance of unconscious movement and control during the pop-up.
Rob works with surf coaches to help clients progress beyond standing on the surfboard.

Surfing strategies and techniques

Michael discusses the importance of having a plan when surfing, including how to return to the lineup after riding a wave.
Rob emphasizes the need for efficiency in movement and paddling, especially when using a large board like an 11-foot glider.
Michael and Rob discuss the benefits of using a larger board to improve surfing skills and confidence.
They talk about the advantages of surfing closer to the whitewater and how it can help surfers learn to surf more effectively.
Michael mentions the importance of paddling technique and strength in surfing, especially when duck diving.

Surfing etiquette and culture

Michael and Rob discuss the importance of surfing etiquette and understanding the culture of surfing.
They mention the frustration that can arise from a lack of understanding of surfing etiquette in crowded lineups.
Rob suggests following Instagram accounts like kookoftheday and johnwaynefreeman to learn about surfing rules and culture.
They talk about the need for shaming new surfers who don't understand the etiquette and culture of surfing.

Surf trips and locations

Rob discusses the surf trips he organizes, including trips to Surf Ranch, California, Washington, and Baja.
He mentions the importance of pre-qualifying participants for these trips, especially for advanced trips.
Rob talks about the demand for these surf experiences and how he prioritizes alumni and course graduates for invitations.
They discuss the challenges of organizing family-friendly surf trips and the importance of finding the right location and accommodations.

Wave pools and their role in surfing

Rob and Michael discuss the role of wave pools in surfing, including their benefits and limitations.
They talk about the variety of waves available in wave pools and the learning curve associated with them.
Rob mentions the cultural experience and bonding that can be found in wave pools, although it may not be the same as a traditional surf trip.
They discuss the importance of blending the experience of wave pools with the cultural and bonding aspects of traditional surf trips.

Pop-up technique and its importance

Michael and Rob discuss the importance of the pop-up technique in surfing.
They talk about how the pop-up is often overlooked and underworked on by surfers.
Rob emphasizes the need to slow down and work on the pop-up, as it is a maneuver that cannot be overlooked.
They discuss how the pop-up can be used by professional surfers to create drama and maximize barrel times.

Surfing philosophy and mindset

Rob and Michael discuss the importance of having a surfing philosophy and mindset.
They talk about the need to be dedicated and put in the work to improve as a surfer.
Rob mentions the importance of not relying too much on technology and algorithms for surf forecasting.
They discuss the quote from Oki about denying oneself amazing surfing experiences if one doesn't go after them.

Surfing equipment and board selection

Michael and Rob discuss the importance of having a range of surfboards to choose from based on the conditions.
They talk about the philosophy of choosing a board based on how one wants to surf the wave, rather than just the paddle out.
Rob mentions the benefits of using gliders, single fins, and boogie boards to learn and improve surfing skills.
They discuss the movie North Shore and the guru's approach to teaching surfing, starting with a log with no fin and gradually moving to shorter boards.

Body surfing and its benefits

Rob and Michael discuss the benefits of body surfing, including the ability to sit inside crowded spots and catch waves that others miss.
They talk about the learnings from body surfing that can be applied to shortboarding, such as understanding the steepness of waves and the importance of setting the body into the wave.
Rob mentions the dolphin start technique in body surfing, where one sets up further out and uses a dolphin kick to shoot out the front of the wave.
They discuss the similarities between body surfing and foiling, with Rob expressing interest in foiling but ultimately deciding to stick with surfing.

Surfing styles and influences

Michael and Rob discuss their preferences for certain surfing styles and influences.
They mention surfers like Bryce, Rice, and bow, who they admire for their unique and progressive surfing styles.
They talk about the evolution of surfing styles, including the shift from going above the wave to going sideways around it.
They discuss the importance of relating to standard waves and the fulfillment of different needs in surfing.

Transcription

Michael Frampton
Welcome back or welcome to the Surf Mastery Podcast. My guest in today's episode is Rob Case from surfingpaddling.com. First interviewed Rob back in 2016. He's one of the first guests. That's back in episode number 12. And we really talked about the details of paddling. Paddling a surfboard and how to improve the efficiency in order to paddle faster, catch more waves, but look after those shoulders. That's a timeless episode, so if you haven't heard that one, I encourage you to go back and listen to that. Rob has a fantastic website and YouTube channel with plenty of free information. And then after I'd interviewed Rob back in 2016, I then moved to the States in 2018 and did both of his courses, Level 1 and Level 2. And I cannot recommend them enough. Yeah, so go back and listen to episode number 12. I will put links to that in the show notes. And go and check out Rob's website, surfingpaddling.com. Again, links to that website in the show notes. In today's episode, I'm not really interviewing Rob per se. It's more of a wide-ranging conversation about all things surfing. So please enjoy my conversation with Rob Case.

Rob Case
It's heavy. Are you getting time to surf and to kind of unwind, or are you just 100% dad?

Michael Frampton
I am now. You know, for the first two years, I pretty much... I didn't. I had a couple of major injuries as well, like I broke my ankle pretty bad, needed surgery, and then I did my AC and my shoulder mountain biking.

Rob Case
My God.

Michael Frampton
Like I rode a shortboard today for the first time in a long time, so wow, just sort of getting back into it. But I've been doing heaps of longboarding, which is, you know, I've been riding my 11-foot glider basically exclusively for six months. So that's been a nice sort of re-entry back into surfing.

Rob Case
I bet everybody around you loves you.

Michael Frampton
No, there's just no one ever around, man. No one surfs around here. I'm out there to myself. Yeah. In the summertime, it'll get busier here, but in the winter, it's already warm here, so...

Rob Case
Nice. Yeah, I loved... I was in New Zealand this time of the year when I visited North Island. It was awesome. Loved it.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, this is a nice time of year to be here, actually.

Rob Case
Yeah. Where are you? Are you near Auckland?

Michael Frampton
No, I'd be an hour flight from Auckland or a five-hour drive south in a place called Hawke's Bay, which is on the east coast of the North Island.

Rob Case
Okay. I don't think I got down there. We went to the east coast, but we shot through Lake Taupo and got almost straight over, and then we went north. So you wouldn't...

Michael Frampton
Want the kids then? Yeah. Yeah, so we're just... If you'd gone... If you'd gone south, you would have ran into me, basically. Same coastline. Gisborne is kind of the famous surfing area on the east coast around here. It gets more, a lot more swell than we do. Yeah, yeah.

Rob Case
It sounds like the glider works then.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, exactly.

Rob Case
That's cool, man. Yeah, we've been busy. Surfing, I mean, I don't think I've gone surfing for myself in a while. I'm always with a client. So it's still surfing, but it's not personal surfing. I'll catch a few waves every once in a while. No, it's so...

Michael Frampton
You kind of see him like a guide or an outfitter in a way.

Rob Case
Things have changed since you took the course. My Level 1 course, I've gone all one-on-one for the most part—four sessions—and two of them are in the ocean and two of them are in the pool. So it's... It's nice because we stretch things out a little bit more. It's not so condensed into one shot. I still do the group workshops from time to time, but the one-on-one has been a blessing in disguise because I really get to know the clients better and understand. I get to see them in the ocean, because like the way they move in the pool or in flat water is totally different than how they move in the ocean sometimes, especially when they're in that wave-catching environment. And then all their bad habits come back. And so I kind of have then something to work on with them. And then I can take them into Level 2 and I'll already kind of know where their wave-catching baseline is at that point. So it's been... It's been cool. I thought I was done as a doornail when COVID hit. I had just finished an injury at that time too. I'd put a fin right through my right foot and almost lost two toes. Yeah, it was brutal. It was a long recovery. It wouldn't recover. The blood flow wasn't working down there. And so I was out of work for like four months. I couldn't work for four months before COVID hit. And then I finally got back on my feet and then COVID hit. And I was like, crap. You know, I better refresh my resume again. Yeah. But then, you know, as you know, surfing kind of blew up and I've been seven days a week since then. So it's great. Yeah. I have to like schedule—I need to remember to schedule—time for myself to rest, but it's been good. Things have been flowing. Changed Level 2 a little bit since you took it, but... Yeah, I'm just doing the same Level 1, Level 2. Anything up until people are standing. And then I’m working with a lot of surf coaches and teaming up with them to kind of take it from there. So I've been doing surf trips since too.

Michael Frampton
Okay. That's awesome. But when you say like anything up until they're standing, does that mean you're including the take-off pop-up movement as well into your training?

Rob Case
Yeah, so... That was an addition that was requested by a lot of clients. Whenever they take Level 2, they're like, “Can you look at my pop-up?” I'm like, I can, but there's not really... There's a little bit of science behind the pop-up, but there's not really anything that's been studied. But what I was able to kind of research and find anecdotally were, you know, a couple of things that were common across any technique that's taught. And so my philosophy is like, hey, as long as you get to your feet with control of your surfboard in all planes—horizontal and lateral—you move the way you're going to move. And then the second absolute is that you have to learn to do that unconsciously, with unconscious movement, not thinking about it. So those are the two rules and that's constant across anything. And so then I looked up a few different ways, kind of movement paths that a person can make. And because a lot of people were like, “Well, I can't move this way when so-and-so tells me to do a pop-up this way.” I'm like, “Well, why don't you do it in reverse and let's see what your body will do?” And sure enough, when they did it in reverse, they surprised themselves in how they could move. And I was like, “Well, you just need to train your brain to do it the other way.” Right. And so it kind of helped a lot of people. And so I included it. So now Level 2 is getting out, strategy and technique—which is another thing that's completely lost with a lot of people. And they burn so much energy making the wrong decisions. And I'm like, hey, make better decisions with strategy. And then which technique to use in what situation. And then the second kind of the three points of the triangle. So we've got getting out. We've got wave catching—which is what you went through with the sprint technique and reading waves and the three different planes, X, Y, and Z. And then we have pop-up. And so then once people are steady on their feet, I like working with a surf coach to kind of take it from there. And that's been really fun on surf trips. It's me and a surf coach. So we cover the whole kind of gamut. We don't have fitness, but we cover the gamut of activity, I guess, or experience of fitness. Surfing, which is fun.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. The hunger for surfing waves was... cover the fitness side of... Interesting you mention all that because I mean those are the... When I go surfing now those are the only two things that I think about. Especially when you are holding on to a heavy 11-foot surfboard, you're like, I want to paddle, I want to surf, and keep my hair dry.

Rob Case
Things. Yeah.

Michael Frampton
I want to go over a wave, or if I have to go under, I want my board to be right there when I come up. I want to time it properly. My paddle out—I want to be aware of how water's moving before the wave and after the wave and all of that jazz. And then when I'm paddling in, I'm like... Surfing a wave is like singing a song. If you don't hit that first note, the whole thing is just... So if you don't set your line and pop up and take off properly, then the rest of the wave... If you're just trying to find your feet—and if you're surfing a beach break—it's gone.

