The ancient Kahunas‘ hang out?

[oldmansurfer]

I think there are surfers who have reached a plateau in their learning to surf and want to learn new things so they can enjoy the process of learning to surf. Something new instead pf the same old thing. In the case of alaia boards it's something old as well. Alaia boards are difficult to ride compared to modern surfboards. That board looks like it was designed to be easier to ride than an alaia but give a similar feeling. I have not felt the desire to try learning to ride a new board although I tried SUP for a while as a replacement for when the waves were small or junk but quit after I found it did not keep me in shape for when the waves were bigger. It's good exercise but uses different muscles. But overall I have never plateaued .

[TeeBee89]

Well said, I agree. I've heard variations of this point about "retro" designs (aside from mid-lengths). In fact I think Derek Hynd said this was partly why he took up finless surfboards.

[BoMan]

Such a pleasure to watch!

[BoMan]

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I'm starting to think about what surfing will be like when I move beyond my 70's. What do you think is the most fun - body boarding, SUP, knee boarding, mat?

[jaffa1949]

I have two mats and they are great stealth weapons, an unsuspecting surf beach with small wave bam you are in and scoring overhead waves!

[BoMan]

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What surfing advice would you give to your grommie self?

I would say, don't worry about sucking. Mistakes are the best way to learn!

[oldmansurfer]

What surfing advice would you give to your grommie self? That's an interesting question. I have thought about this quite a bit and think there is no meaningful advice for me to give my grommie self.

[oldmansurfer]

Here's a funny story about a time I rescued a swimmer at the beach. Back when I was just out of high school one of my friends managed to get a new surfboard. It was the latest design, something I had only heard about and not seen till then. Here it was and I had no clue how he got the board since he had no money as far as I knew. I didn't press him for an answer as to how he got it since I really didn't want to hear it figuring he had done some kind of shady deal. But my friend knew I wanted to try the board out and see how it worked so he offered to let me try it out one day at Kealia.



I surfed on it for about an hour and then decided I wanted my board back so I went in and waited on the beach for my friend to come in. while I was waiting I saw a guy running down the beach from the Kapaa side of the beach. I started worrying that maybe this was his board and my friend stole it so I made up my mind that if that was the case I would just hand over the board. As he gets closer I hear him yelling at me and I think Oh my gosh it is his board so I kind of hold it out away from my body so he can take it easily but he stops by me and says his friend is drowning and needs help while pointing down the beach to the Kapaa side. I look and there are 4 people in the water so I say "looks like someone else is already out there helping your friend." He responds "Those guys don't know what they are doing. Come on! Help out my friend he's drowning" motioning me with his arm to follow him and then he runs down the beach so I follow him. He's out of breath so I pass him on the way there.



By the time I get there, there are only 2 people out in the water so I jump in and paddle out. I could not tell which one was having problems so when I got to where they could hear me I said "Which one of you is having problems?" The guy closest to me a fit looking haole guy says "Me,Me,Me, I am!" So I put him on my surfboard and start pushing him in. There was a slight current going out right there but I was a strong enough swimmer to overcome that even pushing the board in and swimming behind it. I figure that is why he got into trouble this slight current was more than he could handle. He starts yelling at me "We're not getting closer to the shore!" I tell him calmly "We are." He says "No we aren't. We're hardly moving." I told him to relax and the we were getting closer and that he was on the board so he wouldn't drown even if I did. Then I hear the other guy yelling "Help! Help!" So I ask the guy I am pushing in if the other guy was having problems to. He says "yeah. I swam out to help him and got a cramp in my leg." I screamed "Why didn't you tell me?" Then I said "I have to leave you and go help that other guy. Just hang on to the board and I will come back and get you once I help the other guy." He was screaming at me that he didn't want to die and that he was going to drown. I pointed out that he had the board and He could float till someone else came for him if I drowned.



