What surfers really want is pollution free seas, not pollution proof wetsuits
One of the ways you can tell you’re turning into an over-the-hill surfer is when you find yourself marvelling, on a fairly regular basis, at the technology available to the wave-riding youth of today. Having grown up shivering and chafed in wetsuits that were either baggy or leaky or uncomfortable or all three, I never cease to be amazed at the new, super-stretchy suits of now, which fit like a second skin and keep you toasty-warm right through the winter. Earlier this month, however, California-based wetsuit brand Vissla took things to a whole ’nother level with the launch of their incredible new creation, the Rising Seas wetsuit. Featuring a fully-sealed breathing mask and a so-called Biodefense System, the suit is designed to allow surfers to keep on keeping on even in water that’s so heavily polluted you could stand a spoon up in it.
According to the Vissla website, the outer shell of the Rising Seas suit is made from polyester threads woven with “nano particles of lead and anti-algal biologically derived substances” to protect the wearer from radiation and other pollutants. Thanks to a touch screen control panel on the sleeve of the suit and an LED display inside the mask, surfers will be kept informed about the presence of harmful bacteria, viruses, algae blooms and other nasties in the water, and as an extra precaution, the blurb also boasts of zinc oxide nanorods in the seams which light up when dangerous radiation levels are detected. The dystopian-butstill-stylish promotional video, meanwhile, shows a surfer walking along a smoggy, desolate pier with an all-black surfboard in one hand and his Rising Seas mask in the other, before paddling out to surf dark, sinister-looking waves. “Pollution, bacteria, acidification”... runs the tagline at the end of the film. “We’ll be ready. Will you?”
As you’ve probably guessed by now, the Rising Seas video is in fact a publicity stunt cooked up by Vissla and US environmental charity the Surfrider Foundation, in order to highlight the grim future facing our oceans – and, by extension, people who choose to spend much of their time playing around in them. The motif of the gas mask-wearing surfer has long been the logo of UK environmental campaign group Surfers Against Sewage, so it’s not hard to imagine that this might be where Vissla got the idea. However, the lengths they’ve gone to for their marketing ploy are still impressive. The section of the Vissla website dedicated to the Rising Seas suit is slick and convincingly done, and – as pointed out in a recent story in the New Zealand Herald – even though the suit isn’t real, the company still had to go through the steps of designing and making it, so hats off to them for committing to the concept. The point of the campaign, of course, is to emphasise the importance of taking steps to safeguard our seas now, before it’s too late, and not – as some commentators on social media have suggested – that surfing will continue even in the face of environmental catastrophe. (Although as long as it’s six foot and offshore somewhere, it probably will.)
In the still relatively unpolluted waters off Scotland’s coasts, meanwhile, it’s been an eventful month for competitive wave-riding. On Tiree, the finals of the Wave Classic windsurfing contest were held in thumping waves and howling winds at the Maze on 17 October – a day that came to be known as “Big Thursday.” Phil Horrocks won the men’s pro event while Liath Campbell won the ladies’ division.
A few days earlier, on the other side of the country and at the opposite end of the wave-size spectrum, the Lowland Surf Competition ran at Belhaven Bay near Dunbar in waves that were mostly knee-high, “occasionally bigger” according to the organisers. Local surfer Josh Christopherson fought off challengers from as far afield as Holland, Spain, the USA and even Fife to take the men’s title, with his niece Clover Christopherson winning a nail-bitingly close ladies’ final.
And in perhaps the most seismic news to hit the world of Scottish waveriding since Chris Noble became the first homegrown surfer to make it through the first round of a professional contest, 14-yearold Ben Larg from Tiree made a bit of history on 8 October when he rode a fearsome 30-foot wave at Mullaghmore in Ireland. His epic ride was caught on camera by Urbancroft films, who are making a featurelength documentary about Larg and his family, due for release next year. One to look out for. n
14-year-old Ben Larg from Tiree made history when he rode a 30-foot wave at Mullaghmore