Dear David and Chas, I’ll try to keep this short. The only reason to hold your surfboard fins out is when one is walking across slippery surfaces (i.e. jetties, rocks, seaweed covered reef etc). Falling while holding your board fins in, may lead to broken fins. Better yet, hold fins out and in front. I’ve taken a few falls on slippery rocks and usually the board behind me gets the brunt of the impact. That way if you do take a spill and suffer a bad ding, having one on the nose of your board just feels better than one on the tail and you can keep surfing. Keep it up.
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