Loc: El
Porto: 42nd Street Tower
Crew: Khang
Time:
0730-0930
Conditions:
3-4 FT, offshore, cool, sunny, high tide, crowded
I haven’t surfed in four days because I had
landed on my heel hard when I last surfed Huntington, which caused a mild ankle
sprain, but I’m down for a surf session this morning.
The homie Khang comes out to meet me at
Porto. I barely see him since he’s been promoted to store manager at his surf
shop, so a session with him is rare.
Earlier this week the surf was walled, but
as the swell’s on its way out, the conditions have peaked up a bit and actually
produced some shape. The crowd is at about medium capacity with fat, long four
footers rolling through on the sets.
We paddle out in front of 42nd
and join the crowd. There are plenty of good waves to be had but there is a lot
of competition in the water. I have to back out of a lot of waves, but
eventually a left comes to me. I pop up, eyeing the section that I want to race
down, but a guy drops in on me. Not only is he dropping in, but this guy
decides not to go down the line and turn right into me. “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” I
yell, as I straighten out. Luckily he straigtens out too. We both get taken
down by the white wash, and when we resurface he avoids making eye contact with
me. Paddling back out to the lineup, I wonder if I was at fault. I swear the
wave was a left.
After backing out on more waves, another
left comes my way. Sure as shit, the same guy who had almost run into me does
the same fucking exact things again! What the fuck?
Once we resurface, I say, “You must really
like me.”
“Shit,” he says, “I went the wrong way
again.”
Now I could be a dick, and I’m entitled to
be one in this situation, but instead I just turn around, laugh it off, and go
back to the lineup. Afterall, this is Porto . . . there are surfers here who
rip, surfers without etiquette, and surfers who are beginners. It kind of comes
with the territory: at El Porto you have to be tolerant or else you’ll be frustrated
from being burned on so many waves, which is guaranteed to happen everytime you
paddle out here.
When I do finally get an unmolested left,
it’s a set wave, well worth the wait. The wave doesn’t go round, but it’s so
steep that I feel the momentum forcing my weight down on the board. I do a long
and drawn-out bottom turn, trying to get as much inside rail in the face to set
myself up for a good climb. My first turn isn’t too powerful. I get a little
hung up on the lip but still manage to reenter. With all the speed that I have,
it’s better to make sure that I don’t make a mistake and lose the wave.
Afterwards, I get a decent right, but it
doesn’t top the left.
Back on shore, Khang stops to talk to a
photographer who’s shooting from the shore. “Matt,” says Khang. “I want you to
meet Ruben.”
Ruben’s about my height, a little stocky,
wears a hat, and is using a big lense with his tripod-mounted camera. “I got
some pics of you guys,” says Ruben. He has Khang on a couple of his waves, and
then he shows me the left that I was on. My bottom turn is so deep that I’m
crouched low with my ass sticking out. It’s hard to see with the sun shining on
the camera’s LCD screen, but he also shows me my top turn. I can’t tell if it
looks good or not, but I’m stoked for my bottom turn.
Even though I had to back out of a lot of
waves today, and some guy almost ran into me twice, I still managed to get some
decent rides. Despite the crowd, it wasn’t a session where I get out of the
water feeling frustrated. Satisfied, I’m glad I started the day at Porto.
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