Not just that. Your body doesn’t work the same when its cold. Your muscles and joints aren’t as flexible. You have less wind. You are dragging along a 20# wetsuit. Your paddling strength is weakened by the wetsuit and on and on.
Definitely…
I’d like to weigh my wetsuit one day.
I think 20# is probably really close
Sold 4/3 wetsuits for 35 years.
Dry, about 6 lbs.
Wet and out of the water, about 10lbs.
Wet and in the water, totally flushed, maybe 13 lbs.
"best day"....
I've surfed most of the big days at OBSF, from '66 thru '84.
"best" day is subjective, and depends on WHO you polled and how well he felt or rode that day. Some "best" days might be unridden, but still the "best" in consistency, channels to get out, size, and frequency.
Nice the old timers like Bodkin, Robatham, are back on scene. Is SteveLowery and TomAllegre still charging the big ones?
Probably the best season in my experience at the beach. Best string of sessions was mid October 1997. Just happened to take a week off work and almost every day that week was 70+ degrees sunny and waves were DOH++. I had never had so much good surf in my life… Hardly anyone out… Life should be so good…
This is great. I just finished part 1
Best day at OB is very very complex.
It is not about any one thing but many. Especially these days with the maggot maggot maggot scene including the SUPpers, the no cord flintstone board bearded throwback cluless hipsters watching too many Thomas Campbell movies, and the fat 20 something neo-hippies with foamies. Thing is, they are even (trying) to go out on solid days - some of them even make it.
The best day at OB can be 4’ if it is surreal OB. Had one this year. Was out with the crew including the true locals who ride their bikes across town and the real bros who have been surfing here more than 50 years.
It was sunny and glassy. The tide was just so. The swell was clean and peaky, not crushing, not tiny. There were no maggots. It was that day you don’t forget, and it was only head high. That is BEST OB.
The beach is one of the worst spots these days with reagrd to the no responsibility, not earning your place, discourteous, entitled, shithead, hipster, maggot hell, that surfing (unfortunately) seems to be experienceing currently. Why is it extra bad in SF? Because with all the high paying tech jobs there is a huge influx of jokers who deperately need to ‘be someone’ - they never surfed before. They see some ASS in a magzine with a SUP (Laird probably), watch some movie about Joel Throwback, or follow the ASP and POOF - they have an idea about how to spend their tech money and ‘become someone’.
It’s called a prostetic lifestyle.
additionally: the beach is long - about 3 miles, muliply that by the number of surfing hours between dawn and sunset, and you get an UNENFORCABLE situation. There is no way locals can achieve critical mass to lay down the the law - its chaos.
I point this out because I would urge my brethren who have contained reef type areas to surf, to get it together, surf together, back each other up, lay down the law, and send those jokers packing, no matter what kind of jokers they are. We have cool SUPs here - most are not. We have tons of Al Maggot riding discourteous hipsters. Leashless longboard kooks - but we have a huge challenge in controlliing them. If you can surf with a friend or 2 at OB and actually stay with them for any length of tme, that is outstanding. We cannot sit in a pack on the edge of a reef with 10 guys we’ve known for 30 yeras – rips cleanup sets, a big playing field… If you live somewhere with an actual CHANNEL - A LINEUP, a break that makes some sense on a recurring basis, TAKE IT BACK.
BTW: I am all for leashless and cool SUP’s - its just that MOST SUP’s are not cool, not surfers, not safe, and not respectful, and most cordless surfers need to learn to stand up in 1 foot whitewater before thinking they are soulful as they lose their HEAVY DANGEROUS WEAPON in solid surf endangering others.
Back to the start of the thread, good to see Parsons back in the water, my son just sessioned with him at OB.
Had some sessions at OB in the late fall as I do each year since moving north in 07’, was fairly stunned by the crowds, seem to have doubled and tripled of late, resultant free for all sad to see - blatant drop ins now commonplace.
Besides sheer numbers, the other issue is the prevalance of west swells, which tend to set-up fewer really good sandbars.
During north swells years, a lot more quality sandbars pop up, spreading the crowd out.
Still, all in all, even with todays crowds, put your time in at OB, you will get the kind of waves only the best beachbreak in the world can produce…