I swam out to the other guy who was a big Hawaiian guy. He seemed OK and because he was big he floated well so I asked him if he was in real trouble or just tired. He said he was tired so I told him I would take him in through the surf. He was on the outside of the break and the haole guy was on the inside of it. I asked if he could hold his breath and he said he could so I told him that we were going to get hit by waves but if he cold hold his breath it would be OK. He agreed so I proceeded to tow him into the breaking surf. I watched and when a wave was coming I would tell him to take a deep breath and then as it hit I would push him up as high as I could and the wave would push him in then I would go get him and make sure he was OK then repeat this till we were well inside the break. By then my friend who had seen me go down the beach came down to find out what was up and paddled out to me. I told him what the problem was and he offered to take the big local guy in on the board he had (my board) so I swam back to my first victim and helped him get the rest of the way in.



The haole guy who had swam out to help the local guy disappeared without saying a word once we go to the beach. I went to the big local guy and asked if he was OK and offered to go call an ambulance if he needed one. He was so thankful that I helped him that he wanted to give me money for it. I told him not to worry and that if I was in trouble and he could help me I am sure he would have so don't worry about it. He kept saying "Thank you , thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you....etc" I decided to leave before he got his breath and tried to force me to take money so I asked if he was OK again and he said he was and endless thank you's after that and I got my board back from my friend and we went back to the surf.

.

[oldmansurfer]

Here is another kind of funny lifesaving I did. I was at Kalihiwai beach paipo boarding with some friends back when I had just graduated from high school. They had all gone in and were waiting for me on the beach. I finally came in and we sat around enjoying the day when I noticed another friend and classmate of mine who seemed to be trying to come in to the beach and not making any progress. I had said "Hi" when I passed him coming in and he seemed content not worried so I had kept going since I was a much better swimmer than most people so they all took longer to get back to the beach than I did. He looked like he was in the exact same place after 5 minutes of swimming so I swam back out and asked him if he was ok. He assured me he was fine so I went back in again. About 5 minutes later he was still in the same place so I swam back out and asked again if he was in trouble. Again he said he was fine so back in I went but my friends on the beach said I should just drag him in since it's obvious he was in trouble. I said "he said he didn't want help." They said "You don't want to have to give him mouth to mouth do you?" I thought about it yeah I mean I would if I had to but really didn't want to so back out I go and tell him I am going to help him. He says he didn't want to "make shame" (be embarrassed) so could I not be obvious about it. So I went under water and pushed his feet while walking on the bottom, then came up and went to the side of him and pushed him with my hand behind his back and then under water again repeating this till I could stand on the bottom and push him. He was so tired when he came out he had to lay down and once he got his breath and was feeling better he told me that he was in dire need of help but didn't want to be humiliated.

[oldmansurfer]

If it isn't obvious I exerted a far greater amount of effort to get my friend in so that I could push him while under water so that no one else could tell I was helping him than it would have been to do a tired swimmer technique or even just to tow him in. Also I guess you can tell I was in really good shape as I was able to do all of this in the face of a slight undertow going out. It was more of a workout than paipo boarding.

[oldmansurfer]

While I remember a lot of waves I caught there are also a few waves that I remember not catching. One was at Haleiwa on Oahu. I was in college and a fellow dorm mate who surfed took me to Haleiwa and surprisingly it uncrowded and breaking around the 6 to 8 foot range (double overhead or bigger). The waves were awesome and I caught quite a few and managed to get barely tubed on the inside. The inside had a section that got real shallow and pitched over but in my usual cautious approach to new waves I was playing it safe and trying to not let the wave get too far in front of me. However I was outside when a big set loomed on the horizon. I paddled to the exactly right location to take off or so I thought. It was a beautiful wave and I was fairly sure I was going to get tubed on the takeoff or shortly after except this wave was bigger than all the other waves I had tried to catch maybe 9 foot (18 foot face) and it was drawing water up it's face much more than I was ready for and the result was I couldn't gain forward motion enough to get into the wave. It was an incredible disappointment which was made worse by the fact that all the 7 or 8 other surfers were yelling encouragement to me as I paddled. I wasted a good wave by just a little. I should have been a little further out and paddled a little more before the wave got to me.


