The Green Room

There’s a fifty percent chance that another big wave title will be brought back to Santa Cruz when the 2007 Nelscott Reef Tow In Classic goes down in Lincoln, Oregon this winter.

On September 18th contest organizers announced the lineup for this year’s contest. More than half of this year’s competitors hail from the Santa Cruz area, including Zach and Jake Wormhoudt who won the inaugural Nelscott contest in 2005 and return as partners this year, after a broken foot separated them the during practice for the 2006 event. Two other brother tow teams will be competing this year: Santa Cruz’s Russell and Tyler Smith and San Clemente’s Rusty and Greg Long.

Also returning are last year’s champs Garrett McNamara and Kealii Mamala–both from Hawaii–who will look to defend their title against the most talented field yet for a Nelscott contest. Other world-class competitors will include such teams as Brad Gerlach and Mike Parsons, Adam Replogle and Alistair Craft, Raph Bruhwiler and Keith Malloy, Greg and Rusty Long, as well former Eddie Aikau winner Ross Clarke-Jones, defending Mav’s champ Twiggy Baker, and Jeff Clark and Peter Mel. Check out the video of last year’s contest:

The competition will take place in Lincoln City, Oregon, sometime between October 1 and December 31. The Nelscott Reef Tow In Classic is the only tow in contest on the North American continent and represents theonly professional surf event held in the state of Oregon. As per normal protocol for big wave contests, the exact date of the event will depend upon wave conditions, which will be continually monitored during the holding period. Once maximum wave conditions are observed, competitors will have 48 hours notice to get their equipment ready and make it to the Central Oregon Coast. Last winter the Nelscott Reef Tow In Classic was one of the only big wave contests that was able to run–along with the North Shore Tow In Surfing Championships– as both Maverick’s and the Eddie Aikau Invitational at Waimea Bay got shut out in what was a sub-par winter for big swells. And hey, even if the contest doesn’t score massive waves to get the reef rumbling, the boys can still tow the burly beachbreak. Check it out:

“We have some of the greatest tow surfers from around the world on board for this years event,” said John Forse, event organizer, in a press release.  “The competition will be fierce with a line up as stacked
as we have for 2007.”

Now in its third year, the Nelscott Reef Tow In Classic has expanded the breadth of its competitor field to go beyond the usual big wave suspects from California and Hawaii. This year international tow teams from Australia, South Africa, Morocco, and Brazil will be represented as well. Here is the full list of invitees and alternates:

2007 Tow Team Invitees:

Shane Desmond (N.Cal) Tyler Fox (N.Cal)

Adam Replogle (N.Cal) Alistair Craft (N.Cal)

Garrett McNamara (HAW) Kealii Mamala (HAW)

Raph Bruhwiler (CAN) Keith Malloy (S.Cal)

Zach Wormhoudt (N.Cal) Jake Wormhoudt (N.Cal)

Ross Clarke-Jones (AUS) TBD

Brad Gerlach (S.Cal) Mike Parsons (S.Cal)

Jeff Clark (N.Cal) Chris Bertish (S. Africa)

Peter Mel (N.Cal) Ryan Augustine (N.Cal)

Greg Long (S.Cal) Rusty Long (S.Cal)

Twiggy Baker (S. Africa) TBD

Russel Smith (N.Cal) Tyler Smith (N.Cal)

Steve Nichols (N.Cal) Ali Ben Hammou (Morocco)

Dave Mcgill (Oregon) Joel Smith (Oregon)

Danilo Cuoto (Brazil) Rodrigo Resende (Brazil)

Skiz Doudt (Oregon/HAW) Chava Greenlee (HAW)

Pablo Schulte (S.Cal) Davey Smith (S.Cal)

Vince Broglio (N.Cal) Richard Schmidt (N.Cal)

Osh Bartlett (N.Cal) Anthony Ruffo (N.Cal)