Rob Case
Yeah. It's the rhythm, right? Yeah, you're out of rhythm. And you could be out of rhythm—or in rhythm—just getting out. You know, and you talk about whether your hair dry or not. A lot of people, they kick out of a wave and they're immediately on their way back out. It's like, whoa. Let's have a plan. If you catch the wave and you ride it properly all the way through, where's your path back out? Which way is the current moving? What's going to be your easiest way back out? Right. And then what happens if... Let's say you're out of rhythm on the takeoff and you fumbled your feet, and maybe you end up having to straighten out. What do you do then? Right? And Ocean Beach, San Francisco—there are currents all over the place. And so... Having a plan that if you have to straighten out, maybe the best bet is actually to go the opposite way. Or maybe even to come in a little bit further, and then over and then out. And it's funny because people won't extend their distance because they think that's going to be more tiring. But if you're trying to paddle right back out on the same sandbar that's just crushing you, you're going to burn way more energy. And so if they've already taken Level 1 from me, they know how to have that efficiency of movement in the longer-distance paddles. And so they end up saving more energy. So it's... I didn't think about this until I started just kind of, “Hey, once you're way back, hold on, let's let this set come through. Let's assess. We're in no danger being in here—as long as there's no rocks behind you or anything like that.” Right. And just kind of take your time. And then let's figure out where to go. And that always changes as the tide changes and the swell changes throughout a session. So you're still monitoring all that stuff. But it makes a huge difference, especially if you have an 11-foot glider. That's a lot of... It's a lot of work to move that thing around. And if you have to move it around in the impact zone, that's even more work. I get more tired from longboarding than I do shortboarding. You're moving more mass.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, exactly. Especially if you want to start, you know, swinging the board and using the swing weight and the momentum of it to paddle in and cork takeoff. And man, you're never more sore than wrangling an 11-foot board on a decent swell. Yeah. And you're right. And all of that stuff, like in between waves, because you have to hyper-focus on which way the water may be. Where is everyone? You've got an 11-foot board and a nine-foot leg rope. You're like, you need to know, you need to be hyper-aware of everyone else.

Rob Case
Well, if you're considerate like you are. I know some people that aren't as considerate with big boards like that, but yeah, of course.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah. And the cool thing is having that much board sort of forces you to focus on all this stuff. And just when you do jump on the shortboard, you just sort of—like today I noticed, because I've been surfing the 11-foot glider exclusively—it's because once it's going, so much momentum and you can get in so early, you can surf way behind the wave and still make it around sections. And you can just cut through a lot of stuff. So you get very used to surfing right back behind the wave and not worrying about the wave running away from you because you know, no, I can see it. I've got my momentum. So then it changes your whole perspective. So today on my shortboard, I was sort of a bit slow on the takeoff because I'm used to riding a bigger board. But it didn’t matter. It actually helped me a little bit because it made me airdrop down into it. I was already behind the wave, but it didn’t—because I was so used to being back there, riding the big board—I wasn’t worried. Again, I've got more confidence to surf behind the wave and really sort of trust in the bottom turn is going to shoot me around. So I...

Rob Case
Never thought about that being an advantage of that and switching to a shortboard and having that. That is really cool. I felt that. That's why I'm like, yeah. I have certainly felt that same experience when you switch back and forth. Yeah, if you push pause on any—on any high-level surfer, right? Surfing a decent wave. You push pause at the apex of their bottom turn and just imagine, okay, what are they seeing? What are they looking at? Half of their vision is taken up by whitewater. Half of it. How often are you surfing like that? How often are you surfing so far back that, shit, you're not even sure whether it’s—like the whitewater’s right there? Not often, man. Not often. And the thing is, if... This is the same thing as how often do you do a bottom turn and you realize, I could have been deeper, and it shoots you out onto the shoulder too far and you lose all your speed. That happens all the time, right? We always push our bottom turn too far away from the whitewater. But how often are you making the mistake of not pushing your bottom turn back far enough, like fading too much and just getting smoked? Yeah, we don’t do that. So if you don’t start going and playing with the opposite side of the spectrum... We all know what it’s like to surf on the shoulder and surf away from the power source on a bigger board. But just play around with how far back can I surf? How close to the whitewater can I get and still actually make it around and still set a line? And surfing a bigger board really gets you to play with that because there’s a lot more—the board’s already moving, there’s momentum, there's more wiggle room for those mistakes. You can surf back quite far and still make it around sections. So the bigger board—so anyway, if you do a cutback, everything’s slowed down, you end up right back, and you’d be surprised how far behind and down into the whitewater you can come out of. And that's how the pros... That’s where the pros surf, right? As close to the whitewater as possible.

Rob Case
It’s a good compromise of learning that skill. Because if you were on a shortboard all the time and a surf coach told you, “You should be fading more and being behind the whitewater,” no surfer is going to give up waves until they learn that. Like, waves are too precious. Right? That's something I commonly tell clients is like, “Hey, let’s make your paddling strokes precious, and waves—just let them be.” Because you gotta try stuff. If you're going to progress, you gotta try stuff. But this is a great compromise of that. It's like, you still get the wave with the glider, with a bigger board. You're still going to make it around. You're still going to learn that. I like that. I like that a lot.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, and obviously a big 11-foot board, that’s exaggerating. You could get a mid-length, and in principle, there's a lot more leeway than you're going to get with the performance shortboard.

Rob Case
Right. No, it's really neat. I like that perspective.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, and so one of... Who's... I remember I interviewed—it was someone a long time ago—and that was one of their shortboarding coaches. He said, “Get a log. Just get a big, old heavy surfboard and it'll teach you just to look at the wave differently and surf the wave differently.” And that's exactly what I did. At the time, I bought a 9'8" model. And then... With Devin Howard once on it, and Devin's like, “Man, you should’ve... thing like—literally.” I mean, you follow the advice of, you know, those who are more experienced, and that leads you into places. And now, you know, those 11-foot gliders, they’re very versatile boards. If I turn up to my local point break and it's knee high, there's no one else, and I’m just like... Can’t put my wetsuit on fast enough. Yeah, because you've got these perfect knee- to waist-high waves and the glider would just... The challenge of setting a line to surf, you know, perfect waves like that that are small is so much fun. And yeah, like 11 foot and flatter, straighter profile of a board just allows you to surf even smaller waves than a big old log. And I've—I mean, I've surfed it in double overhead, 18-second swell as well. Because they're such good paddlers, you can get into the big waves so early. You don't have to stay close to the whitewater at all. You just play around on big waves. Obviously not performance surfing or barrel riding and waves like that, but you can certainly mess around. And I've seen some photos of some gliders...

Rob Case
I'm curious about that, though. Like, in bigger surf, how close to the whitewater are you surfing that big board? Are you running? Are you gunning out in front of it with that much mass that you have to manage?

Michael Frampton
If you see a section start to run, then you want to highline and make the section. But if the wave slows down and fattens out, you can sort of mess around with it, as long as you get a nice smooth surface. Because the board’s got stuff-all rocker, there's not much room for error. Any sort of wind chop or side chop is a little risky. But just the challenge of wrangling boards like that. And the main thing I like about it is just the wave count.

Rob Case
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
You know, literally you barely have to paddle for waves. If you see a section over there that’s—you know, “That wave’s going to break over there,” 20 meters away—you just paddle over to it. To where the wave’s breaking and you can surf all the smaller ones in between sets. And yeah, and you can go on the inside, surf a couple of smaller waves, and if you see a set coming, you’re not going to get stuck on the inside because you just... 20 strokes and you're out further than everyone else.

Rob Case
I feel like that activity keeps your rhythm going. You know, that's where you really get in tune with the sets.

Michael Frampton
Totally. And then the thing is, you can take that same approach into your shortboarding, which is what pro surfers do, right? And it's because their efficiency at moving through the water, and their fitness, and their strength, and their paddling technique is so good that they can move around. And they don't mind duck diving. If they duck dive a wave on the inside, they just pop out the back and they're laughing.
Yeah. It almost... you get to see a lineup differently. And if you're willing to put the effort into, you know, get your paddling technique and your strength up, you can surf a shortboard like that as well. And it’s what you see—what Gabriel Medina is the master of—just catching every single wave that comes through. And he's like a dolphin paddling. It’s like, what? How do you move a tiny board through the water that quickly? It’s amazing watching those pros paddle.
And then when you see them in real life and you’re like... and they just... they’ll pass you. And you’re like...

Rob Case
Wow. Their board is thinner and shorter and smaller.
Yeah, narrower. But, you know, it's funny—the comfort level that they have, like you said, staying on the inside—I think that's something that a lot of recreational surfers need to get used to. Right?
Because if you're... and I tell people, I don’t really judge people based off of their skill level, but based on how comfortable are they getting caught inside on any given day at any given spot. Right?

Michael Frampton
Because that's a good way to look at it.

Rob Case
Yeah. It’s a bit of a misnomer when you're like, “I surf waves up to six foot.”
Well, what kind of waves up to six foot? There’s some really heavy ones at three foot. But are you comfortable with that thing landing on your head, or being inside or outside? Can you make the right decisions through that situation? If you can do that, and you can move around efficiently, your wave count goes up tremendously.
It’s incredible. That fear of... the unknown of getting... or drowning, or whatever people are fearful of in the water—that’s the biggest inhibitor, 100%.
I mean, you look at... it reminds me—did you ever watch that... Tim Ferriss had that TV series a while ago. And he thought that... I want to... I think one of the episodes was, “I’m going to learn how to drum in two days.”
And then I’m going to go on stage and drum with INXS. Like he would go about trying to learn things really fast. And what’s the most efficient way to learn.
Right? Because he did that with tango dancing, I think it was. Within a year, he became like a world champion tango dancer and Taekwondo. Although he didn’t necessarily become as skilled as the Taekwondo champions, he...

Rob Case
And we got a loophole.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah. But he tried to take that same approach to surfing. And he employed Laird Hamilton as his coach. And the first thing that Laird did was just like, “All right...”
They were just going—I think they went to Pines on Kauai, which is just a short beach break—and he just got Tim into the shore break with no surfboard. He’s like, “Let’s see how you deal with swimming around in the shore break.” And that was the first surfing lesson. Because Laird knows.
You can’t deal with this, you can’t focus on the things that are coming before that is going to happen. You’ll be scared of what the thing that’s coming.
So that was the first—and that’s a great strategy. Clayton does that great. Clayton gets a lot of his clients body surfing.

Rob Case
Yeah. Well, for a duck dive—when I do duck dive with a lot of people—boards are standing on the beach.
Yeah. You need to know how far under you can go. Because you can look at a wave and be like, “My gosh, that thing is going to drive me down.” But as you know, it doesn’t go that—as deep as a lot of people think.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
They think, “I need to dive this thing way down.” And I’m like, “Let’s go out without a board and let’s find out how deep you really have to dive in.” And you really don’t have to.
Yeah, it’s really—it’s fascinating. I love that. And that’s how I started. I started body surfing.
So I think I’ve... I was eight or nine when I started body surfing in Santa Cruz, and then I didn’t board surf until I was 12.
So, yeah. The fundamental thing.

Michael Frampton
That’s naturally how kids get into surfing too. I saw it a lot living on the east coast of Australia. Just sort of... just going to the beach was like a family thing. And, yeah. There’s some parents that push their kids into it, whatever, but sometimes it’s that they just see Dad enjoying the ocean. They see Mom enjoying the ocean. They just enjoy the beach with sandcastles.
The next thing you know, they’re going for a paddle. The next thing you know, they’re grabbing the bodyboard and messing around, or they were there with a friend and they want to feel what it’s like to get rolled and dragged up the beach by the shore break. And they just enjoy that. And the next thing you know, they jump on the front of Dad’s longboard. And that’s kind of... and then naturally just sort of progress. There’s no pushing at all. They’re just exploring the ocean and having fun with that sort of... with those... that natural energy that’s coming in.
And it—I think if we all just always assumed that’s what surfing is, I think. It’s just... The different surfboards that you ride and the different styles and speed and size of waves, they’re just different ways to explore that. Just go and play around with the energy that’s coming in, that nature is giving us, and just tune into it.

Rob Case
Yeah, I love it. If you polled the number of recreational surfers nowadays, I doubt that half of them do that. Especially the newer surfers in the last five years.
So that’s something that just needs to happen. Whereas you and I—we kind of grew up doing that. That was forced upon us in a sense.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, well, nowadays the entry... because it’s so... There’s surf schools everywhere that have wetsuits and soft tops readily available to try.
And then if you want to buy a soft top and a wetsuit, it’s dirt cheap. It’s almost cheaper than filling up your car nowadays. You can buy a soft...

