Found an informative piece discussing, recognizing and reflecting on how The Hurricane Riders (THR) helped shift rough water paddling pursuit with longboats and the design of longboats itself (with Reg Lake at Sterling Kayaks) for such. I started off as a seakayaker (25 plus years ago) but lost interest after several years. After experiencing surf kayaking, waveskiing and white water kayaking, for next 15 years or so, my primary interest was to develop rough water paddling skills with the shorter, surf specific crafts and whitewater boats. What brought me back into rough water paddling with longboats was in fact coming across The Hurricane Rider videos about 4 or 5 years ago. Of course, this led me back to rough water play with the newer and more surf specific longboat designs, e.g. a Delphin 150, a Dagger Stratos 14.5 and the Sterling Progression. Soon, Iâll add on a surfski for downwind paddling. But, my appreciation for rough water paddling with a longboat has largely been inspired by what the THR group was doing and demonstrating with their sea kayaks. Apparently, I am one of many other longboaters so inspired by THR.
I suspect there are maybe three or four regular posters who are into extreme seakayaking. I was lucky to be able to take lessons and go on trips to Baja with Jenn Kleck and Jeff Laxier and learn a bit, but longboat surfing isnât really my thing. For me once I started waveskiing I found what I like best. Not able to do that now, so I mostly SUP paddle when the water is liquid - probably April this year.
For being a freewheeling fun loving group the THR bios come off as taking themselves too seriously. Lots of groups that have gotten together through the 26 years I have been ocean paddlingâŚTsunami Rangers, Class V Surf Dogs, and looser groups of kayakers on the west coast who get together at Santa Cruz and Ventura contests, as well as very loose groups that are basically email lists. "Hey itâs going to be huge tomorow, any body want to meet at xxx? The videos are cool though.
Iâm not a âsurferâ (but do find it fun), learned the surf out of necessity.
32 years ago I decided to paddle the east coast of Australia (having no ocean experience).
I had a good âLake Superiorâ roll, but no experience with currents, tides, or SURF.
I learned pretty quickly (you know, do or die).
After the trip, I relocated to Kirkland WA and spent many (,many) weekends at the coast, learning âthe surfâ (not necessarily âhow to surfâ).
I was out there about 12 years and never went up to Skookumchuck - regretting now, though, had many sessions at the (much closer) Deception Pass.
Started paddling the Sterling kayaks in 2012 because of design/weight. Typically, donât get the waves here (Jax, FL) as did out west, but still fun.
Hope you enjoy the surfski, it will definitely be another âdimensionâ of the sport for you.
I started off as beginner with sea paddlers group. I took two club sponsored surf classes, as an intro to learning surf zone dynamics and rough water skills. Loved these and tried to get other club members to get out and practice/enjoy with me when surf was up. Turned out that most others were not bitten by the surf bug as I was. There were some âseniorâ clubs members who had reputations as skilled rough water paddlers and provided trip reports of such. But, it was a bit of an âin groupâ. I never paddled with them nor they with me. After participating in my Rhode Island Surf Kayakers (RISK) winter gathering/event, I became more enthralled with these more âadrenaline orientedâ group of dedicated surf and whitewater paddlers and drifted away from the seakayaking group.
I really didnât see or interacted consistently with any highly skilled rough water longboaters. Without any role models, I turned more to the highly skilled surf and white water kayakers that I met through RISK sessions and white water paddling with the NH-AMC white water group. My âorientationâ as a âsea kayakerâ (in a longboat) phased out after that.
Yeah, so I was aware of the Tsunami Rangers and how the group was pushing boundaries of rough water play in the ocean. While I found influence from John Lull, specifically from his book, Sea Kayaking: Safety & Rescue, in how to approach rough water training with a long boat, the available videos of the Tsunami Rangers didnât provide in my opinion much in the way of skilled, athletic and aesthetically pleasing wave riding with a longboat. Actually, some of the action looked pretty âkamikazeâ to me.
Contrast that to the surf kayak footage by Vincent Shay in âThe Searchâ, or Xaver Walserâs Subgraviti videos of world class waveskier, what a difference in visual examples of exponents of skills, althleticsm and aesthetics in riding on beautiful waves and venues from across the oceans. Like you, I became way more interested in short surf specific crafts and wave riding.
So, I didnât become (re)interested in longboating until I saw the THR in their videos as well as that of the Hoebuck Hoedown comp. With these, I saw some longboat riding skills that I feel inspired to try and develop.
