This past week I surfed early morning Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

Monday the conditions were really clean with 2 small south swells in the water. One swell had a longer period than the other and a bit more size but both had pretty inconsistent sets.

Tuesday those same swells were there with a bit more size and consistency. To bad for me… right when I started paddling out a south wind picked up and the clean conditions started to deteriorate. Though the wind didn’t pick up strong enough to completely mess up and blow out the surf. It was still possible to pick off a couple set waves, over all it wasn’t that good.

Wednesday the surf had picked even more size and consistency but winds had also picked up later in the day Tuesday and continued through the night in the channel. I think gusts on the west Santa Barbara buoy were running around 27 kts. So even though there was a nice south swell in the water there was also channel bump and a junky small wind swell too. The bump is one thing but, typically the wind swell crosses the south swell and breaks it up to the point that it’s really not very surf able… which was happening.

Hoping for better size and when it finally reaches us it’s all bust up. I went out anyway, grumbling all the way. Once in the water I found that the junk wind swell had lulls and if a lull came when there was a south set you could pick off a decent ride… or decent enough. You’d bounce around and move around for several minutes then maybe find a decent line and go after it. It was a mental game battling frustration and manipulating for position every second.

I read this line recently… In restless forces the surfer holds their balance and flow smoothly through it all… that’s a good line. The interesting thing, from the beach it looks effortless.

D.R.