Saltburn for the Weekend

The UK Pro Surf Tour gets under way this weekend, with the first event up at Saltburn. Forecast is looking just a tad flat but a well run event should be fun for all and there'll be a good buzz about town this weekend.

Getting there: A174 from the Boro to Saltburn seafront. Park down the hill at the surf shop & pier. Popular centre of surfing in N. Yorks. This is a fairly weak beach-break, with the better peaks focussed around the pier, which you can jump off to avoid a paddle out. They take swell from most directions, and like southwest winds. Pretty handy and there's a surf shop by the pier. As busy as you'd expect.

"Heading east down the beach to the Ship Inn, on the A174, you'll find Penny Hole; quality beach-break left and rights (with some hollow lined up lefts often the best pick). Across the channel from this, under the cliffs and receiving their protection from easterly wind, is a right-hand reef/point off the Saltburn Scar. Expect to see it work well on south to southeast breezes and solid northeast swells. 2-8ft plus. Advanced.

Try Coatham Sands up past Redcar for a low power beach-break option in south winds and any east swell. On the way up, seek out the Redcar Scars, location of some steep but rare reef break peaks for advanced surfers.

Down south, Skinningrove can host a fickle right-hand reef, and some beach-break peaks, all working best on a southerly wind."

Click here for more info on surf spots around the UK & Ireland.

Surf Spot Guide: Trestles

Talk about classic Southern California waves and Trestles is usually one of the first to get a mention. This week it'll be top of the list as the Nike 6.0 Lowers Pro hits the beach. With the new ASP World Ranking system in play this season and the fact that the event is a 6 Star Prime, there's a good number of WCT guys showing up looking for a few extra ratings points. Surf report looks like small but clean and fun waves for the week, so reckon it could be good for Jordy, Dane and crew. Anyway, here's a little extra info for you on the surf spots at Trestles.

"Just north of the San Onofre State Beach, adjacent to the train trestle. One of the world's best surfing arenas. Running continuously from San Mateo Point to San Onofre State Beach.

Cotton's: Lined up left-hander good in big south to southwest swells. Breaks over cobblestone and sand bottom on any tide, but lower is hollower. Holds 2-12ft plus. All levels.

Uppers (Upper Trestles): Superb quality, long (mostly) right-hand cobblestone point wave. Works best on a wrapped northwest to west winter swell at higher tides, when there will be multi-second barrels firing down the beach towards San Mateo Creek. It'll work well on south swell too though. Any tide is OK. 2-10ft plus. All levels. Best in winter ... generally. Crowded with mini-tankers.

Lowers: Left and right cobblestone peak. Long rights in winter swells from NW, awesome fast peak left and rights in summer south swells. Generally both lefts and rights have 3 sections, with the first (outside) being more hollow. Rights often longer/lined up, and longer than Uppers. Lefts punchy and good channel to paddle back from. Any tide is OK, but low tide plus summer swell and morning off-shore = hollow green barrels at high speed. 2-15ft. Very crowded. Usually better than Uppers in summer, and vice versa.

Down from here is Middles: Mellow right-left summer peak needing northeast winds and any swell. All tides. Low is better as it can be a mush-burger at the best of times. If your surfing isn't working here, get a new board, or a coach"

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58 degrees North - Thurso East

The Northern tip of the UK is getting set to welcome some of the world's top surfers as the O'Neill CWC Scotland starts its waiting period at Thurso tomorrow. Following one of the coldest European winters on record the water temp will be uncomfortably low and may shock some of those more used to surfing Hawaii's North Shore. Sunny Garcia and John John Florence will be fully suited up and joined by a crew of ex-WCT guys like Marlon Lipke, Aritz Aranburu & Tim Boal. There's also a good bunch of UK surfers including former WCT pro Russell Winter and current UK Pro Surf Champ Alan Stokes.

