Surf Nation

Come surf with me

Who is the best surfer ever to have emerged from Watford? There are many who would say that there's no contest: it has to be Rodney Sumpter, born there on 27 May 1947, and, despite such an unprepossessing start (if surfing's your thing), a man who went on to be an Australian, United States, British and European surfing champion. There is more to this than meets the eye, for Sumpter did not hone his smooth and elegant style in the streets of Watford but on Avalon Beach, near Sydney. His parents emigrated to Australia just before Sumpter was five, but absence only made the heart grow fonder. Sumpter, a surfing prodigy down under, yearned to see his country of birth, and returned to the UK when he was 16. Almost at once he was blowing minds when he took to the water, and in 1965 he cemented his reputation as the UK's best surfer with a win at the first British championships in Jersey, in 1965. Then began a lifetime of surfing and travel, the early years of which are captured in Sumpter's beguiling film Come Surf With Me.

Carlos Burle - does he know the meaning of fear?

The miracles of technology should mean that this will appear in the midst of my trip to the Orkney and Shetland Islands. The latter might be relatively uncharted, in surfing terms, but I strongly doubt I'll be looking out at a reef break like this. You never know, but here's one man who would take it on, however big and however cold it gets - Brazilian ultra-charger Carlos Burle. Here he is charging at Teahupoo. As a rider with Finisterre Burle has also slotted deep inside some heavy pits on the west coast of Ireland - if we find anything comparable in the frozen far north of the UK, I'll give the crew at Finisterre a shout...

This is prairie surfing

The frozen north looms but before I go...

My mission to travel as far as is possible within the UK begins in about an hour. Given that I live near Land's End a trip to the Shetland Isles is definitely one of the more challenging I've ever undertaken. Here in the balmy far south-west we had a hint of cold this morning, but otherwise it's shorts and T-shirt weather (well, nearly). But tomorrow, having tonight got myself as far as Exmouth via meetings with the dudes of Surfers Against Sewage and Finisterre in St Agnes, I arrive in Newcastle. This is courtesy of www.flybe.com, who run a handy number of flights from Exeter airport, and once there, if Newcastle United football matches are anthing to go by, the locals don't bother with T-shirts even when, as is currently the case, there's heavy snow. Then I heard on up to the Orkney Islands, most likely with North-East charger Jesse Davies, where we'll meet Al Mackinnon and hopefully score some swell. Then it's a rail-to-tail Northlink ferries ride overnight to Lerwick on the Shetland Isles for more waves and a Viking Festival by the name of Up Helly A, which I had never heard of until a trip to the Hebrides last October, when Cheggs mentioned it to me. Trips by boat and plane involving Aberdeen will also happen. If all that sounds confusing, imagine trying to organise it. But before I go please check out Sam's posting on Surfcore - good waves in NZ are under threat. Post some comments on Surfcore and add your voice to Sam's. Meanwhile, here are a couple of shots of Up Helly A courtesy of a search on www.flickr.com.

Want a ticket to ride J-Bay and beyond?

Many surfers, not least those who have read Tom Anderson's excellent Riding the Magic Carpet, will have spent a lot of time dreaming about surfing Jeffrey's Bay. Its long, reeling, exquisite right-handers are a regular footer's vision of paradise. Anderson made it to J-Bay as the culmination of a lifetime's yearning, thanks an odyssey that took him to the colder waters of the Orkney Islands and the barrels of Mundaka, not to mention a number of other classic surf spots around the world. Anyone thinking of taking the strain out of planning a similar trip would do well to check out www.ttride.co.uk. Set up towards the end of last year, Ticket To Ride's remit entails taking people who are taking time out from their careers or studes surfing in South Africa. Their inaugural three-month trip along South Africa's stunning southern coastline has just left London. The organisers - all BSA-accredited surf instructors - take surfers of all levels on the three-month adventures, and are looking to expand soon to cover Sri Lanka and Mozambique. Looks like a mighty fine way to spend a few months, not least because every one who signs up agrees to spend some time working with children in African townships. They surf, but put something back into the community - which is how it should be.

See www.ttride.co.uk for more information and Monkey Trekker for more photos.

