Ya, Cliff, but which one looks cooler…? Photo: Screenshot
Dr. Cliff Kapono would have been the coolest high school physics teacher on Earth had he chosen to go that route. He has a remarkable ability to make anything related to science, research, and environmentalism interesting, and I’d argue it’s because he has such a profound curiosity for those things himself. He reveres his Hawaiian heritage and is a student of history — really a student of anything and everything you might talk to him about.
Now back to my original point: imagine walking into your high school physics class on a random Tuesday, zooted on Monster energy drinks and Jack ‘n the Box tacos, and on the whiteboard is a diagram of a wave. Since Dr. Kapono is your teacher, the wave obviously looks like something off the cover of an old SURFER magazine. You mindsurf it before you’ve even taken your seat. It’s a good ride. You flew through an impossible first section and slid casually into a cavernous barrel, held your breath for a moment when you thought the foamball was going to send you off your board like a bucking bronco, and then found yourself in the channel with your back feeling like it’d been stung by a thousand bees because the thing spat you out so hard.
Now, quick question. Did you set yourself up for that first section with a big bottom turn off the takeoff or did you race to your feet and rush into a highline?
Sit down, class. We’re going to discuss why option B was likely the best answer. And even though that answer may seem obvious to most people, Kapono wants you to understand the mechanics behind it all. Time for a physics lesson.
“Water molecules on the upper region of the forward face of a breaking wave, just below the crest, experience the highest velocity and acceleration,” he says, referencing a 2017 paper written by Nick Pizzo, Surfing Surface Gravity Waves.
Forever the curious scientist, Kapono posted this clip on social media breaking down the hypothetical scenario. He wanted to know what peer-reviewed research had to say about the simple question: take a highline or a bottom turn? The 2017 paper is filled with diagrams, a dive into The John Equation, and talks about “stoke waves.” Turtle could not have written this paper.
“When the wave breaks here, don’t be there.”
“A highline in the upper region of a breaking wave just below the crest provides more opportunity for acceleration when compared to, say, a bottom turn, where you go out of that sweet spot region,” he explains. “What’s super cool to me about this paper is that water molecules just below the crest of the simulated waves start out with an acceleration of less than half a G, and that dramatically increases to an acceleration about four times the force of gravity, which infers that a surfer can experience extreme increase in acceleration if a highline is initiated just after takeoff and extended out through the ride.
Check out Cliff’s full explanation…
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