US Congress to Cut Dawn Patrol Surf Hours 6-27-05

The United States congress is currently reviewing a law that would eliminate 28 hours of prime dawn patrol surfing time each year for working class surfers.

The law is the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (HR 6), which has been approved by a joint Senate-House Energy Conference Committee and is now moving to the House and Senate floors for approval. Congress is expected to vote on the bill this week. A portion of the law mandates that, beginning in 2007, standard daylight savings time be extended by four weeks. Daylight savings time would span from the first Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November.

During these weeks, sunrise times are between 6:00 a.m. and 6:30 a.m., making them perfect times to get out and catch a few waves before the work day begins. Additionally, these weeks are in the Spring and Autumn, a time for great crossed-up swells from storms in the north and south. They are in October and November, which the winter spots start to bloom while the summer spots are still breaking, and the converse weeks in March. This daylight savings time extension would push the sunrise an hour later, into the 7:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m. window, effectively killing an hour of dawn patrol surf time every day for those 28 days.

Of course, the members of congress have no idea what a horrible blow they will issue to the surfing masses, with their short-sighted focus on energy savings. The extension of daylight savings time is designed to reduce electrical demand in those four weeks by extending sunset times and reducing evening or nighttime energy used. Supporters claim that it will increase economic activity and induce improved social wellness for all. Of course, none of that is an appropriate substitute for a clean and cold north swell on a November morning.

It should be noted that not all surfers will notice the change. Only working class surfers and high school surf team members, being those who have places to be at obligatory morning times, will be affected. The time change will neither burden the self employed, multi millionaires, and capitalists, nor the moochers, squatters, drug addicts who sleep in their cars, and fast food and retail workers on the night shift. In the long run, it could be estimated that the measure will have no overall impact on surfers at all, if housing prices drive the working and middle classes out of beach areas entirely.

But, for the time being, and for those who like to surf in the morning and still make it to work by 8:00 a.m. or 9:00 a.m., the time to speak is now! Write your senators and congressmen! Call them! Send them emails! Tell them how important the dawn patrol session is to the American constituency! You'll get back vaguely worded form letters on completely different topics, and feel like you contributed to the great responsive machinery of democracy.

Copyright 2005
Travis R. English

Travis spews advise to the new guy 07-13-05

Got this email the other day:
--------------------
Hey man,
Long story short, I found your blog from 10 or so clicks off a google search. Anyways, I'm a new surfer looking to surf without making the 'pros/locals' mad. I've longboarded before, but I'd really like to short board. Everyone has told me it's really hard, but being a waterpolo player for 6 or so years, I find that when people tell me something in the water is hard, it's just their inexperiece in the water. So with that said, you seem to be a surfer who just likes to surf, and not be worried about the 'surf-scene' and I thought you'd be a good person to get advice from.

If you have the time, I'd love to hear what you have to say.

Xxxx

---------------------------------
Hey, bro.. Sorry it took me a while to get to your email.

I've never really had probelms with "pros/locals" as you say. Contrary to the popular image that surfing has to completely dominate every aspect of the surfer's life, most surfers are just regular people who happen to surf. Very few that I've met are really out to get anyone or prove anything.

And, common courtesy typically prevails. I don't know if you've ever read the so-called rules of surfing etiquette http://www.surfline.com/surfology/surfology_borl_index.cfm (this is just one. you could do all kinds of google's on surfing right of way, etiquette, etc.), but they are pretty simple and intuitive niceness and courtesy that I've generally stayed within the bounds of and stayed out of most trouble. The first and most horrendous offence is "dropping in" on a claimed wave (more on this later), which should simply never be done, regardless of skill level. But, in the same breath, it happens all the time. And, most people don't get too mad about it.

A friend of mine once said "You know, Travis. Now that I'm getting to know you better, I don't feel so bad about dropping' in on ya." And he did, too, about two sets later.

The worst places I've been, in terms of jerkish attitudes in the water, are the very good reef breaks where line up crowding can be a problem. The guys who surf there a lot know exactly where to be to catch the wave and can get there faster than the visitors, effectively locking them out. But, even then, I've recently surfed Topanga Point in Malibu on a few weekday mornings and found that in a light crowd, there are waves to be had for all.

Now, as for the shortboarding. I would advise a bit of temperance in that department. This advise is coming from a guy who rode shortboards for, like, 6 or 7 years and wasn't making a whole lot of progress. Surfing has a horribly extended learning curve, especially if you aren't starting at some age before you have pubic hair. What you want to do is learn to ride on waves. But, in order to do that, you have to stand up on waves, and in order to do that you have to catch waves, and in order to do that you have to find waves with nobody on them.

Think about it this way: If the waves are coming in at 14 seconds to 18 second period (typical wave period for fun surf), that's 200 - 250 waves per hour. Assuming that you are a great paddler from all those years of water polo, you'll be able to get in position for at best about a quarter of those, 50 or 60 waves. But, most of them will have other people on them, or you won't be lined up right, or you'll think it's better to wait for the next one. So, you might paddle after 15 waves. Of those 15, you might catch one in three - 5 waves. Now, hopefully, you'll get to your feet every time and surf off beautifully. But, as a beginner, that's just not true. On 2 of those, you'll fall right off. On 2 more, you'll get to the bottom, try to make a turn, and fall off, and the last one you'll go over the falls.