Josh Mulcoy (N.Cal) Stan Meurer (N.Cal)

2007 Tow Team Alternates:

Carlos Burle (Brazil) Eraldo Gueros (Brazil)

Dan Moore (HAW) John Anderson (HAW)

Mike Brummett (N.Cal) Chris Brown (S.Cal)

Makua Rothman (HAW) Ikaika Kalama (HAW)

Brent Hudson (N.Cal.) Jeff Kafka (N.Cal)

Homer Henard (N.Cal) Matt Rockhold (N.Cal)

Matt Ambrose (N.Cal) Shawn Rhodes (N.Cal)

Ramon Navarro (Chile) Danny Fry (Chile)

John Gangini (HAW) Yuri Soledad (HAW)

TransWorld Surf magazine’s first ever film, “Tomorrow Today” will play it’s NorCal premiere on Monday, October 8 at the Rio Theatre in Santa Cruz (Soquel @ Seabright).

The film features five freakishly talented surf stars under the age of 25 earning their six figure incomes by punting, gaffing, and spinning at your standard exotic surfing locations around the world. Californians Dane Reynolds, Bobby Martinez and Mike Losness, Western Aussie Yadin Nichol, and Maui boy Clay Marzo make up the cast. Sounds like a completely novel idea for a surf film.

“Tomorrow/Today will help bridge the gap between the present and the future,” claims TransWorld on its website. All the hype is warranted.

Here’s what poster boy Dane Reynolds told Quiksilver about being handpicked for the starring role:
“I’m excited. I like the cast of surfers in the film, and I’m stoked to be a part of it.”

Wow, Dane.

If that wasn’t enough to convince you, maybe the trailer will (caution, may cause seizures)…

In last Sunday’s Sentinel I wrote a piece on Marciano Cruz, known around town as Chango. The article (click here to check it out) focused on Chango’s incredible life–the challenges he’s faced, how surfing helped him turn his life around, and his campaign to share his passion for the ocean with other disadvantaged young people in the community.

Chango during his heat at the 2007 Santa Cruz Longboard Union Invitational at the Lane this Memorial Day. photo: Boots McGhee.

While I was happy with the way the article turned out, because of space restrictions I wasn’t able to delve into a number of other elements that make up Chango’s rich personality. In addition to being a community activist, a passionate surfer, and a mentor to many young people in Santa Cruz, Chango is also a talented artist. He has worked with a variety of mediums over the years, including acrylics, pastels, felt pen, etc. Recently he’s really gotten into painting surfboards with paint pens.

Chango’s art is in high demand around Santa Cruz. He has painted boards by request for many talented surfers, including CJ Nelson, Bud Freitas and Cold Water Surf Club founder Christian Wadman.

The following is a small sample of some of his most recent surfboard murals. All photos were taken by Santa Cruz photographer Boots McGhee (check out his website here).

Chango has only taken one art class in his whole life–a nine session class at Cabrillo–but loved it and says he wants to take another whenever he can find the time. The board he’s holding above was on the cover of the Sentinel last Sunday as well as last spring for the front pager we did on the Big Stick Logjam at the Point. It depicts Quetzalcoatl–the feathered serpent who is thought to have been the principal god of the Aztec religion–and the symbol of the Aztec calendar above.

Below is Chango’s latest project. He’s in the process of painting a used 10’0″ nose rider given to him by CJ Nelson. He’s almost finished–just needs to add the detail and add some contrast so it stands out more. On the bottom of the board is a picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe, hands cupped, water pouring out from her fingers and into the deep green of a Pleasure Point lineup, stacked to the horizon with groomed lines of swell. Evening light is shining through the lips of the waves. When he’s finished, an arc of roses will hang above her head.

“The Virgen is the first thing I ever painted on a surfboard,” explains Cruz. “I paint the Virgen because she has been loyal to me when I have needed her most. She watches over me and keeps my faith strong. She is like my mother.”

