Guest Blogger

Nic asked me to guest-blog so I'll go ahead and do it for the guy. Nic is a much better blogger than I am (my personal blog history is defined by flurries of greatness followed by long lapses of nothing) but maybe guest-blogging will work out for me. And maybe it'll work out for Horace too, let's see if anyone makes any comments on my post.

So I'll follow Nic's format here and off we go.

Session 26 - The Hook - Feb. 27
Wed Feb 27 - 7 to 9 for Nic and 'til 11 for Joel - Nic on 6'8" Kirkshapes Stinger Fish, Joel on Brewer

Surf here is awesome. Weather here is awesome. Nic's pad is awesome. His board collection is awesome. Nic's surfing is kooky. Haha, well, honestly it's not, but he says he's been extra wobbly since I got here. I know how that goes, there's pressure to show improvement since Nic now surfs all the time and I never surf and we of course both want to be the best. Actually during XTREMO weekend (which was awesome by the way) Zac asked who was better and Nic got pretty defensive about it when I said I thought I was.

Let me explain a couple things so that you understand why Nic, being goofy as he is, faces such a disadvantage here. And no, not goofy in the head, but goofy in surfing. If you surf right foot forward, you have a "goofy"stance. If you surf left foot forward, you have a "regular" stance. This means that when the wave is breaking right from the surfer's view, which is almost entirely what happens here in Santa Cruz, a goofy-foot surfer has to ride it with his back to the wave (backside). Surfing backside is way harder than surfing facing the wave (frontside). I always get to ride waves frontside here in SC, Nic always has to ride them backside. This means that if we had a surf contest here in SC to determine who was the better surfer, I'm pretty sure I'd win it.
However, take the surf contest down to Costa Rica and get us in the water at the left breaking Pavones, Nic probably surfs circles around me. I really suck riding a wave backside since I hardly ever do it.

Discussion also came up about who was the better bball player (Nic against good competition because his skills are higher and nobody can stop the bull-rush right hand drive, me against so-so players because my body is better put together at this point in our lives and I play harder); who's the better snowboarder (Mikey said he thought I was better, but I concluded that I'm only better through trees and in pow-pow because I have a bit more practice at it); and who's better looking (Nic said he is, I suppose I won't argue that one).

Anyway, I'm really rambling here. Let's get to the surf from this morning. What can I say, it was realllllly good. There were like 8 people out at the Hook and we actually were able to get some of the top waves since the guys out weren't super aggro like they often are. I am still kicking myself for letting about 4 of the best, biggest set waves of the morning slip right underneath me because I wussed out on taking off on them. That was very EXWEEN of me (opposite of extreme). I did manage to get a few good ones though, but couldn't really keep up with them the whole way. You have to surf with some real speed to stay ahead of those Hook waves when it's good like it was today. Nic picked off a ton of waves on the inside that were getting past everyone else. It was glassy, sunny, warm, and really just about perfect. I just wish I had more confidence in my surfing right now and had gone for one of those bombs though, I'd really be feeling good if I'd have made one of 'em...and even if I had wiped out I think I'd be over the embarrassment by now. Next time there's no holding back. Oh, after Nic went in I was walking back to the house but saw 38th on fire so I paddled back out for 3 more waves there. They were even faster than the waves at the Hook and some early 20's dudes were really flying on them. One of them wanted to go get a video camera and film since it was so good, but then decided he didn't have enough time. Anyway, just know that this morning had big-time surf movie quality waves.

I gotta write real quick about the Tahoe trip too, it was really a good time and I enjoyed hangin' with all the old college crew. We went big and everyone did really well for getting about 3 hours of sleep per night. Danimal went the biggest on an attempted 360 in the park, which he almost accidentally turned into a HUGE 540 but didn't quite get that far around and instead had a pretty painful crash. But man did he ever go for it. Mikey is a really good skier and he landed some 360's, although none of them were on the scale Dan went for. Zac nearly stuck a 180 which Mikey got on video, I'd link to that for some laughs if I could get it. I suck at jumps and had a pretty stupid looking crash that got filmed too. Nic landed the babiest 180 ever, but at least he can claim it. The powder was awesome on our half-day on Sunday, and there was really some good tree-skiing to be had and we got our share. The question for me now is...should I go again this weekend??

Well I didn't intend to write such a huge blog post. I'm pretty sure nobody will read all of it. Hey Nic, you should do a board history, those are good.

Peace out,
Joel