Whitewater

depends how big the surf is, prob. alot in big stuff... but i think they are in such good shape it just doesn't phase them much.

 

In big surf... everyday... Even the pros. Don't let Jamie Obrien fool you, he can't duckdive 50 feet under a mavericks slab like he says he can. I am no big wave tour professional, but on a huge day, whitewater cuts deep... especially over reef, it has a cheese grating effect underwater. There is no way around that unless you are in a contest and guys are towing you back out.

 

depends how the wave is breaking too..... I find that once all that energy is exerted all at once (in one huge heaving barrel for instance), that the whitewater can actually be softer than if it sort-of spilled, rolled, and kept its energy for a longer period.

 

WHAAAAAAAAAAT the Fu$@ does that mean? was that supposed to be a physics explanation of whitewater?

 

Its to bad we don't see any footage of pros floundering around out there.

 

"remember when france was maxing and kelly and andy couldnt make it out" yea right.

 

Duck Diving

Better to read up on wave mechanics, and study the hydraulics at work at any particular break. The biggest waves are not typically beach breaks and world class surfers have intimate knowledge of local channels and rips, especially with reef or rock bottoms. Shifting sandbars, like much of the East Coast, are difficult to rely on at best, and absolutely punishing to anyone who tries to surf them, pro or amateur. Better to paddle around an impact zone than directly into harm's way. Knowledge will always keep you safer, even if only incrementally.

Wiley Bascom's Waves and Beaches comes HIGHLY recommended.
http://www.amazon.com/Waves-Beaches-Willard-Bascom/dp/0385148445

 

Its difficult to swim / paddle in whitwater casue of the high oxygen count in it which makes it less dence as the water around it and more difficult to manuver through. But that also depends on the amount of whitewater and the depth of water its in . Well at what I was told anyways .

 

you live on the east coast & surf a beach break...getting rocked on a big day is inevitable. you just need to prepare yourself for it. if you're physically fit, its not a big deal. hell, there were times that i came up laughing when i was really fit!

surfing a big beach break, esp. on a relatively short period swell such as we get here on the east coast a lot, is so incredibly different from surfing a longish period swell over say, a rock reef. the waves behave differently. the energy is more focused in one spot, over the reef, as someone said previously. you just don't take the same kind of beatings in that situation.
one of the best pioneering big wave surfers, fred van dyke, grew up bodysurfing ocean beach outside of san fransico, ca. google up some pics of huge ob...it'll make you want to crap yourself.
at a reef, as long as you don't end up at the point of impact, you avoid the majority of the wave's energy.

i remember the first time my father brought up the possibility of travel outside of the east coast, i was super nervous...all i knew, wave-wise, was nj & hatteras. the one thing that really stuck w/ me from the ensuing conversation, was my dad telling me that if i could handle DOH hurricane surf here, i'd be fine w/ just about anything the rest of the world could throw at me. since then (i was about 13 at the time), it has been my personal goal to make sure that i'm physically fit enough to laugh & giggle my through the impact zone during a major hurricane swell. it has served me well so far.

oh, & waves & beaches is a phenomenal read. i think every member of my immediate family owns a copy of that book.

 

I remember reading an article from mike stewart about duck diving monster waves...

"The Bounce Theroy"

You time it and position yourself 3-5 feet in from the lip when it hits the water. When it explodes, the water is up in the air and theres a split second where you can go under very easily. Then when the water comes down and rolls in as normal whitewater it becomes hard to ****dive again.

 

Thats the stuff i hate... Im not sure if were talking about the same things but like a couple beaches away from me, if u drift into this area i always get caught in this foamy wishy washing machine that u cant go forwards or backwards in. This is on like the cleanest of days too. is that cause of the sandbar at the spot or something... all i know is a hate getting caught in it

 

i just ordered this! also, read a bunch of great reviews and it seems like this is going to be a great book. looking forward to it! thanks!

