Humility Makes the Ultimate Student, which in Turn Makes the Ultimate Coach
Today’s podcast guest is Boyan Zlatarev from Tarifa. One of the conditions for getting Boyan to come on the show was that I not embarrass him with flattery. So with that, I will just say this…
Boyan’s humility makes him the ultimate student. He approaches everything he does with an open mind and a mindset that there is always more to learn, this in turn, is the magic ingredient that makes Boyan such an incredible coach.
This is the longest podcast I’ve recorded yet, but it is packed with deep and thought provoking insights and analogies that are certain to improve your paddling experience and performance. I know that it has fundamentally changed my approach to downwind paddling and I’m now more excited than ever to get out in the waves, whatever kind of waves they might be
We cover a wide range of topics including
Boyan’s athletic career before surfski paddlingHow boyan got started in surfskiBoyan’s first downwindHow Boyan did NOT meet Oscar Chalupsky for the first timeStudying the science of waves with J B ZirkerWhy Boyan paddles a V8 99% of the timeApplying the concepts of Deep Practice to downwind paddling by paddling slow boats, limiting strokes, using a smaller rudder, and limiting heart rateThe LESS FormulaImportance of the brace strokeChecking out Slomo to help understand why we are hard wired to chase the acceleration we get from dropping down a waveStaying high on the wave and riding it until it delivers you into the next waveAveraging 11 kph (6.8 mph) as a rough threshold for determining if you will gain anything from an advanced surfskiThe recent blog I wrote on trying to become a Mindful Downwind PaddlerMuch much more….If you haven’t already, do yourself a favor and Like Boyan’s Surfski Education FB page. There is a wealth of information here
If you really want to take your paddling to the next level, consider spending a week at the Surfski Center in Tarifa