Rob Case
Top. Yeah, well, and they want the Instagram moment, right?
So they want the Instagram moment, and a surf instructor can get them that pretty quickly without any whitewater experiences.
I mean, paddle even. You can get that moment.
And then they’re like, “I get some more experiences to deal with it there, where you really become one,” you know?
Yeah. And I... I was at fault too.
I mean, I was a surf instructor when I was in college, and that’s what we did. Like the number one thing was get them up and riding and get them stoked. And we taught them etiquette and we taught them paddling—that was where I started doing my first studies and my first kind of A/B testing was there. But...
So I understand the dilemma that surf schools have. But at the end of the day, like... At least when I was teaching, maybe five out of every 500 that I taught would continue surfing. It was mostly—they were there for the class, they were there for the experience, and then they would never surf again. I think nowadays people are getting hooked way quicker and longer.
You know?

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I mean, that’s what surf schools are there for. They’re there for that tourist experience, for the most part.
Yeah, there’s nothing wrong with it, I don’t think. But yeah, as soon as you want to, “Okay, I really want to try this thing,” it’s good to sort of, you know, learn about etiquette and where to surf and some of that stuff, which is... it’s hard to...
Yeah, unless you were to go in and regulate and have surfing licenses, there’s not much you can do about it, I think. But sometimes maybe it’s just up to more experienced surfers just to stay calm and just help educate some of those newbies—if they’re willing to listen. I don’t know. It’s a tricky one, isn’t it? Because—I think, must be—probably when you come into surfing as a sort of... an older person, it’s popular, it’s accessible.
And then you see someone who’s essentially your—you think is your equal—that hasn’t, in reality, been surfing for 25 years... There’s just a massive—I don’t think new surfers understand that disconnect.
About... Cool.
You know what I mean? There’s a lot. And you can pick and choose your conditions too. You might only ever surf nothing bigger than glossy three-foot. And you only surf during three months in summer.
Yeah. There’s a big difference between that person and someone who’s surfing every day, no matter what the conditions are. And they’ve got a quiver of boards to deal with the conditions and everything. There’s a big difference there.

Rob Case
Yeah.
I think the only time I come into problems, I think, is when those newbies try and surf... They think they can just go out to First Point Malibu and wait their turn and get a wave.
Yeah, you might as well be at Zuma practicing on the closeouts really, because you can’t really go along the wave anyway. Nice. There’s a bit of a mismatch there, I think. And I’m sure a lot of... that’s where a lot of the frustration comes from.

Rob Case
Think. Yeah.
Yeah, just this morning, my client and I were at a local spot where—when conditions get like they're about to get in the next few days with a certain angle swell—a lot of surfers can get pushed into a cave. And so there's a—literally—there's a safety issue, especially if you don't know what you're doing. And lately, the locals, the guys that I looked up to growing up, they've been vocal to new surfers at that spot. And I think it's more... I think it's partly they're upset that, “Hey, listen, your level's not here. Go down the beach.” But it's—I don't want to have... like I'm doing myself a favor. I'm doing you a favor as well as moving you down the beach a bit. But you have to be accepting as that new person in the lineup. And I don't think that that's a part of some people's consciousness: “This person might know more than me and I should listen to them.” Especially around here.
There's some people that feel a bit entitled because they've been very successful in their lives—on land, in their career, with their personal lives. And then they come out to the water and all of a sudden they're back at the very bottom of the totem pole. They're underground of the totem pole. And they have a hard time dealing with that.
So it's interesting, the dynamics in the lineup these days.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, there's not enough... maybe there's not enough shaming in surfing.

Rob Case
Absolutely.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, because it's—can you imagine if you'd only been playing tennis for six months and you tried to just force your way on having a go at main court at Wimbledon?

Rob Case
A shame can go a long way.
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
No. Yeah. And on that note, can you imagine if the pro tennis circuit decided that Roger Federer and Nadal were going to have a match at some random local tournament and a fifth? It would be an embarrassment.

Rob Case
Yeah, public court. But—ha ha!—finally.

Michael Frampton
Isn't that exactly what's happening with the WSL? Isn't it? It's just like, I can't even watch it anymore, man. I don't know how you feel about pro surfing, but to crown a world champion that is literally, admittedly, too scared to take off at Chopu and goes and surfs the kiddie break at Lower Trestles, where old men and kids practice their surfing, and now he's a world champ?
Yeah. It's—in my opinion—it's so bad that they literally killed Kelly Slater.
Like Kelly Slater is... if the final was an eight-foot Pipeline, and they had been to Cloudbreak on a swell, and Chopu was in a better window, Kelly would be up there in top five.
Yeah. It's actually a disservice to one of the finest and greatest surfers in the world to have him go out like that. The conditions of like... anyway.

Rob Case
Yeah, I think part of this year’s issue was timing. They didn’t get waves, even at those heavy spots, which was reflected in his point total.
You know, the ultimate winner’s point total was pretty high compared to everybody else, but there were no swells. There were no legitimate swells, right?

Michael Frampton
It's the wrong... it’s literally like getting Federer and Djokovic to go down to the local tennis court. And... for the world title.
Yeah. It’s the same thing, because Lower Trestles—there’s old men and children wearing... it’s not testing the best in the world to their abilities.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah. It's very user-friendly. It's the most user-friendly wave around. That's why it's so crowded.

Michael Frampton
It's just not.

Rob Case
No, crazy.

Michael Frampton
It's just... it's...

Rob Case
I think on the women's side, it was more of a tragedy—what happened this year and last year—even on the women's side with Carissa. She should have taken it all. She was the best surfer all around.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah. But again, we all—we both—grew up with: point total is your world champion. That’s our perspective.
So it'd be interesting to hear from somebody that, like, within the last two years, started to get into it—really thinks about that whole thing.
Yeah. Because I'm in agreement with you. I'm biased. Used to the old way.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I mean, I think part of it is too—we’re so spoiled. Like, we can just go into any of the Florence brothers’ Instagram accounts and see better surfing and better waves. Do you know what I mean?
You could make the argument, “They didn’t get any luck with the swells,” but the Florences—they seem to find waves all of the time, and they have way less resources and connections than, you know, literally a group of the world’s best surfers.
You don’t get any more connected to swell reports, and they could have so easily...

Rob Case
Yeah, it's a bigger animal though. It's an amoeba versus something small that you can be mobile. And that’s the other argument—is that maybe the tour is too many people.
And you can’t—it’s not a dream tour anymore. It’s back to like the Bud Tour. Do you remember the Bud Tour?
Yeah, they would go to like Oceanside and Imperial Beach, which I love, but like that’s not a world tour spot.
And then they come up with this dream tour and it was a dream at first. It’s not a dream tour anymore.

Michael Frampton
No. Let’s hope it changes. I mean, maybe even if their luck changed and they got, you know, big swells in each of those spots, could...

Rob Case
No, this is karma. Ha ha! It's karma.
They need to change the whole sequence. Are you okay with the cut or do you not like the cut?

Michael Frampton
I think the cut should have happened before the competition starts. It should only be 15 surfers.

Rob Case
Because then they can be mobile. And go to better spots at the better times.
Yeah. Then they could run the whole event at the peak of one swell, because it's a day and a half or whatever. And then imagine if they did that—like, against the champ.
But guess what? We're still going to hang around, and we're going to film these pros go out the next day and surf the spot around the corner and...
On different boards. And they could make so much out of—you know, if they went to Fiji for two weeks, and then of course it’s all over in one day, but they’re still staying and they’re going to surf.
You know, they've made the effort to get there. They’re not just going to fly home. They’re going to hire a boat and paddle.
The cameras could just follow them and see where... they’re free surfing of that same—you know, the next day.
There’s so much they can do, with so much potential, I think, for some awesome content to come out of those.
That's why I think it’s so sad to see... they’re literally paying these pro surfers who are itching to travel and find the best barrels. They want standout barrels. They want—you can literally just do it for them and film it all.
It would be—I think that... because that's how the UFC does it, right?
They stick to their core. They stick to the core and then the public—more people want to watch.
Most people watching the UFC don’t understand what a rear naked choke is. But the commentators aren’t dumbing it down.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
Do you know what I mean? You’re coming in to watch our spectacles.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
You want to come in to watch Kelly Slater and John and Gabriel Medina battle it out at just lurching Chopu?
It's a spectacle.
You know what I mean? It’s so much more than surfing. And that’s what I think—contrary to their thoughts—they thought that making it plain Jane, “Best small wave surfer in the world surfing the most friendly wave in the world—Lower Trestles” is going to...
But then they just alienate the core, and they destroy everything.
What a way for Kelly Slater to die.
You know what I mean? Yeah. Everyone’s like, “Yeah, he’s still so good in big waves, man.”
Like it made me... maybe he's got a shot. And then they're just—next thing you know, it's just small wave venue.
Like, they get skunked everywhere. And... Who is Kelly Slater now, we see?—Yeah.

Rob Case
Think. Yeah.
Yeah, just this morning, my client and I were at a local spot where—when conditions get like they're about to get in the next few days with a certain angle swell—a lot of surfers can get pushed into a cave. And so there's literally a safety issue, especially if you don't know what you're doing. And lately, the locals, the guys that I looked up to growing up, they've been vocal to new surfers at that spot. And I think it's more—I think it's partly they're upset that, hey, listen, your level's not here. Go down the beach. But it's—I don't want to have... Like, I'm doing myself a favor. I'm doing you a favor as well, moving you down the beach a bit.
But you have to be accepting as that new person in the lineup. And I don't think that that's a part of some people's consciousness. “This person might know more than me, and I should listen to them.” Especially around here. There are some people that feel a bit entitled because they've been very successful in their lives on land—in their career, with their personal lives.
And then they come out to the water and all of a sudden, they're back at the very bottom of the totem pole. They're underground of the totem pole. And they have a hard time dealing with that.
So it's interesting, the dynamics in the lineup these days.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, there's not enough—maybe there's not enough shaming in surfing.

Rob Case
Absolutely.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, because it's... Can you imagine if you'd only been playing tennis for six months and you tried to just force your way on having a go at main court at Wimbledon?

Rob Case
A shame can go a long way.
Yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah, public court. But—ha ha! Finally.

Michael Frampton
Isn't that exactly what's happening with the WSL? Isn't it? It's just like—I can't even watch it anymore, man. I don't know how you feel about pro surfing, but to crown a world champion that is literally, admittedly too scared to take off at Chopu and goes and surfs the kiddie break at Lower Trestles, where old men and kids practice their surfing—and now he's a world champ?
Yeah. It's, in my opinion, it's so bad that they literally killed Kelly Slater.
Like, Kelly Slater is... If the final was an eight-foot Pipeline and they had been to Cloudbreak on a swell and Chopu was in a better window, Kelly would be up there in the top five.
Yeah. It's actually a disservice to one of the finest and greatest surfers in the world to have him go out like that. The conditions of... like... anyway.

Rob Case
Yeah, I think part of this year's issue was timing. They didn't get waves, even at those heavy spots, which was reflected in his point total.
You know, the ultimate winner's point total was pretty high compared to everybody else, but there were no swells. There were no legitimate swells, right?

Michael Frampton
It's the wrong—it's literally like getting Federer and Djokovic to go down to the local tennis court. And... for the world title.
Yeah. It's the same thing because Lower Trestles—there's old men and children wearing... It's not testing the best in the world to their abilities.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah. It's very user-friendly. It's the most user-friendly wave around.
That's why it's so crowded.

Michael Frampton
It's just not.

Rob Case
No, crazy.

Michael Frampton
It's just... it's...

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah. But again, we both grew up with: point total is your world champion. That’s our perspective.
So it’d be interesting to hear from somebody that, like, within the last two years started to get into it—what they really think about that whole thing.
Yeah. Because I'm in agreement with you. I'm biased. Used to the old way.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I mean, I think part of it is too—we’re so spoiled. Like, we can just go into any of the Florence brothers’ Instagram accounts and see better surfing and better waves.
Do you know what I mean? You could make the argument, “They didn’t get any luck with the swells,” but the Florences—they seem to find waves all the time. And they have way less resources and connections than...
You know, literally a group of the world’s best surfers. You don’t get any more connected to swell reports, and they could have so easily...

