News

The Autumn swells are continuing to roll in and, frankly, this year is one of the best I can remember. I’ve spent most of the last week surfing all the out of the way breaks that hardly ever get swell and even the big British newspapers (Telegraph, Express and Mail) have featured the colossal swell that came through last Sunday. I just hope that it can continue right through winter.
This crazy week of swell actually started on the Saturday which happily coincided with the British Nationals that were taking place at Newquay.

Congratulations to local lad Harry De Roth who caught some double overhead (not that hard when you’re only 4’6 tall) waves and surfed them to a well deserved victory in the under 14’s category. GAS employee Paddy Daniel also managed a creditable 3rd in the under 18’s category.
Good on you both.
Meanwhile back at Gwithian we are continuing with our Junior Surf Club for as long as conditions allow. The surf has dropped of a little this weekend but there is still plenty of quality surf to be had. Better yet the forecast for next week is a beauty – offshore winds and reasonable swell.
And the weather?
Who cares, I’m gonna get wet anyway.

The nights are drawing in and the Indian summer seems to have drawn to a close but the surf is continuing nicely. The quality might not be quite as good as you’d expect for this time of year but at least the water is still fairly warm and with a little bit of local knowledge you can get a quiet, clean wave to yourself.

This and May/June is also the best time to learn to surf and you can do it in the knowledge that you will probably be the only people on the beach. It may seem lonely but you will have loads of space to stretch out in and the waves to yourself.
I have added a video of the Open final from the Europeans last month in Ireland for you to look at. Our chap in white, Newquay’s Alan Stokes, didn’t have a lot of luck with waves in the final but he got a 6.6 out of 10 for one manoeuvre – pretty impressive when the other surfers were getting 5’s and 6’s for performing four manoeuvres on a wave.
It was one hell of a manoeuvre.
Its a crying shame that he didn’t get a solid back up wave or he might have been England’s first European in the Open division for decades. He is still young has plenty more goes left though – who know’s, maybe he come through in 2013. I really hope so as Stokesy is one of the nicest blokes you could possibly meet and I can’t think of anyone who’s surfing deserves it more.
Meanwhile, back at home the British Nationals are coming up at the end of the month. There is an old farts division (over 35’s) so I’ll probably have a crack at that. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for good waves!

Still no sign of the promised Indian summer  but at least the waves (accompanied by howling wind) are with us.
This is proving to be good from a training point of view allowing me to get at least two surfs a day and because the surf is so lousy I can pretty much guarantee I’m the only one in the sea.

The wave where the competition is due to take place is a beautiful reef in County Donegal called Bundoran Peak. I’ve managed to surf there on previous trips to Ireland and it has always been well worth a visit. There are no waves in this area of Cornwall that offer the same kind of ride so finding something to practise on has been tricky but I have at least managed a few surfs at Porthleven. ‘Lev is also a peaky reef break but that is where any similarity ends – it tends to be short and sweet but at least the bottom surface is the same. Reefs tend to be more powerful than the beach breaks that Cornish surfers are used to and by my reasoning anything that is even vaguely similar has got to be helpful. I’ll keep my fingers crossed there!
The other more humdrum aspects of preparation for the comp involve filling out indemnity forms and letting the relevant authorities know that any asthma medication I take is not performance enhancing! It certainly doesn’t help me breathe underwater.
Five days to go.

Summer is well and truly over but the waves are making a welcome appearance. We have had a load of swell in the last week or so and the weather seams to have settled down a little bit. The odd shower here and there but by and large dry.

We managed to run the No pro on Saturday 10th (full right up here) and young Adam Bayfield, 15, from St Ives  won the junior and open categories – a first in the 17 years that we have been running it.
We also ran a Masters (over 35’s) for the first time and local boy (not really a boy at 36 but whatever) Pete Williams was the victor. Meanwhile Maisie Marshall took out the womens. One massive talking point was the prizes generously provided by Hurley. Oh my God, they were unbelievable. Wetsuits, clobber the lot. Better yet is that they are keen to sponsor the event again next year. Can’t wait.

Staying with the theme of competition surfing I have been invited to surf in the European Surfing Champs in Ireland. Im in the Seniors (over 28’s) so I could well be up against some comparatively young guys (sadly I am 37!) but I can’t wait to get amongst it. I’ve been training pretty hard since I got the invite so who knows. I managed to get 3rd last time around so I’d be delighted to get around that mark again. My goal is to get the final – if I do that I’ll be stoked.
If other fat-bloke related news I snagged a quick surf with Gwithian surf school pioneer (among a million other things) Graeme Bailey down at Hayle. He had the first surf school in this area in 1995 but stopped to run some phenomenally popular flats. Good on ‘im!