We would like to welcome Beryl Besseau in the family today! He has been performing more than well in the contests in France, and Europe! From the Saint-Nazaire area, he is a “La Courrance” local, and surfs very well too!
Visit his profile here: http://ocean.victoriaskimboards.com/beryl-besseau/
Stay tuned for more action shots of him very soon!
The Victoria Team represented very well up in Santa Cruz, CA for the annual Skim Blast! We rented a house for the Team, right next to the contest site. Ams and Pros hang out together along with Lynn and Tex Haines, and everybody had a great time! Overcast, but decent waves the riders made the most out of the conditions once again!
Tim Fisken is the frontside turn master from the 80’s. We just called him Torg Torgsen, which was his pen name for the Skimboard Magazine series of stories on a wide ranging subjects back in the day when Victoria published a magazine.
-Tex Haines
Here is an email recently received from Torg Torgsen
This is a board Tex made for me 15 years ago. 3″ fins, deep conclaves, a really unique vehicle. It was a duplicate of a Frankenstein experimental I lost to Reno Abellira. Tex had given me a twin fin of his around 97′. I had been having a blast riding it but the fins kept popping out and the tail was getting trashed. I cut over a foot off the tail and re glassed the bottom a few times due to delamination problems. I set up small fins on the rail as a quad and the board went really good. Reno had been living in Ensenada and a friend if mine had been surfing San Miguel and Todos with him. After I had Tex make this duplicate for me I sent the original model down to San Miguel for Reno to ride. He tripped out on the board, riding it several times, making new eliptical fins and re laminating the bottom for the 3rd time. Unfortunately someone he owed something to stole it along with several of his other boards. It’s whereabouts now is unknown.
There is truly a nexus of connections that bring all this small fin/ no fin/ flat bottom engineering together. I credit Tex for a lot of inspiration and knowledge in this area that many of these shapers think they are just now discovering.
Great to see that Quam has maintained his love for alternative equipment.
That’s Tyler holding the X-15 as well as some recent yellow fin off of the Coronados.
Thank you for that thread Dirk, ….really good stuff.– Tim Frisken aka Torg Torgsen
Here is an example of articles that Torg Torgsen used to write in the Skimboard Magazine March/April 1988
Another big swell hit Southern California this weekend! We have been spoiled! The sand has been moving so much, the usual spots are a little bit messed up, so we decided to move the Saturday Session to the right of Aliso, Treasure Island! Big long slope and heavy shorebreak for Johnny and Mark Atoe, Sean Malek, Derek Ledesma, Matthieu Thibaud and Tex Haines. Joe Bailey captured some nice ones of Johnny and paid the price on a big set, that threw him to the sand and dragged him. Luckily he only had scratches on the elbow and a sore shoulder.
Very nice South Swell hit Southern California this weekend, giving us a great edition of Saturday Session. Ryan Ward, Jared Green, Kyle McClure, Matthieu Thibaud, Johnny Atoe, Jack Howie and many more gave a great show! More swell is on the way so stay tuned for more pictures soon!
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Summer is coming to an end and there’s only two stops left on the United Skim Tour. This past weekend was the final stop on the east coast, taking place in Vilano Beach, Florida. This was a huge stop for everyone focused on the tour because all the scores throughout the top ten are in reaching distance. Everyone is as hungry as can be and I believe the title is going to come down to the final stop on the tour once again. Similar to Delaware and North Carolina, were dealing with small wave conditions and multi trick combos. It was interesting to see how certain waves were judged higher and lower against each other because at the end of the day, no matter what your opinion is on a trick or wave, the overall decision is from the judges.
I feel a lot of the riders that dedicate themselves to being a part of the whole tour would agree that they would rather be on bigger sized waves, like Cabo and Brazil. However,
It’s more of a skate contest, where you make the best out of the conditions you’re given. And you see riders pulling off tricks you wouldn’t see on a regular basis.
Everyone on the team presented a great showing at this contest.
He was on his game throughout the whole event and brought out a large variety of different tricks. He had a very tough battle with the winner of the contest Sam Stinnet in his semi final. Even though he may not of made his heat against Sam, he put on a great show and made it one of the most memorable heats of the year. East coast rider Troy Rhoten ended up getting one of his better finishes of the year and his performance really showed. He has the east coast conditions on lock and completed a lot of crucial airs and shuvit combos. Teddy Vlasis made it through a couple of very tough heats and you could see that he really wanted to perform at his best in this event. He was pulling off very challenging 3 shuvs before he would hit the wave and tried to create the biggest score he could in the smaller wave conditions. This was probably one of my most difficult events of the year and I was really happy to make it through a couple of rounds. At the beginning of my heats I would get caught up thinking “there’s no way I have the tricks to beat the riders I was up against.”
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I had an especially great time outside of the event visiting the city of St. Augustine.
We had a couple days of downtime to explore and came across a lot of fun sites. For instance, Ponce De Leon’s “Fountain of Youth” and the Castillo de San Marcos, a National Monument of Florida. It was crazy to imagine all the history that happened throughout that town. It reminded me somewhat of a real life Pirates of the Caribbean. I really cherish moments like these on our trips, because it displays how unique all the different stops we attend are. Out of all the different things we did on the trip,
It reminded me why I skim and why I enjoy skimming. The groms were so stoked to see all of us dressed up and doing what we love, and I was glad I could be a part of that group. It reminded me of how fired up I would get when I used to watch old videos of guys like Paulo Prietto and James Lovett dressing up.
