MOONLIGHT SERENADE, SURF STYLE

By Richard Steadham

It was shaping up to be an awful Saturday, at least that's what the weather forecasters were predicting. They were saying we would probably receive the most rain in the oncoming storm since last May. Well, maybe in some parts of the county that's what happened, but at Moonlight State Beach in Encinitas, the weather was beautiful all day long with mostly sunny skies, scattered puffy white clouds and warm temperatures. Sunday was a different matter however, with a dismal cloud cover and cooler temperatures all day—the sun never making an appearance. The South swell on tap for the weekend provided better size and shape for Saturday's prelimiary heat's, while the advancing heats on Sunday saw a bit of a drop in size and wave quality from the previous day, matching the gloomier skies.

Surfing on the PB team on Saturday in the preliminary heats, but unable to advance to the elimination rounds on Sunday were: Michele Vincent, Young Women's 20-34 (longboard); Quintin Macklin, Mens' 20-29 (longboard); and Joe Drake, Sr. Mens' 30-39 (longboard). A big thanks to them for coming out and supporting the team!

The first heat of the day on Sunday was the Sr. Womens' Semi-Finals (longboard) which saw Kathy Austin and Celia Treamer battling not only the other competitors, but the sloppy shorebreak as well. At seven in the morning, the sets were mostly closing out, making it difficult to find a workable shoulder. In these conditions, Kathy just missed making the cut and advancing (placing fourth), while Celia survived, coming in third and a spot in the finals. Jane Mold surfing in the second heat of the same division found herself in second place and a slot in the finals as well.

In the Jr. Mens' Semi-Finals (longboard) Alex Greene saw the same lousy conditions as the Sr. Women and wound up in sixth place, mirroring his sixth place finish in the Shortboard Finals.

In the Grand Masters' Quarter Finals (longboard), Ron Greene surfed with power and finesse and finished this heat in first place. The following heat in the same division had Pablo Smith powering his way into second. He followed this with a fifth place finish in the Masters' Quarter Finals (longboard) while standing in for George Popovick who was a no-show for the weekend (a competitor can surf down in a younger division, as Pablo did here, but not vice versa).

In the Masters' Quarter Finals (longboard), Jeff Hackert managed a third place showing with some fine wave selection, but could have been second. A competitor from the Doheny club should have been disqualified on a nice right-hander that was obviously Jeff's, but wasn't called as such by the judges. Ironically, this outcome came back to haunt Jeff in the Masters' Semi-Finals as the roles were reversed with the same surfer (who by all rights shouldn't even had advanced): Jeff took off on a wave that appeared to be the Doheny club's surfer and was called for interferece and disqualified. When team captain Travis Long spoke with Jeff after the heat however, he learned that the other surfer had bamboozled him by calling out as the wave was coming that he was going to go left, prompting Jeff to take off and go right. The other surfer immediately went right when he stood up though, causing in the eyes of the judges and interference call on Jeff, landing him in last place. When Travis heard this, he confronted the surfer from Doheny about the "bush-league tactics" he had employed, but could only manage a feeble apology in return.

In the Senior Mens' Semi-Finals (longboard) a few heats later, Travis Long narrowly missed advancing by coming in fourth. One wonders if the earlier distraction affected his performance. He mentioned to Jeff later that the DQ call he had been forced to take continued to bother him. Also competing in this division was Dave Washkowiak, equaling Travis' mark of fourth place in an earlier heat. The day was over for Dave, but Travis could still look forward to the Tandem event with Halley.

The Grand Masters' Reprecharge (longboard) saw Ron Greene and Pablo Smith advancing to the finals with a second and third place showing, respectively. These two guys continuallly surf so well for the club that we can almost always count on at least one of them making it to the finals and pushing up the club's total points. This time, both of the made it. Talk about being consistent!

Each Coalition contest matches the presidents of various clubs in a heat all their own. This meant that Kathy Austin would surf her third heat of the morning in short order (Sr. Womens' Longboard, Womens' Shortboard and Presidents Heat). She surfed the heat well and took fourth place in a very competitive category, being bested by the presidents of the Swami's (1st), Doheny (2nd) and Oceanside (3rd) clubs. Kathy is another consistent point-getter for the club and fun to watch, no matter what heat she's competing in.

In the paddle relay race for this contest our team consisted of: Josh Hall (lead leg and pacesetter), Nick D'Rov (second leg), Michele Vincent (third leg), Jeff Hackert (fourth leg), Rich Walwood (fifth leg), and Alex Greene (final leg and gap-closer). Josh got us off to a great start, and by the time he had paddled out around the bouy and back to hand off to Nick, we were in first place. Nick and Michele kept us close in their legs, but Jeff ran into a little trouble as he paddled out, when he was pounded by a set wave and lost the board momentarily. Recovering quickly, he regained the momentum we had built up to that point. By the time he had gotten back and handed off to Rich, we were in about sixth place. Rich made a valiant effort to close the gap, but disaster struck when he was paddling back in as a huge set wave caught him off guard and he was up-ended—he going one way, the board following the frothing foam the other way toward shore. Seeing our hopes in the paddle race dashed yet again, quick thinking Kathy yelled at Alex, our last leg paddler, to get out there and grab the board and continue the race. Alex being one who respects his elders immediately did what he was told. He ran down the sand and splashed out into the surf retreiving the loose board, turned it around and paddled out around the bouy and back as if a great white shark were nipping at his heels the whole way. He paddled so fast, we came in third place, erasing the deficit the recent calamity had wrought!

