The Pop Up Surf Pro: An Honest, Comprehensive Review!

The UK surf scene has seen growing popularity over the last few years. Whether this is due to social media influence, movies and films, or just that people are coming to their senses and realizing that surfing is the coolest thing in the whole wide world. And with this newfound interest in surfing, there comes a much larger number of people wanting to practice more and more.

If you’ve been on this thing called ‘the internet’ recently, you may have noticed a certain product popping up across your feed. The so-called “pop-up surf pro.”

From a first glance, the Pop-up surf pro looks like a plank of wood, with a few bent wooden strips stuck to the bottom of it. Upon closer inspection, you’ll see that it is a plank of wood with a few bent wooden strips underneath. But, it’s more than that… Let me explain.

Anyone who doesn’t have the luxury of having the ocean at their doorstep knows the pain of having to re-learn how to pop up every single time they go for a surf. It is absolutely soul-destroying and wastes a hell of a lot of valuable surfing time.

The Pop-up surf pro claims to imitate a 6’6″ shortboard, and to “Improve, Perfect and Refine your pop up.” I decided I’d get one for myself and see if it does just that…

The Specs

Out of the box, the pop-up surf pro comes with:

The Deck

• Length: 111.8cm (44″)
• Width: 47cm (18½”)
• Weight: 4.5kg

The deck and rockers are made out of sustainably sourced FSC registered, furniture grade birch plywood, which is proper sturdy, and as anyone who knows me personally will tell you, I’m fairly heavy-handed with, well, Everything… so for this to be in pristine condition after a few weeks of use is just a testament to the built quality.

The deck shape of the pop-up surf pro is designed to replicate the deck and tail of a 6’6″ shortboard and takes a similar shape. Weighing a total of 4.5kg, it’s not at all flimsy, just be careful not to drop it on your bare feet.

The deck is great and all, but what about the things that make the Pop-up surf pro work?

A set of two lateral rockers

• Length: 39cm (15¼”)
• Height: (Just over 9cm)

The idea of the lateral rockers is to imitate the imbalance between the ball of your foot to your heel, something you’ll experience a great deal while surfing, especially on shorter boards.

A single longitudinal rocker

• Length: 95cm (37¼”)
• Height: (Just over 9cm)

The Long (longitudinal) rocker is intended to help train your balance from front to back, which is something you’ll also experience a great deal when paddling for a wave, or when you’re too far forward or back on your surfboard.

The Baseplate

• Length: 111.8cm (44″)
• Width: 47cm (18½”)
• Thickness: 6mm

Pretty self-explanatory really, just an MDF rectangle base that the pop-up surf pro sits on, and prevents you from scratching up your floor.

Knee protection

The pop-up surf pro comes with two tubular compression bandages (around 23cm in length), with the intention of protecting your knees from bruising whilst using the product. I’ll go into this a little bit later…

A handy-dandy instruction manual

 

A small booklet with all the usage instructions and tips for assembly. If you’re smart you’ll read this before messing around on the pop-up surf pro… I am not one of those people, and as a result, I nearly broke my face a few times… read the manual.

So, now that you’re equated with all of the constituent parts of the pop-up surf pro…

Time To Assemble The Pop-Up Surf Pro!

First off, you’ll want to take everything out of the boxes… obviously.

Once you have broken down all of your packaging and have arranged the components neatly next to each other, in alphabetical and height order… 1,2,3,4… You can begin the assembly.

I’m joking about the whole “alphabetical and height order” thing… I mean, you can do it if you really want to, your life eh?

Step 1

Lay the baseplate down on the floor with the ‘Pop up surf pro’ logo facing upwards. Then proceed to lay the deck on top, with the deck facing downwards, this will allow you to fit the rockers, which just so happens to be the next step

Step 2

Decide on which Lateral rocker you want to use, here I have labeled them “1 and 2.”

Number 1 is the easier of the two. It has less of a dramatic concave to it which makes it (slightly) easier to balance on. A good starter if you will.

Number 2 is the opposite. It is much harder to balance on, and especially while trying to balance whilst laying on the deck. However, this difficulty, in my opinion, is more extreme than what you would typically experience out in the surf.

This information is coming from a Landlocked Kook though, you may well experience way more extreme surf conditions than I have, in which case you may find it more similar to your average surf session.

 

Step 3

Once you’ve picked your lateral rocker out, place it into the middle grooves, going across the width of the deck. Next, you’ll want to take the Long (longitudinal) rocker, and place it dead centre of the deck, securing the Lateral rocker in place.

One thing you’ll need to do is make sure you put the long rocker in the correct way, with the blunter side headed towards the front of the deck. (The front of the deck is where the pop-up surf pro logo is.)

 

Step 4

Clear everything around you… Falling off and hurting yourself is bad enough, falling off and killing a cat or breaking that family heirloom coffee table is even worse!

 

Step 5

Turn the board the correct way up, take off your socks (trust me), and put on the stylish knee protection.

Next, lay down on the middle of the deck and try and balance yourself without your hands or feet touching the floor. This will help you familiarize yourself with your centre of gravity while using the pop-up surf pro.

 

Step 6

Just Stand Up. Well, it’s a little more difficult than that…

In case you didn’t already know how to pop up, you essentially want to place your hands down by your ribcage, and in one fluid motion, arch your back, push your upper body off the deck as if you were doing a pushup, while simultaneously moving your dominant foot forward, where your chest was, and standing low, with your knees bent.

Easier said than done, I know.

