I have succumbed!

Can you blame me really though as one does feel incredibly vulnerable on a surf mat. We have had yet another serious shark attack just a couple of days ago and only two months after the last. This means there has now been an unprecedented and statistic shattering 5 serious shark attacks here in Western Australia in the last 10 months, along with many other sightings and incidents. The combination of this unsettling news and the recent little incident, that occurred right here at the point, has resulted in my purchasing a Freedom 7 Shark Shield to wear when I am surfing in the future. Those testimonials make for an interesting and thought provoking read particularly as some of them relate to incidents nearby here on the south coast such as this one.
I have on three previous occasions seriously thought through the psychological, physiological and particularly the idealogical issues relating to doing so and three times have decided against taking this step. Because, like many of us who surf, I have been an advocate of the philosophy that says you are sharing the ocean with all creatures so you just need to accept the risk. So I have not come to this decision lightly and it disappointments me somewhat. But when the game changes, and it certainly seems to have, you have to adopt a new strategy or you might start to lose. So with the same reasoning behind why I put up with the inconvenience of a seatbelt in my car, I have decided to change my strategy when I go out to catch waves and today have placed an order.
I may actually have to wait sometime to get one as I have heard that they may have run out as the demand has been so high because of recent events. I am waiting to hear about that as I write this post.
In the meantime, I will keep surfing even though the sessions of late have been charged with a little extra head dialog adding to a more tense atmosphere than normal!

New Range of Voit Fins

I was pretty excited when I saw this post by PG the other day.

The saviour of Voit swim fins Dr Greg Deets has improved his already sensational range of fins making the UDTs more flexible and the Duck Feet whippier. There is a fantastic article about the life of this pretty amazing guy here that is well worth a read.

Like many others on the same journey, I have discovered that, depending on the size of your legs, these two models of swim fins are the holy grail for mat riding. I started off using Pod 2 fins but soon switched to UDTs which I left unmodified rather than modified as many riders choose to do. They immediately revolutionized my mat riding experience and made my already tree like legs even more so. 

A year or so later, having noticed many experienced mat riders preferred to use them, I switched to Duck Feet which I posted about here. Although, I loved the raw power of the UDTs, I found the torsion they applied to my ankles and lower legs during a ride and when mixed up in the wave at the end of one increasingly uncomfortable to have to deal with. Although the Duck Feet don't provide quite the same degree of propulsion, less length, weight and stiffness allows for a good flutter kick to assist on the take off. They still provide plenty of control during a ride without feeling like they want to twist my lower legs off at the knee if I get mixed up in the closing out wave at the end of it. 

Straight from the horses mouth, here is the pricing and the details of how to get yourself a pair. 

Greg's email is parsimony@earthlink.net or phyla11@me.com

robin

fins are now available

all came out real nice

50 for udt

29.50 for v-ducks

26 for ducks

all USA dollars

sooo

just give me a formal order

i'll send it to lindsey at warehouse and cc you

you call her for CC # and address

she'll ship asap

fins below

take care 

greg

Will I be placing an order? You bet I will be!

Not my over active imagination apparently!

There was a hell wind last night that resulted in the swell shooting up from 2.5 metres yesterday to 7 metres today. After Michelle and I had taken the dogs for a walk and picked up our regular Wednesday evening Haloumi Masala takeaway curries, we headed off to the point to check out the action. As we drove up to the boat ramp bad weather viewing point, we discovered another half a dozen vehicles worth of locals had the same idea. The whole bay was a seething mass of movement with huge waves pounding the beach all the way round. It is incredible how the point can still provide surfable waves for the brave and talented even in those conditions and the short video shows two of the 4 punters taking on the more moderately sized of the powerful and fast right handers that were coming through.
Yesterday, I had been out in far more moderate conditions chasing that left I had so enjoyed and posted about here. It was very overcast and rainy and apart from two others well around the bay, I was on my own until another punter turned up looking for that same left that he had also enjoyed albeit a day later. I had been feeling a little spooked and uneasy about being out there on my own most of the session and the feeling did not really dissipate even with the arrival of another human being. The left was not working nearly as well as it had a couple of days earlier as there was a little more swell and the tide was probably a touch too low. I did catch a few so-so waves but was having to sit very wide as the section at the peak was closing down and this next section was not providing great shape either. As I headed back out following what was to be the last wave I rode that day, I saw an all to familiar shadow in a wave rising in front of me.