Rob Case
Yeah, it’s a bigger animal though. It’s an amoeba versus something small that you can be mobile. And that’s the other argument—that maybe the tour has too many people. And you can’t—it’s not a dream tour anymore. It’s back to like the Bud Tour. Do you remember the Bud Tour?
Yeah, they would go to like Oceanside and Imperial Beach, which I love, but... like, that’s not a world tour spot.
And then they come up with this Dream Tour, and it was a dream at first. It’s not a Dream Tour anymore.

Michael Frampton
No. Let’s hope it changes. I mean, maybe even if their luck changed and they got, you know, big swells in each of those spots... could.

Rob Case
No. This is karma. Ha ha! It’s karma. They need to change the whole sequence. Are you okay with the cut, or do you not like the cut?

Michael Frampton
I think the cut should have happened before the competition starts. It should only be 15 surfers.

Rob Case
Because then they can be mobile. And go to better spots at the better times.
Yeah. Then they could run the whole event at the peak of one swell—because it’s a day and a half or whatever—and then imagine if they did that, like against the champ, but guess what? We're still going to hang around. And we’re going to film these pros go out the next day and surf the spot around the corner and...
On different boards. And they could make so much out of—you know, if they went to Fiji for two weeks and then, of course, it’s all over in one day. But they’re still staying, and they’re going to surf.
You know, they’ve made the effort to get there. They’re not just going to fly home. They’re going to hire a boat and paddle. The cameras could just follow them and see where... they’re free surfing of that same—you know, the next day.
There’s so much they can do—so much potential, I think, for some awesome content to come out of those. That’s why I think it’s so sad to see they’re literally paying these pro surfers who are itching to travel and find the best barrels.
They want standout barrels. They want... you can literally just do it for them and film it all.
It would be... I think that—because that’s how the UFC does it, right? They stick to their core.
They stick to the core. And then the public—more people—want to watch.
Most people watching the UFC don’t understand what a rear naked choke is. But the commentators aren’t dumbing it down.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
Do you know what I mean? You’re coming in to watch a spectacle.

Rob Case
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
You want to come in to watch Kelly Slater and John and Gabriel Medina battle it out at just lurching Chopu? It’s a spectacle.
You know what I mean? It’s so much more than surfing.
And that’s what I think, contrary to their thoughts, they thought that making it plain Jane—best small-wave surfer in the world surfing the most friendly wave in the world, Lower Trestles—is going to...
But then they just alienate the core and they destroy everything.
What a way for Kelly Slater to die.
You know what I mean? Yeah. Everyone's like, “Yeah, he’s still so good in big waves, man.”
Like it made me... maybe he’s got a shot. And then they're just... next thing you know, it’s just small-wave venue.
Like they get skunked everywhere, and... who is Kelly Slater now?
We see. Yeah.

Rob Case
Well, and they can make that business. It’s a lot of work, the way you're describing it—with longer waiting periods, smaller number of surfers, getting the best surf, and then shooting media around the event with ads or sponsorships around those media assets—instead of what they’re doing now, which is trying to make it, you know, commentators that are trying to educate and trying to... it doesn’t make any sense to me. I literally have to turn off the sound. And I really like those guys as humans, but I can’t stand when they get their commentary voice on and they’re explaining every little thing about everything and just filling dead air time.

Michael Frampton
—

Rob Case
It’s frustrating. Have you seen the video that I shot with my wife where we’re watching Chopu? And it’s like Mystery Science Theater. I put the camera behind—because she had the funniest comments about just surfing in general.
Like, “Why don’t they have like a scuba team underwater keeping sharks away?” Like, just the funniest stuff. And it was like 10 minutes of it.
And yeah, she’s like... at one point she’s like, “My God, this is so boring.” And it was actually a really good event. But that’s the thing.
Like, they’re not going to ever get that person to watch.

Michael Frampton
It’s insane. Don’t get me started. The production. I remember tuning in—I can’t remember which competition I tuned in—and there were average waves. And literally, they were filming the surfers just sitting there waiting for a wave.
And then they cut to ads. And then there’s about four ads for nothing but WSL. “Trestles is happening now.” “These are the shirts you can buy that no one buys.” “This is the best surfer.” Just ads for themselves.
And then finally it cuts back to the footage and it’s like, “Here’s the waves you missed during the ad break.”
Yeah. I tuned in to watch live surfing and you’re showing me the ads and then the replays of live surfing. I just... they couldn’t have made it any worse. It’s just...

Rob Case
Here’s an ad for the contest that you’re currently watching right now.

Michael Frampton
For the...

Rob Case
Like, dude, you already got me here. You’re killing me.

Michael Frampton
And they lost me, like, straight away. So hopefully with the new CEO and stuff next year, maybe they can...

Rob Case
We’ll see. You know, it’s funny—on finals day, I had to work that day, and I actually wasn’t that bummed about it.
And I still haven’t looked at the replays yet because I... I’m almost terrified about how many of the same ad I’m going to watch over and over again.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, just go to Nathan Florence’s Instagram if you want some good surfing.

Rob Case
Yeah, it’s been a bit of that. Good point. What other media do you take in? I’m curious.

Michael Frampton
At the moment, not really. I still tune in to the Spit podcast and sometimes The Grit. I’ll sort of skip through and listen to some of that stuff.
Yeah. I was tempted not to have a rant about the WSL because that’s all they seem to do, but it kind of has to be mentioned almost. It’s almost that—it’s just got to the point where the WSL is just so asinine you can’t not talk about it.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah. It’s been tough.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. That’s about my only surf media. I, you know, I look at... something comes up on Instagram, but it’s Dead Kooks put out or something, and I don’t really follow too much.

Rob Case
Stab stuff’s pretty good. I think they’ve done their contests pretty well. And that’s pretty grassroots.
If they did a blend between what WSL does and what Stab does, I think that would be a happy medium.

Michael Frampton
Just get rid of all the corporate stuff. Stab should buy the WSL and they’d do it.
Yeah. It would be—in an ideal world—those guys, the core surfers. They know what? They know their target audience.
Yeah. They’ve actually done—you know, they know how to cater to the core audience, and you get so much more engagement from the core audience as well.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah. And the newbies start to become core.

Michael Frampton
Circle—it’s what’s missing.
Yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah.

Rob Case
'Cause it—going back to you—sometimes they need to be shamed. If I read some of the comment sections, some of the comments come in and you're like, “That person's new to surfing.” And sure enough, the next comment is shaming that person.
Like, well, they learned their lesson. Don’t touch the hot oven.
Totally. I agree. I think all new surfers—if you're new to surfing—you should be following @kookoftheday and @johnwaynefreeman. You should study those Instagram posts, threads, like for hours. Just go through Kook of the Day and join in Freeman's commentary and just realize... that satire will help you to understand some of the rules and the culture of the core surfing. And you will have a way nicer time in a crowded lineup if you just sort of understand a bit more of that.
Once you get to the—you know, obviously you want to be at a level where you can negotiate the crowded lineup—but that's a lot of people's frustration, right? Is getting waves in a crowded lineup and understanding the etiquette and the culture and the...
Can I get a set wave? Can I sit in the whatever? A lot... You learn a lot of that stuff through those satire surfing Instagram accounts. I reckon one of... he's been doing some really good ones lately too.

Rob Case
My favorite is Luke Cederman's Raglan Surf Reporter. I mean, he does it beautifully.
Yeah. Yeah. I like the opposite day. When he was at, like, Ulus with the ladies and the men—that one—I was like, falling off my chair.
So funny. And so true.
So true. It's nuts.

Michael Frampton
So... Uluwatu is a beast of its own. Have you surfed...

Rob Case
There? No, I haven’t. When I go to Indo, I avoid Bali like the plague.
Yeah, I'm... I will go an extra day of travel just to be away from the zoo that is that area. But I mean, I think... it's beautiful in its own right. But if I ever go there, it’s not with the purpose of surfing. It would be to explore the temples. And if I can surf—which normally you would—it would be a bonus.

Michael Frampton
Good.

Rob Case
I don't know. I can’t do major crowds anymore.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.
Yeah, I hear you. I think it's... I've surfed Ulus. I’ve surfed it for a couple of weeks every day and it's one of those waves where—even if there is 60 people out and you surf for three hours and only get two waves—those two waves you got were insane.
A 21-second period swell comes out of deep water and that's the first spot that it hits, is outside Ulus. And it just freight trains—just goes—and you're scared, just riding it like nothing ever.
Yeah, it is. It is a kind of pretty unique experience. It's similar to sort of Cloudbreak. I don't know if you've surfed Cloudbreak.
It’s a similar sort of a freight train, roar-energy sort of wave. And it's amazing—there’ll be 60 people out, but literally half the people out there have no... You don't even know how they paddled out.
Like you're going, “How did you even walk down?” Because it’s not an easy place. You've got to walk down this very steep slope, stone-cut stairway. And then you've got to negotiate a cave that at high tide could easily kill you. And you've got to paddle over a very shallow coral reef to even get out there.
And I'm just constantly dumbfounded. There's guys—lifeguards—up on the point whistling at people, you know, making sure they don't get into trouble. And there’s all sorts of newbies paddling out and getting cut.
So it can be 60 people out, but it might only be half that those people actually know what they’re doing. Right?
Yeah. Just managed to somehow negotiate their way out there.

Rob Case
Yeah, well, you said it right. You did it right. You were there for a few weeks.
Yeah, so if you're there for a few weeks, I get that. I’ll do that. If I'm planted somewhere, I don't mind it being crowded.
Like Santa Cruz is like that. I'll go down to Santa Cruz, but I'll spend the day. And if it’s packed and there’s a bunch of aggressive people, I’ll just get out. I’ll get out, let them have theirs, and then I’ll get back in because it’s good all-day kind of deal.
That’s how I kind of navigate it.
But in terms of epic freight train waves in Indo that come out of deep water just like that, and it’s right, and I’m happy with that. And I’ll take that any day, travel an extra day and a half to get there—I have in the past.

Michael Frampton
You know, are you... Are you taking people there on trips?

Rob Case
I haven’t been back in a few years since COVID.
It's not a spot that I take anyone that I haven’t surfed with before, because it’s—you know—I consider it an advanced trip, and we take very few people.
Because it’s just... the whole environment. Like being there, getting out over the reef, having to deal again with what happens if I get caught inside.
And at that place, a few of those places, you get rolled right over the reef if you get caught inside.
So you need to know what decision you're going to make instantly and have the confidence and the skills to get yourself out of that danger.
So there's no way I ever take an intermediate there. And maybe an advanced intermediate that I’ve witnessed here or handled something like that, then I’ll take them.
But that’s a tough one. Like, with surf trips, I have to pre-qualify with a lot of them. There's no question.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, well, if you're chasing... you know, serious waves.

Rob Case
Yeah. But even our, like, intermediate trips, I’m still pre-qualifying to make sure that they’re not a-holes either.
I mean, you've been on a trip and you’ve run into some, like, jackass, and it ruins your trip to a certain extent until you get away from them.
So yeah. I’ve been lucky that most of the people that go through Level One and Level Two will be my first invites. And I know how they surf. I know what’s going to help them, what’s not really for them.
And I can almost customize the trip with the people that are going to thrive the most. Amen.
I don’t really get to the rest of the invite list because it gets full. And I'm like, “Well, sorry, it got full. That’s the way it is.”

Michael Frampton
But... when’s the next trip?

Rob Case
So 2024... we have planned out. Surf Ranch is in late February. That's an annual trip now since COVID.
Yeah. And then we’re going to do a surf camping trip in California.
You know, just the kind of California experience. We’re going to pick a few campsites and do small group—let's just go out and surf.
That’s not a coaching trip. That’s just a fun “let’s get together...”
And then in July, we’re going up to Washington again to that standing wave.

