Ventura has been having a good winter season so far this year.

There has been one or two swells come along every week since some time in October seems like. So what usually happens when we get a lot of surf? The crowds thin out.

One morning this past week I thought I’d woke up in the past. I got a late start for the morning and didn’t get down for the daily surf check until about 9 a.m. I figured when I got down to inside point there most likely wasn’t much surf because there were so many parking spaces available on the street.

Surprise number one… the surf had picked up again, there were over head sets.

Surprise number two… there was a grand total of 4 guys in the water from the top of the point all the way down inside.

What? Someone see a shark?

I rubbed my eyes. Am I still asleep? I’m dreaming… that’s it. Then I was talking in my sleep. There were a few guys checking the surf that I normally don’t see at the point so we got to talking, about how strange it was that there were so few guys in the water, with surf like what we were seeing!

That particular swell was short, by the end of the day it was much smaller and not as clean. But then only two days later another swell shows up. That was Friday, today there was still surf. This afternoon there was a very light crowd in the water, a Sunday after noon no less.

I talked with a friend who had just come in from surfing and was walking back up the promenade as I was checking the conditions for my go out. He said “I think this is the best year I’ve ever seen, there has been so much surf”! He was stoked walking back to his car after yet another day of good surf.

It’s nice when there is enough surf to satisfy the surfing population. Enough waves that everyone gets their fill, gets tired and has had enough. It’s nice to look at good surf and think maybe you woke up on that particular day and some how it’s January 1992 again.

Dreamer.

D.R.

Kauai, at a spot you can’t get out when it’s like this. I took the shot with the crazy tourists in the fame for perspective. Nice left.

My story post 41

After that first surf contest I completely forgot that there actually could be surf during a surf meet.

It seemed to me that there was rarely any surf during the days a surf event was scheduled. Even though sometimes there was surf, most of the time there was little. Case in point was the second surf contest I entered.

It was early summer of 1967. The contest was held in Hermosa Beach. Beautiful weather, sunny warm… but the surf? Totally none existent. Unless you call not even knee high wind chop surf, maybe one rogue knee bump every 15 or 20 minutes if that. So with 15 minute 5 man heats what kind of surfing were the judges scoring?

Remember your best three waves count, but getting three waves was close to impossible in the allotted 15 minutes. Looking for something to ride you’d paddle for anything hoping the chop would have enough push to glide you long enough to get to your feet, but then what. You couldn’t generate enough speed to execute a turn without digging a rail. My friend Mike Smith was in the same heat as I was so we just joked around in the water until the horn blew to end the heat.

So once again I walked to the check in stand, tuned in my jersey and continued walking to my van and went home.. hoping when I got back to Ventura there may be some surf because, by then I really wanted to surf!

What I didn’t know was that every time you entered an event you got points. If you advanced to the next level in the event you got more points. Over time you would accumulate all these points that would put you somewhere in the standing of the USSA, or what ever the organization was that did the contests. So if you entered all the contests and advanced through enough heats you could have a pretty high standing at the end of the event year. Never really placing very high in an event.

Oh well, it really didn’t matter to me at that point because it just seemed stupid to hold a surf contest when there weren’t any waves. And it seemed that most of the time there was little to no surf when a contest was held. So I gave up on the whole contest thing.

Contests can be fun and maybe most guys don’t mind them as long as they’re not held at their home break.

D.R.

An old Surfer Mag. photo of a contest winners circle. Steve Bigler wins a TV. Donald Takayama wins… what is that a transistor radio? And John Peck wins the motor cycle. Bigler... 'pretty cool ... a TV set'. John is all smiles on his new machine... with the look on TD’s face…. ‘what the heck’?

My story post 40

My first attempt at surfing in a contest was the fall of 1966. I’m not real sure what organization this particular surf meet was with, possibly the USSA. It was held at a spot called D and W, a jetty spot along the beach that runs in front of LAX.