Ummm, I thought to myself, I am not absolutely certain what I have seen but given the recent events at the point and the marginal conditions today I think I will go in.
So it was with great interest to me that the local police turned up at the point this evening also. That last wave, was Leif's last also, as they had come down to warn the boys of another shark sighting that day.
I think I made the right decision yesterday!

God Music from "The Reef"

Not mat surfing but a first cousin for sure. A quirky little clip featuring Ryan Burch at Gnaraloo in North West Australia on his, not much bigger than a surf mat, finless piece of foam! The highly atmospheric music is from George Crumb's Black Angels!

Sometimes I forget to take the high road!

You have heard it before and you are going to hear it again in this post. Yesterday's session was stellar! What looked like not such great conditions resulted in the discovery of a good sized and perfect left offering up 100+ metre rides that I was only required to share with one other initially. That was until local shortboard charger Leif and his good woman Tanya, on their way further around the beach, noticed a wonderful 4 section ride that I got almost in to the beach. They back tracked to join us with Leif relating this background to their decision to me as he arrived in the line up. Now, that must be a first. Leif is a hard charger, the sort of guy that returns from a Bali surf trip with skin lacerations resulting from taking on one of the world's great waves, Desert Point in Lombok.


So a hierarchically challenged surf mat rider such as myself inspiring a top runger of his ilk feels pretty damn good!
Anyway, I was giving the 5GF another outing and I can say it went really well on these solid waves. The addition of the 5GF increases my quiver to 5 different mats with the Tracker Roundtail and Standard and Series I & III MT5s. I think there is definitely an advantage to having a number of mats in your quiver as a mat riding discovery previously learnt, but sometimes forgotten, was reinforced from riding a mat with different characteristics today. The waves had a bit of speed and even though I was on a mat and coping, there was little room for error as I was often tucked right in to the pocket. On that particularly long ride mentioned earlier in the post, I could see early on in the wave that I might get caught. Without really thinking about it, I squeezed the right front corner a little just to get the mat to move further up the face of the wave and there was an immediate increase in speed as I obviously moved in to a part of the wave where the push was most powerful. As I mention, I am aware of this but as a surf mat is so inherently efficient, one often remains too content to just let it have it's head without exploring beyond. To be fair on myself, though, it has been sometime since I have had the opportunity to ride a wave of such lengthy quality and I am hoping to be able to repeat the experience again today.

Arguably the most definitive article on GG!

Sometime ago, in the days when PG would communicate with me, he told me about a comprehensive article he had written about GG's life up to 1970.
The article was published in the Autumn 1999 issue of the now defunct "Australian Surfer's Journal".
After a lot of searching around on the internet, I managed to get my hands on a back issue ages ago and have been meaning, ever since, to subject myself to the laborious task of scanning all 53 pages of it for your viewing pleasure.
Well, today, as there was no chance of a wave this morning, I did just that and 2 hours on, *here* is my gift to all of you. Friend or foe!
It is scanned at 300dpi so do take the time to download it and have a good read and check out the awesome images. I should have descreened it but that would have taken about 6 hours on my domestic scanner.
Enjoy and thanks for taking the time to drop by over the last couple of years.

Surf Mats and Their Riders in Action 10

I am staggered that I have collected another 100+ images of mat riders doing their thing in less than a month since the ninth edition of this series. There has clearly been a huge leap in the profile of surf mats in the last year or so. I think that is a really fantastic result and welcome to our world of exceptional fun all you new folks! I went vintage and heavy duty blues for this one. Turn it up!