Michael Frampton
Okay.

Rob Case
The CityWave. And we’ve had a blast there. Have you tried one of those?

Michael Frampton
No?

Rob Case
You should try one of those. I think you’d be pleasantly surprised.
Now, so that’s not a coaching trip for me because there’s no paddling, nor is there popping up.
But I bring a surf coach. And there’s optional coaching for them.
And I just have a good time. And I just, you know, rail surf the whole time.
So much fun. Day watching some people at the beginning and the end of that trip.

Michael Frampton
Interesting.

Rob Case
So that's become an annual trip. And then we're going to do our kind of beginner-intermediate Baja trip in the fall.
And then another surf camp trip. So no major trips next year, except for maybe Baja. That's a week long.
And then Waco—I’ve been doing kind of strike missions. So whenever a client asks me to come out to Texas, or people are like amped on going to Waco—we'll try to set one up. And that's been fun.
So more wave pools, I suppose.
Yeah. I mean, I fill them with the invites.

Michael Frampton
Are you finding a lot of demand for these experiences?

Rob Case
I never really need to open it up to the public. So my general process is: alumni first—so people who have been on the trip before.
And then Level One, Level Two completed graduates.
And then Level One graduates.
And then online course graduates.
And then newsletter subscribers.
And then open to the public.
And so I rarely ever get to that last stage.
And so it's been fun. But, you know, with family stuff, I have to be conscious of not being away for too long.
The kids—my kids are now middle school, first time, and first year of high school.
So it's like these two new transitions.
Which is... crazy. Thank you.

Michael Frampton
—

Rob Case
See. Crazy.
Yeah, the older my son has gotten into it. We've been going about every week.
I used to take them both just boogie boarding and, you know, getting back to just throwing them in the water. I’d go with a friend, we’d throw our kids in and be like, “Hey, we’re going to be here for an hour. Here’s some boogie boards. We’re going to go surf. We’ll see you in an hour. Don’t drown.”
And they got really good at reading waves. They got really good at duck diving on their own. They body surf on their own and they’re having a blast.
And now the youngest—my daughter—like, she is extremely good at reading waves, but she’s just not interested in it.
And I’m like, okay, she’s 12. Maybe she’ll get interested in it later, but no big deal.
My son is interested in it, but not because of me, but because of his friends.
Like, he has another friend that surfs. And he's like, “I want to get as good as him.”
And so we’ve been going and we’ve just been having a blast longboarding. And yeah... he’s taller than me now.
So I’ve had to—he’s now wearing the same size wetsuit as me.
But I’m getting like hand-me-ups from him.
Like, one of his shoes—like I’m a size 9, he’s a size 13.
So when he was a size 9 for like two weeks, I got his shoes for that time period. It’s crazy.

Michael Frampton
Wow.

Rob Case
Yeah, but it’s been fun.
Kids are good. And Laurie’s still kicking butt in the fitness world.
Do you have OrangeTheory in New Zealand?
OrangeTheory Fitness—heart-rate specific. It’s one of the fads.
Like a CrossFit or...

Michael Frampton
I haven’t heard of it, so...

Rob Case
No?
Yeah, so OrangeTheory—it came out years ago.
And so she was doing personal training at a bunch of different gyms—group classes, bunch of different gyms.
And then OrangeTheory came along and... it was such a great fit for her, because you could do like five or six classes in a row, because you're coaching.
And you're not actually physically spinning the bike or doing the class, you know.
And we were finding she was getting exhausted trying to put classes together for a full day. She was exhausted. She could only do like three in a day.
And so when she found OrangeTheory, it was a good group of people. The client list was awesome.
And so she started with them and she's been coaching with them for a few years—through COVID—and is now the head coach there.
So she's like... does the schedules and trains the people and everything. So yeah.
But it’s pretty funny. Pretty fun. She’s kicking butt at that.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Have you ever thought about doing a trip with one of the kids and then the people that come on the trip bring one of their kids?

Rob Case
I have not.
Now the first one where that might happen is Surf Ranch this year.
So I’m thinking about bringing my son, but he might just stay at the kind of the end basin—not ride the real wave—because he’s not quite that skilled yet.
And I don’t want to drop that much money for him to waste my wave.
But that’s a really interesting idea—to do like a parent-child surf trip.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah, sure.
Yeah, in the Maldives or something, like where you can just leave them with an instructor and a soft top if you want. Ha.

Rob Case
Thank you. I see where your head’s at. I like that.
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
Good. But, you know, take them as well to a medium wave and help them.
But then, you know, if it's pumping, you go into the bay—white sand bay, soft tops—and we're going to get barrelled, we’ll come back and...
You could do a mixture on a trip like that.

Rob Case
Yeah. I like where your head’s at.

Michael Frampton
It’d be pretty cool.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah, there’s not...
It’s funny, I get a lot of clients that ask me, like, “Where’s a good surf trip that I can bring families to?” And there's...
You know, my spot in Indo—definitely, like—my friend promotes it as, “Yeah, it's family-friendly.”
I’m like, it’s not family-friendly.
Like, you have to be a super adventurer family to do it.
But like, there’s a place in Mexico that’s awesome.
You know, you got a nice hotel, you got waves out front, you got a variety of waves.
But that’s like that. And wave pools are my two go-tos.
It’s crazy. I can’t think of too many where the accommodations are nice for the family, and the waves have this variety.
I mean, Fiji... Fiji has some decent beginner waves, I’ve heard.

Michael Frampton
I've only put in one week there.
Yeah. I spent one week there and it's—even the waves that they call friendly—you still... I mean, if you stuff up, you hit the coral reef and you’ve got a cut on your knee.
And it’s like, still—you have to kind of know what you're doing.
Still.
Yeah, okay.
Like you said, you wouldn’t take beginners there.
Must be somewhere in the Maldives or something where there's a sand beach and the swell comes in a little gentler.
Obviously, the accommodation in the Maldives is not cheap.

Rob Case
Have you been there? Have you been to the Maldives?

Michael Frampton
No, I haven’t.

Rob Case
Yeah, I haven’t either. It looks awesome.
It’s a big push right now. India is the next kind of... Sri Lanka, India. A lot of push.
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
There. I spent a couple of weeks in Sri Lanka. I had a great time there.

Rob Case
I have a client of mine that lives six months there, six months here. He's a little upset that the surf media is starting to talk about Sri Lanka and India more. He’s like, “I just bought a place there. I don’t want to get crowded.”

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah, it's...
So nice to be in the tropics, isn't it?
Yeah. Yeah, and that’s... That’s where my kids—I’ve taken them to Hawaii. And they’re like, “Hey, why don’t we do this all the time?” I’m like, “Because...”
Yeah. I think...

Michael Frampton
There’s a lot of—I think there’s a lot of parents out there that would be into a trip. Like, “Shit, how do I justify another week in... in the tropics to the family?” It’s like, “What if I take one of the kids off the wife’s hands?” And it’s a father-son or father-daughter or whatever bonding trip.
There’s a mixture of surfing together and, you know, going to get barreled with just the adults only. I think that—I think that would do well.
And even if you chose somewhere where it was actually family-friendly, where there was, you know, like really nice yoga classes and a day spa and, you know, some stuff for the kids too—some nannies or whatever, like they do in some of the bigger resorts—to good surf, I think that would be a popular trip too.
Because then you can justify having to spend half a day focused on my surfing. You can justify that if you know the wife’s getting a massage, the kids are, you know, being dealt with over there.
And then you can hang out with the family in the afternoons once it turns onshore or whatever.
You know, I think one of those types of trips—interesting to know if anyone out there would be interested in that sort of trip.
Obviously, there’s a lot of logistics to organizing that and... yeah.

Rob Case
You’ve got to do a holiday week, right? And that’s what I find now that the kids are older. When they were younger, “Hey, let’s pull them out of school for these experiences.” Loved it. But now they’re getting into some more serious academics and sports and you pull them out and... that’s a big no-no.
Yeah. So we’re now having to do vacations during vacation weeks.
And my wife and I are like, “This is terrible. It’s so busy. It’s so expensive.”
Like, what happened to just pulling them out on a Wednesday at the off-season?

Michael Frampton
That’s the period when they get older, yeah.

Rob Case
Yeah, it’s been... but so... I’m looking at another seven years and then they’ll be off to college.
So they’ll both be off to college.

Michael Frampton
We’ll see.

Rob Case
That’s another thought—is a trip. But we’ll see. I’m just trying to build their skill level up to a point where I can take them where I want to go.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah.
In seven years, the world could be a very different place.

Rob Case
Yeah. Well, speaking of like—okay, where do you take people—the family, one of my most family-friendly trips was that standing CityWave up in Washington.
Like, my wife had a blast there because it’s like an amphitheater. She could get beer whenever she wanted. She could get tacos whenever she wanted. She was in the shade.
You know, she saw action in front of her. You could zone out to something else.
Like, the kids were busy in the water park down below having a blast. And it was just a great vibe.
And I’ve seen that at Waco as well, and at Surf Ranch to a certain extent, but I think these wave pools are kind of like that.
You don’t get the cultural experience and you don’t get the surf adrenaline that you would on a proper surf trip, but it's... that’s kind of, I think, where they're trying to take some of the business plans for.

Michael Frampton
Those... it’s not yet. I mean, wave pools are becoming so... there’s so many of them being built and stuff. I think there’ll be a point where there’s a lot more of this stuff going on, I imagine.
Yeah. And I still haven’t surfed a wave pool, so I’ve got no idea what to do. I can’t imagine, but everyone seems to love it.

Rob Case
You might be a convert. You might be a convert.
It’s a... again, I was very hesitant. I was like, “I don’t want to do that.” But I’ve done coaching trips, obviously—which are, for coaching, you can’t beat it because it’s focused. You get feedback almost immediately.
But I’ve taken trips just with clients and friends, just like, “Hey, let’s get enough people to get a private and let’s split it evenly.”
And I have seen progression happen just on those trips.
Like, that is amazing just because of the reps. It’s like reps.
And it’s loose, and it’s fun, and you’re cheering each other on. You’re super close to everyone.
And it’s just like all the best parts of a surf trip.

Michael Frampton
—Is it—

Rob Case
Except for the culture.

Michael Frampton
Ha. Some might argue they’re not missing much there. But what about...

Rob Case
Thank you.

Michael Frampton
Because imagine if you play golf—you’d played golf for years—and then all of a sudden you get to go to a driving range.

Rob Case
Ha ha! Quite like that.

Michael Frampton
It’s not.

Rob Case
It’s not quite like that.
Because some of these pools have such variety—you can call up different varieties. I think after you do the same settings several times, it feels like that.
It does feel like that.
So I have found kind of like—okay, one session, too few. Five sessions: perfect spot. You get excited, you’re pumped, you’re saturated, you’re happy. But anything beyond that, you’re like, “All right, this is like Groundhog Day—just doing the same turn in the same place every time.”

Michael Frampton
Five sessions? What’s that, it takes a couple of days to get five sessions in?

Rob Case
Yeah, it depends on where you’re at.
I mean, like Waco—five sessions—because their schedule...
So their schedule—I’m frustrated with them. Their schedule is tough to get on.
It’s like, they’re like, “Yeah, we have stuff available. It’s at 6 a.m. and 7 a.m.”
And then the next day, 1 p.m.
And you’re like, “What am I going to do for the whole—like, that’s crazy.”
You can do... we’ve done five sessions in two and a half days at Waco—like three days.
You get five sessions in at Kelly’s in a day and a half.
And at Lakeside, you get five sessions a day in one day.
But that’s a lot of surfing.
Once you learn that wave... the one downside of that wave is that the learning curve is so much steeper, because it’s completely foreign to your brain.
But then once you get it, you’re like, “My God, this is surfing. And this is real. This is rail surfing.”

Michael Frampton
Lakeside?