There's a decent swell predicted for later this week so we're looking forward to seeing some classic Thurso conditions. Here's our take on one of the UK's best waves:

"Thurso East: Lined up, often perfect, long reef break that delivers square pits best on very solid West to Northwest swells (North more lumpy and fun, but big Wests deliver the barrels and often come with nice southerly air-flow). On low to mid it's a relatively easy if tight take-off, then an incredibly hollow, fast bowl section. Mid tide is when it hits the ledge at the perfect depth to toss up wide barrels. The reef sits close to your fins; disconcerting on a winters day with the water at 5 degrees and flakes of snow floating about! Summer visitors might get disappointed because the reefs don't pick up the swell unless it's big, or straight out of the North-Northwest. The prevailing south-westerlies are cross-shore so a lot of the time there's a feathered lip firing spray into your eyes. Advanced, 2-8ft plus. Not always crowded, but tight take-off spot means it can't handle numbers.

At the turn of the last century the middle of the reef was dynamited for boat access, and this area now forms a nasty lump; imaging how long the wave would be if Thurso hadn't been a fishing port! There are quality reefs to be had out in the bay and around towards Castletown, some of them named and handling considerable size, others hardly ridden."

Click here for more info on surf spots around the UK & Ireland.

Margaret River: Surfer's Point

Maybe it's something to do with the changes to this year's ASP rankings, but 31 of the Top 45 will be showing up in Western Australia next week for the Drug Aware Pro at Surfer's Point Margaret River. Dream Tour vets Mick, Parko, Taj & the Hobgoods will be there along with the new crew led by Owen Wright & the Gudauskas brothers. Forecast appears to be promising, so looking forward to some cracking action.

In the meantime, here's our bit on the best of the West:

"Take Wallcliffe Rd to Prevelly Park. Head for the car park at the river mouth.

Most (in)famous big wave break on the WA coast. Surfers's Point is a L & R peeling either side of a shallow ledge reef. Holds up to 25ft. Tricky paddle out & shifting peak in bigger swells. The left can be a vertical drop takeoff, followed by a long sucky bowl section, then a great long whackable wall.

The Rivermouth just North is an occasional beach style option. From the car park you can see Southside (Suicides!) just South.

Goes without saying that you need to be expert to survive here on big days. Quite apart from the wave itself, there's also hold-downs, being caught inside, broken boards & strong currents to think about."

Click here for more info on surf spots around Australia.

Surfest in Newcastle

This marks the 25th year of Surfest, run on the New South Wales central coast. About a 2 hour drive north of Sydney brings you to Newcastle, which lays claim to being the world's largest coal export port and home of 4 time World Champion Mark Richards. Surfest was started back in 1985 to try and shake the grimy industrial image of the city and since then has become Australia's largest surf festival. Past winners include legendary names that include Tom Curren, Occy, Kelly Slater and current World Champ Mick Fanning.

This year's lineup includes current WCT surfers Drew Courtney and Ben Dunn, along with tour veterans Occy, Sunny Garcia and Nathan Hedge. Here's our take on this world class spot:

"Merewether is the southern end of the Bar/Dixon/Park Beach trio. The Ladies' reef works just off the rocks - heavy R breaking on patchy reef and sand. Holds up to 15ft swells (best in 6-8ft) and can get very powerful. Serious local crew with many surfing legends here. If there's solid SE swell head S to Leggy Point and S end of Glenrock Beach to get away from the crowds. On the way there you may see Shallows."

Click here for info on more Aussie surf spots.

Off to the Gold Coast

Waiting period for the Quiksilver Pro - Gold Coast begins on Friday, so a perfect time for us to highlight the breaks that the Top 45 will be calling home for the next couple of weeks. From the forecasts D'bah may have more to offer than Snapper, but here's our breakdown of both waves for you anyway.

"Snapper Rocks: The start point of the longest right-hand barrel machine on earth. The Snapper section gets more swell than Kirra, often delivering a hard-breaking take-off, leading to a makeable section and race-track. Can link up across Rainbow and Greenmount for record breaking shack time. Current is mad so get a wave quick and walk back up the beach. Advanced. Crowds? Ah Yeah!"

