Session 77 - May 16 - LM

Friday May 16, 7 - 9 AM, 6'6 quad

SPEED BLOGGING! I was blogophobic this weekend and didn't do any updating ... so I'm gonna speed through these last couple session reports faster than some logo'd up first peak ripper upon failing to make a section on his set wave can paddle back out to berate the 2nd peak longboarder kook who got in his way and tell him to go home (no, I don't speak from personal experience...nope not at all) ... for those of you who have not had the privilege of that lovely experience, let me tell you it is really, really FAST.

So surf was pretty great on Friday probably pretty much everywhere, from what I overheard north Santa Cruz spots were absolutely firing, but I made the call to head up to Linda Mar and see what I could get at my normal San Mateo county dawn patrol beachbreak option. Met up with Brian from work and had some company out there, good stuff...surf was good although not very good but good enough. Got a fair amount of waves, best one probably a shoulder high left that held open for me for a bit enough to get two real quick mini hits off the lip, at least my best versions of such...waves were unfortunately either backing off a bit too much to get a whole lot, or just closing out on the big sets...patience and some wave selection skills still offered up some select waves to those willing to wait. Good start to the day.

(a quick note on the above 1st peak/2nd peak analogy. Yes, that did happen to me this weekend. And yes, the guy was hands down an incredible surfer, really something else to watch him do his thing...and I probably was guilty of doing a little bit too much of just that...watching his wave and as a result, not getting over the shoulder fast enough to get out of his way. I really thought he was going to cut back and there was plenty of room for that, but to my surprise he decided to take a really high line directly at me, actually coming within probably about 2 inches of the front of my board on a long arcing top turn instead of the tight cutback I expected...it was one of those situations where as the longboarder on the inside you have to decide do I paddle hard for the shoulder or do I go inside and take the whitewash...I always go to the whitewash and take the duck-dive as opposed to getting in the way, but in this scenario I felt doing that was going to put me more so in the way as I was able to get pretty far out in front of the shoulder but apparently that was the wrong decision, I think I would've been screwed basically either way..I really thought he was going to cut back...to be honest, I think a large part of the contributing factor for said ripper choosing his high line instead of the cutback was so he could make a point of coming ultra extremely close to me to illustrate his point that I was in the way and was a kook...so, OK. Point taken. My apologies for being in the way. And if it makes things any better...dude, you rip! Was a privilege to have you fly by my nose at mach speed and shred apart the rest of that wave on the way. And I'll continue to always try to make every effort to stay out of the way, as I always do. My bad.)

So far my speed blogging isn't going that well.