Rob Case
Yeah, it’s the CityWave. That’s where—it’s the CityWave.
And you need the bigger one. You don’t need—the Germany one’s too small.
You want the one that’s Lakeside or the one in Hawaii that’s really long.
It’s the same technology.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. There’s a guy in New Zealand that’s just opened one of those.

Rob Case
Really?

Michael Frampton
Not the same—not nearly as big as the one in Hawaii—the same thing, like the standing wave.
Yeah.
Yeah, and I was talking to some river wave surfers—because you get to talking. The culture is great, by the way. Everyone is super accepting and fun.
And they’re like, “Yeah, there’s like different flow speeds and different steepnesses.”
And you start to feel these differences the more you ride it.
And it’s so funny, because the instructors that work there, they rip. They’re so good at surfing.
And then they turn to us and they’re like, “So... how do you catch a wave in the ocean?”
And you’re like, “Bro...”
You’re like, “Dude, what you’re doing is like one percent of surfing. It’s like the most fun—it’s one of the most fun parts of surfing.
Aside from getting barreled, I think, is putting it on rail hard and really pushing with speed. I love that feeling.”

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
That’s probably—that’s my second favorite. Yeah.
The perfect section, right?

Michael Frampton
CityWave.

Rob Case
Yeah. But in the ocean—like—how many times do you get that situation over and be in rhythm?
Like... really fascinating.
So that’s been a... it’s been interesting.
Wave pools—I’ve... I hate promoting them, but I really like going to them. For two or three days.
I think I’d go nuts if that was where I had to go all the time to surf.

Michael Frampton
Just like the driving range—like, you might spend hours at the driving range to try and get one good drive, right?
But once you start—this is how you drive the ball 300 yards—and then you finally click in after hitting 200 balls or whatever...
You finally get a couple of good shots. Those shots feel amazing at the driving range.
But they feel so much better during a round of golf against a friend.

Rob Case
Totally. 100%. Analogy.
Yeah, and then when you're sick of—like you've been playing rounds of golf all day long, and you're out of rhythm, and you're not hitting it well, and you're completely missing the ball—that's when you go back to the driving range to kind of freshen up. And that's how you use it.
You know, at least that's my vision of it.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I want to come on one of these trips. Yeah, I...

Rob Case
Yeah. Well, your closest one was Urban Surf. Probably.

Michael Frampton
In Melbourne, yeah. That would be the closest sort of decent wave.

Rob Case
Pool, yeah.
Yeah, I haven’t surfed that technology, but I’ve heard it’s all... it’s all the same.
A lot of paddling in that one. And that’s the thing that I found—there’s more paddling in these wave pools than I thought.
I didn’t think that there was coaching opportunity for paddling, but there certainly is, especially for takeoff as well.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Case
Fascinating.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, that takeoff is... one of the most important maneuvers.

Rob Case
Do you follow a guy, Kookapinto?

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
So I feel like he makes the takeoff a maneuver. He makes it stylish. He changes it up. It is a maneuver. A hundred percent.

Michael Frampton
I think that—especially—he rides such a variety of surfboards too.
Yeah. And that’s one thing when you do go with a bigger... he rides gliders and miniature gliders as well. Those boards that are heavy and catch waves early—that faded takeoff becomes like a thing.

Rob Case
Yeah. Stylistic.

Michael Frampton
It's almost like your favorite part. I can’t wait to do a massive faded takeoff to get into this wave, to set me up for the rest.
It does become a thing for sure. And I think that a lot of...
Like, a lot of pros approach the takeoff that way as well.
Like, especially when you think of Kelly Slater—if he wanted to really paddle into a bombing wave at Pipeline a little bit earlier, just to make sure he was going to set the right line and come out of the barrel—
But he’d go, “No, you know what? I’m just going to hold. I’m just going to drop in a little bit later and create some drama and make this wave look way gnarlier than it actually is.”
That's how I think a lot of those pros get a lot of their points.

Rob Case
Yeah. I—

Michael Frampton
Agree.
The famous one being—you remember Italo’s first ever wave at The Box, whether it was or not? And he just dropped out of the sky and did this almost-faded-too-far bottom turn and wrangled it.
And if that same wave had been ridden by Jack Robinson, he might have threaded the needle perfectly and got a couple of points less.
But because it was so dramatic... and I think that when you start riding these big boards like Colapinto’s riding, and you get to play around with that in different ways—because you get in the wave earlier, you get speed out of the flatter section of the waves...
So, yeah.
I think it’s...
The more I surf, the more I realize how important that moment is—that as you're paddling in, setting the right line, popping up with good timing and not too fast, not too slow.
Making sure your feet hit the right spot.
But while you're popping up, you're still surfing the wave.
You're still keeping an eye on the wave.
If you're lacking neck mobility, you might literally have to look down halfway through your pop-up because you don't have the mobility and strength to actually stay connected to the board as you're going through that movement.
Your brain’s going to slow everything down without you realizing—it’ll feel like the wave runs away from you, but in actual fact, you just weren’t... your pop-up wasn’t there. That’s all it was.
So I think it’s the most underrated, underworked-on aspect of surfing.

Rob Case
Heavily overlooked. Heavily overlooked.
People—they come to me and they're like, “Yeah, can you help me with my pop-up?” And I was like, “Alright, we're going to slow this thing down. And we're going to work on it,” because—to your point—it’s a maneuver. It cannot be overlooked.
And you do it differently in different situations.
When the wave curvature is a certain way, you do it differently.
You physically will do it differently when the board drops out from underneath you versus staying more buoyant on top of the water.
That movement and that physicality are completely different.
And even the timing—as you pointed out—the speed at which you do it could be different.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
It’s crazy how overlooked it is. But people want to jump to surfing.
“I want to surf. I want to surf.”
It’s like, okay. Get down to the line.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, it's overlooked in so many ways, including the ways in which the pros use delay, or go early or late.
They mess with the pop-up and the timing of it to create drama and to maximize barrel times and foam—but all sorts of stuff.
They’re so in control.
And it’s a fundamental skill.
Lie down on the ground and stand up.
Yeah, forget about being a surfer or not—like, that's actually like a measure of longevity and life length, they say.
Yeah. The time it takes you to go from lying down to standing up—however you do it—the faster and more efficient you can do that is like a measure of health.

Rob Case
That's fantastic.
So it’s—there’s more than one way to skin a cat.
Have—

Rob Case
You heard—it was... I thought it was Spit—asked Rob Machado,
“So how do you pop up? Can you enlighten us on how to pop up?”
And he’s like, “What do you mean?”
He’s like, “Well, you know, like, can you break down the technique?
Like, ’cause your pop-up’s amazing, right?”
He’s like, “I don’t know. I just get up to my feet.”
Like, the pros don’t think about it.
Yeah, that’s how it should be.

Michael Frampton
No.
Yeah, but the pros—most of the pros—they started surfing when they were young, and they were supple, and they had the full range of motion and the strength and ability to control that transition between hands and feet whilst looking at the wave.
They had that at a young age.
And then they kept doing it, so they maintained that skill.
But if you’re coming into surfing and you’re already 30, and you’ve been sitting at a desk for eight hours a day, you’re going to spend hours regaining the shoulder mobility, the spinal mobility, the strength in your hip flexors to bring that leg forward without looking down.

Rob Case
You're being generous with hours. It’s months.
It’s months to almost years of it.
Yeah. You have to retrain the brain as well—at what fires.
So there’s the physical and then there’s the neurological changes.
Yeah. It’s amazing.
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, it’s the most... under pressure.

Rob Case
Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Michael Frampton
Especially a beach break. Like, you’re surfing perfect waves, it doesn’t matter if it takes you a bit longer and you mistime the takeoff.
If you’re on a long point break, you can get up to your feet, shuffle, move your feet, “Okay, now I’m surfing.”
You missed half the wave, but you might still have 100 meters of perfect wave going.
So if you’re lucky enough to be surfing good waves all the time, it doesn’t matter a lot of the times.
Yeah. But when you think about it, you’re missing out on what you do often.
I think if you can really glide into a wave and pop up, take off nicely, it’s setting you up.
Or usually you’re doing that whole sequence of events before you stand up, and that’s setting the tone of the entire wave.
If you’re doing it in the right spot, you’re doing it where the wave starts breaking, where it’s peaking, where it’s most likely the biggest, where it’s most likely lurching the most.
You actually have the most potential to begin that wave with lots of speed, and that can carry you through the sections.
It sets the tone for the wave.
Yeah. I think that’s the hugest mistake that most surfers are making—is in not understanding the intricacies and the importance of that takeoff.

Rob Case
Well, they're skipping over it like crazy. Like you said, you'll see it a lot. When people are thinking about—especially at beach breaks—they’re thinking, “I don’t want this wave to close out.” And so they rush everything and do nothing.
Right. And they just end up doing nothing.
And then they come back and you’re like, “Listen. One thing at a time. Catch the wave. Get up to your feet. Find that control spot. And if the wave runs away from you at that point—fine. That’s a rep. That’s one repetition of doing it right.”
And they’re like, “But I did it too slow.” It’s like, “Yeah, but how do you think it’s going to speed up?”
Like, you’re going to have to train it. And the more you do it, the faster that becomes with less effort.
And then all of a sudden you find that third step of turning—so catch the wave, get up to your feet with control, control the board, and then go surf.
That’s going to happen only if these first two are fluid and smooth.
And the second one’s only going to happen if the first one works—if you're catching the wave.
Right.
And going back to your point with the pros—they can play with that. They can play with the setup of the wave, right?
They could drop into every wave beautifully, but they want to create more drama to get more points, or they want to feel something different, like Tom Curren wants to feel something different.
And so they’ll delay the pop-up.
And now someone sees that and says, “I need to delay.”
It’s like, “No. That’s advanced.”
They’re messing with it, and they’re purposely doing that so they can come from behind the whitewater and whatnot. It sets everything up.
Yeah. It’s a step.
It’s the... what’s the cornerstone of a building called? I’m blanking right now. There’s a name for it.
No, there’s a single stone that they call it. It’s like the main foundation of a building.
And... I don’t know. Maybe it’s cornerstone.

Michael Frampton
I think it might be. laughs
Stops them from thinking—leaning.

Rob Case
Yeah, the cornerstone of a building.
Yeah, you don’t—if you take that out, the whole thing falls.
Falls down or is weaker.
Yeah. It’s in a... in a Bob Marley song.

Michael Frampton
That's right. Must be true.

Rob Case
It must be true. Scientific fact. That guy... the rocket scientist. That's wild, though.
It's this concept of wanting things to happen instantly. That is the downfall of learning. With the process of learning.

Michael Frampton
Yes, getting too far ahead of oneself.

Rob Case
Yeah, I tell my kids all the time, I was like, it's gonna take longer than an Instagram moment for that to work.
You know, you're going to... you're going to have to put some work into it. You got to put some hours.
Some months, some weeks, months.

Michael Frampton
Years. A good chunk of time, I think, to make surfing a thing.
Something more than a pastime. Something you want to explore and possibly travel and etc., and then you have to spend at least a year of your life focusing on nothing else.
Yeah. Just, “No, I'm going to go surf.”
Every spare moment I go surfing, no matter what the conditions are like. I've got the wetsuits. I've got the boards. I've got the car gassed up.
I'm getting 10 hours minimum per week surfing in. And I'm training. I'm stretching. I'm watching surfing videos during my spare time when it's dark.
I went through years of that. I was so obsessed with surfing.
And that's the only reason why I can... I can look at the report and go, “Alright, I'm going to surf at this hour, today or in three days’ time,” because I know those conditions are going to be good for this surfboard that I like surfing.
And there's so much work that goes behind those simple decisions of... you see people drive out to the surf. Surfing—there's so much that goes behind that.
And for sure, there is a chunk of time where you're obsessed with surfing and digging into these details.