The demise of the MSC Napoli - good news for the wreckers, not so great for south coast surfers

Spare a thought for the south coast surfers of England. The stricken MSC Napoli might be good news for those in the south-west who keep the venerable tradition of wrecking alive and well (BMW motorbikes, barrels of wine, beauty products and foreign language bibles are among the pickings), but the 62,000-tonne vessel has already leaked a sheen of oil at least five miles long. Roger Sharp, the editor of Slide, has been in touch with some typically excellent shots of the carnage, which occurred in my old stamping ground of south-east Devon. Now I know, from bitter personal experience, that the breaks of Sidmouth, Exmouth and around are fickle (to put it mildly), but even a lousy wave is better than no wave at all. The area is also home to a vibrant windsurfing and kitesurfing community, and no one, on whatever kind of board, should have to surf in oil. Let's hope the damage to the environment is minimal. Check out Slide for more images - here are some to set the scene...

Sam Smart: the Sennen local who punches as hard as he surfs

Surfing or boxing - which would you choose? Sennen Cove's Sam Smart is one of the few people who might one day have to make this decision. The 26-year-old goofy-footer is not only a highly-regarded professional surfer, but also an amateur boxer whose growing mastery of the sweet science could soon yield an offer to turn pro. Smart's double-life as a boxer - he has won all nine of his bouts so far, seven by KO - is surely unparalleled in British surfing. While Jersey free surfer and big wave charger Ian Battrick is an amateur boxer - as was long-time Newquay standout Jamie Owen - there do not appear to be any other surfers who have demonstrated such ability at two ostensibly unrelated sports. Boxing and surfing, indeed, would not appear to be naturally compatible. The conventional image of surfing is of a free-spirited, hedonistic activity, one whose sole purpose is the enactment of the pleasure principle. Boxing, on the other hand, involves hours of training, immersion in a disciplined and hard world, and the prospect either of hurting someone else or taking a few shots yourself. How, then, does Smart combine the two at all, let alone to such a high level?

British success - yes, there's quite a bit of it about

The ISA World Masters Surfing Championships in Puerto Rico are now underway, with British hopes high thanks to a solid contingent including the likes of Jed Stone, Gary Rogers, Daz Wright and Roger Knight. A total of 12 countries have sent competitors to the event, which Richard Lucke, the President of the Surf Federation of Puerto Rico, declared to be "the most important in the world." That might be pushing it a little but should the British team do well their success will crown a fine series of recent British performances in the water. Just last week, at the 2007 Kneeboard World Championships in Santa Cruz, California, Jody Winter from Newquay took to the podium to claim the Ladies World Championship, while Polzeath's Richard Smith took the Pro Junior World title. In surfing, last year Reubyn Ash bagged the European Junior title and the British team brought home a silver medal thanks to Ben Skinner in the ISA World Surfing Games. Karen Walton, the National Director of the British Surfing Association, sums up the mood of optimism and good vibes in the contemporary British surfing scene: “We are so proud of what the team and each of the individuals have achieved in the Kneeboard World Championships. As a British surf team attending a World Championships event, they have set new standards and have gone from strength to strength. Put together with last year's perfomances,  no-one can deny that British surfing is making an extremely strong mark on the international scene."

How Mundaka and the Old Spice ad are connected (for me, at least)

I've just spent an hour or so trying to find the Old Spice ad from the Seventies - the one of the surfer emerging from an awesome barrel, set to Carl Orff's Carmina Burana. My memory is playing tricks and I can't remember if it's a right or a left, just that it was a great wave. It worked for me - I covered myself in Old Spice for years. But I can't find the footage, so instead I had another look at some of the highlights from last year's Billabong Pro in Mundaka. I was there for a couple of days - what a location. Typically the moment I arrived the sea went flat, and only improved after I'd gone, but this footage shows just why Mundaka's temporary disappearance (owing to dredging of the sandbars in the river to enable a newly built ship to reach the ocean) caused dismay among surfers everywhere. The wave is unquestionably one of the best lefts in the world, even if (I am sure) it has but the most tenuous connection to the Old Spice ad.

Who was the surfer in the Old Spice ad?

It wasn't this guy...