Technically an Indian Summer occurs when a period of unseasonably warm weather occurs during autumn, after the first frost but before the first snow. Of course, we don’t have frost of snow in Hawaii (except on Mauna Kea), so we can’t have a real Indian Summer. But if there were ever a Hawaiian version, this year might be it. After having our first northwest swell of the season in mid-September—a solid eight-foot pulse that had the big wave crew pulling out there mini-guns and heading to Sunset Beach—the North Shore fell back asleep. Meanwhile, the South Shore has been pumping out late-season swells well into mid-October, including last week’s sizeable run of waves and this week’s smaller ground swell. Photo by: Kuhio Vellalos But if we have been in the midst of a Hawaiian Indian Summer, that’s about to change. The atmospheric conditions in the North Pacific are switching the second half of the month, and the pattern we are coming into is much more reflective of what we normally see in the early winter. A solid north/northwest swell fills in on Wednesday, with the North Shore moving into the six- to eight-foot range, and a second more north/northeasterly swell...

The longboard world tour ended with a bang this week at Malibu, one of the spiritual homes of traditional surfing. Blessed with a late-season southern hemisphere swell, First Point lit up with long, dreamy walls that were perfect for noseriding. When the dust settled, we crowned two world champions from opposite ends of the age spectrum—but the one thing they both had in common was world-class surfing. Photo of Joel by WSL / THOMAS LODIN At 45 years old, Joel Tudor had done it all. He’d won two longboard world championships, single-handedly brought traditional longboarding back to the mainstream, and started the Duct Tape Invitational tour, which is the most sought-after invitation-only event for young loggers. But a talent like Tudor is never satisfied, and after he won the first event of this strange, two-year COVID-19 season at Noosa back in 2020, there were whispers that he might try for his third title. Joel didn’t do well at the Surf Ranch last month, so he came into Malibu as an underdog, but after Eduardo Delpero fell out of the event early, the door was opened for a third world title. All Joel had to do was finish ahead of Harrison...

🎉Celebrated Fourth of July With a World Full of Swell🎉 As we celebrated Independence Day here in the US, the Southern Hemisphere celebrated with us, serving up pumping surf in numerous regions during the July 4 weekend. 📷 @keana.rivet Things got started in Tahiti late last week, when Teahupoo turned on in a big way with one of the most hyped swells of the season. This one was forecasted weeks ago, and according to sources on the ground it ended up delivering the size we’d been expecting—although video has yet to start trickling out. And Teahupoo isn’t done, as a second and potentially even bigger swell is stacking up for the middle of the month as well. Of course, whenever Teahupoo fires, Oahu gets swell a few days later, and that’s exactly what happened this holiday weekend. Long-period forerunners started filling in on the 4th, with the swell peaking on the 5th and still pumping on the 6th. This was the biggest south swell of the summer so far, with reports of 6-foot+ at swell magnets and Big Bowl turning on for a heavy crowd of Ala Moana regulars. We typically only get one or two swells this size each...

NEWSLETTER MARCH 2021   Cargo Slowed Due to COVID-19 at Los Angeles Port - Expect Shipping Delays As if COVID-19 hasn’t affected life enough already over the past year, the latest news out of Los Angeles is that there is a huge backlog of cargo ships stuck offshore. Nearly 700 stevedores are either sick or out of work due to COVID-19 infections and quarantines, so there simply aren’t enough people to process all of the cargo ships that come into the port. On top of that, everyone stuck at home during COVID-19 this year has been ordering things to help keep themselves occupied (including surfboards!), so more ships and more cargo are coming into the port than normal. The Los Angeles Port normally handles 10-20 ships per day, but lately they have been receiving upwards of 30! This influx of cargo and lack of employees to process it has created a huge maritime traffic jam and huge amounts of cargo that is not getting unloaded and shipped to retailers, with dozens of ships stuck off shore in line, waiting to come into the port and unload. In mid-February, there were ships that had been waiting over two weeks to get...

Hailing from San Diego, CA, Taylor grew up with a passion for riding any type of surf craft that he could get his hands on. At the age of 13, he fell in love with Longboarding and since then he has become one of the most successful and dominant competitive Longboarders in the World today. Over the course of his career, and with many more years to go, he has racked up 3 WSL World Longboard Titles, 6 North American National Titles, 3 Australasian National Titles and over 50 professional career victories along the way. When he’s not chasing swells and contests all over the globe, Taylor spends his downtime with his wife Nava and daughter Jagger, splitting their time between the beaches of San Diego, CA and the Far North Coast of NSW, Australia.     Taylor Jensen has won three longboard world championships, with back-to-back titles in 2011 and 2012, and a third in 2017. Throughout his career, he has competed on his signature model, the TJ Pro shaped by Dan Mann, which is available in Firewire Timbertek, and will be available in Thunderbolt Black (carbon fiber) and Red (Xeon fiberglass) starting in April. To get us hyped up for...

Foods that Give You Energy in the Day and Help You Sleep at Night Between work, family, and surfing, life can be exhausting sometimes. But responsibilities keep coming, and so do swells—so it's up to us to find the energy to keep up. Fortunately, there are a few things we can do to make sure our energy stores are topped off. For one, getting enough sleep each night is essential. But beyond that, we can also benefit our bodies by eating the right foods. Here are five foods that can help give us energy during the day—and a couple more that can help us unwind in the evening, when we are ready to rest. 1) Brown rice: Carbs are the popular topic of the day when it comes to healthy eating. Too many carbs end up getting converted into fat, but if you don’t have enough of them, you won’t have the energy needed to support physical activity. The trick is to eat the right amount and the right kind of carbs—namely, complex carbs. In Hawaii and Japan, rice is a major source of carbs for many of us—but we tend too eat too much of it, and the wrong kind....

NEWSLETTER JUNE 2020 The History and Science of Surf Reporting and Forecasting on Oahu All of those who surf and live in Hawaii have become accustomed to daily surf reports and forecasts, but many of us are unaware of the science and history that go into those reports. This information is not only interesting for us from a cultural perspective, but also useful in better understanding the ocean and swells, which in turn makes us better watermen and women. The original surf reports were anecdotal observations from surfers and other coastal people. In 1968, a man named Larry Goddard began keeping written records of observed waves heights on the north shore of Oahu, and four years later he added the south shore to his report as well. These observations were taken at standout spots that tend to receive the most size in the region, such as Sunset Beach and Ala Moana. They used the Hawaiian scale and logged what was called the H1/10, or the average 10 percent highest waves for the day. In 1987, Mr. Goddard moved away from Hawaii to the Mainland. But fortunately, that same year, Pat Caldwell began keeping his own written record of wave heights...

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