And I feel I did just that. The joy and happiness that came out of those groms made every moment worth it.
– Words by Johnny Salta – Pictures by Fabiana Badie & Johnny Salta
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Glorious Saturday Morning, perfect conditions, nice warm weather, and a solid swell. Everyone had a blast sharing waves, having fun together… Remember anyone is more than welcome to join the fun! Every Saturday Morning we all meet up for a fun session together, we bring you Hot Coffee and Donuts… We post where and when to meet on Friday on our Facebook page. We hope to see you there!
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“The Amateur World Championships of skimboarding took place this past weekend in Dewey Beach, DE. Skimmers from as far away as the Philippines traveled to compete in this all amateur event.
arriving a few days before the contest. We rented a car in Philly and drove down through the state of Deleware, stopping on the way to stretch our legs by running around in the corn fields. Arriving in Dewey Beach, you can almost blink and miss the small town. It has a very cool vibe, warming and inviting to the skimboard community. A few of the local skimboarders parents own the local convenience store, Joey Vavala’s family owns the souvenir shop across the street, and Alley Oop’s shop is located right in the middle of town, with a billboard outside “Welcoming all Skimboarders to the Zap AM Champs”.
The boys made the best of the conditions and learned real quickly that they had to tap into their box of tricks, as the swell was mostly non-existent. It was definitely going to be a competition of tricks and technical maneuvers. The first day of competition went well with all boys advancing through at least one or both of their divisions, Mens (18-21), and Semi-Pro.
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We also ran into our fellow teammate and super shredder, 10 year old Aidan Stevenson. His parents took us out to dinner on Saturday night, and during the entire trip, always made sure that we had everything we needed during our stay. Big thanks to Mike and Melissa Stevenson for the hospitality and love! During the second day of competition, the conditions did not get any better. Ankle high waves resulted in most riders doing tricks multiple tricks along the sand, as there were 1 or 2 rare wraps or lines that only came through every 15 minutes. Due to the flat conditions and the local talent who skimmed these waves day in and day out, the boys were unfortunately eliminated by the semi-finals round. We all had a great time, skimming, eating cheese steaks, hanging with all the international skimmers, and just being on skim vacation.
Leaving Dewey was bittersweet, but also nice to know we we’re coming back home. I asked Aidan, who finished 2nd in his division, his thoughts and how he felt about the weekend, and he summed it up quickly with “It was fun”. Thanks Victoria Skimboards for the support and opportunity to share the stoke on the East Coast at the Amateur World Championships of skimboarding.”
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It was another really fun summer session together. Slightly overcast, small SSW swell offered enough bumps for everybody to skim, and have fun as you can tell by the short instagram video and the pictures. Few siders came through, but also some secondaries and fun wraps. We met up at nine and skimmed until 12. Remember anybody is more than welcom to join us and share some fun! We post on our Facebook page wehere and when to meet up on Fridays.
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[dropcap]”[/dropcap]This has been my third year as a pro and I’m happy to say I think it’s been one of my best so far. I think the difference between this year over previous years, is I finally believe in myself and know that I truly want to present myself the best I can. I’ve been behind the game since I’ve been a pro and I still don’t think I’m close to the top. But that’s not stopping me from still trying to become the best rider I can.
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Of course it feels great to win but my main focus is being a part in helping this sport grow to what I truly believe it can. And this is exactly why I travel to places like North Carolina to compete. You’re traveling to a location where pretty much
That is exactly why you can never be too hard on yourself if you don’t make it out of a heat. Everyone deserves a chance to win and everyone deals with a loss, that’s what sport is.
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Before I left for North Carolina, I imagined long liners with multiple trick combos. And that idea made me pretty nervous because I knew that wasn’t my strongest type of skimming. However just like any break, you never know how the conditions are going to be. And unfortunately we were not given the greatest conditions for this years event in North Carolina. I was pretty bummed to not make it out of my first heat of this contest because I was starting to come closer to the top ten of the overall tour. Although, I feel this heat loss will only make me stronger just like any other loss. Every contest is run a little different and you can’t always skim the same at every event to make it through your heats. For instance, places like Brazil, Cabo, and Aliso you’re charging! Trying to get the most critical and big waves you can. However on the east coast, you may not get those heavy conditions, so
The top riders on the tour already have these tactics locked down and they don’t even have to think about it now. They’ve gotten to a point where it comes naturally. People always ask me “who do you fear skimming against the most?” And in a situation like North Carolina, I think my answer would be the locals. These guys are skimming these breaks on a regular basis no matter how good or bad it is. And that’s why I believe they may have a slight advantage. Of course there’s always going to be the list of names that I fear skimming against because there always at the top of their game, but it doesn’t mean I can’t be at the top of my game. Instead of getting too frustrated after a loss I’ve learned to accept the loss and focus on working towards the next event. And hopefully taking out my anger in the water and improving my results the next time around. Even with an early round loss I still made the best of the trip and I give it up to all my friends that I’m fortunate enough to travel with. I especially want to give a big shout out to the entire Pruitt family and friends for taking care of all of us throughout the weekend. We were lucky enough to experience their lifestyle and all the amazing things they have to do and I couldn’t be more grateful for that opportunity.
I’m looking forward to the rest of the season this year. As of now my goal for the rest of this year is improving on my flaws and locking down more tricks and maneuvers to stand out. Of course Id love to finish this season with a top ten finish overall on the tour. But for now my biggest thing is being a part of helping this sports growth.”
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