I didn’t know anyone that surfed in contests then. For some reason I thought maybe it would be a good idea for me to do contests because I could get close to guys in the industry. So I signed up for the event and when the day came I got in my VW bus and drove to D & W by myself, found a place to park and went to find out when my heat was.

It was a cold, dark overcast day and there was a swell running with over head sets. I waited for my time slot to surf, again by myself… I had no friends there or knew anyone at all. When the time came I got my jersey, walked to the waters edge with my board and paddled out with the rest of the guys in the heat.

Once in the line up… at least where I thought the line up was, I’d never surfed the place before, I caught my first wave. That wave was pretty much a non event, a short ride on an inside wave. I didn’t realize how much of an inside wave it was until I pulled out and saw the set waves charging toward the beach… with me inside. I bounced over the first 2 walls of white water and scratched like a mad man hoping to get past the next wave now marching toward me with a clean feathering 8 foot or better face. I reached the wave right in the impact zone, turned turtle and held on with all I had. It didn’t matter, that wave wanted my board and got it in one split second.

I surfaced after the pounding gulping a breath of air at the same time thinking maybe my board would be close, maybe it would’ve bounced out of the turmoil and be in site, a short distance off. No such luck. I didn’t see my board anywhere, which meant it most likely was on the beach. I started swimming, ducking deep a couple of times to escape some white water. When three or for minutes later reaching the beach, I don’t see my board… anywhere.

What the heck? I look up and down the beach and don’t see my board. Don’t tell me it’s still in the water, or what? Thinking It got sucked into a rip and washed out past the line up? Then I noticed it… up on the jetty about half way out. How it got there I have no idea. I walked 50 yards just to reach the jetty and then worked my way over those giant rocks until I got close enough to reach for my board. Waited for a lull and grabbed the darn thing jumping up a couple rocks to dodge the surf. Of course by that time my heat was long over as well maybe the 2 heats after mine. I worked my way off the jetty.

With board in hand and my tail between my legs I walked to the check in table and turned in my jersey. Then kept walking to my van, toweled off, put on some warm clothes, put my board in the van, got myself in the driver’s seat and went home.

Honestly, I had no big ideas or really knew what to expect. But if I started entering contests I’d maybe start networking with others in the sport and that would be a good thing.

When I got home my mom greeted me and asked “how’d it go Den?” I shook my head and said ‘ not so good ‘.

D.R.

Early eighties winners gathering after a surf meet. My son in front of me holding my fifth place yellow ribbon. Notice the lack of surf in the back ground?

It’s hard to believe that another year has come and gone. It really only seems like yesterday we were all worrying if every computer based service was going to crash because of Y2K. That was a decade ago!

It’s hard to believe after living on Kauai for 9 years I haven’t been back there for 4 years now.

It’s had to believe that Clark foam was once the only foam company you could buy surfboard blanks from… well besides Walkers small catalog. Clark foam has been gone 4 years and Walker 2 years.. I think.

Speaking of foam… there were a couple foam companies that closed in 09. But we still have a selection of foam brands to work with.

It’s nice to know that you can go to the beach with just about any size, shape and style of surfboard available or not, because it’s all good. As this past year progressed it was even OK to go to the beach with a ¾ inch wood plank to surf.

Now as the new year comes on you could say it’s OK to go to the beach with what one guy laughingly called a ‘pig nosed thruster’. My first tri fin back in the early ‘80s was an egg…. But it was called a ‘pig nosed thruster’ by some. This year I’ve got a Stubbie Quad and every time I take it for a surf guys show interest in the design… It’s all good!

Boards have become shorter and wider as well as longer and heavier. Finless designs, single fins, twin fins, tri fins, quads and five fins… It seems that this past year has seen it all.

It’s hard to believe that surfing has come out of it’s once narrow line of acceptable shapes and designs. Now each design is getting a chance and we are all adding to the data base.

That’s a happy thing….

Happy New Year!

D.R.

It’s hard to believe my wife and I celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary 12/20/09