#1 Surfing Sports Psychologist
Stay calm, focused, and ready for every wave
Surfing can test your mindset as much as your ability in the water. Our surfing sports psychologist helps you manage pre-surf nerves, stay focused in heats, recover from mistakes, and make confident decisions when conditions, fear, or competition pressure affect your performance, judgment, and wave selection.
1-on-1
sessions built for you
24 Hour
response time to new enquiries
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sessions possible
Sessions
at times that suit you
Keep your focus when the heat gets tight
A bad wave, a missed opportunity, or a tight heat can get in your head quickly. You might second-guess your wave choices, hesitate when you need to commit, or lose focus after a poor ride. As the clock runs down, nerves can make it harder to trust your instincts.
Our surfing sports psychologist can help you manage those nerves, reset after mistakes, and stay focused on the next opportunity. You’ll work on mental skills for making better decisions, committing to your surfing, and maintaining your focus throughout the heat.
Perform under pressure with a stronger surfing mindset
Surfing demands more than technical ability. You need to read changing conditions, manage risk, and execute when a heat gets tense. We help you develop mental skills that carry from training into competition, manage nerves before paddling out, and recover from mistakes.
Take your training into heats
You might surf freely in training, then struggle when the heat starts. Build mental routines that help you trust your technique, read the lineup, commit to your choices, and bring the same intent into competition.
Settle nerves before paddling out
Pre-surf nerves can affect your breathing, attention, and confidence. Develop a routine that helps you settle your thoughts, assess the conditions, and paddle out feeling prepared for the heat ahead.
Reset after a poor ride
A missed section or bad wave can affect your next opportunity. Learn to leave the mistake behind, regain focus, and approach the next wave with a plan instead of letting one ride affect your confidence.
MAKE BETTER CALLS
Challenging conditions can affect your wave selection and commitment. Learn to assess risk, trust your reading of the conditions, and make sound decisions without letting nerves or the result dictate your surfing.
Handle competition pressure
Rankings, judges, opponents, and a ticking clock can affect your concentration. Learn to manage distractions, focus on your own performance, and make sound decisions when you have limited time to post a score.
BUILD BETTER ROUTINES
Mental skills improve through regular practice. Use structured routines before training, before heats, between waves, and after competition to manage nerves, reset after mistakes, and maintain a consistent mindset.
Get a mental edge by working with psychologists who understand surfing
Surfing demands patience one minute and commitment the next. You need to judge conditions, manage risk, trust your read, and adapt as the lineup changes. We help surfers build the mental skills behind those decisions so they can stay focused, recover from setbacks, and perform consistently.
Brian Langsworth
Michelle Pain
Harley de Vos
David Barracosa
Gareth J Mole
Madalyn Incognito
Darren Godwin
Alexandra Mapstone
James Kneller
Lauren Bischoff
Chris Pomfret
4 steps to getting your surfing mindset on track
Tell us what you're dealing with
Start by giving us some context about your surfing. You might be struggling with nerves before paddling out or finding it hard to focus once a heat gets underway. We'll review your New Enquiries form and aim to get back to you in 24 hours.
Speak with Tara or Lizzie
A New Enquiries Officer will talk through what you'd like to change, and where you feel your mindset is holding you back. This is your chance to ask questions, understand how the process works, and learn our Monthly Options.
Pinpoint your performance goals
Tell us what you want to improve, whether that’s making better calls in changing conditions, trusting your wave selection, or regaining confidence on your surfboard as you return from injury. We’ll arrange your Kick Start Session.
Put your mindset into practice
Use Mental Toughness Training with a practitioner to work on the mental side of surfing. You’ll develop strategies for maintaining motivation, adapting to changing conditions, and carrying confidence from training into competition.
Make better decisions from paddle out to final horn
Surfing keeps asking you to make quick calls, from reading the lineup and choosing your waves to adapting when conditions change and your heat clock starts winding down. Learn how to trust your read, keep your attention on the next opportunity, and adapt your approach without losing the game plan you brought into the water.
Get back to trusting your surfing
A run of average sessions can change how you surf. You might start playing it safe, forcing turns that aren’t there, or wondering if you’ve lost your form. After an injury, that uncertainty can make returning to the lineup feel harder, especially when surfing doesn’t feel natural right away.
Surfing sports psychologists can help you rebuild belief in your ability and find your rhythm again. You’ll work on ways to keep motivation up through slower periods, trust your technique as you return from injury, and focus on the parts of your surfing you can control while your form comes back.
Contact us to strengthen your surfing mindset
Get in touch with us because the right support can help you approach training and competition with greater confidence, sharper focus, and a stronger sense of control.
FAQs our surfing sports psychologist usually gets
How can a sports psychologist help me in the water?
As surf psychologists, we can help you understand what happens mentally when you surf under pressure. We can work on nerves, confidence, concentration, decision-making, and the way you respond when a wave doesn’t go to plan.
We’ll look at your specific surfing situations, then develop mental skills you can use in training and competition. That might mean creating a pre-surf routine, improving your focus between waves, or learning how to reset quickly after a mistake.