Here’s a wee video I made showing my attempts at popping up. There are much better videos out there of people popping up though, so please don’t use my form to go off!

As you can see… I definitely need to use the Pop-up surf pro more…

One thing you’ll notice after your first try on this thing is that there’s no stringer down the centre. You may see this as a design flaw, but it’s quite intentional…

The reason there is no stringer down the middle is that in order to train your muscle memory, you’ll have to adapt to the feeling of not landing quite centre of the board. This will accelerate your progression and help your body intuitively know where the centre of the board is.

Mind muscle connection… Muscle memory… Or something like that, I dunno. You get the idea.

 

My Personal, Non-Biased, And Honest Opinion…

 

After getting over the excitement of receiving the Pop-up surf pro, setting it up, and finally giving it a go, I found out the hard way that you should always read the manual first.

Me being the thick muppet that I am, I decided to try it with socks on. Top-tip, the pop-up surf pro is quite slippery. It has a smooth, machined surface, which as you may have guessed, isn’t all that grippy. This didn’t react well with socks, and I swiftly faceplanted, much to the amusement of my mum who was watching from the other room…

Apart from the sock situation, I’ve found that even barefoot the deck can sometimes be a little slippy too, so be careful when you’re using it.

Another issue I’ve noticed arise is Bruised knees. 

Now, I want to be clear about this. The Pop-up surf pro team has made it very clear, you shouldn’t use it with bare knees, it’s written in big, bold letters on the back of the user manual. To combat this, you get a pair of quite frankly, very thin compression bandages to slide over your kneecaps while using the product.

I found these knee bandages to be about as effective as a cotton bulletproof vest. However, I’ve also found a quick fix for this issue…

If you take a pair of thick socks and fold them over a few times, then slide them in under the bandages, (over your kneecaps,) you get way better protection from knee pain… (be it at the expense of looking a bit daft.)

Do I think Pop-up surf pro should send some better knee protection? In my opinion, yes. For the price of the product, it’s my personal opinion that they should come with a little bit of cotton padding, or a sponge you can slide in over your kneecaps. Saying that though, it is something that anyone can do from home with a bit of ingenuity.

Another aspect that I think the Pop-up surf pro should come with is a set of small rubber or neoprene feet to place underneath the Baseplate. I noticed whilst using it on laminate floor that the baseplate likes to move around a little.

To combat this, I’ve found that sticking a yoga mat underneath the baseplate stops the issue altogether, and also hugely dampens the noise that the pop-up surf pro makes. Alternatively, you could just nip to your local DIY shop and get some little, flat, rubber feet to stick on each corner of the base plate.

Or, just use it on carpet… Works just as well.

It’s certainly not a massive issue, but it can get a bit annoying after a while.

Enough of the negatives though, because they were the only ones I could find. My overall experience with the Pop-up surf pro was one of enjoyment and addictiveness… Is that a word?

What I mean by that is, you try it once, and you just want to keep using it again and again. Even to the point where your knees, ribs, and back are aching from overuse, I found that it’s incredibly hard to put away!

The customer service is fantastic too, Will Hampson (the owner of Pop-up surf pro,) is an incredibly friendly guy, and you can get in touch with him and his team through the ‘contact’ screen on the Pop-up surf pro website for any questions or feedback about the product.

Another great aspect of the Pop-up surf pro is the build quality. As I touched on earlier, it is made from furniture grade, FSC- certified birch plywood. (FSC stands for ‘Forest Stewardship Council‘. … FSC certifies forests all over the world to ensure they meet the highest environmental and social standards.) 

The additional fact that the wood is sustainably sourced, and that it is hand-manufactured in the UK makes it all the more enjoyable and satisfying to own. You’re not getting some injection moulded plastic shite from China here, it really is well manufactured and built to last.

My only wish? That they made one for longboards too!

As a longboarder at heart, I’d love to see the same product, but slightly larger, to allow people to practice their cross-stepping and obviously, pop-ups.

Saying that though, I have found that using the Pop-up surf pro helps regardless of what board you ride. The idea is to train your core skills and muscle memory, to allow your body to adapt to the unstable feeling of trying to pop up. This aspect of surfing is fundamental, and pretty much identical no matter what surfing style.

I’m not being paid in any way to write this post, it is genuinely my honest opinion. And honestly, I think if you are stuck inland, want to train your core, or want to practice the art of popping up more often, you should definitely consider grabbing one of these for yourself!

How did it affect my surfing though?

Well, seeing as we are still among some tight travel restrictions, I’ve been unable to get to the coast. However, in a few week’s time, myself and a couple of mates are going to head into north Wales for a surf trip. We plan on roughing it and camping in the sand dunes and surfing throughout the day. Only then will I know the full extent of what the pop-up surf pro has done for my surfing skills.

Keep your eyes peeled for a post all about that trip though, it’ll be a gooden! 😉

If you fancy getting a pop-up surf pro for yourself, head to their website and take a look at the product for yourself. Don’t hesitate to ask them questions if you wish, Will is an extremely nice bloke, and provides fantastic customer service!

If you do get one for yourself, leave them a review too. They’re a rather new company which I think has a bright future in the UK surf scene, and hopefully even globally!

Click here to visit the Pop-up surf pro website!

I filmed a video reviewing the Pop-up surf pro too, give it a watch if you fancy…

Already got one? let me know what you think of it in the comments under this post. Lets chat!

If you’re interested in other surfing alternatives, check out my post about The Best Surfing Alternatives For Landlocked Surfers