Rob Case
And it works. It works.
Like I'm thinking in the back of my head, I just—two of my clients I can think of right now that have done Level One, Level Two, and they...
And at the end of Level Two, I completely forgot that they’ve only been surfing three years total.
And like, we're dropping into legit Ocean Beach—six foot, gaping—and I'm like... they were like, “I was pretty freaked out on this.”
And I completely forgot.
Like, we get back to the beach and he's like, “Yeah, today's my three-year anniversary surfing.”
I'm like, “What?” I was like, “I completely forgot.”
But both of these guys were guys that were obsessed. Obsessed.
I mean, just going on everything, staying out in the water as long as they possibly could—but not just bobbing around—like actively failing. Actively failing.

Rob Case
And it pays off. Yep. Hats off to active refill.

Michael Frampton
All about the failing. The more you fail, the better.
Yeah. It's so cool how nowadays we have so many resources as surfers to go out and get coaching and go on YouTube.
If you're serious, you can fast-track that.
To be able to, you know, paddle into a six-foot Ocean Beach wave after three years—it's kind of like...
Is this—you’re talking about Kelly Slater when he was 14?

Rob Case
Yeah, no, I couldn't. It tricked my mind.
We paddled out and he paddled out next to me, just fine getting out.
Paddled into this pretty solid wave, made it out the back and was like... I was just completely—just on his face—I couldn't believe it.
I could not believe when he told me and reminded me how long—how short—he's been surfing.
But he, you know, him and this other guy—just fully dedicated. Fully dedicated. Put the work in.
Yeah. And they're still employed. Ha.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, well, if you're determined enough, it's amazing what you can achieve.
Yeah. And surfing—I mean, for me when I was younger, that naturally did that, but, you know...
Nowadays, if you're starting surfing a bit older, you've got to plan for it with family and work commitments.

Rob Case
Yeah, but it's a lot easier. Like you're saying, there's more forecasting, there's more data in general.
This morning—it was funny.
I'm looking at the spot, and I'm like, “Yeah, there's supposed to be this swell coming in.”
I think the surfer I was with wasn’t ready for the bigger swell.
And I was like, “You know, I think we're good,” because we look at the Surfline forecast, and I'm like, “Let's look at the buoys.”
And this is a big lesson I teach in Level Two.
It's like, you know, the Surfline forecast is algorithms. Algorithms are good. It's on a lot of history.
Let’s see what is actually happening.
And so we look at the buoys, and the buoys are lagging. They’re lacking by like five hours. And the swell hasn't shown yet.
And I’m like, “Alright, let's go. Let's do it.”
And while we're out there, we start to sense a little bit of it. We start to see which swells are which from the buoys.
And then we get out, and I think this afternoon it finally arrived. And then tomorrow it's going to arrive.
So that’s it.
There’s a lot of surfers that rely a little bit too much on the tech.

Michael Frampton
Can you give me one second? I've just got to sign something to a courier. Hold on a second.
Go for it.
There’s another thing I was thinking—I saw an Ockie... I don’t know if you remember.
There’s an old surfing movie with Ockie, and Ockie says something to the effect of, “If you're a surfer and you're not surfing good waves, you're denying yourself some amazing experiences.”
And he was talking about, you know, going and traveling and finding really pumping waves for surfing videos.
I think it's so true.
It's like—you know that feeling of scoring waves in a tropical location, and you're an experienced surfer, and you finally get on a...
There's nothing like it.
And if you have the ability—if you have the ability and the experience to—you think, “Man, I could probably... I reckon I could make a six-foot wave at Cloudbreak. I reckon...”
Then go and do it.
And if you don’t go and do it, you're denying yourself so much as a surfer, I think.

Rob Case
I love that quote.
That’s... that hits. It hits home big time.
And that’s—for me—traveling was a big part of surfing.
Is exploring.
Getting into problems.
Getting out of problems.
So that’s where like—I think the wave pools—you don’t get that.
You don’t get everything.
So, plug and play.

Michael Frampton
But I imagine—I mean, I haven’t been—but I imagine going to Waco itself is a great experience.

Rob Case
Yeah, there’s some culture there, for sure.
But it’s not the same as having to really have travel issues or weather issues or cars breaking down and then finally arriving and, like, seeing no waves.
And then all of a sudden the next day, a swell that is unexpected shows up and...
It’s a different experience.

Michael Frampton
Touché. Yeah, different experiences.

Rob Case
So it is an experience. And that’s where—as a coach—we’re trying to curate a coaching environment on trips and have them be put into better waves.
And it gets difficult when it is a trip that you have no control over the ocean.
And then when you have a wave pool, it’s like... the perfect... for it.
But it’s not a surf trip, in my definition of a surf trip, which is the experience and the bonding that you feel.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
And if you can blend those two—and my Baja trip kind of blends those two pretty well—because of where we go, we get it all to ourselves.
There's usually waves. It’s not great waves—perfect for beginner, intermediate kind of level.
But you get that time to kind of unwind and bond with people over the campfire and all that stuff.
It’s awesome. It’s hard to find those experiences now. It is.

Michael Frampton
They’re out there. They—whoa—the cold water thing, that's becoming popular too.

Rob Case
You got to search. You got to go cold water, bro.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I know.

Rob Case
Can you imagine traveling for two days, going somewhere that’s hyper cold, and then all of a sudden it’s 50 people in the lineup?

Michael Frampton
Ha ha! Yeah, I choose the tropics any day.

Rob Case
Yeah, I’ll do the 60 in the lineup in the tropics.

Michael Frampton
I'll ride a longboard in the tropics. It’s fine.
Yeah. No, five mil of rubber or seven mil of rubber and...
I mean, it’d be an experience. I’d certainly like to do it once, but... right.

Rob Case
It’s funny—like, my buddy that we go to this camp in Indo—we pull up first day.
And when you come from cold water and you jump in tropical water, it could be just like onshore slop, and you're happy as could be.
And so he's like, “Sorry, it's only like one foot at 18 seconds.”
And because it's such a strong southern exposure, it's like six foot plus. And you're like, “No problem.”

Michael Frampton
Thank you. Yes, sir.

Rob Case
Yeah. I got no problem with this.

Michael Frampton
I've got to book a surf trip now. Just talking about it...
We scored.

Rob Case
Do it.
Now, this is the time of year you guys get good surf, right?

Michael Frampton
Where I live, it’s... it never really gets that good.
Today was about as good as it gets, and it was, I guess, head high.
A little bit what we would call maybe three to four foot sets here.
And it was beach break, and there were some corners that were peeling, and it wasn’t crowded.
That’s about as good as it gets around here.
I can travel for a few hours and score more intense waves.
It’s hard when you’ve got kids to do those missions all the time.

Rob Case
Agreed. I got seven more years and then they’re out.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
I'm just going to keep myself healthy.

Michael Frampton
That's the cool thing about owning lots of different surfboards is you can just—whatever the conditions—you have the right board for the conditions. And then surfing is as fun or as challenging as you want if you have a range of surfboards to choose from.

Rob Case
Yeah. And you can make something exhilarating on the right surfboard. You can make it feel like it's six foot and gaping.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah, I've got everything from a 5'3" to an 11-foot—everything in the middle.
20 surfboards to choose from. It's nice to have that.
Yeah. That's something that all surfers should aspire to as well. I reckon there's a nice quiver of boards.

Rob Case
Yeah, and I've—another philosophy that I don't know if you've heard me say this before, but I try to teach people to paddle any surfboard as efficiently and effectively as the design and your body type allow.
And so you're not choosing a board based on the paddle out and what that looks like, but you're choosing a board based on how you want to surf the wave.
Right. And so that when you do that, you're like, “My gosh, okay, it's kind of mushy. I'm going to take a little bit more volume so I can go through the flat spots.”
And you're looking at it completely differently.
Even though it's a mile-long paddle out, you might still take a 6'3"—because you've got that tool belt.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, when you're surfing all the time and your surf fitness is up, then that definitely should be your default decision-making for what board you're on.
I think I'm guilty of taking a board that's easier to paddle out just because I know I'll get more waves—not necessarily because it's the best board for the waves that are happening.

Rob Case
Well, it might be the best board for the way that you want to surf that day.

Michael Frampton
And...

Rob Case
That's my point. It's like, you know, some days I wake up and I'm like, “I just want to cruise today. I think I'd be really satisfied cruising. I don't want to deal with a crowd.”
And some days I'm like in the mix. You know, I'm competing.

Michael Frampton
Yep.

Rob Case
Yeah, both are equally happy.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, when I'm paddling—especially on the glider—I'm still so focused on... like I want to be sitting on that board and have it just rolling with no yaw, beautifully, like as if I was paddling a canoe perfectly.
That's awesome.
Lining up the middle of the stringer with a point on the horizon and moving my body in a way where there's the minimum yaw.
And you get this—man, you can start getting some speed going when you really tune into the efficiency of paddling.

Rob Case
That's awesome to hear. I love that you still think about that. That's great.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.
Yeah, because if you get that, you can even—you get to the point where you're choosing a wave on a glider so early.
You just see the swell coming in, and no one else in the lineup has even moved.
And you're already like, “Shit, I've got to paddle out to there and turn around because it's going to break another... and I'm going to—as it breaks, I'm coming in—I want to already have my line set, and already be at top paddling speed so I can stand up on my feet as that wave comes in.”
I got all the time in the world. You just think about surfing so differently when you're on a board like that.
You can predict. You predict waves earlier. And yeah, it's one of the best things I've done for surfing—the show boots.

Rob Case
I've had a similar experience with single fins. Like, I've ridden... I first tried a single fin for the first time—it forced me to slow everything down and be a little bit more planned with things.
And I’ve—I love it.
Like, when I feel too spastic on a shortboard, I'll go back on that single fin because it slows me down every time. The great teacher.
So gliders, single fins, boogie boards—all teach us things naturally.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, what's that movie? North Shore. Remember that one?

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah.

Michael Frampton
And that's basically what his guru did, right? He was like, “Start with this tree,” basically. With no fin. It's a log with no fin. Learn how to surf that first.
And then shorter and shorter down back to the shortboard.

Rob Case
I've fully done that with my son. I've Chandler’d my son. I'm like...
He's like, “I want to ride a shorter board like my friend.”
I'm like, “Nope. You got the 9'6", kid. Show me you've got control of this thing.”
I did it wrong. I grew up with the Kelly Slater potato chip boards.
You know, did it wrong. I wish I had saved many years the other way.
You know what's funny about that movie, though?
The first surf lesson is—they just went out and sat and watched the waves. You remember that?

Michael Frampton
Yes.

Rob Case
Going full circle though, we were talking about—with you know, just learning the ocean.

Michael Frampton
Incredible. Yes.
That's something that you can always—even waves that you're not surfing—you can look at and predict where they're going to break while you're sitting out the back waiting for a wave to come to where you're going.
I sort of play that game all the time as well.
Yeah. There's always something to tune into when you're surfing.

Rob Case
Well... right. You're always surfing in your head.

Michael Frampton
Even when you're not.

Rob Case
It's funny because, like, my kids—
I've tried to like...
“I don't want to go surfing today.”
I was like, “Well... we're surfing just by collecting our gear, putting it in the car, going out, settling in, pulling it out, getting our gear on, floating around.”
Like, the whole experience is surfing.
You know what I mean?

Michael Frampton
Yeah, that’s a good point.
Yeah, the whole sort of... you're like, “The conditions are good,” but experience tells you that doesn't mean anything.
But let's just go anyway.
Let's pick a car. Let's go out anyway.
We've got music or a podcast on the drive out or conversation.
And even if you get out there and you don't surf—or the surf’s junk and not great—it's still like...
You know, we did it. Yeah.
We still...
It was still—
I don't think I force myself to surf. If I make the effort to drive to the beach, I was like, “No, I'm going to go out no matter what and catch at least one.”
I've never regretted it, ever. Never regret it.
Have a regret having to turn around and drive home either because at least now I know that—
You know?
This beach—it turns out—was supposed to be westerly, but this valley has a microclimate.
It's onshore when it's supposed to be offshore, but whatever.
You learn from getting skunked.

