First I want to explain rocker. Rocker is the bend you see in a wakeboard from tip to tail. There are two types of rocker: continuous and three-stage. Continuous rocker is a smooth curve that does not change from tip to tail, while three-stage rocker has two distinct bend points, almost like a skateboard deck but not nearly as drastic. When you ride wakeboards with continuous rocker you lose a bit of your pop, but you get a fast ride because the water flows without disruption across the bottom of the wakeboard right out through the tail. Since wakeboards with three-stage rocker has two distinct bends in the wakeboard, it pushes more water in front of the wakeboard. This makes your ride slower, but with three-stage rocker you gain a lot of pop off the wake.

 

Not only are there types of rocker but you also have to deal with amounts of rocker. Just like tequila, more is not always better. The more rocker you have, the slower, looser and less edgy the wakeboard. With more rocker, you tend to lose the locked-in feeling of your fins, which allows you to break the wakeboard loose whenever you please. This reminds me of a more snowboardy feel. For beginners, wakeboards with a lot of rocker will feel loose, but it will teach you how to edge rather than relying on your fins, which pays off in the long run. You are forced to be more gradual with your turns and for some the slowness makes them feel more comfortable. As far as landings go, the more rocker your board has, the softer the impact will feel, but you will notice a stuck-in-the-mud sluggishness when you hit the water and try to keep your direction.

 

In contrast, less rocker allows the wakeboard to move faster, hook up better and become more aggressive. You can be more aggressive with your turns and really edge hard through the wake instead of going slow and bounding off it. You will work less, last longer on the water and be able to land really far out in the flats because the wakeboard planes better and you don’t have to put so much effort into making the wakeboard move across the back of the boat. Beginners may feel a bit out of control and unstable with less rocker. Overall, your impact on landings becomes harder, but your recovery time after landing is quicker, allowing you to adjust and move right back into acceleration again fairly easily.

 

Another question to ask: Does the size of the wake I ride affect the type of rocker I should consider? Believe it or not, yes. For those of you who ride a small to midsize wake, your pop is produced more by edging, so less rocker is ideal. Since you don’t get that bounce up from a big steep wake, by using less rocker you won’t get sprayed in the face as you edge through a mellow, more gradual wake. On bigger steeper wakes, your pop is projected straight up more than across, so you need the bounce created by a wakeboard that has a lot of rocker. You may have to work a little harder to make the wakeboard go, but the end result is that you get more height.

To sum it up, if your wake is really big but has a mellow transition you can lean a little more towards less rocker. If you start digging in and getting sprayed in the face by the wake you’ll know you have too little rocker. If you’re the type of rider who loves to turn fast, go big and land out in the flats but you ride a rigger, steeper wake, try to find a wakeboard with medium rocker. The slower, smoother and more wake-to-wake your style leans toward, the more rocker you need.

Throughout the years different riders have been known to ride wakeboards that may seem too big or too small for them according to the manufacturer’s sizing chart. The reason is that wakeboards a size smaller or a size bigger can help distinguish a certain style of riding. Shawn Watson has been seen in the past riding wakeboards that would seem to be on the smaller side of the spectrum according to his weight and height. Shawn is known for his off-axis 900’s and wake-to-wake 720’s, and smaller wakeboards carry less swing weight so he can spin really fast and land these high-end spins. On the other hand, Parks Bonifay is known for riding larger wakeboards to suit his style better. A larger wakeboard allows Parks to go really big and absorb those huge landings.

Sizing down will make the wakeboard feel lighter, spin faster and seem more aggressive. But your landings do suffer. There is not as much surface area to plane across the water, so the wakeboard will not float you as well. You will have to work a little harder to keep the nose from digging in and you may have to increase your boat speed a bit to help you plane. However, smaller wakeboards are great for people who like to do a lot of handle-pass flips and spins and move around the water fast. It can also be a great learning tool. If you have a selection of wakeboards and are working on a spin, for example, sizing down will help you rotate better and farther. When you get the landing and get comfortable on the smaller wakeboard, start trying to increase your rotation on the wakeboard sized for you. If you struggle to get the whole rotation, move down again. Land the trick then move back up.

