Screen shot 2014-06-16 at 5.38.33 PM

Dynamic. Look it up in the dictionary. Or Google it. Who uses the dictionary anymore, right? Same goes for night surfing events. Who does that, right? It’s a head scratcher, but one that brings about some intrigue (which can’t really be said for the dictionary anymore).

I first got word of a unique event via Instagram and Malibu team rider Johnny Stieg. He hit me up and asked if I’d be interested in coming to an event he and Chris Loomis from Malibu were organizing. When he gave me some of the details the word “dynamic” popped in my head. I mean, who puts on a contest along with wakeboarding nowadays? The event was the Spring Ride up in Nor-Cal, a longstanding double up contest that pro wakeboarders have been coming to for years. Malibu invited us from Alliance Wakesurf to join in on the action for their SurfGate Rave Wave event as part of Spring Ride.

In three days time as I was rushing around between making boards I was dropping loads of calls to some pro surfers to join me on a road trip up I-5 to Lathrop, just outside of Stockton. One ripper who answered with a quick yes was Josh Buran, a freak on a surfboard who has wakesurfed with me before, although that might have been almost a decade ago. Our only problem was that we didn’t hit the road from Oceanside until 2:30 AM Friday. According to MapQuest we were staring at a 6-hour-plus drive and the pin we dropped didn’t show any signs of water nearby, so we were a bit skeptical of the address we plugged in. After our all-night roadie and just as we were running out of gas and freaked out about missing the event, we saw some banners flapping in the breeze and realized we made it. Stoked! Nor-Cal INT organizer Chuck Payton greeted us and, knowing the long journey we’d just been on, pointed us in the direction of a Costco down the road so we could stock up on some much needed rations and a couple camping necessities. Who knew we’d get to score a Costco run and surf at night in the middle of the San Joaquin Valley?

It turns out Spring Ride was being held at an old quarry, which is why Josh and I didn’t see any water when we dropped our pin into MapQuest. The quarry sits right off I-5, but you would never know it existed driving by because there is a large berm protecting it and blocking the view. Stealth mode! Chuck told me that one day at one of the Nor-Cal INT events the owner of the quarry came up to him and said feel free to contact me for future events, I’ve got a spot. Now all the locals have one of the sickest spots I’ve ever seen to host events and do some awesome riding. The quarry has areas to camp, grass areas for vendors to setup booths, and fresh sand that was just trucked in along one side of the lake for spectators to hang out and have fun. I’ve been to so many events over the years and each spot never seems to be deep enough, so you never get a big wave – either that or the riding is too far away to keep the attention of the crowd. Not with this quarry though, it was perfect, and already had me scheming/hoping about future events.

For the Rave Wave event hosted by Malibu the invited wakesurfers were James Walker, Chris Wolter, Josh Buran, Sean Cummings, Mike Schwenne, myself, and a fella named Edrik. The www.chucktronics.com MXZ 24 – which is pimped out like nothing I’ve ever seen before – with SurfGate was on hand to pump out the waves. For judging they had local legend and all-around waterman Arun Frances and Zoltan Torkos. Zoltan is the first ever wakesurfer to land a kickflip. What’s funny is that Zoltan had no idea I’d be coming to this event, and I didn’t know he’d be a judge. He’d actually called me the night before to let me know and to try to convince me to come. As fate would have it I was already making the trek with Josh.

Before the event even kicked off Josh, Zoltan, Arun, and I were treated to a private session on the MXZ 24 to test it out with Chris Loomis of Malibu and Ryan of Chucktronics. It was awesome getting the opportunity to watch all those guys ride and see what the boat was capable of. Ryan blew our minds when he started changing the colors of the lights on the back of the boat, which meant each of us could surf our favorite color during the event at night! I happened to like fire red the best, Josh preferred ocean blue, and Zoltan went with forest green. Chris Loomis was a gracious host and we all felt he was really on point. He is truly interested in putting on the best events possible and in creating the best boats that make the best waves. After some great surfing and conversations, we knew we were set for the following night.

Saturday came quickly and I awoke to a beautiful sunrise. Everytime I go to a new spot I like to take a few minutes to soak it in. For being next to one of California’s busiest freeways, I couldn’t believe how isolated I felt. It might sound cheesy, but it was awesome. As with any event though, there can be a lot of downtime. Fortunately for us Mike Powell had a winch. Pretty soon that meant us wakesurfers were able to winch into the rollers being thrown by the boat for the wakeboarding double up contest. Awesome! The event organizers and riders were stoked too because it was something fun, totally organic, and it wasn’t disrupting the water or the wakeboarders at all. What was even cooler was it allowed us to interact with a lot of the wakeboarders when they weren’t out on the water. Winching the rollers was sort of like an ice breaker between wakeboarders and the wakesurfers that were there. I think they got to see that we weren’t a normal group – we were into everything going on – the wakeboarding, winching the rollers, wakesurfing, it was all rad! Hanging out with guys that I’ve watched and followed like JD Webb, Josh Twelker, Derek Cook, and a bunch of others was also really refreshing. A lot of us surfers had never seen a double up event like the one Spring Ride was throwing down and it was insane – total freestyle sickness! It just made our group live the boating vibe even more and got us that much more amped to put on a ride show during our night demo.

After the sun set – and with the DJ pumping some sick tunes – an awesome bonfire was lit and it was time to transition from Spring Ride into the SurfGate Rave Wave. The vibe was perfect and I knew right away that these two events were a match made in heaven. We were able to surf just ten feet off shore and all the wakeboarders, surfers, and fans were hooting, hollering and having an awesome time. Plus, the lighting setup from the boat on the waves was totally insane. All the surfers were super pumped up and stoked on the vibe of everything coming together – so needless to say the riding was through the roof. A little battle broke out between Chris Wolter and James Walker as to what tricks they were going to pull transferring over the spine with the SurfGate. In my eyes, on a competitive level this is what makes champions, and on a personal level is what makes me want to redesign some of my boards so I can try more of this kind of riding and keep up with these kids! In the end James Walker swept the Rave Wave event by taking Best Trick, Best Run, and Best Transfer. Nobody could argue with it either, he killed it. For a guy who’d never done a transfer behind a boat, James dropped jaws when he pulled a full frontside three air over the spine and followed it up by nearly landing a legit big spin. Insane!

In closing I’d like to answer a few questions:
1. Did everybody have a sick time? YES!
2. Did we participate in some adult beverage activity and winch boat rollers with succes? YES!
3. Was it a dynamic first event in wakesurfing history? YES!

All I can say is a big thank you to Malibu, Chucktronics, and Chuck Payton. I really look forward to coming back to the quarry – a place that isn’t on MapQuest’s map, but is most definitely wakesurfing’s newest hidden gem of a competition site.

Invalid Displayed Gallery

Invalid Displayed Gallery