Da Bolt gets out again and discovers more mat riding secrets!

NSW mat rider Eric "Da Bolt" Bridges seems to be getting the mat riding bug bad! But many of us would not be surprised as we know just how insidious it can be!

Here are 3 emails received in the last week.

Hi Robin

Have enclosed a couple of piccies from our latest episode to “No Toes” a fairly heavy reef break on the south coast, although quite tame on this outing.

You may remember that I am a “bit” caffeine intolerant..well after being given a double strength latté by the boys I was desperate to get into the water and burn off some energy…

We arrived at no toes and I saw a wave and in my hyped up state said..I AM SSSOOO OUT THERE…my kneelo mate Oily (ex-submariner) joined me as he had not surfed this spot before..

As you know I like to throw the Vespa around …well as you can see in the piccies I got a little too excited and ended up just hanging on. Would not have been a good place to loose the mat with lotsa rocks and currents.

Still have not learned to have the finesse required to mat ride eloquently BUT hey its my style and I have a ball, even though mats do not have a rail.

We still crack up laughting and give lotsa older guys a trip down memory lane when they see us.

Da Bolt

Yo

Had a day off yesterday.

Stopped at backside Gerroa at 9 am and with one guy out decided the matman should do his thing…then the amazing thing happened..this guy says to me ..WOW is that a paul gross 4gf standard…NAH…it is a vespa roundtail….WOW…how many models does he make…blah blah…seems he recently wore out his standard and is getting another…so I say where do ya surf it…at latte corner (sand)…he thought I was nuts riding it over the reef…anyway had fun gotta couple and then committed myself into another awful drive thru Sydney traffic…crazies everywhere.

See ya …looks like another BIG swell for the weekend.

Da bolt

Yo fellow matman....had a stack of fun mat waves at backside yesterday...had to roll on my back a couple of times as I got rolled right onto the shallow ledge so that was different.

Now every time I go out I learn something new...i have found that if you can ANGLE into the wave on the take off and not drop straight down the face you keep ya speed up and remain more stable...i have even tried not stop kicking even when I take off...there is a difference between a board and a mat where on a board ya get up and turn away building speed with a mat you have to give it a bit more push.

I noticed in some of the piccies taken of me how I seem to go backwards after I catch the wave...this is due to drag etc...

So yesterday I kept kicking and angled in, made 9 out of 10 waves and got a couple of great "little" cover ups...

So this is why mats are so unique cause you have to adjust ya method for each type of wave..

Backside was slow so hence the extra kicking....once I was getting the wall lined up and had speed up I was able to put my flipper in for stability ...once I did it to hard and did a reo off the wave...one to deep and I slowed way down...so just a gentle edge is enough.

Shared thoughts...da bolt

Love ya work mate!