The symbol of the Virgen is an important symbol of faith and guardian in Mexico. This type of imagery makes up the foundation of Chango’s art, a world he first began to explore in prison. Back in the day, when Chango was doing time and bouncing around the prison system, there were no art classes offered in the pen. He would get a friend to smuggle an extra white sheet or two from the laundry room and swipe a felt marker pen from the commissary. With these tools, he would make elaborate murals on sheets.

“Art was a tool to survive when I was in jail,” Chango said, ”to get what I needed whether it was toothpaste, books, cigarettes. It also attracted people who liked what I created.”

Locked up in Susanville, day melting into day, no one knowing where he was, Chango began drawing on envelopes with felt tip pen and sending them to people on the outside.

“I learned that the art was a way to communicate with others,” Chango said. ”If you send some art to someone on the outside, they’ll keep in touch. Doing three years, nobody knew where I was. I started drawing on envelopes and sending them to people on the outside. People really got into it. Art attracted people on the outside.”

“We all have abilities that we don’t search out,” added Chango. ”With my art, I searched it out to communicate with others and attract others.”

The notion of a surfboard as a blank canvas first occurred to Cruz when he saw photos from the late sixties and seventies of surfers on wildly painted boards. The idea resonated with him, not only because of his artistic ability, but because of the tradition of decorating objects during festivals in Oaxaca such as Todos Santos (All Saints day), Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), Christmas, and the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe.

“In Oaxaca when we have festivals, people decorate the entire town with flowers and paper decorations,” said Chango. ”We bake big special breads that we don’t normally ever get to eat. We even dress up the cows and other animals with bells and ribbons.”

Painting his surfboards with the imagery of his culture–the Virgen de Guadalupe, Quetzalcoatle the plumed serpent, and an entire pantheon of other Mesoamerican gods and symbols–is a way for Chango to reconnect with his Mexican roots.

“You want to show where you come from,” explains Cruz. “I’m proud of my traditions and I want to display it in the water. With these paintings I feel like I regain something of who I am, a part of my culture I never learned about before.”

Above: A Mayan holy man/priest. Below: An abstract take on the ancient Aztec god Quetzalcoatl (with Marciano’s cat admiring his work).

This one looks to be a classic, folks. From the guys who brought you the movie “Singlefin: yellow” comes a new film on what it means to be a California surfer today. In “One California Day” independent filmmakers Jason Baffa and Mark Jeremias attempt to capture the essence of the California surfing experience as it exists today through a series of portraits of surfers from various surfing regions along the CA coast.

In the vein of the current surf cinema renaissance–which includes such talents as Jack Johnson, Chris Malloy, and Andrew Kidman–Baffa and Jeremias skillfully present a story that is at once reflective–with a keen sense of the history of California surfing–as well as visually inspiring, conveying the brilliant aesthetic of a life centered around the ocean and the California coast. Check out the preview below…

In the words of the filmmakers:

“One California Day is a visual journey through six distinct coastal regions, capturing the California surfing experience through the surfers who live it. Shot in brilliant super 16mm color film, the movie examines the variety of subtle differences that make California so unique.”

Santa Cruz stylemaster Dane Perlee was chosen to represent the waves and the surf scene for the film’s Santa Cruz/Northern California segment, and judging from the trailer does a great job of capturing the peace and solitude that can still be found in a solo session along the north coast. The other surfers in the film, representing various regions of the Golden State, are:

• Joel Tudor in San Diego
• Alex Knost in Orange County
• Tyler Hatzikian in the South Bay
• Jimmy Gamboa in Malibu
• Joe and Tom Curren in Santa Barbara
• The Malloy brothers in the Ranch/Lompoc area

And if you can’t make it to the Rio on Thursday the 27th @ 7:30, don’t worry! Baffa and Jeremias just locked in seven more showings at the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco:

Thursday Oct 4th @ 8pm
Friday Oct 5th @ 7 and 9 pm
Saturday Oct 6th @ 7 and 9 pm
Sunday Oct 7th @ 7 and 9 pm

DON’T MISS IT!