What you really want to do is maximize the time you spend actually riding waves. The best way to do that is with a board that is easiest to catch waves, easiest to stand up, and easiest to move around on.

With a shortboard, your wave count goes down significantly. First off, the longboarders at the spot will be catching most of the waves. Padddeling is harder, standing up is harder, and getting a good angle on the take off is harder.

Now, don't get me wrong, I love my shortboard. Its super fast, gets flying on the mid size or bigger waves, and turns like a sonofabitch. I bring it whenever I think the conditions are right and I'll have a good time with it. But, on any day less than that, I bring the board that I think I'll have the most fun on. Most days, I like my mid-sized board. It's 7'6", so it's not "officially" a longboard (8'0" is the limit in my mind). it turns a whole lot faster than a 9'0" or a 9'6", but it catches a lot more waves than my shortboard does in just about any size surf.

Besides, this is the era or the hybrid board. The longboard/shortboard decision that was so polarizing in the 1980s is gone. There are fishes, eggs, hybrids, semi fish shortboards, surftec boards, big-guy tris, the whole pug nose family (that's what I want next, about 7'0" or 7'2"), and whenever else you can imagine.

Sure, the "jocks" of surfing will always ride that "high performance" shortboard, and, yes, they'll get all the press, all the chicks, all the movie roles, and we'll always be jealous and feel inferior (which is what they want). But at the end of the day - fuck 'em - we had a good time, and the so-called "recreational" surfer (a step down from the so-called "hardcore" surfer) is the unspoken majority of the sport of surfing. You'll never see that in the magazines, by the way. Unfortunatly, those 'pro/local' guys that you are afraid of, write for, photograph for, subscribe to, run advertisments in, and surf in those magazines. The whole of the surfing media grosly misrepresents the sport it covers.

My advise is this: When you are starting out, catch as many waves as you can. Spend as much time on your feet as possible. Use the board that will most help you do that. As you become more confident, you'll gain some insight into how you want your next board to be different (like that pug nose 7'0" I'm looking for) and let that be your guide.

Red Tide Blues 7-13-05

This red tide is killing me. I think i'm alergic. I went out last Friday and have been sniffing and stuffy ever since. Nasty. Now, I just keep looking at the photo of the day here and as long as the water is brown, I'm staying on shore - that is, unless there is some legitimate summer swell.

I guess I don't have enough experience to know, but isn't the red tide condition supposed to only last a few days? This has been weeks, now. Some of the veterens I know told me that this is highly unusual. Perhaps it's an indicator of the War of the Worlds.

My friend Steve said that the water was actually glowing in South Carlsbad two weekends ago. "Every wave that came in just glowed." Apparently, it has also produced quite a stench.

Acusurf Reporting 7-5-5

"You know," Brett told me. "for someone who resisted the cell phone for so long, you sure are a cell phone maniac."

"Well. I figure if you are going to practice hypocrisy, why beat around the bush? You might as well just dive right in and be the biggest hypocrite you can be."

"You're doing very well."

"Thank you. now, I gotta go. I'm pulling into my street."

He was completely correct. for most of my adult life, I've dodged the cell phone trend. Cell phones first surfaces on a huge scale about the time I was 25 years old. For over 5 years, I swore that I would never have one. I mocked the swarming, ignorant, overly-connected masses as they sacrificed the freedom to sing loudly in their cars for the so-called freedom to be called by somebody and told something that just as easily could have waited. I tormented my wife for her unceasing use of the accursed thing, as she strode from room to room wearing an earpiece and speaking to the walls.

Then, one fateful day, she called. She had gotten me a phone. It was "free", she'd said. I accepted it with reservation, knowing to my core that this was a wife leash tied to my ankle. For the first few weeks, I left the phone off much of the time. I left it in my car while I was at work, and turned it on only while driving home.

Then I discovered that surfers, like the remainder of our conditioned consumer society, carry cell phones. I figured out that I could call people and wake them up at 5:30 in the morning, to get them to go surfing. I exchanged cell phone numbers with a couple of surfers that I had only ever met at the beach, and found I could call them up in the afternoons to get surf reports, or in the moorings to give surf reports.

Brett and I had always suspected that this phenominon existed. When perfect conditions show up on a Tuesday morning, and you paddel out alone, only to have a crowd of twenty surfer come running down to the water at 6:30 in the morning, you begin to suspect that there is a network of communications working somewhere.

My friend, Chris, gave me the phrase that I now use to describe this practice. On my way home one Saturday morning, I called his cell phone and gave him a less than optimistic report of how the waves had been at Newport Beach at dawn. based on my reporting, he decided to wait a few hours for the tide to come in, and maybe head north.

"Alright, bro" he said. "Thanks for the Acu-surf."