"Duranbah: Consistent, peaky L & R beach breaks up and down the beach due to sand deposited out of Tweed River mouth. Quite powerful and punchy with some shore dump. Best in 3-6ft SE swells. Very crowded with a heavy local scene. All standards. Consistent. If it's huge, you may see the Tweed Bar from here, outside rights and lefts way off-shore."

Click here for more surf spots around Australia.

Competing Theories

The 2010 pro surf season is well under way, with a good half dozen WQS events completed. Both CJ Hobgood and Taj Burrow have already won and are looking in good shape for the start of the Dream Tour this Saturday with the Quiksilver Pro at Snapper on Oz's Gold Coast. We thought this would be a perfect time to break out some pearls of wisdom from old & current pro's on heat preparation & competition.

Luke Egan on preparation: "Eliminate everything from your mind except what you need to zero in on. Your board, food, heat time, leashes, wetsuit, girlfriend and personal issues should all be taken care of way early. When your heat comes you just need to focus on strategy and conditions."

Occy on staying in a groove: "Competition will make you superstitious. Every athlete in every sport does little things to give himself what he thinks is an edge. I'll start out with a routine, with a certain pair of boardshorts, a way of putting everything in place. And if I win, I just keep doing the same thing; I won't change my boardshorts or tee shirt colour, I'll stay with that same routine, the same board. And I'll change it all up if I'm off. People won't usually talk about it, but they all have something they use to get in the zone. If it works, use it. And keep winning."

Taj Burrow on winning: "Here's a key thing I've learned - you only need to win 6 heats to win the contest. One thing you don't want to do is look at the whole pack. I get to a contest and see the top 44 and it can psyche me out. I look at everyone's form and it's intimidating. They are all so good, it's easy to get down on yourself if you aren't surfing in perfect form. The secret: just surf your heat. I've had victories when I wasn't the best guy in the contest. I just concentrated on beating six guys, not 44. That's all it takes."

Kindly taken from Jim Kempton's "Surfing The Manual: Advanced"

Mavericks Is On

Not wanting to miss out on this winter's XXL wave action, the contest at Mavericks was finally called "On" and will be firing it up at 8am PST on Saturday ... that's 4pm UK time. This wave has a storied history and has provided some classic pics & vids over the years. Winner of the last Mavericks contest was Greg Long, who also won the "Eddie" in December, and he's in Heat 3 along with the likes of Carlos Burle, Brock Little and Kenny "Skindog" Collins.

All 24 riders know the wave well, but for those of you who don't here's our take on it.

"Mavericks: Hairy paddle out from south side of Pillar Point. Current sucks you south of the peak and you have to scrabble. Some go by boat from the harbour.

Way out to sea, Mavericks bowls up almost cartoon-like over a deep ledge reef in a minimum 10ft of swell. It forms impossibly steep, concave drops, and for this reason really needs to be surfed on the glassiest, cleanest of days. It does fade into a channel, but controlling the drop well enough to set a rail and get there is why experts / total hell-men only need apply. 10-35ft. Tight crew of tough guys. Fall / Winter. Supreme danger. Spectators only."

Click here for more info on surf spots around the US & Hawaii

Porthleven Firing

The expected swell arrived down in the UK's south west over the weekend and conditions at many spots were awesome. Porthleven is known to be one of the UK's best spots, and it was absolutely pumping on Saturday ... click here for pics, vid clip is at the end.

Here's our brief take on Cornwall's finest:

"Fickle, splendid wave. Known for its hollow rights over a flat rock shelf, it gets sucky at low to mid tide, when pretty square barrels are possible. Higher tides are OK too but dead high is often rippy, back-washed and flat. Needs very big west, or solid / big southwest swell. 3-10ft plus. Advanced! Crowded if it ever gets on in summer. Can get awesome."

Click here for more info on surf spots around the UK & Ireland.

Weekend in Cornwall Anyone?

