Category: Victoria Skimboards

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Sean Mcclenahan rides mythic Jaws on his Skimboard

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It was a cool, breezy Maui morning last Friday as Bill “Beaker”Bryan and I awoke to the call that it was officially on. After years of planning and talking about surfing Jaws on a skimboard, we could feel history was about to be made. With veteran jaws surfer and expert ski driver Jason Blue behind the wheel we loaded up the trucks with the boards, float vests, and equipment.

The buoys were reading 12-15 foot long period NNW swell with 15-17 second intervals and calling for north winds, which aren’t the most ideal conditions for surfing out there. As we passed Hookipa we could see the outer reefs were bombing and the anticipation and rattling of nerves began to sink in. Jason and Bill pulled into Maliko Gulch which is a few bays down from Jaws and safest place to launch the jetski.

I drove my truck up to the cliffs to meet up with Jason Harris, owner of “Jerome Baker Designs”, who had helped organize the event and lined up a videographer to film the action! As I got to the top of the cliffs overlooking Jaws I saw Bill Bryan catch a monster left and ride it all the way across the reef. I’ve watched Jaws break only a handful of times and knew this was our day to shine. With the sketchy conditions and north wind there was no one else towing or paddling even though it was bombing.

After throwing on my wetsuit and strapping on my “Quatic” safety vest I began to make my way down the goat trail to get down by the beach. As I got down to the beach with help from a Haiku local named Sean I scouted out the best place to jump in and paddle out.

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With the six foot plus shorebreak exploding on dry boulders and the river rushing with huge logs floating in the water I tried to time it and jumped in. As I began to paddle out, the water sucked dry and I began bottoming out hitting the rocks, taking two waves on the head which ended with cut knuckles on my right hand. After making it through the treacherous shorebreak I felt a little relief as I began to paddle out to the peak, which is about a half a mile out whilst bleeding from my right hand. As I got to the peak I saw Bill catch another left all the way inside then lose his board in the rocks. At this point I began to get scared as I’d already been paddling for about 40 minutes drifting near the peak, and Bill and Jason still didn’t know that I was in the water.

Finally after waiving my board around and yelling, they finally found me floating amongst the mountains of water. Jason told me to wait there and he’d be right back after he drove Bill inside to look for his board on the rocks. As the ski drove away I told them I’d be fine, a giant west bowl came sneaking in and I was caught in the impact zone. I dipped the first one barely as the second wave broke right on my head, rag dolling me and holding me down for about 20 seconds. Right as I surfaced there was a third wave right on top of me which pounded me again. Just as I started to get worried, Jason came flying up on the ski and I climbed on the life sled just in time before getting nailed by the fourth wave. After that proper pounding I knew it was time to catch a bomb myself. My first wave was one of my biggest waves of the session. I held on to the tow rope as Jason drove over the first wave and began throttling for the second wave as it began to jack up on the reef.

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As I let go of the rope the wave began to grow and I momentarily felt like a was snowboarding down a black diamond slope whilst trying to navigate through the bumps and chop. As I got to the bottom of the wave to set my rail I almost slid out, but was able to yank on my outside rail and managed to hold my bottom turn. I made it all the way to the inside while Jason came flying up on the ski screaming with excitement and I began to scream too after catching the biggest wave of my life. Funny it happened to be finless and on a skimboard. We towed into a few more bombs then the wind started to get nasty and more choppy.

After successfully towing into about 6 waves we decided to quit while we were ahead and call it a day. I was so grateful to catch a ride back to Maliko on the ski and not have to go in through the shorebreak and boulders again. On the ski ride back I was floating on endorphins and adrenaline also frothing at the accomplishment of being the fist person along with Bill Bryan to surf Jaws on a skimboard, making history in the world of surfing and skimboarding! Can’t wait to do it again!

Big thanks to sponsors for making dreams come true! Victoria Skimboards, Maui Jim Sunglasses, CMV clothing, Dakine, XS Energy, Beaker Boards, Grape Skimboards, Astrodeck, Jerome Baker Designs and Kine Ocean Design for capturing the video and frame grab!

 

ALoha

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Sean-Victoria

 

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Oak Street Saturday Session

Skimboarding is all about getting together and share waves and good laughs. It was the case during this weekly Saturday Session at Oak Street, Downtown Laguna Beach this last weekend. The forecast was not promising at all, but as sometimes it is not as good as expected, it also happens that conditions are actually a lot better too. High tide, slight onshore winds but a lot of people showed up from top Professional Johnny Salta, to first timers and everybody had a blast, as you can tell by the pictures.

A little overcast, I was in a Black and White mood when editing the pictures. If you stop by Laguna Beach, make sure to join the fun during one of this Saturday Session!

 

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Mainland Mexico Part 2: The Mission

Rise and shine to another beautiful day in paradise. Today we woke up to fresh fruit smoothies and an unbelievable breakfast at “Rosita’s” a well-known little breakfast spot here in Melaque. Rosita runs her business in a small little shack. If you’re not used to the setting of authentic Mexico, imagine a restaurant environment as someone’s kitchen in a way. They would have tables and their own menus but your basically eating out of someone’s’ house. There has yet to be a bad meal on the trip. Who would have thought you would have endless amounts of the best Mexican food down in Mexico?