 

Yeah, let me preface this: Look at the ASP world tour. There is no where they really go without a HUGE channel next to it. Every spot, regardless of how huge and gnarly it is, you can paddle out to it with dry hair. So the key for the pros is to take off on a gigantic set and not wipeout. Only if you wipe out at a good big wave spot are you screwed.

For instance... You guys all know Rizal Tanjung, they biggest pro surfer from Indo ever. I watched a video and all the pros were calling him out, saying he can't handle a lot of different waves, because he grew up paddling out to perfect reefs and points where you paddle over deep water and pull into a 14 foot wave with dry hair...

So yes, the conditions you guys surf in is MUCH harder than most anywhere else in the world. I mean, I surf everyday in SD, and when we get a larger, short period windswell in the fall like you guys get, i get sooo pissed off. Because most of our swell is long period groundswell, so we get used to timing sets and a pretty easy paddle most of the time... But then you hit your beach break and it takes you 20 mintues to get back out after you take a set... So, the bigger it gets, the worse it is....

And to the original post on here about the whitewater,... I broke two toes a few years ago in the middle of winter by whitewater... I was surfing Indicator that day, and the reports said it was 14-18 feet that day. HUGE basically. But it was a 75 degree day, long period groundswell, so you get really comfotable out there even though its huge... So anyway, after surfing for about an hour... there were lik 12 guys out... We were all talking and laughing... Then I heard an old guy say something like "The tide shifted an hour ago, and I can see all the water sweeping south... We are going to get cleaned up in a mintue because all the water is emptying off the reefs... About 4-5 minutes later, I saw a set from about a mile away... Biggest one of the day... Me and one other guy were in position and we took off paddling out to sea. At that point I would have paddled to Japan to avoid this set... So he and I made it all the way out under about a 20 footer and right before it broke, we both realized, Ohh sh**, we aren't going to make it. So, the Lip threw and landed about 50 feet in front of me, and the whitewater explosion look to be still 12-15 feet, just a rolling wall... I duck dove so deep... like 10 feet, and I braced for impact. I had both hands on my board and both feet on the pad pushing down... The impact from the whitewater ripped over me and the way my toes were positioned, they all just snapped back as the board slammed into me. Leash gone. Board gone. Toes... broken... Luckily, my board ended up like 100 yards away... But the other 8 people that were further behind me got it even worse. Me and the other guy were the only ones left... It look like an hour before anyone made it back out....

So long long story short.. Whitewater hurts... There is no way around it.... It will break you just like a lip will. sometmes worse.

 

Yeah this is the reason why you should always duck-dive a wave, unless it's a wall of whitewater 15 ft high.. There have been many times where a wave was breaking right in front of me and I'm thinking "crap, I'm gonna get worked", but instead I end up making one the easiest duckdives all day.

Also, if the lip is landing right on you, you can still duck dive it, I don't know if this works on really big waves, but the lip will like push you under and spit you out the back like an underwater jet stream.

White water is just so hard to duckdive because you need to go really deep, whereas a wave you can just dive through the face and not have to worry about getting deep.

 

lmao!!!! :d

 

But, this doesn't always happen and results in being sucked over the falls

Especially in shallow water.

About 3 weeks or so ago, I found myself directly in the path of a breaking lip on a 6ft day when the tide was low in about 4 ft of water. I was pushing to get back out after about 10 minutes of being smashed by whitewater and waves, pushed down about 5 blocks, and I thought I finally made it out past the breakers and rested for a moment. Then the biggest wave I saw that day started coming in and I couldn't do anything about it *BOOM* detonated right on top of me, pushing me to the bottom then right back up and through the washing machine. *BAM* right back down to the bottom slammed even harder on the sandbar. I was just pissed of then haha I came up like, goddammit! Seriously? Ahh, the joys of east coast surfing.

 

Anyone know if the pros are duck diving with these big guns they're using at Jaws or Mavs?I would think their turning turtle.

 

From pics I see at mavs, it looks like they just ditch their guns and try to get as deep as possible so that they don't get sucked over the falls. Turtle rolling wouldn't do too much in 25 foot "Hawaiian scale" surf! haha