Sizing your wakeboards up from your established size lends a slower, smoother style. A bigger wakeboard moves slower in the water, making you look smoother. The bigger surface area makes the wakeboard act a little like a dump truck, but really lets you spin slowly and hold on to those grabs for a long time. If you are into going big, the increased surface area lets the wakeboard land softer, saving your body from the bigger impacts. The trade-off is lugging that huge thing around in the air. But think of it like this: Have you ever seen a baseball player swing four bats before he goes up to the plate? After swinging the four bats for a while, dropping those and only swinging one makes the single bat feel like a feather. The same applies to furthering your rotation. You can use the different wakeboard sizes as a learning tool and size up or down to help you learn.

Are you still with me? Hang in there. The width of a wakeboard directly affects how high it sits in the water. There are three places to check wakeboard widths: Tips and tails – those are generally the same – and in the middle. Narrower tips and tails sit lower and make the wakeboard turn more aggressively. However, to initiate spins you might have to wait longer because the wakeboard doesn’t release as well through the wake. A rider may want to load up fins on the ends of this wakeboard since it sits lower in the water. Wider tips and tails allow you to break your fins loose and slide around for lip tricks and surface tricks, and a better release for spins off the wake.

As we focus on the width of the middle of the wakeboard, the variable that changes is pop. The wider the middle of the wakeboard, the higher it will sit in the water and the harder it will bounce off the wake. You do lose some ability to edge the wakeboard really aggressively and cannot rely on your fins as much. This teaches you to use the rail of the wakeboard to edge through the water instead of relying on your fins.

Your next question might be: How does the size of the wake I ride influence my choice of wakeboard width? I find that if you ride a smaller wake you need a narrower wakeboard so you can load up the line and your tricks more. You sit lower in the water on a narrower wakeboard, so you are essentially creating more wake for yourself. For the big, mellow wakes and aggressive out-in-the-flats riding you should find a wakeboard that is wide through the middle and a little narrower at the tip and tail so you can edge longer and use your fins more. For an all-around loose snowboard-type feel and those huge, steep wakes, find a wakeboard that is wider throughout. As a coach, I would rather see a rider get on a wider wakeboard so that from the beginning the rider learns to use the edge and not rely on the fins. It may seem squirrelly at first, but it will pay off in the long run.

Less weight is definitely a luxury. Lighter wakeboards are easier to move around and may have better flex patters, which affects your pop and landings. Weight is a variable that is closely related to length and can be used the same way. You can move back and forth between a lighter and a heavier wakeboard to help you progress or to suit your style. Most of the lighter wakeboards are made with a wood core, lighter density foam or honeycomb construction. Wood is one of the trends nowadays. It is said to flex better, giving you a snappier feel off the wake. On landings you get more flex on impact, so it should feel softer as well. The drawback is durability. If you are into grinding rails, wakeboards with wood cores don’t hold up quite as well as a normal high-density foam core. But if rails aren’t your game and you spend all your time on the wake, try one out! It will probably spoil you.

There are many different bottom designs in wakeboards – it is a feature wakeboard shapers use to express their own style. On the bottom of the wakeboard you will see concaves, channels or maybe nothing at all. Each performs a different function, fine-tuning how the wakeboard rides through the water according to its width from tip to tail, fin setup, rocker and tip and tail shape.

Concaves create lift and make the wakeboard sit higher in the water. Ever so simply, concaves in different areas of the wakeboard created lift in different areas of the wakeboard. For instance, a double concave in the middle and a single concave in the tip and tail keep the wakeboard riding higher in the water overall. But the double concave in the middle will always sit higher than the single concave.

Channels act like long fins. It’s something for the water to run into and along to help the wakeboard edge harder. If there are channels through the middle of the wakeboard and not at the tip or tail, it will be a hard-edging wakeboard but will still release well through the wake, depending on the fin setup. On a wakeboard with channels running through the tip and tail, the fins will hook better and the wakeboard will not release as well through the wake. Finally, a featureless wakeboard bottom basically lets the tip and tail shape, and the width throughout the rocker and the fins do their job, which can be a good thing – sometimes less is more.