While the world’s top surfers awaited the start of the 2021 World Surf League Hawaiian season last week, the ocean decided to fire up before they got their coloured rashies on, the north shores of both Oahu and Maui erupting with huge swells from the early hours of December 2.
According to spies on the ground, the next couple of days were brilliant for waves but horrendous for crowds along the North Shore of Oahu’s famous “Magic Seven Miles”, with traffic backed up forever on the two-lane Kam Highway and carnage at Waimea Bay as people who really shouldn’t decided to tackle the big boomers.
The offshore reefs were the place to be for the tow-in crowd, while over on Maui, Jaws had plenty of tows and plenty of paddlers mixing it up, with usual suspects Kai Lenny and Billy Kemper scoring some of the best waves of the swell, but the video footage that blew me away was of 12-year-old Stevie Roberson, confidently dropping, dropping, dropping down the face of a monster like it was nothing.
Stevie is a third generation Jaws surfer, following in the footsteps of grandfather John and father Kaleo, who made his history-making debut at the famed big wave break two years ago at age 10, when he was still known as “Baby”. Having ridden many bombs since then, he’s now just Stevie, thank you very much.
And look out, Kai and the boys, once this dude gets some more flesh on his bones.
Big wave charger Keala Kennelly was front and centre at Jaws on the biggest day, but tour title contenders in the women’s division mainly chose to warm up down the coast at Honolua Bay in preparation for the Maui Women’s Open, which was due for a start at the time of writing. The warmup sessions proved to be cold comfort for Courtney Conlogue, who fell down the face and broke her nose, re-emerging in the line-up later in the day with 14 stitches. But that won’t stop her in the event.
Aussie tour rookie Isabella Nichols was another stand-out in the practice sessions, putting paid to any thought that lack of experience in waves of consequence might be a handicap, and former champ Tyler Wright also looked to be on song.
Here, the drought continues
Meanwhile, the surf drought and the devil wind northerlies continued to bum everyone out except the kite surfers at the river mouth. Spring is notoriously bad for these conditions, but can anyone remember a surfless season so drawn out? Perhaps it’s just that it’s coming on top of Covid fatigue.
But look out! Help is on the way, in the form of a solid bump of east swell predicted this weekend with the potential for the system to keep producing right through to Christmas, according to Swellnet’s Ben Matson. The winds could get a bit flukey as the low tracks down the coast, and, of course, predictions this far out are an inexact science. But the WAMS have got me just a little bit excited.
And remember, kiddies, if we do get a good one, the best way to ensure that Santa comes down your chimney with a sack of goodies is to give an old bloke a few waves. When you see him huffing and puffing over the ledge, don’t think he’ll never make the drop, and turn and go. Just wait, watch and wonder. And, as Duke always said, there’ll be another one along in a minute.
Quad in a good cause
I featured the beautiful Fuyu speed pin replica that we’re going to auction at this weekend’s Surfers Christmas Ball at the Sunshine Beach Surf Club in this column a couple of weeks ago, and now here’s another generous donation from our local surfboard-builders’ community.
Our raffle board on the night, courtesy of Classic Malibu Surfboards, is this very cool quad fish with multi-coloured resin tints, shaped and glassed with love and care by CM founder Peter White. Constructed from a lighter EPS foam, the fish is a wider, flatter, fuller, easy paddling board that is rideable at a significantly shorter length than the average board. (This one is 5’10” by 21 3/4” by 2 ¾”.) Increased flow and trim make it excellent on longer point waves. But with a few refinements, equally adapted to beach breaks. This board has a quad fin set-up to maintain drive through turns.
If you’re coming to the ball, make sure you grab a bunch of tickets at the door. If you’re not, you can’t have this one, but you could go see Pete, Janet and Kirra at Classic Mal on Venture Drive and order one!