Another wave was more recently at my usual break called Horners. It's a big left that breaks over a reef. I had just been talking to my neighbor who was surfing at the same break. It was a little chaotic and he asked me how to deal with the surf. I said you just need to be in the right place at the right time and do the right thing. This break was often difficult to surf and to takeoff you had to be in exactly the right place. Shortly after that I saw a nice wave and I was in exactly the right place but I didn't paddled enough for the wave and failed to catch it. My neighbor noticed this and said "What's up? You were in the right place at the right time?" I answered "Yeah, but I didn't do the right thing." I am not sure why I remember this one other than I had just told my neighbor to not do what I just did. I wasn't particularly embarrassed as I quite often missed waves there as it is a tricky wave. Maybe just the irony of me saying what I knew was the thing to do but didn't do it myself. When I was younger I was much better at catching the majority of waves there.

Lastly not a wave that I didn't catch but one that I thought I was going to get tubed and didn't. Remembering this wave made me think about other waves that didn't go as planned and the two above. I was surfing a longboard back after I restarted surfing and I was out at blackrock which is the reef break on the other side of the bay from Horners. There was a local guy with an SUP that he was using for a regular surfboard and doing well. I took off on a very steep wave where I had to push the inside rail into the wave to avoid pearling on the drop and then the wave looked like it was going to tube and I pulled up onto the wall and did a turn stall but the wave was very slow breaking and the longboards rail broke free of the wave and I dropped down gaining enough speed to get ahead of the lip. I was mildly disappointed and the guy with the SUP was right there and he was very excited saying "OH MAN! I thought you were going to get tubed". I answered "Me too." but wasn't nearly so excited about it. This was part of what made me switch from a longboard to an oldman board.

[oldmansurfer]

Have you night surfed? I have done it a few times. One method is to park one or more cars on the beach with their lights shining out on the break. I did this a couple or three times but pretty much the waves were not the fun part as they were ordinary, but the fun was just from surfing at night. I also surfed by a hotel where the lights shone out into the water making the waves visible, not too exciting because I wasn't familiar with the break and worried about various dangers (sharks reef, currents). The most fun I had was surfing a break where I usually surfed and just kept surfing after the sun went down. I was at the break closest to my home and the waves were fabulous, about 8 foot faces and tubing out (lefts). A bunch of us decided to stay out in the dark and it was dark. There was no moon and no lights shining on the ocean. At that size I felt comfortable being able to handle whatever the waves dished out but at the same time not wanting to get pounded. In the other situations I could not see the waves far out where I usually take notice of them but could see them well before they were next to me. This night was so dark I couldn't see the wave till I could feel it. This did not leave much time to paddle but I was quick and i sort of learned to hear the wave. When a wave rears up nearby, it blocks out the sound and kind of echoes sound back to you. I also found around the time I could hear it, I could see it blocking the stars. It was tricky but I adapted and was doing okay. The worst part is I couldn't see anyone else paddling out or sitting in the lineup. After a few close calls I decided to call it a night as did the last stragglers out with me but we stayed a couple hours after it got dark.

[oldmansurfer]

One of the times I used my car for the lights along with 2 other cars. I didn't want to leave my car running and didn't want to drain the battery so went back in quickly LOL and left them with only 2 cars headlights. Probably could have left car running but needed to have someone watching the cars to make sure they didn't get hijacked. So it was just the headlights for 30 minutes

[oldmansurfer]

On the dark night that I described above, there was one other guy who also learned to hear the waves and was taking off at the peak with me. It was just a matter of letting whoever was out there the longest catch a wave and then it was your turn. I guess there were a few guys who couldn't figure out the peak and waited inside for the wave to break first. That way you could easily hear it as well as whitewater was easier to see than the unbroken wave. I wrote about this because I read a book, S. Jacques Stratton, Islands on the Fringe: A Year of Micronesian Waves and Wanderers advised by teebee89. The book ends with him night surfing using the moonlight. I guess a good full moon and no clouds would be okay however if you do decide to night surf I advise you to be familiar with the wave and conditions during the daytime first.

