Monday, August 27

A Weekend Full of it

The weekend took a harsh toll on me. I am sitting in front of my laptop trying to be creative and, at the same time, trying not to face plant it out of shear exhaustion. You see, this past weekend was spent in a town, 4 hours from the Mother City, doing nothing more than bodyboarding. Now that I think about it, the long distance drive, the lack of sleep, the random sunburn and the festering red eyes was all worth the time at the Southern Cape Bodyboarding Champs in Mossel Bay. No regrets!

The contest was held at Mossel Bays most notable wave, Outerpool. Outerpool is a right hand reef break that produces some amazing waves when the winds are blowing in a South Westerly direction, the tide is low and the swell is a South Easterly swell in the range of 2.5m to 3m. These are roughly the conditions we got during the contest which made for a spectacle of big moves.

The riders that stood out in the contest consisted of a group of locals such as Adam Morley who made got one of the highest heat scores of the event, Bjorn Coetzee who clenched biggest move of the contest with an insane backflip he boosted and Johan Nortjie who won the mens division respectively.One kid that set the bar for the standard of riding was, super grom, Tristan Roberts who performed so well in the contest that he ended up taking titles in 2 divisions being the boys division, because he is young enough to compete in this event, and the Pro division because he is just that super! The junior division was won by Plett local, Niklas Martin, ladies was taken by Nikki Gerrike, who is also from Plett, and the dropknee division was won by Matt Webster.

The contest that Southern Cape Bodyboarding Association hosted was a truly good comeback since they left the South African Bodyboarding scene in 2007. Many thanks go out to the organizers and the sponsors and especially to all the buddies that made the long drive to Mossel Bay for the epic time we had!

The next provincial championship will be the weekend of the 1st and 2nd September where Boland will have its chance at hosting an insane comp. For more information go to the Boland  website

Now for some eye candy from SCBA Champs...Feast!

The face of the Boy that took Pros, Tristan Roberts

Deep in the pocket- Douw Steyn chooses to seek the tube

Tristan Roberts demonstrates his mechanical flips

Doing something behind a mighty bush- Mafoos Lombard

Outerpool local, Joe Boogie, going crazy on a section in the Drop knee semi-finals

A free surf at Innerpool caused Mafoos Lombard to get vertical.

Juniors winner, Niklas Martin, boosting a clean roll in his semi-finals

The reason why he won pros is because of massive moves like this flip- Tristan Roberts

Boost of the contest winner, Bjorn Coetzee with this massive Back Flip

Tuesday, August 14

Womans Day aka "I can go surf in the middle of the week day"

With Winters icy fingers completely wrapped around our fair country, it is that part of the year when the weather is to bad to even think about leaving the confides of our warm beds to brave the harshness of the cold Atlantic. This is not made easier by the vast amounts of swells that have been tormenting our coastlines for the past couple days combined with the strong NW winds that just are not friendly.

So when mother nature throws you you a bone, by which I mean a warm sunny Thursday, you try to make the best of it by getting a few friends together and head out on the road with one thing on your mind...A boogie!

This is what our plan was last week when our Government had declared last Thursday, August 9, to be Womans Day- an excuse to not work- Thanks Ladies!!!

Although the waves were not perfect it was just good to be out in the ocean doing what we love. Here are some of the images captured during that outing.

Releasing some built up tension, Matt Webster throws some tail.

Still angry, Matt throws buckets on the knee.

Soaking up the sun with the table in the background, Dino Barito takes it all in.

After surf delights- Matt Webster & Janneke De Kock
 

Monday, August 13

Growing in the Local Garden

What really does it for me is when I look at my home town and I see that the amount talent that just stagnates there. Hermanus is a bodyboarding town. Long have the ways of the booger dictated the lifestyles that groms shall end up leeding. Rarely has a kid gazed upon the local headquarters of Onrus Beach and said to himself "I want to start surfing."

No! the kids in Onrus start bodyboarding and develop so much talent because there are no surfers to burn the groms on every wave and stop them from boosting out.

and then years go by, these kids get older, and better at the sport which usually results in them becoming a strong part of the Boland Bodyboarding Association which is our provincial team.

Sometimes there is a soul on the shore that feels it a good idea to film these "kids", edit the footage and create a short clip that gets everyone in the sleepy town fired up with stoke.

His name is Kevin and he made a clip of the grown up kids while doing what they love in Onrus River.

Check it out...