You don’t need to compete at an elite level to benefit. Surf psychology can help you approach sessions with more confidence, stay present in changing conditions, and make better decisions in the water.
Why do I surf well in training but struggle in competitions?
Competition can change the way you think, feel, and make decisions. You might become more focused on scores, rankings, other competitors, or the consequences of making a mistake.
We can identify the thoughts and behaviours that affect your performance under pressure. From there, we can help you develop routines for managing nerves, refocusing after a poor wave, and keeping your attention on the next opportunity.
A performance psychologist can also help you prepare for different competition scenarios. You’ll learn how to respond when you’re behind on a heat, waiting for waves, or sitting with a lead.
How can you help me surf better?
We can help you understand the mental factors that affect how you use your physical skills. Confidence, attention, decision-making, and emotional control can all influence your performance on a wave.
We’ll explore what happens before, during, and after your best surfing sessions, then identify the mental habits that support those performances. We can also work on what gets in the way when you feel stuck, frustrated, or hesitant.
Your surf coach can continue working on technique, tactics, and wave selection while we focus on the mental side. Working together can help you take the skills you practise in training into more demanding conditions.
What do I do if I get nervous before surfing big waves?
Start by recognising the nerves rather than trying to push them away. We can help you understand what triggers your anxiety, how it affects your breathing and attention, and whether it changes the decisions you make in the water.
We can then work with you on strategies for managing that response before you paddle out. This might include breathing techniques, attentional cues, visualisation, and pre-surf routines that help you settle your focus and prepare for the conditions.
You still need to respect your limits and make sound decisions about the conditions. Mental skills can help you manage nerves, assess situations, and stay focused, but they shouldn’t encourage you to take risks you wouldn’t normally take.
Can you help with confidence after a bad wipeout?
Yes. After a heavy wipeout, you might start anticipating the same thing happening again. That can make you hesitate on take-off, avoid certain waves, or lose confidence in conditions you previously handled well.
We can help you unpack what happened, identify the thoughts that now affect your decisions, and work on responses that keep you focused on the present moment. We can also help you rebuild confidence through controlled exposure and well-defined performance targets.
Mental coaching can give you tools to manage those thoughts when they appear in the water. You’ll still make your own calls about conditions and risk, but you’ll have more control over how you respond to challenging situations.
How can I prepare mentally for a competition?
Start by preparing for the situations you’re most likely to face in a heat, rather than focusing only on your physical surfing. We can help you develop a pre-heat routine, manage nerves, set performance cues, and prepare for situations such as a slow start, poor score, long wait for a wave, or an opponent taking the wave you wanted.
We can also rehearse situations that can throw you off, such as a slow start, a poor score, a long wait for a wave, or an opponent taking the wave you wanted. Working through these scenarios ahead of time can help you respond without letting frustration or panic take over.
During a heat, we can help you keep your attention on your own decisions rather than constantly tracking what another surfer is doing. You’ll have routines for resetting after each wave, staying composed, and making the most of the opportunities you get.
How can I stay focused during a long surf session?
Start by noticing when your concentration drops and what tends to cause it. Long sessions can test your attention, particularly when you spend extended periods waiting for waves or dealing with inconsistent conditions.
We can help you develop routines for managing your attention between waves, setting useful cues before you take off, and resetting after mistakes. You’ll have specific strategies to bring your focus back when fatigue, frustration, or distractions start taking over.
These skills can make a difference during free surfing, where you need to manage your own attention without a coach or competition structure. You can learn when to scan the conditions, relax between waves, and focus intensely when an opportunity arrives.
How can I get my mindset right before I paddle out?
Develop with a pre-surf routine that gets your attention onto the session ahead. We can help you identify what you need to focus on, how you want to approach the conditions, and which thoughts tend to distract you.
We can then help you create mental cues that you can use before and during a session. These might help you manage nerves, stay present, and respond to changing conditions without overthinking every decision.
Your routine should fit the way you surf. We’ll work with you to develop something you can use before training, competition, or a challenging session, rather than giving you a generic checklist to follow.
Do I need to be a competitive surfer to get help?
No. We work with surfers at different levels, whether you’re chasing competition results, working towards high performance, or trying to get more from your weekend sessions.
You might want to improve your confidence, stay focused for longer, manage frustration, or commit to waves you previously avoided. We can also help you prepare mentally when you move into bigger conditions or return after time away from surfing.
You don’t need to reach pro surfing level before you seek support. If your thoughts, emotions, or confidence affect the way you surf, we can help you develop skills to manage them.
How can I balance sports psychology with my surf coaching?
You can use both by giving each one a different job. Your coach can work on technique, tactics, wave selection, fitness, and competition strategy, while we focus on the mental skills that affect how you perform under pressure.
For example, your coach might help you improve a manoeuvre while we help you manage hesitation, maintain focus, and commit to that manoeuvre when competition pressure kicks in.
You don’t need to choose between the two. Combining technical coaching with sports psychology can help you develop your surfing skills and learn how to use them consistently when nerves, fatigue, frustration, or pressure enter the picture.