Rob Case
Yeah. Yeah, and you never regret it.
You know, you'd rather have driven out there and just even checked it.
Usually for me, when I drive out, I'm getting wet no matter what.
Because again, to your point, like when you have enough surf craft—
I’ve got fins for body. I body surf 20 minutes at the end of every session anyway. I'm getting in no matter what.
I had a client shape me a paipo, the bodyboard, you know, and we took it behind the boat.
But I’ve taken that bodyboard—like, body surf—
Nothing comes close. So much fun.

Michael Frampton
Body surfing is something I haven’t done much of.

Rob Case
Got to do it more. Got to do it more.
Get a set of—

Michael Frampton
Fins. You use a thing for your hand?

Rob Case
I'm conscious of that pulling out the shoulder.
You need your rotator cuff and that whole girdle to be pretty strong.
Because if you hit a bump or it gets pulled up, you can put it in a really... odd position.
Yeah. So I just go, you know, my good old hand. That works.

Michael Frampton
Yep.

Rob Case
And lucky for me, my local is a pretty darn fun body surfing spot too.
And what’s really fun about body surfing is that if you ever do surf a crowded spot, you can always sit inside everybody else.
You sit inside even the frothiest shortboarders.
And the ones they miss—you can drop in right away, because the runway is... as short as you can get it.

Michael Frampton
Super fun. What learnings from body surfing do you take into shortboarding?

Rob Case
So if you remember from Level Two, the runway—
And the surf craft that you ride determines how long your runway can be.
With body surfing, because you're completely displaced—there’s no buoyancy other than you bobbing around—
You need to get to planing speed and get on top of the water to actually surf.
And so you need more gravity, and you need more momentum transferred to you from the wave.
And so the main thing is: how steep can this wave be, with very little effort from me—
It's like maybe one stroke in...
And then you lock your body up as if it’s the rail line.
And you take... it's the angle that you can go down in a steep wave that has taught me the most.
I think about, “Okay, if I have a hyper-thin board that's really knifey, I can do this same thing—just maybe a foot back in the runway. Just maybe one second advantage in the runway. And I can take this same line, and just be on a different part of the wave.”
We talked about it earlier, like the takeoff grid is pretty big.
When you think about that grid—where you can take off and where you take off, you end up with a different line, right?
So with body surfing, I get to see visually how far deep I can be and what that line might be.
And then I think about, “Could I do that with a shortboard?”

Michael Frampton
And?

Rob Case
Inevitably the answer is yes.
You can—by just getting in a second or two earlier with the extra buoyancy from going from displacement to planing, just that split second.
Then you just need to set that rail, just like you would set your body.

Michael Frampton
So as you're paddling, when you're catching a wave body surfing—are you forcefully stiffening and straightening your body to.

Rob Case
Is that the technique? Once...
So, yeah, so... It's the same three-stroke burst or less, depending on how quickly it develops where you're at. And... If you don't stiffen your body and go on the side, you're just going to slide right down the front.
And then it crashes and it's not really a ride. You're just going straight at that point. But I like... Going down the line.
That's why I body surf. I go down the line and I try to get barreled. And if you don't stiffen, you're just going straight out the front. If you don't set your body into the—into the wave just like you would the rail, you're going to slide right out the front. And so it's a combination of your body, but the fins.
Sometimes I'll split my legs a little bit to get one leg straight with the rest of my body.
And then the other one's kind of counterbalancing until I hit the bottom of the wave. And it catches me.
And then my line is set at that point.
Sometimes I miss it. Sometimes it chucks me and I don't have the time to get into the wave. And that's when I know, okay, maybe that was a little too late. I found that kind of threshold, that limit.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, it's something I never really... Okay. Haven't done.

Rob Case
You want to hear something else I love doing body surfing is the dolphin start. I call it the dolphin start. Because you actually set up way further out than you would normally body surfing.
And then you go underwater—make yourself streamlined and you do dolphin kick with the fins. And you start to feel the orbital energy.

Michael Frampton
Yeah.

Rob Case
While you're underwater. And then all of a sudden... If you're in the right spot, it shoots you out the front of the wave. Just like a dolphin. Just like you see what the dolphins do. Now, the problem with that one is that it shoots you so far out. Your rail and go sideways at that point. But it—one, it feels amazing, right? But two, it freaks people out.
Like no other because you're underwater and then all of a sudden you shoot out the front and nobody's—they're like, "Holy crap!" And to see their faces when you shoot out of the wave like that, it's pretty fun. But it just feels enormously fun.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, it's tapping into it. You're tapping into that part of the wave that foils are tapping into.

Rob Case
Yeah, that orbital motion.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Have you got into foiling at all?
I tried it a few years ago. I almost killed myself and I stopped because I was like, one, it's too many toys. And two, I don't want to kill myself. I don't want to hurt myself because I like surfing so much. But it does look fun. I have a few people in the neighborhood here that wing foil.
So they have the wing and they're foiling on the lagoon. And that looks fun. I definitely think my wife would kill me if I brought home another... thing. But I definitely see it as an alternative at certain surf spots. Looks fun. But there's just so much in surfing that I still want to learn and I'm still trying to master. And I'm like—it’s kind of like golf.
Like if I have four hours to kill, am I going to go golf or am I going to go surf? I'm usually going to go surf. I just love it that much.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I'm not. I'm intrigued by foiling, but I'm not.
Yeah, I'm the same. I think a lot of pro surfers, they're just so exhausted with surfing. They've been there, they've done it all. And it's like—they find foiling so challenging and just a new way to approach riding ocean waves. I think it's maybe why there's so many people doing it.
Yeah. And I'm so excited about it.

Rob Case
It has a really interesting feel to it.
It doesn’t feel like surfing. It feels like almost snowboarding powder, like really soft and fluffy.
And then, so when I did it, I was behind a boat.
And I was like, I'm getting it. I'm getting it.
And then boom. I wipe out. I'm like, this scares me. I don’t know why I just wiped out. That's how sensitive it is.

Michael Frampton
It looks like you're trying to balance an egg on top of an egg.

Rob Case
Now, granted, I had... Like it was a kite foil.
So it was smaller, thinner, more high performance, more sensitive, apparently. And now it's—the bigger the foil, the thicker the foil, the wider, so on and so forth, it's easier. But I just—I don’t know. I can’t bring myself to put in time to learn it. I know I’ll love it if I do. I know it.
But I look at conditions like that, and I’ll just take my longboard.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah, I’m the same. Buy a bigger board rather than a foil.

Rob Case
Yeah.
I had a friend that SUP surfs and I've done it. When I was on the East Coast where there was really no waves, I tried to get a workout in. Every once in a while, you run into a wave and you surf and it's fun. You're like, this is awesome.
But he's really into it. He has shorter SUPs. And he's like, "Hey, let's go. You can use one of my boards."
And so we go out. And I'm like yard sailing left and right. I'm like setting up for the wave and then I'm about to go and then a side chop hits me.
And I’m sitting there going, man, I could catch 40 more waves on my longboard if I had just brought it.
So the next time he invited me, I’m like, “You know what? I think I’m good. I’ll just bring my longboard.”

Michael Frampton
Bye. Yeah.

Rob Case
I don’t know. Too frothed out.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, fair enough. I do get it, like—because riding a big board is...
It’s a great—that’s a cool feeling, having a big heavy board with momentum.
And so I kind of get the feeling of surfing a stand-up paddleboard, but...
Yeah. Nah, just go with the glider or the log.
Yeah, when the boards are like that.

Rob Case
Yeah. Which—yeah.

Michael Frampton
Is great for like Colapinto.

Rob Case
Make it a maneuver.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. Yeah, no, I love that Instagram. Who else is doing cool stuff? I always liked the Needle Essentials, Torren Martyn and... is it Neal Purchase Jr.? Neil Young—no, sorry—Nat Young. Isn’t it Young?

Rob Case
You're right—Bryce.

Michael Frampton
Bryce and Beau—both. I love the way they surf. And Torren Martyn.

Rob Case
Bryce and Beau. Yeah.

Michael Frampton
I like that sort of... It’s still kind of aggressive, sort of progressive surfing, but on different—you know, on bigger boards. I like that.

Rob Case
Yeah.

Michael Frampton
It's a nice—
They do.

Rob Case
Blend. They make it look really easy.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. They do.

Rob Case
Yes. It’s a good thing to aspire to because there’s a lot—there’s almost too much—of the same style out there nowadays. Like with competitive surfing, it almost all looks the same to me.
There’s some small variances, but like Torren and Colapinto, they look very unique. And they look like they’re just having fun. And with Bryce...

Michael Frampton
I would way rather watch—to surf with and be able to surf like—Torren Martyn than Filipe Toledo.

Rob Case
Yeah, me too. And I have to remind myself of that.

Michael Frampton
Yeah. And now do you remember when airs first came out and it was all about like—they actually went up?
Yeah. Above the wave and it was like, whoa.
And nowadays they’re doing airs, but they don’t go up—they just go out.

Rob Case
Yeah, they go sideways around. They show—
"Look, here's the bottom of my board," and "Look, I landed another air 360."
And you scored it a seven. Are you kidding me?
It was horrible.
I don’t know—I don’t want to see the bottom of your surfboard fly out into the air and you land on the flats.

Rob Case
But Mike, you need the stickers. You need to see the sponsors.

Michael Frampton
You need—yeah.

Rob Case
To.

Michael Frampton
Must be what it is.
Let’s see Beau Young do a layback turn on a big fat wave any day.
Yeah. Something like that.
But it’s good that people should—and I don’t think people should necessarily aspire to surfing a refined shortboard in powerful waves because that’s not our everyday experience.

Rob Case
Right. That’s pretty rare.
Yeah. I loved the Surf 100s by Stab, the first one at Lowers, because it’s like, okay, they’re in a huge crowd. I’m used to that—check.
And it’s Lowers, which is, like you said, a standard wave.
And you’re like, I can relate to that. I can relate to that.
I cannot relate to 8 to 10 foot Chopes, but I love watching it.

Michael Frampton
Yes. Love watching.

Rob Case
So they’re just—they’re fulfilling different needs.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, I’m big on enjoying Devon Howard’s stuff as well. He’s playing with Channel Islands on some—he just released a new video surfing the refined version of their big boy shortboard—the M13, I think it’s called.
Something like that. That’s interesting to see Devon Howard surf a thruster, essentially.

Rob Case
I got to look that up. That’s crazy because I’m used to him—you know—really showing us how to ride bigger boards.

Michael Frampton
Yeah, check him out on this big thruster. I think it suits his surfing. It’s like he’s putting a bit of performance into his grace and his wave-reading ability. It’s cool.
Yeah, I’m coming up to the hour.

Rob Case
I appreciate that. Yeah, I got it. I got to run.
Yeah. Two hours.

Michael Frampton
Yes.

Rob Case
Great. So that’s the thing. I’ll just keep talking.

Michael Frampton
That was Rob Case from surfingpaddling.com.
Links to that website and a link to the original interview we did, where we talk about his work, in the show notes.
Feedback: mike@surfmastery.com.
Thanks for tuning in.
And all that—Sola Rosa.
Bye, yeah.

91 Rob Case - Paddling Coach

For the passionate surfer—whether you're a weekend warrior, a surf dad, or an older surfer—this podcast is all about better surfing and deeper stoke. With expert surf coaching, surf training, and surfing tips, we’ll help you catch more waves, refine your paddling technique, and perfect your pop up on a surfboard. From surf workouts to handling wipeouts, chasing bigger waves, and mastering surf technique, we’re here to make sure you not only improve but truly enjoy surfing more—so you can get more out of every session and become a wiser surfer. Go from Beginner or intermediate Surfer to advanced.

Michael Frampton

Surf Mastery

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