I obviously have been bitten by the surfing bug. But, I started off like you â wanting to learn these skills to be able to paddle more safely in sea conditions.
Thatâs the beauty of playing in the surf zone. You can practice and assess your capabilities before being in a âdo or dieâ situation, like being off the âeast coat of Australia.â LOL!
Ditto concerning the Tsunami Rangers Kamakazi antics. There is a group of paddlers from close to the Bay Area who are much more into controlled long boat surfing and rock gardens. I think Peter is a member.
Glad to hear you think Neptunes Rangers are more controlled (though not always), but I would posit that Tsunami Rangers were not that out of control. They had the art of finding areas that looked dangerous, but really werenât. They find things like a slap wall where the water splashes all over the place, yet they could be in deep water right next to it. Those that followed learned from that.
But they also realized there was some risk, so they designed those sit on tops for easy remounts.
Of course they were early adapoters, and there are things we do now that they didnât know then. We learned from their mistakes and improved on it.
Side note:
Neptunes Rangers has kind of died off as the paddlers moved on to other aspects of our lives. About half of the members donât even live in the area any more, many of those who moved arenât even close to the ocean. But the NR videos are still there and can be seen at https://youtube.com/@neptunesrangers?si=Pc6gtdRSNmhv4fQw
I was doing a search on Santa Cruz Surf Festival and came across this feisty gem of a discussion from 20 years ago. Was a fun time on this and other then-existing forums/message boards.
So, to be clear, the kamikaze comment is in reference to wave surfing with the longboat. I didnât see any great intentional directional control with the longboat, not even with the (shorter) Tsunami X15 SOT. By this I mean I didnât see any really aesthetically pleasing (for me) action that begins to approximate the atheleticism and âexpressionismâ, like surf kayakers and waveskiers to the surf board riders.
For sure, the Tsunami Rangers were the âearly adoptersâ of shorter boats, particularly older white water (slalom) boats, for ocean play in waves and rockgardens. And, they probably initiated the rethinking of longboat designs for those ocean play venues with the introduction of their Tsunami X15. By time we get to the subsequent Neptune Rangers and their videos, we are seeing more modern whitewater creek boats being used as well as the newer, shorter âlongboatsâ like the PH Delphins, Hammer and Dagger Alchemy and Stratos (now Scorpios, Virgos, etc).
We began to see more directional control on the waves with these shorter and more surf specific longboats. But, again, for me, my interest in longboat surfing (and in the possibility for more âexpressionâ) didnât pique until I saw THR folks in their Sterlings and, almost to a similar degree, the TopTurn Kayaking crew in their (Danish design) CD Karlas and Sisus. For me, surfing a longboat straight down a wave face and towards shore is âeasyâ. Being able to do diagonals and long cutbacks with a longboat is more challenging and, thus, more interesting. As Kate Hives said in one of the THR video, I want to be able surf the Sterling (or any other longboat) like a surfer on a longboard. Actually, that ability (though still in process of further development) for directional control on a wave face has gotten some notice and acknowledgement by some of the boardies at my local break. I find it interesting, challenging and engaging to attempt with the longboat what I was trying to do as a surf kayaker and then a waveskier 20 plus years ago.
Wasnât taking any offense at calling them Kamikaze. More defending the look of kamikaze as a goal of their videos, while not actually being as unsafe as an untrained eye would think they are.
And to put it out there. Neptunes Rangers didnât focus on surfing like THR. More rock play. So a different category than what this thread is about.
Loved the Out the Gate on a big day video you posted. Starting about 4:30 made me smile. On strong ebb days, you need to stay along the wall and surf up to âattainâ upstream. But there is a shelf that sticks out which the guy in orange/red alchemy (Mark Berger, I think) got caught on. Iâve been caught in that many times.
That seems the case for both âRangersâ groups. Certainly, really helped push the notion of crossover kayak designs from the whitewater world. The venues seemed focus on what look very much like class III/IV drops and features (without the sustained rapids before and after)
Likewise love that area. TsunamiChuck took me out from Sausalito through the Gate. We didnât play in the rocks but paddled among very long period swells I guess in the 6â-8â range, along the Marin headlands. It is still one of the more memorable paddles in my seakayaking journey. Beautiful and majestic area.
I generally donât enjoy surfing standing waves, but a good wave feature does offer the opportunity to push/learn your edging and carving on a âpredictableâ canvas. Moving wave changes more, depending on the size of the swell, tide phase, wind direction, shifting bottom contours, etc.