It seems like there are endless amounts of spots throughout Melaque, and just twenty minutes down the road are more endless spots in Manzanillo. Todays adventure consisted of making way to a new town where Diego and Jorge Barba’s X3M Shop is located. They pretty much supply the town with every surf and clothing necessity you need to be ready to shred at any time.. Their X3M shop is a great hangout spot for the younger crowd and a great representation for the sport of skimboarding. After a visit to their shop, it was time to hit the water at “Secrets” a fairly newer found spot minutes away from their place. At first your mindset of a secret spot is a wave that not many people have ridden and endless amounts of fun. However, I think the secret to the spot is if you haven’t gone, you’re in for an awakening of a lifetime once you arrive at the location.

The trip to the secret spot started off by crossing paths with a large snake in the middle of the road into the beach.

Jack Howie went straight into grom mode, yelling and jumping out of the back of the truck, grabbing the snake by the tail. We all jumped out of the cab and as we turned to see what was going on, the snake slithered out of jacks grip and disappeared into the bushes. As we calmed down from the snake wrangling and re focus our attention to finding skim, Jorge and Diego point at the cliff and say, “ That’s the mountain we have to climb over and the break we are going to is just on the otherside…” So the team grabs their gear and starts the treacherous trek up scorpion/snake infested terrain. It was like walking up the face of a steep jungle where any moment something could go seriously wrong. And if something were to go seriously wrong it was either life threatening or your throwing your buddy over your shoulder and hoping for a miracle to someway and somehow return back to safety. At least every rider and team member had some kind of shocker or beating. If you’re afraid of heights or have a big fear for any of the poisonous animals above, this is not the place for you. After the twenty-minute journey through the life-threatening hike to “Secrets” we found a new unique wave with a sider in both directions. The team along with a few other local riders scored some of the best waves we have gotten on the trip so far. The boys were frothing so hard that we didn’t start the 20 minute trek back until the sun was setting. This put us scaling the mountain side and tip toeing along cliff drop offs with nothing but the light of our phones guiding us. Jack sliced his toe open on a rock, Johnny and his board almost fell off the mountain and on the final decent, Johnny accidentally sent two grape fruit sized boulders straight down the mountain with one barely missing Jack and the other connecting with his calf. Luckily all riders are in fairly good condition and able to continue the adventures. And hey what’s an adventure without a couple mishaps.

– Words by Johnny Salta / pictures by Diego Barba

 

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Johnny Salta – Going into the 2015 season

Two thousand and fourteen has come to an end, and I find myself looking back at what could quite possibly be one of the most amazing years of my life. This is all thanks to the sport of Skimboarding. I decided to dedicate myself to the season, as I was finishing up my two thousand and fourteen spring semester at school. I knew I had only missed one stop and could commit myself to the rest of the tour (knowing that there are two dropped scores at the end of the season). Over the past couple years I have learned a lot about becoming a professional rider and it definitely isn’t just an entry fee to make it. In 2013, I finished dead last in every event I entered whether it was Skimming, Surfing, whatever. As that year came to an end I couldn’t have been more bummed on myself and wanted to give up on the whole competing thing. But if there’s one thing anyone in the sport of skimming knows, is were all one big family. Everyone I was connected with reminded me to stick with it and keep in the water. So the journey began…
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My first stop (2nd stop on the UST) was Cabo. Throughout all my time spent in the water skimming, my 2014 trip to Cabo was the best wave conditions I have ever experienced. I like to look at Cabo as the “pipeline of skimboarding”. Super heavy shore break and probably the best wrappable barrels that have been found. The contest had an amazing start, but I think there were a good handful of riders and well-known names that could say the event ran into some issues midway through. This issue came up at multiple events and I would agree both sides of the issue had good reasoning. However, when it comes to a time of making a decision of whether or not to run the event in questionable conditions, I really think the riders should have majority vote on whether or not the contest should go on. A lot of big names were taken out in early rounds that could have potentially be ran the next day in better conditions. Decisions like this can change results such as the United Skim Tour Champion at the end of the year, even though it may not seem like it at the time. (Before I go on, please note that I am not saying the 2014 Champ did not deserve his crown, because I truly think he worked the hardest I’ve ever seen him skim this past year.)
Another major issue that I think the majority of riders, staff, and even fans can all agree on is judging. Anyone that has any experience with judging can say that it takes a lot of time, patience, and awareness to score riders as precise and correct as possible. We are limited a certain amount of time and the waves coming in that time period are very limited. Riders that have been competing for a while, know that it is recommended to not go for the same waves. Although, when conditions are not at their best and there’s three to four riders in your heat you’re all fighting for the best waves. It would be nice if we had the technology, similar to the ASP where we could replay rides, but obviously were not on that level. One thing that stood out to me on the East Coast was calling out rides during heats. That way if there were two riders running in opposite directions, you had someone informing you to keep aware of both directions so you could use better judgment. It would be great to see the same names judging throughout the entire season; names that are knowledgeable, unbiased, and dedicated to the sport of skimming. There were a lot of very close calls this past year, that once again could have changed the overall end of the year results for several riders.
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Room for Change?

