Click the link and watch the video.
http://www.wdio.com/article/stories/S2453028.shtml?cat=10349
I have surfed in colder conditions. Air temp around 10, water temp right around 28. Of course, once it gets below 20, it doesn’t feel much different.
The other thing is that waves like that are about as good as it ever gets on the lakes. I wouldn’t freeze my butt for waves like that. I was surprised to see how well one of those guys surfed. He must be the guy from Fla they mentioned.
I lived in Michigan for four years, and made a few trips out to some of the lakes’ beaches. Nothing there I ever thought was “good.” Even compared to New Jersey… Pretty gutless. Something about the density of the water I guess…
It’s not about the cold. As somebody already said… cold is cold. At some point it really doesn’t matter anymore.
Still… just goes to show you how powerful the surfing bug can get.
Coldest for me was 18* air with 36* water with 20" of snow on the beach.
Water density has nothing to do with it. The period rarely gets above ten seconds. Period is a direct reflection of the energy a swell contains. The higher the period, the more “punch”, all else being equal. Period and height are dependent on three factors…velocity, fetch, and duration of the wind. Lakes don’t allow for much fetch or duration.
MAKO224:
I am not hard core at all!
Cold water is not for me.
Just got back from Tahiti 200 mile northwest of the capitol.
Good place to go with the family for Christmas and New years.
79 degree water with 83 degree air temp.
Glassy conditions with 5 waves per set.
You can have the cold.
I don’t care I’m a fair weather waterman.
The last cold water for me was in CHILE back in 1994.
47 degree water with 75 degree air with a 4 mil wetsuit and booties.
The energy was all time with 10 foot swells so you did not notice the cold.
If I live in the great lakes and was a surfer I would move to some place warm.
I guess you would call me soft core.
I don’t think I’m hard core at all and either are people who surf cold conditions.
They just lack imagination to travel to some place warm.
Kind regards and stay warm!
surfding
Last winter the hardest time was -5°F air and water 35°F. Everything except the moving water was frozen in our river, even a layer of ice was on the ground.
You have to be carefull after surfing cause your board will freeze to the ground in a few seconds if you lay it on the street…
SammyA doesn’t even salty water freeze at around 28°F?
6/5mm wetsuit and 7mm gloves and 7mm boots will do it. But you feel like a knight with an armor… Definitely prefer my summer trips
Yes. Ocean water freezes at 28. I’ve been out when there was slush in the shorebreak and chunks of ice floating in the lineup.
If you want to talk about “hard core” guys in cold conditions, I’d say the boys who surf Northern Maine are far hardier than lake surfers. Imagine similar air and water temps and 2xOH waves. Not uncommon in Maine and also Nova Scotia during Winter.
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Ya, I think I am pretty hard core. I moved to MN about 5 years back and have been a lake surfer since. I was out with the guys in that video, but left befor the news came by. Earlier that morning was amazing, 8-10 ft and no wind and only 10 heads. I found swaylocks and started building my own boards when I realized the difficulties of shipping boards into the midwest.
My son surfed Bar Harbor on Saturday, air 24, water still not as cold as some years, rode Hull, Mass late 60’s, whole ocean was a slurpee, water was too thick to ride, waves looked sooooooooo good from shore, but the white water would back off and re-form into a swell again, wasn’t worth the getting into all the rubber we wore back then. 2 pair boots, long john, hood, shorty and sleeves
OK, two pair of boots? That is too cold for me.
…why, it’s so cold where I come from, the people have to live in other places…
All the spots I surfed were cobble bottoms, with water in the upper 20’s, a hole in your boot, even pin hole sized, will freeze you out within 2 minutes. I took an old jacket and made wetsuit socks out of it and wore those inside of hard soled boots.
The hoods back then sucked too, they barely tucked inside of the jacket neck, first wipeout and there was no way getting it back in with gloves on, I took the upper portion of the cannibalized jacket and glued it to my hood, there was noway it was pulling out.
There is a video that Bill Connor shot over a stretch of years in RI, one particular segment at Monahan’s Dock has myself, Mike Risser, Tom Hogan, Ed Logee and a host of others with our modified wetsuits, Bear ears, Unicorn horns, etc., very early 70’s, lots of swells during that time frame, good times
Last Friday, when that video was shot Dawn Patrol 1 degree F.
I once had the entire crotch seam in my suit fail at The Dock in mid February. Glad that spot is a short paddle in!!!
My Winter suit at that time was an 1/8th inch long john with an 1/8th inch beaver tail jacket over it. Before those came along, we were stuck with dive suits that consisted of pants a and jacket in 1/4 inch variety. They were stiff, bulky, and gave you a rash that was brutal. Not meant for paddling comfort, for sure.
The husband of one of my classmates in Hawaii owned the Surfboards Hawaii shop in Gansett, he gave me a White Stag 2 piece wet suit.
While surfing Nasty Narry one icy morning, my morning coffee needed releasing, as I let the bladder go, nothing happened, the beaver tail was pinching the flow, it started to burn then hurt like hell, I was frantically grabbing at the crotch of the suit trying to undo the botleneck, I finally succeeded.
The next morning my first leak of the day was a congealed blood gummy worm, I had blown a gasket. My Matuse suit is like slipping into a rubber t-shirt, not those bondage suits of yore
Hey mikeb - Why did you move there? I’ve been, my dad was from that area, seems if one loves surfing… Granted, me and many of my surf buddies are from this part of the Oregon coast, and some ask, a similar question, “If you love surfing, and do not love cold, fickle conditions, why not move???” Family, friends, familiarity… Ah life…
HEY JIM AND SAMMYA Are you two located in the northeast? Just curious because I surf the gansett area you speak of often?
My days in New England are only to visit my sister and family, the 5 years I lived in Gansett were on Newton Ave., my drunken, coniving father-inlaw found a socialite that was confined to Johnson Hospital, started visiting her and asked her to marry him. So when I married his daughter, we moved to the gardeners cottage on the estate, ocean view, only a mile and a half from Point Judith.
The light house was seldom ridden at that time, pre leash, so only the very best surfers dared to ride it, the “pier” was reserved for the “Rack Rusters”, those that spent the summer with a surfboard atop the car and the Guido’s.
This was before “Urban Re-developement”, old Gansett, Liberty Inn, after the installation of the cracker box apartments behind the pier, it was over, Asswipes from New Yawk started coming up in droves, the leash happened, Monahan’s was no longer a death sentence, the Lighthouse didn’t get it’s quota of board to eat, it was Yuppie Town, you couldn’t find a parking spot, Matunuck was off limits to surfer parking, it was Fisherman’s park only.
F THAT, I left
Hey JIM Yah, its really bad now with the NJ/NY guys coming out of wood work. The development has also exploded and it is no longer a backwater area like it was in really old days. Still fun to surf some of those spots when we actually do get swell.