When we are paddling you can get carried away and start to pull from your arms. Just remember every time you pull from your arms you are dropping the shoulder on the stroke and if you were to then increase the stroke rate you would see your shoulders start to roll and this causes the surf ski to tip from side-to-side causing drag. We need to ensure we are sitting upright on the stroke, and we need to pull from our hip and rotate our hips and shoulders to ensure we keep our shoulders up and level. Imagine yourself paddling with two glasses of wine on your shoulders and you can’t spill a drop.
As your paddle head comes down through the air there is no resistance, but when the blade engages with the water there is an incredible load that gets weighted onto the paddle head. As we are holding the paddle the load comes through our body and we don’t want you to bend your elbow and take the load through your bicep as it’s a very small muscle. We want you to know that the load is coming and to pull from your hip and rotate your torso so your “lat”, “obliques” and “quads” take the load.