THE ART OF THE COOL
LLongboard surfing is a more laidback approach to catching waves, where style, elegance and ‘trimming’ is valued over
manic shortboard manoeuvres, writes Jes Brodie
ongboard surfing teams nationwide congregated on the hallowed beaches of SA’s surfing mecca, Jeffreys Bay, last week for the annual South African Championship. The contest saw the country’s most talented longboard surfers compete for the chance to hold a national title. I followed the Buffalo City Longboarding team for the week with my sister Francis Brodie, a competitor in the open women’s division.
There was a wholesome scene unfolding on the beach when we arrived. A swirl of long-haired, sun-drenched surfers decorated the sand, with wetsuits clinging to the lower half of their bodies while their tanned torsos were bared to the sun as they hoicked cumbersome boards up and down the beach.
They are lithe and graceful, and there’s a profound lack of guile — people seem genuinely happy — flashing white teeth, sparkling eyes and frazzled sunbleached hair. Gentle upbeat surf tunes played, which were punctuated with tinkling laughter and greetings.
In contrast, the waves were huge and intimidating. As actress and surfer
Jolene Blalock says: “The concept of surfing is amazing. You’re taking on nature with a little plank and saying, ‘I’m gonna ride you!’ And a lot of times, nature says, ‘No you’re not!’ and crashes you to the bottom.”
It was incredible to watch these gentle people going out into that raging maw.
The competition was held adjacent to the infamous Supertubes, at Lower Point. This is a reeling, long-running seashore where the waves break along a rocky reef spanning the length of the beach. This consistently breaking wave gives surfers more time to manoeuvre the longboard along its face. The longer the ride, the more time to show what you can do and the higher the points a surfer is likely to score.
There are charming idiosyncrasies everywhere, including in the category names. Once you get beyond the standard Open Men and Women you get all kinds of fancy nomenclature, including the older men’s categories of Kahunas and Legends and the older women’s category called Divas.
The youngest competitors are under 14 and the oldest, Legends, is described as, “If you’re surfing in that category you’ll be leaving your Zimmer frame on the beach before you hit the water”.
There are families of surfers taking part, including father and daughter Nathan and Anna Gernetsky, who surf for Buffalo city; Nathan in the men’s masters and Anna in the under-18 women. These family units can be spotted up and down the beach, debating tactics, assessing the waves and carrying the longboards for their loved ones.
Longboarding has a gentle and dignified ethos. Longboarders eschew their shortboard counterparts for focusing on tricks and fancy manoeuvres. It’s a sport that levels the playing field between men and women — often women surpass men in style and elegance. Athletes are scored for their ability to complete a range of graceful moves, with the highest scores awarded for a hang five or a hang ten, which involves walking to the front of the board and curling your toes of one or both feet over the edge.
Cross-stepping involves traversing the board, stepping over each foot rather than shuffling your feet from side to side. Surfers are also scored on style, posture and grace. High scores are given for arching your back and trimming your fingers along the wave for as long as possible. There’s a lot of talk about artful hand positions. If you close your eyes and listen to them describing what’s going on it would be hard to tell if they were talking surfing or ballet, but the surfer drawl gives it away.
Beyond this, there’s a deep reverence for the heritage of the sport. Longboarding has a hierarchical puritanism, with the most pious surfing without a leash, which reflects when surfboards were invented. The leashes were added later. There’s also politics around fin configuration. One fin is traditional and authentic while the more modern three-fin set up will get you some raised eyebrows.
I asked Francis what the appeal was for her and her answer impressed me. “I used to have my own problems at the centre of my life. I was haunted by depression and disappointed with my life. Surfing put something nourishing in place of that. Slowly that expanded until there wasn’t space for anything but happiness.”
This inner joy emanates from everyone I saw. Usually at a sporting competition people try to save themselves for their big performance. You don’t see runners jogging for fun before a race. But here, in every spare moment, everyone piles into the sea to catch even a few waves, huge smiles
mixed with stern concentration.