[Naeco78]

When i was a kid, me and some friends tried to night surf next to our local pier that had some lights on it. We didnt have much luck seeing the sets until they were right on top of us. Almost gave up.. but then a huge flash of lightning lit up the night sky.. and the ocean below I'll never forget that... an awesome set was coming just as the lightning flashed and we were lined up perfectly for them. It was still a late takeoff.. but it was doable. We surfed until the storm had passed. Got a few good one's. In hindsight, we had no business being out in the ocean during a thunderstorm.. but i grew up at a time when the news had to remind parents.. "It's 10pm. Do you know where your children are?" Didn't seem that out of the ordinary at the time

[jaffa1949]

Dee Why Point had a 50 metre swimming pool cut into the point side rocks which had lights above it and on the promenade this provided light enough to surf quite some hours after sunset.

This is the view of the point in from the roof of the swimming club during the day , this level of wave at night Yahoo

[BoMan]

Stacy Peralta wrote poignantly about Gerry Lopez learning to ride a foil at age 70. Unlike most of us who are afraid to fail especially in front of the camera he embraced it!

Becoming a kook is key to progression.

What I’ve realized is when you allow yourself to go into the kook phase, you have to embrace uncertainty. You have to embrace insecurity, and you have to face all of your fears of everything. And it’s incredibly healthy to do that. And since that time, I’ve done a lot of research, psychological research, and found that when we allow ourselves to do this, it demolishes a lot of the pathways in our brain that no longer serve us. And it allows us to make new pathways that are much more healthy for us. So it wasn’t just a fun thing to experience. There’s actually a physiological reason to do this. And now I’m continually looking [for] the next thing I can do that will put me back in the kook phase. Because I want to keep breaking those neuronal pathways in my brain so I stay flexible and loose and open.”

Shouldn’t we all?

https://www.surfer.com/culture/stacy-peralta-gerry-lopez-is-a-kook-in-the-best-possible-way

[oldmansurfer]

Hmmm well I didn't see him learning to ride a foil but I imagine he won't be running over others or getting in their way much like real kooks do. I think if you aren't learning anything while you surf then it's time to do something else otherwise you are still a kook on some level. Here's a plan; learn to surf a longboard but as soon as you aren't a kook switch and go to a shortboard and as soon as you aren't a kook switch and do SUP surfing and as soon as you aren't a kook do foil or kite or windsurfing or try riding an alaia, then whenever you run out of new things to learn go back to longboarding and you will probably be a kook once again for a while and just repeat the whole process. I think there are surfers who just quit learning. They lack the curiosity or motivation to improve their surfing. They just assume that what they are doing is the pinnacle of their surfing career. The longer you surf regularly the more likely this will happen. It's fun to learn stuff to me anyway but I have so much more to learn about riding a regular surfboard that I haven't ever reached that point. Be sure to be careful if you chose foil surfing, it's very dangerous for you and others.

[BoMan]

Aging naturally lowers metabolism and muscle mass as a % of total body weight. Joints stiffen and flexibility reduces. The first thing that you really start to lose is a fast pop up and the ability to get into a wave, but once you're up the moves are still there. You come to appreciate what you are - not what you were - and it's still the best fun you can have standing up!

What are your Kahuna work arounds for these problems? (boards, conditioning, wave selection, everything is on the table)

[jaffa1949]

Truly a hang out of ANCIENT KAHUNAS but in Haole talks and Aussie speak OLD FARTS!