Winter Surfing 2009

To be honest, I did not think I could survive surfing in the winter in California. I am an Asian and we skinny butt people usually bundle up in the winter, not jumping into the icy cold water. In the winter the water is too cold, the waves are bigger, blah blah... But you know what, I did it. I surfed the whole winter of 2008. I did not stop surfing when November came. I surfed on Thanksgiving afternoon, right after a rain storm stopped. There were only a few people went surfing on that day. I remembered saying Happy Turkey Day to some of them. I went on in December, even on Christmas Eve. Did I surf on New Year Day? I think I did, can't remember. I surfed throughout January, February. I surfed on flat days, sitting and waiting for a small tiny little bumps in the water. I got bad wipe-outs, pinned down under overhead sets in Huntington Beach where the waves were so walled up, so strong that one big one pinned me down and pushed me in. So fast, all the way onto the beach, sand all over my wetsuit. It was nearly impossible to go back out. There was a teenager boy on a fish board, was trying in to get out at the same time with me. I guessed he got pinned down so bad that after he came back in, he just lied flat on the beach for a long, long time. In this winter, I fell off my board a lot. One time when I fell, my board fell on top of me. Its fin cut me right across my nose. Blood-dripping down of my face but I was still surfing. So bad.

But I also caught some of the best waves I ever caught in this winter, down in San Onofre. I learned how to make turns, do cut back, hang five, close to hang ten but not yet, float on the top of some waves. Now I can do some moves so I am having a lot more fun. I rode some big sets that way over my head. I remembered one day right after a storm, I hit the beach. The whole San Onofre beach and there were only 3 people, me, Doug and another guy. Waves were breaking overhead, so fast and strong that I took me a good 15 minutes just to get out to the line up. And the first wave came at me was huge, like a tall building, at least 10 foot tall. I had no where else to go but to go down with it. I was really expecting a bad wipe out. I remembered the wave picked me up. Somehow I managed to stand up on my board, stared down its nose. My board was pointing down so steep, like 60 degree down. I was so high up on the crest of the wave that it was like looking down from someone's second floor's balcony. I managed to shift my weight, tilt the board to the right so it ran 45 degree to the wave's face, avoid a bad wipe-out. And then I rode the wave, ride it for a long time, started from the Point and ended up at Old Mans. My legs were burning from stood up for a long time. That was scary and fun at the same time. After catching that wave, I paddled back out with my heart pounding, my body shaking. The freaking scary wave, the adrenalin rush of catching it, all mixed up together that it took me a while to calm down. After that I caught one wave after another, had lot of fun until I could not paddle anymore. That was definitely a define moment of my surfing this winter. I just love it.