Check out this footage of Hawaiian hellmen Garrett McNamara and Kealii Mamala towing into a tsunami wave created when a massive chunk of ice breaks off Child’s Glacier in South-Central Alaska and plunges into the Pacific Ocean.

No matter where you stand on the whole Motorized Personal Water Craft/tow surfing issue, you have to admit one thing–it’s strangely appropriate that a tsunami wave resulting from global warming and the subsequent melting of thousand year old glaciers, only be possible to ride with the aid of a fossil fuel burning machine like a jet ski.

The more these guys tow the outer reefs (and the more your average Joe practices tow-ats in three foot waves down at Moss Landing), the more CO2 is released into the atmosphere, and thus the more their chances of scoring another one of these freak waves increases–even if it’s only by the tiniest increments. Ironic? We think so.

Who knows what other strange new extreme sports will be made possible by the tragedy of global warming? Mountain boarding the steepest alpine peaks that once were covered in year-round ice and snow? Iceberg hopping near the poles? Tow surfers hunting the ever-increasing number of hurricane swells in the Gulf of Mexico every summer?

History has been made. Tsunami glacier waves have officially been ridden by surfers. Cutting edge and creative, or a big fat waste of time, money and resources for a freezing cold, mushy wave? That’s for you to decide. But honestly, Kealii– “All natural?”–come on, dude.

A big happy birthday goes out to Santa Cruz’s own Ed Guzman. The surf instructor extraordinaire–of ClubEd Surf School fame–and big wave aficionado celebrated the big 5-0 over the weekend, hosting a huge birthday bash on Sunday, September 9th. Friends and family gathered outside in Ed’s beautiful backyard in Watsonville’s Larkin Valley to eat, drink, and enjoy live music by the Norton Buffalo Band. Folks danced on the lawn, basked in the sun, played Ping Pong and Basketball, and some just lounged to their heart’s content.

Plenty of story telling went down, with Ed and friends recounting numerous heavy wipeouts, epic days at local breaks, and classic stories from the road. As a special treat, the birthday boy got up on stage and whipped out his harmonica, jamming with Norton Buffalo on some classic blues standards. “Who knew fifty could feel this good?” asked Ed in between jamming onstage.

Happy birthday Ed! I hope I’m as happy, healthy and surfing as well as you when I’m fifty!

Whether he’s charging monster closeouts at Pipeline or celebrating his birthday with friends, Ed always goes big.

Also, there are a number of beach cleanups and environmental events in the area planned for this week. Here’s the roundup courtesy of surfline.com:

• Drop by the Simpkins Swim Center (17th Ave) for Surfrider Santa Cruz’s Chapter Monthly Meeting on Tuesday, September 11th at 7pm. There will be a short screening of  The Synthetic Sea, and an overview of the upcoming calendar.
• Join the San Mateo County Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation and the LIVE 105 Action Team for a beach cleanup at Tunitas Creek on Saturday, September 15th from 9am-12noon. Tunitas Creek is located south of Half Moon Bay, just a little south of Martin’s Beach on Highway 1. If you reach San Gregorio Beach and the Highway 1/84 junction, you’ve gone too far.
• And for those of you in Santa Cruz: On Saturday, September 15th, from 9am ‘til noon cruise on over to Capitola Beach and look for Rich, the SC Surfrider chapter cleanup leader with forms and gear for volunteers, on or near the sand. Be there—or surf dirty!

Before the summer of 2007 was even halfway over, grumbling claims of “worst summer ever” were already beginning to echo around town. “Worst summer ever” is a tricky claim since hardly any summer ever delivers much in the way of consistent surf around these parts. Every year when the North Pacific goes into hibernation and tiny junky little windswell is all that can be found, it often feels like the present situation is more hopeless than any on record. But even the old timers were backing this summer’s claim.

