Battle of the Paddle–Lots of Pictures

…The beach break behind me looked about head high. I thought “oh great, I’m going to finish the race by getting worked in front of 500 spectators” but I managed to catch it before it crumbled and got out in front of the whitewater. I beached the board at full speed and stumbled up the steep bank. I ran into the chute for the finish line, but my legs started wobbling as soon as I hit the soft sand. So I just walked through the serpentine and crossed the line, losing four places with my geezer plodding. But hey, I made it…

The Rainbow Sandals Gerry Lopez Battle of the Paddle was remarkably well organized for a first year event. Simply put, it was a historic occasion, and the organizers rose to the challenge, and then some. I’ve put on an event or two, and achieving this degree of organization is very hard and very expensive. Everyone involved deserves more than just congratulations. They deserve your support and encouragement. Next year should be amazing. One word to the organizers–get some food vendors for the spectators. A thousand hungry people on a beach is a great opportunity.

On to the pictures, I’ll flesh this article out more later:

Set Up Day: The day before the BOP

New quickblade paddles with beautiful wood blades

Modeled by the lovely Diane

“But I don’t want to be on the Internet”

There were paddles everywhere, here’s some new colored quickblades

New 12′ starboard for the pro race with a centerboard fin. Ekolu Kalama (right side) paddled it and looked fast during practice but retired early as the race conditions made the board impossible.

Everyone was so happy with the flat conditions. They lasted until about two minutes after the race started.

Jimmy Lewis came with three of his Distance boards and others to demo.

Santa Barbara and Malibu

I poked my way down the California coast, looking at inaccessible surf spots, monster kelp beds, and cold-looking water until I reached Santa Barbara. I pulled into town and made my way to the beach. I had planned to look up the infamous Wardog once I got there, I figured he’d have a secret spot or two I could get him to share. But it was late on a Saturday, so it seemed unlikely that he’d be at his shop. The surf looked small, but there were a couple of SUP surfers out with the crowd of longboarders, so I decided to get wet. Tossed my board in the water and paddled out. I caught a few nice rides, but it was pretty dinky. I went for a long paddle along the beach, intending to quit when I got back to the shore and head further south for the night. But when I got back to the little surf spot most of the folks had gone home, the water glassed off, the sun was going down in a big ball of orange, and the waves were looking clean and nice.

Santa Barbara

A family of young kids on longboards with their dad were shredding the heck out of the waves, doing long noserides and showing a lot of style. I slid in and caught a bunch of nice rides, played around, let the kids try my board, surfed until pitch dark.

Local Santa Barbara SUPer in little swells

By then I was hungry and I remembered an italian restaurant I’d had a great meal at many years ago. I drove down the shoreline and there it was. the place was packed but there was room at the bar, so I had a great meal and some nice wine. Turns out the place was so busy because Jeff Lorber was doing a CD release party there. Hard to believe a jazz great like Jeff Lorber was playing in a little restaurant, but there he was. I stayed for the music, and by the time I was ready to leave it was too late and I had too much wine to push on. So I found a place to stay on the beach and slept like the dead until 9:00.

The surf looked a little bigger, but I wanted to try Malibu, so I hoofed it on down the coast. Coming into Malibu I saw a lot of interesting looking breaks, but no SUPers at all, and flocks of surfers. Usually a great break has a lesser break nearby that no one uses that’s perfect for SUP, but i didn’t see anything like that. I drove through Malibu without seeing a SUP, but I was determined to try this famous spot. Finally I say two guys on SUP boards in the middle of what looked like a solid raft of surfers.

I pulled into a parking spot and pulled out my board just as both of them quit. I didn’t even get to see how they were surfing the spot. I paddled out and went looking for a wave that wasn’t packed solid. No joy. So I paddled North, past all the houses, looking at all that ridiculously expensive real estate getting pounded by beach break. I didn’t see anything that looked rational so I paddled back to the break and took a couple of rides at the far southern end.

Malibu SUPer

I saw the lifeguard walk down the beach looking at me, so I figured I might be out of bounds somehow, though I didn’t see any markers or flags, and there wasn’t anyone in the water. While he was headed my way I took one more ride, and wound up in about five inches of water. I could see the pebbles and rocks under the nose of the board. I dove into the face of the whitewater, so I didn’t get munched, but the whitewater and my board dragged me over the pebbles and we both got a little beat up. I walked up the steep bank and the lifeguard said “that’s a really dangerous place to surf”.

Next… Del Mar and Mission Bay.