Everyone's excited about a nice big winter swell that's heading for the UK this weekend and into next week. Charts on Magicseaweed are predicting a 16.5ft swell hitting Fistral on Saturday morning, and if the winds play ball even The Cribber might show up. The UK surf mags Carve & Wavelength are hyping it up and will no doubt be keeping us all updated with reports, pics and clips.

So, when the swell hits, where's the best spot to head out to? For somewhere easy to get to and with plenty of parking we'd be off to Newquay's Fistral Beach, the most well known spot in the area:

"Signs all through the town of Newquay, huge carpark on the beach.

The most famous surfing beach in England. Whilst reef breaks and some coves may get better waves, the probability of getting good waves on any given day of the year is higher here than just about anywhere.

South Fistral works through all tides, with good lefts and some rights. It's a bit more protected on bigger days with a southwest wind. North Fistral is often bigger, and gets hollow at low tide, especially off the rocks at the top end, where there's usually one of the best left and right peaks. Little Fistral, right around the corner, and almost swallowed up at high tide, can have great shape too on low to mid. Autumn swells from NW-W are best but it is consistent all year round. 1-8ft, intermediate +. Crowds in the summer and plenty of room in the winter.

The Cribber, out the back of Towan Head off Cribber Rock, is a fickle off-shore reef for hell-men, although it rarely breaks in a rideable way. It needs a very big groundswell in the 8-12ft range to show, and perfect south-east offshore breeze to hold shape. In these conditions it'll hold any size."

Click here for more info on surf spots around the UK & Ireland.

Little Bit of Hurlyburly

"Hurlyburly: noisy disorder and confusion" ... at least that's the official dictionary definition anyway. Out at Burleigh Heads, QLD a couple of days ago Aussie surfer Dean Bowen was making his own noise by winning the Hurley Burleigh Pro Junior. Hurley have stumped up quite a bit of prize cash recently and the $25,000 winner's cheque was the largest ever given for a first place at a Junior event. Highlights of the final down at the bottom.

Here's our breakdown of the classic Queensland point break:

"Burleigh Heads: head S from Surfers on Gold Coast Hwy past Nobby's Beach. Left to Goodwin Tce. Walk down and around the headland for jump-off and paddle through big hard rocks. Paddle fast and straight!

Legendary right-hand point break, refracting around the headland over a boulder bottom in-filled with sand. Will take anything from NE to S swell, but a solid SSE wraps to generate very long rides.

In the right conditions, Burleigh can produce perfect, hollow, long-walled waves, breaking all the way in to the sand bottomed inside. It will handle a lot of size; over 10ft if swell is in the south, but currents are insane, and constant rowing for position is required. Conspicuously consistent for a point break, but can be of lesser quality for long periods when sands drift away and out of shape. Protected from winter south winds, so its crowded all year round. If too small here, head south around the point to Tallebudgera for pretty consistent beach break action on most tides, early morning or in NW to SW winds."

Click here for more info on Aussie surf spots.

New Season Kicking Off at Sunset

The 2010 edition of the WQS is already under way, starting out with the Sunset Open out on Oahu's North Shore. This winter's epic conditions appear to be continuing and after a couple of lay days due to closeouts, the contest is expected to pick back up again on Tuesday. For a WQS 1 Star there have been some serious names attracted to this event ... Sunny Garcia, Freddy P, Jamie O, Pancho Sullivan and John John Florence.

Here's what we think about Sunset and a couple of the surrounding spots:

"Sunset: Set of reefs dealing with swells from N through W. Northerly swells break the wave up into different peaks, and make the place a little more sharing as a result. On a classic big West swell with trades, Sunset is a heavy, jacking peak that develops into a hollow, sucky, thick lipped beast. These swells catch the trades side-offshore, and the result means heavy long-boards and serious intent are required to get you into the wave. 4-15ft. Major rips. Crowds. Experts.

Sunset Point, further inside, is a quality R breaking at 3-6ft on NW-W swells. It can lose shape on N swells. Crowds. Intermediate.

Just East is Backyards; fickle, often shifty proposition that goes left and right, and works from 4-12ft. Currents and unpredictable peaks absorb surfers well. Expert or tow-in.

