Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Mobile Surf Blog

Greetings from the road. I've got to pull my head out of the sand- there's a lot of cool tech stuff that's evidently happened without me knowing much about it. Some of you are going to laugh at me but check this out: Here I am on the road, sitting at a "hotspot", linked up to the 'net, logged into my blogger account getting myself ready to tell you about my surfing day. And, oh yeah, I'm sipping one of those giant blended coffee drinks that's really just a caffeine milkshake. Now that's progress!

Notes from the road: Had a fun morning of surfing with Tim Stamps. Funny, how I can remember to bring three paddles, two stand up boards, three wetsuits, five leashes and my toothbrush but I can remember to toss in my camera's upload cable. If I had remembered to bring that little piece of wire you'd be looking at what I surfed this morning instead of just forming a picture of it in your mind's eye. (Don't worry I'll post some photos once I'm back home.)

Let's just say it's a relatively new spot. I won't name it out of respect for the small handful of guys who've got it dialed (including the guy on the yellow fish who was ripping it) but I will say that sometimes a man-made bump in an otherwise stretch of straight beachbreak can produce little magic peaks. I'll call it Nooks and Grannies. Heres why: there's a couple of little, hidden, tucked in peaks (the nooks) and there's a couple of SUPerfect outside sandbars (the grannies). The trick at this spot is to link the Grannies into the Nooks.

Imagine taking off going left on an outside wedge, you cutback a couple of times all the while looking over your shoulder at the oncoming right hander. Time it just right and whack! You can bounce off the oncoming right and ride it all the way to the inside. Like surfing a curving bobsled course with a couple of lip whacks and a cutback or two thrown in for kicks. Good fun, but in all honesty, not an easy place to do stand up. There's a lot of refractory wave action, a big rip creating a weird, semi-standing wave and shifting peaks- the good SUP guys (T. Stamps included) make it look easy, effortlessly finding themselves in the right place at the right time.

I had a rougher time. And this is funny because coming from my home beach, which is not an easy place to do stand up, I thought I'd developed some pretty strong stand up skills. Wrong. One hour of paddle surfing at Nooks and Grannies just about did me in; I was beat! It remains a universal truth that in the world of SUP, just when you think you've got it down, you find out how much more you have to learn. A humbling, but fun day.

More paddling tomorrow. I'll keep you posted.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

john found a two part epoxy putty at dixiline.drys hard can be sanded.i do not like solerz pops off.also been told to shoot agua dulce in the ding to flush the salt water.some how salt water does not dry out.captneg9.hope these tips will help if the ding is small.