The sport of surfing divides the surfing of big waves (from approximately 4m upwards) into the Paddle In and Tow In categories. This means that experienced surfer paddle into big waves with so-called “guns”. These are very long surfboards that enable surfers to build up sufficient speed for extremely large waves while paddling. These surfboards are very stable, but more difficult to manoeuvre due to their size.
From a certain size wave it‘s no longer possible to paddle in. In this case, jet skis help to tow the surfer into the wave on a so-called “tow-in” surfboard. These surfboards are considerably smaller and more manoeuvrable than the paddle-in surfboards. For tow-in, the surfer needs a team to tow them into the wave.