Predictions on Crowds in the Water

Unfortunately, surfing is a fashion statement for many people. These days you are either a d-bagger, a hipster, a thug, a geek, or a surfer. I dont care how crowded PacSun gets, but i liked that crowd better when they were "posers" and not "kooks".

We should make surfing less cool. It will be tough, because we ARE some cool mother Fukkaz. I'm making the switch from surf shop to American Eagle and only listening to top 40. I'll also go ahead and trade in my flops for some jordans. When I do surf, ill suck it up and wear a speedo. If we all do it, noone will want to learn because surfing is for losers. Then we (and our banana hammocks) will enjoy good waves and empty lineups.

 

I don't think more affluence is a factor. If anything, I see downward mobility in employment, especially in young people.(ie getting a college degree and then working a service job for 8/hr...that's what happens when EVERYONE starts going to college) More Leisure time? haha This is America my friend. Got to make sure the rich are getting richer. Less and less people taking vacation time. Work...work....and then more work for the majority. We will soon be like Japan with 70 hour work weeks commonplace and no weekends or worse like China. Surfing is simply a more popular thing now. It was almost unheard of in the 50's. It's a culture thing. Also, an ever increasing overpopulation.

 

It's all cyclical. Surfing always has boom and bust periods. The advent of fun/longboards certainly makes it easier for people to get into the sport which leads to crowded conditions. That ease of learning goes around the old way of slowly paying dues which instills etiquette in people. so now we have more beginners with less etiquette in the water today. THAT is a bad combination.

My guess is that at some point either surfing loses it's cool factor or rabid localism/enforcement will make a comeback. I'm already seeing this at some breaks.

 

I see two problems:
1. Cheap products that are easily available on a whim (cheap popout surfboards that people can buy in boardwalk souvenir shops (people buy them as an impulse purchase!), and more effective (but less costly wetsuits), etc. Man, companies want to cash in!

2. A Freaking advertising culture that puts surfboards on every car in every car commercial, and ones that show families with "active lifestyles" as they grab their surfboards and jog down to the water's edge.

Advertisers know what their doing - they know that people want to be like those "beautiful people" they see on tv and magazine ads! Its f*cking sickening!

 

True, BUT, with everything today, overexposure tends to have a backlash effect. At some point people will say 'I've had enough of this 'surfing' crap. Show me something else'.

I also think that many of the older newbies get a serious dose of reality when they get into surfing cause it's not what you see on TV. At many spots, it's ultra competitive and aggressive. You see it on this board all the time from people who whine that surfing isn't this happy, sing-around-the campfire sport they thought it would be. Those people tend to sell their boards pretty quickly.

 

all those things contribute but the biggest impact is you have a lot of people too inexperienced (or too stupid) to figure out for themselves when the best times are to go and which are the best places for specific conditions - so when there's a storm or event with good waves predicted more than a couple days out, everyone goes at that timeframe and to the more well-known spots.

 

I think warm season crowding at several spots in Delaware / Maryland has leveled off in the past few years. The explosive growth happened around 5+ years ago and got so bad (multiple riders on waves accepted at certain spots under small conditions) many stopped going to the "obvious" spots. Winter crowding seems to be on the rise still.

 

It should be a happy sport, guys like you ruin if for everyone else with your crybaby selfishness. You're like a 2 year old....WAAAAH That's my wave! I hope you're mostly in the water dec/jan/feb wearing your 6mm diaper to save everyone else the agony of your unnecessarily aggressive presence.

 

I used to think surfer dude's were chill and laid back at one with nature hippy type of deal, until I started bodyboarding myself then I learned that a ton of them(not all) are total douche's.

 

hahaha. I think the hippy types are the douchebags.

 

You can find douche's and hippies everywhere. People are people. Some are cool, some are lame. Nothing about surfing makes that any different. Although, I think more surfer's will appear to be cool if you stay away from the best peaks, don't drop in, apologize in case you do, and show respect to everyone in the water, especially the people better than you (even if they don't necessarily give it back). Not saying that you personally don't do any of those things... it's just what's worked for me.

 

True dat, but you know people are seriously screwed when you have such a thing as "surf rage" with a bunch of grown men playing in the water in a nice day at the beach. I mean seriously....Isn't life stressful enough? Bunch of wack jobs

 

of course... wack jobs are everywhere. If you think surfer's are supposed to be hippies, you should go to a Phish concert and take note of the number of aggro-douchebags there. At least with surfing people can get seriously hurt if you don't follow proper etiquette.

 

yeah, tell me about it...I thought I was being a nice guy when I decided to help teach my friend how to surf...On Sunday, he dropped in on me (mind you, he wasn't even standing either) Here I am cruising down the face and his board nails my ****in' leg and put a nice gash in me...I really wasn't angered by it, but when I tried to explain to him what he did wrong, he gave me a whole bunch of **** like it was my fault that I was already riding the wave in front of him...some people just refuse to learn, they already think they know everything...it was definitely not my intention to help put another careless person out in the lineup...I keep telling him to read through the surf ethics, but he already knows it all...it's funny, if he actually looked at it, he would see what he did wrong...

 

haha thank god for heaving barrels, difficult paddle outs and winter!

 

I gotta say, during Earl...I didnt see anyone or personally myself experience any tension.....it was bizzare in a sense, everyone was out to have fun.......even if there was 3 or more getting on a wave. There were even a few bodysurfers out there (I got tangled up with one and he was quick to help me up above before the next wave broke).........Sure it might be a media thing brainwashing people, but we have the control out on the water when we spread the good vibe. Besides, people who are smart enough will learn on their own that you just cant get in, paddle out and be epic......its years of training, learning the swells, and breaks..........

I'm ecstatic that summer is over..........fall and winter barrels with 4 people out is more my style.........5/4/3 all the way!

 

aww that sucks alottt

 

I can't wait for next spring/summer. Screw winter and the cold, and the heavy barrels. I'm loving the BIG easy rollin' breaks! I'm a tropical guy. Love the young girls in the bikini's. Local colleges really deliver. Of course sept and oct should be awesome hopefully! I wish I lived in the tropics and didn't have to deal with winter sometimes. It's disgusting.

 

Interesting discussion on this thread.

I think that two factors that have not been mentioned that have contributed to surfing's popularity in the past decade are cheap air travel and the internet. Cheap air travel has allowed "learn-to-surf" camps to spring up all over Central America and brought in many new people to the sport. And the internet, with surf cams and easy access to sophisticated forecasting, has for the first time made it possible to be a frequent surfer without living close to the beach. Plenty of surfers now have an hour+ drive to surf but are able to plan their schedules for swells and make sure the conditions are good before hopping in the car, making for more surfers overall and especially when the swell is good.