Our Santa Barbara surf shop manager Evan Gambetta walks you through CI's offering of all-new, redesigned traction pads. There are lots of options out there, so we wanted to help you find the right pad for your new board.

All our traction pads are made with CI's "Bio Grip" grip, which means they are built from discarded waste. This helps less items going into a landfill and means you can feel a little bit better about your choice of pad under foot. Additionally, all CI pads use premium 3M adhesive tape—ensuring it stays on firmly.

To narrow down your pad selection further, you will need to consider whether you like a flat pad or one with an arch. Flat pads tend to give you a little more room to move, whereas and arch provides a more locked in feel. We have two different arch options, the traditional and then our new Mega Kush which has a softer, cushier feel for the arch. Mega Kush let's you be more locked in like a trad arch but still offers a little bit more room to move and is noticeably more comfortable.

Next is deciding what overall grip feel you want under your feet. We have the "Mixed Groove" pattern which is a more traditional, more aggressive grip. Then we have have the newer "Thermo Press" pattern, which is a thinner pad that's gives you a closer to the board feel. If you're used to not riding with a pad, Thermo Press could be a really good option to provide added grip but without the foreign feel of a pad. The majority of our team riders do however prefer Mixed Groove, as evidenced by pro series signature pads that all have it. So if you like the more traditional feel of a traction pad we recommend Mixed Groove.

Narrowing down even further, you need to select the shape you like. We've got a lot to choose from, but we recommend you take into consideration how you like your grip to fill in the tail area of your board. If overwhelmed by the options we recommend you look our signature series (Mike, Dane, Parker, and Reef)—between those four shapes they cover all of the bases for most surfers's preferences. All of CI's signature pads were designed with specifications from our those surfers.

One final detail to take into consideration when choosing your pad is the tail kick height. Some are more aggressive, some are mellower. It's ultimately a personal preference, but generally speaking with a more aggressive tail kick you get a little bit more to leverage against for big hacks and airs.

We're really stoked on our updated line of traction pads and hope this video helped you make a decision on which one is right for you. At CI we try to do everything with the best quality and best performance in mind, which is why we confidently feel our new pad offering is best-in-class.

Find our selection of traction pads at your local surf shop or here