Not so fast. Other clubs with their own visions of glory had just witnessed the same thing we had just seen and were quick to point out to the judges that we hadn't performed a proper hand-off between Rich and Alex. Foiled again! Well, it was still exillerating to watch our team and cheer them on, no matter the final outcome. And though team points are involved, that's what the race is all about anyway, having fun.

KARAOKE FOR POINTS   After a full day of heats on Saturday, the Swami's club put on a party at the local Elk's Lodge we won't soon forget. Karaoke was the order of the evening and each club scored valuable points towards their total by fielding two singers (and I use the term "singer" lightly). Putting all inhabitions aside, Travis Long and Pablo Smith stepped up to the mike for the PB Surf Club. Travis worked the audience over with the tune, "Zip Gun Bop" by a band called the Royal Crown Review, at one point even pulling a pair of womens' panties out of his shirt pocket and wiping his brow. At that moment, a true showman was born. A bit later, Pablo crooned away on the Drifter's hit, "Under the Boardwalk." You have to admit, when it comes to putting the needs of the club first, it seems there's nothing this duo won't do. They know how to bring it when it counts, at least in collecting points.

In the Tandem event, Travis Long and Halley Burd managed third place. Winning the heat was Brian and Illa of Windansea. Placing second was Wendy and Caleb of Huntington Beach. Speaking afterwords, Travis said he felt the judges scoring was fair and that he and Halley's effort this time seemed like a third place showing compared to the others.

Nick D'Rov surfing in the Menehune Boys' 14 and Under Finals put together some fine wave riding in his heat, but wasn't able to make it into the top three, finishing a disappointing fifth place.

In the Womens' Shortboard Final, Kathy Austin could only muster a sixth place in a division that spanned the entire age range. Thinking about it in those terms however shows what an accomplished surfer she really is.

The Sr. Womens' Final had two PB women surfing: Jane Mold, who took fifth place in the final talley and Celia Treamer, who followed in sixth. A big thanks to each of these women, as this was the first time either had competed for us in a Coalition event. Hopefully we'll continue to see them surfing for us in upcoming contests.

Near the end of the competition on Sunday, the Grand Masters' 50-59 group paddled out and surfed their best in the worsening conditions. As the gray afternoon had progressed, the wind had increased and the surf had gotten extremely sloppy. In this mess Pablo Smith made it look easy as he went to the nose on wave after wave in the heat. His efforts were rewarded in due order as he earned first place in a division crowded with experienced watermen. And speaking of experienced watermen, Ron Greene took home the fourth place trophy in this category.

At the end of the day after all the individual trophies had been distributed, it was time to learn the overall team placement in the contest. In all, 14 Coalition clubs had competed, and as their names' were read starting from the bottom, they eventually got to sixth place and announced, "Pacific Beach Surf Club." Once again, the little club that could—did. No, we didn't take top honors, but we finished ahead of eight other clubs, and that in itself is worth celebrating.

In closing, the following series of photos were taken by Tom English of the Swami's club. Enjoy.

PHOTO SERIES BY TOM ENGLISH

New Logo Contest: In the last issue we announced a contest for redesigning the club's logo. One month later we haven't even received one, nada! Wud up? I know, you're all busy polishing up your designs and just haven't finished them yet, right? No worries, there's still plenty of time of course, the deadline being December 31st of this year. Don't wait too long though, we're anxious to see what your creative little minds can conjure up. If you missed what this is all about in the last issue, click here for more information. Now get cracking!

Survey Says: Also in the last issue I asked you, "how's it looking?" I wanted to hear from you whether you were receiving this newsletter the way I had designed it, or all messed up visually—technically speaking. Confused yet? Click here for a better explanation. Anyway, I'm happy to report that seven readers took the time to respond. Six of them said the newsletter looks great (or fine, or used some other positive remark; two even said it rocked!). That's what I was hoping to hear. However, one reader responded that it looked great, but one area of text did run off the right side of the page. That's what I feared, some of you getting the newsletter with quirky things happening in certain areas. It sounds like most of you are receiving it the way I designed it though and so for now, we'll leave things the way they are. I'm always ready to hear more about this, good news or bad. Click here for that.

Letters to the Editor: It's been a drought recently as far as anyone sending in a letter (email message actually) expressing their views on any surfing related topic. Have something on your mind? Tell it to the world, or at least the crew reading this publication. Put on your thinking caps, think of a subject, then tap it into your email message program and hit "send." I'll get the message and publish it here.

OTHER UPCOMING EVENTS

Want to announce future surfing related events in this section? Contact the editor.