Finally, Outside Sunset: huge right tow-in spot when Sunset is closed out. Can work all the way through Outside Backyards, which is a right / left outer monster too, with shallow reef under the end section. Hell-men only!"

Click here for more info on Hawaii & US surf spots.

Eat Like You Surf: Lean and Mean!

Still trying to beat the bulge leftover from the festive season, here's a little inspiration for you from Jim Kempton's "Surfing The Manual" on a healthy surf diet:

"Martin Potter, the 'super-kid' from Durban who started his surfing career by beating future three-time World Champ Tom Curren for the 1981 NSSA International Team Challenge and then just weeks later won the final against 1978 World Champ Shaun Tomson, was a gregarious partier in his early days on the tour. I could go out and have a big night, drink heaps of beer, and wake up the next morning without a hangover, he would recall. My body dealt with everything. There were contests I won after staying up all night. Not enough of them though - he was as inconsistent in his first five years as he was flamboyant. Potter had the talent in spades - but not the discipline to prevail in the clutch. Then in 1989 he got serious, started training in a non-surfing fitness routine that got him in the very best shape of his young life - and promptly won an unprecedented six contest victories on his way to the World Title. The moral of the story? You can survive a lot when your body is a 24 year-old temple, but given two equally talented opponents, a well-trained, highly-fit, health-conscious competitor will triumph every time.

Diet may be one of the most debated health topics being discussed today. There are dozens of diets purported to help you lose weight or stay fit - eat only meat, don't eat carbs, eat more protein, eat only at lunch - the list goes on and on. None of these diets will actually keep the weight off, make you fit, or sustain your nutritional needs long-term. In fact most diets are harmful, either because they remove needed nutrients of some kind, or set you up with bad eating habits themselves. Studies have shown time and time again that dieters on a long-term basis end up gaining more weight than those who don't diet. Don't let anyone kid you: the only way to lose weight is to burn more calories than you eat. And there are only 2 ways to do this: eat a little less and exercise a little more. No diet will work properly if you do not have the balanced nutritional components. You need fruits (almost all kinds are good and much better than fruit juice) and vegetables (the green leafy kind are best), for essential nutrients; protein for strength (best to get them from fish, chicken, soy bean products and limited lean meats); carbs for fuel (try to get your carbs from whole grains high in fibre); healthy limited fats (like salmon, nuts, peanut butter and avocado, and some dairy (skim milk, low fat cheese, a few eggs a week)."

As Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz says, "Set your sights right now on being a champion. Live high on the best health habits you can muster. Make greasy foods, salty snacks and sugary pops a seldom, not a frequent mischief. Follow the song in your heart that tells you that the sweet sea is the greatest high"

New Year, Fresh Talent

Happy New Year to one and all ... here we go, steaming out of the "Naughties" and into a brand new decade. Checking out the surfing calendar and it's straight into the Billabong World Junior Championships out at Narrabeen in OZ. Looking at some of the past winners of this comp it's definitely worth keeping a track of. Parko, Andy Irons, Adriano de Souza, Jordy Smith and Kekoa Bacalso have all triumphed in the past and are now regulars on the ASP Dream Tour. Two of this year's surfers have already qualified for the 2010 Dream Tour. All eyes will be on Owen Wright and Jadson Andre to show just why they are getting hyped to take over from the older guys.

The comp is due to kick off on Jan 9th just north of Sydney at Narrabeen. Here's our take on this classy spot:

"North Narrabeen is a very consistent long left at the lake mouth which can produce a perfect barrel all the way in. There's also an occasional R point type set-up, further up off the rockpool on bigger days.

Alley Rights, just to the S, breaks into the same channel, and has a shark reputation.

Just off the middle of the car park is ... Car Park Rights. Another generally well-shaped bank that delivers steep take-offs and barrels on a mid tide.

To avoid crowds, you can check the peaks further down South towards Collaroy. You may get less shape but there's a good chance of a lonely session."

Click here for info on more spots around Australia.