Thanks for the discussion and references. I think I've got a clearer
picture now: You want to be going a bit slower than the wave (so it
catches up to you) but not too much slower (so it doesn't just pass
under you quickly). Then as you start riding up the sloped front of
the wave, the "normal force" of the water surface pushes you forward.
Presumably you then adjust your position along the slope to balance
air resistance and maintain equilibrium (in the wave's frame of
reference, so there is no water drag, at least until you start moving
laterally along the wavefront and no longer straight toward the
beach). There is an energy loss (but no change in kinetic energy
after the initial acceleration up to the wave speed, my mistake
indeed) equal to the air resistance times longitudinal distance moved
(in the ground frame, in addition to water/air drag times lateral
distance moved) which is being taken out of the wave (amplitude
and/or speed, but imperceptibly small I suppose).
Next question: How does plasma wakefield acceleration (which is also
often described as "surfing") work? I think there are different
kinds, but I mean the kind where you fire an optical pulse into a
plasma and use it as a form of particle accelerator. For the surfer,
we have horizontal component of water normal force forward, and air
drag backward. Taking a charge q in the plasma with the pulse
arriving, what are the analogous forward and backward forces?
--
Carl E Mungan, Assoc Prof of Physics 410-293-6680 (O) -3729 (F)
Naval Academy Stop 9c, 572C Holloway Rd, Annapolis MD 21402-1363 mailto:mungan@usna.eduhttp://usna.edu/Users/physics/mungan/