Oil slick glass, A-frame peaks, and just a few friends…the ingredients for a perfect California surf session. photo: Megs

Ironically, the southern hemi season actually started off with a bang in early April, dishing out back-to-back-to-back solid SW swells that were perfectly angled (in the 200-210 degree range) to reach Northern California and fill into all the little nooks and crannies that just love a south. Unfortunately as June and July played themselves out, it became clear that the summer surf climaxed a little, um, prematurely. After the early April craziness, things really shut down. A brief, over-hyped swell hit around the 4th of July weekend providing minimal relief for the ravenous holiday crowds, and then the ocean went pretty much dead flat in town again until recently.

With the “WSE” coming on the heels of what was by all accounts a lackluster–and freezing!–winter it makes a NorCal surfer wonder if the surf gods are taking revenge on us for some terrible mistake. Might they have taken offense at some unintended insult or insolence on our part? Perhaps it’s all the trash we’re dumping into the oceans, or maybe it’s a late collection on dues we still owed for that epic 97/98 El Nino winter.

Most folks in town resorted to other ocean related exercise this summer, with the lake-like conditions in Santa Cruz being perfect for long distance paddle boarding and everyone trying to learn how to ride their brand new Laird Hamilton signature stand-up paddle board. The stand-up boards in particular seemed to multiply in the Santa Cruz lineup over the course of the summer.

If you wanted to stay in surfing shape this summer, paddleboards were the call. photo: Boots McGhee

Not to say that it was completely flat. There’s always something to ride if your willing to spend enough time and gas money scouring the coast. It seemed as though every pro in Santa Cruz was making the drive north at least a couple times a week to surf a sharky little patch of sand somewhere between Natural Bridges and Maverick’s, notorious for always producing some type of punchy, ridable wave–even the odd little tube. Was all that driving time and gas money–you’r average SC pro drives a gas guzzler with at least a V8, and raised a minimum of 4″ from the ground–worth it to keep up the sea legs in two foot shorebreak? It depends on who you ask. Reports of rideable little longboard waves at the beachbreaks south of town were also verified.

And then there’s our most recent run of south swell relief, which has been pushing up fun, consistent waves for over a week now. Once again the peak of the swell coincided with a holiday weekend. Reports of 300 guys out along Pleasure Point over the Labor Day swell were only slightly exaggerated. Again, makes you wonder if King Neptune might just be laughing himself silly deep at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, trying to see how much anarchy he can create in the surf-starved lineups of Santa Cruz. After this winter, his antics already had many anxious NorCal surfers on edge.

As far as worst summer ever, it’s all relative to who you talk to, how long they’ve been surfing and how far they we’re willing to go to find some waves. What’s your claim for worst summer ever?

But we’re not complaining. There have been fun waves for almost two weeks now and the fall season is just around the corner. Here’s a little slide show of the action from the past week of swell, with a couple of shots tossed in from that epic April 11 swell, just for fun. Enjoy…

The North-Central Coast loves a south photo: Megs

The lack of any real low tides during the most recent run of south swell–the low tide during daylight hours hovered around 3 feet during the peak of the swell between Sep. 4-6th–made for some bouncy, backwash conditions at many spots in town. This guy managed not to get bucked off by the backwash and found himself inside the tube of a warbly one on the West Side. photo: JS

We’ve had reports of dead seals washing up on multiple beaches north of town, all with big chunks bitten out of them. It’s getting close to “Sharktober,” the month when your chances of encountering whitey are at their highest, according to Santa Cruz superstitions. When you’re bobbing out in a murky north coast lineup by yourself and the theme song from the movie Jaws is pounding in your head, glassy little barrels like this are always a welcome distraction. photo: Herman

A frothy one rolls through Mitchell’s Cove on that April 11 swell. photo: Bob Island

Another Westside reef goes richter back in early April. photo: Bob Island.