I think there’s always room for change and improvement. I think there’s a huge handful of big names from all over the world that have not been able to be a part of the entire tour for whatever reason. And I think adding in all these names to the Title battle would change the overall ending results significantly. There’s a lot of talent and passion in the world that has pushing this sport forward. I believe time will play its part and bigger sponsors will start to recognize how unique and special this sport really is. I don’t think competing is the most important factor to get our sport known. Spread the stoke to the groms, work on media, and inform people that don’t know what the sport skimboarding is. We’re a family, not against eachother, trying to show the world what we are most passionate about.
As much as there may have been some negatives on the tour, I find the positives will always takeover the negatives. My heart and passion will continue to work as hard as I can to help this sport progress. I believe this sport is still at a very early age and the level of riding is progressing drastically each year. As of right now you definitely recognize the solid Top 8 names on the tour, but everyone behind that list of names is really hungry. And they are all pushing themselves as hard as they can to work their way to the top.

 

– Johnny Salta

 

 

Photo credits

Fabiana Badie

Tex Haines

Mary Hurlbut (front page slide)

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Max Bourne’s retrospective on 2014

Max Bourne just stopped by the shop after scoring a solid Team Session at Seal Beach earlier this morning. We were all watching footage of the morning and thought it was a perfect time to sit down and talk to him about his successful year, that ended with Max’s debut into the Professional Division… Here is the discussion we just had with Max.

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VS: Every year seems to have delivered more for you, but 2014 has been an especially incredible year. Skim trips, contests, Skim Camps, and Saturday Sessions kept you pretty busy on top of school, and delivered a ton of quality Media that everybody saw in Magazines, on this website, or on the social Media… But let’s start from the beginning, you started off the year as an Amateur with the Green Eggs and Am Contest, tell us a little bit more about this first 3-stage contest of the year.

MB: The Green Eggs and Am was a great success. I placed 3rd in the first contest at A Street in Newport and…

I placed 1st in the second contest at Aliso Beach in Laguna.

I had the opportunity to take a skurfing trip to Mexico during the third contest, and I could not pass up the incredible offer. I decided to skip the last contest giving up my 1st place spot for the Triple Crown. But it turned out great, I got some crazy Mex slaps on my skim, and my good buddy Jared Green took the win at the third contest at West st.

VS: After the GEAA you went on a trip to Cabo San Lucas for the Cabo Classico and you won the Amateur division! How was the trip, the contest, the conditions, the lifestyle?

MB: O my goodness. Cabo is the cream of the crop. It definitely was my favorite trip of the year. Best waves, people, and partying I got to experience in a while. The trip was awesome, the conditions were perfect, and the lifestyle in Cabo is something I miss a lot.

Taking 1st place in Cabo was just awesome.

I will definitely be there next year.

VS: Up next you roll into the 38th Annual Victoria World Championships coming off a win. Tell us about the contest and why it is a special contest for riders in general and for you.

MB: The Victoria Skimboards Contest is the most premier contest of the whole UST tour. Everyone agrees it is a competition we all look forward to. I made it to the finals and took 2nd place.

I was happy to watch my good buddy and fellow Vic rider, Jack Howie, take 1st place.

VS: You also were involved in the Victoria Skim Camps this summer, teaching skimboarding to the younger generation. How did you learn to skim? Who did you look up to?

MB: I learned to skim from my buddy’s in Laguna when I started at the middle school here. My main inspiration was from one of my best friends, Jared Green. He inspired me and made me appreciate the beauty of the sport. Without him by my side, skimming as groms, I would not be where I am today with my skimming career. Teaching the kids at skim camps the same way I learned is really a gift in itself. It makes me so happy to see these kids fall in love with the sport just like I did 7 years ago.

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VS: Then you were invited to go to the Amateur World Championships, VIP treatment… Tell us more about that

MB: The Dewey Beach, Delaware Amateur Championships was a blast. I was flown out by the man who made the contest happen, Jason Wilson at Alley Oop, and I was so grateful for everything he did. The locals and the support from Jason really made the trip. I got knocked out of the contest, but I was stoked.

VS: You have been to Santa Cruz multiple times, but this year was officially your last contest as an amateur.

MB: Santa Cruz is also one of my favorite contests, and I was so stoked to take another win in the amateur division. Santa Cruz is really chill 😉

VS: Here comes the last contest of the season, and you decide to enter in the Professional division…

MB: I turned Pro at Oktoberfest this year because I knew the conditions were setting up to be something spectacular.

I made it 4 rounds and I was stoked to take 11th place in my first Pro contest. It was a huge success and really felt great to make it that far. I am so ready for this upcoming year of contest. In the meantime I will be skimming in Laguna.

Shoutout to my Sponsors: Victoria Skimboards, Let’s Party Traction and Tortuava.

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