Fist (HMB Jetty)

Shazam!

I couldn't imagine how good it would feel to ride a thigh-high wave until I stood up on one after 16 long days out of the water due to injury. The woo-hoo! and raised-arm claim were spontaneous.

My sprained right wrist is slowly getting better, but is far from capable of fulfilling its duties, especially the critical one of pushing me to my feet from lying prone on my surfboard. Jay suggested keeping my bad wrist locked with my hand in a fist, letting the good one carry most of the load. That method passed land trials, and I was frothing to surf this morning. Scott wrapped my wrist with KT Tape, making me feel like a superhero, and I headed to the sunny part of the coast on a warm summery day.

The worst part of resuming swimming has been prepping to swim - I tweaked my wrist yesterday tucking my hair under the swim cap - and the same was true for surfing. I would have preferred to bring my longboard for extra stability on those funky pop-ups, but the risk to my wrist would've been greater wrangling a big heavy board. While I managed to encase my 7'0" Emm in the boardbag without too much difficulty, pulling the board out at the beach was painfully hard, and I had to ask a woman in the parking lot for help. But wrist locked, I got my wetsuit on tweak free, and wrapped on a neoprene wrist strap for extra support.

I saw wet Tracey in the parking lot, and she reported, as George had earlier, that the break could use more water, which was on order with the rising tide. J-Bird, Jacob and Chris pulled in shortly after, but I didn't wait for them to get ready - with the waves in sight, I needed to get wet, now!

George on his longboard, and Jacob and J-Bird paddling away

Fortunately the surf was small and gentle, perfect for a convalescent. I caught a wave and tried to pop-up fisted, but crashed. On the next one, success! It was maybe thigh-high, but I was riding. Woot!

I rode several more waves, punching my board to get to my feet, a wide grin spreading across my face. The sunny day was bringing out the crowds, and I noticed a nearby empty left a bit father from the Jetty, so of course I paddled to it. After a nice little frontside ride, I was so excited to catch a slightly larger wave that I forgot to fist up - oww! At the first stab of wrist pain I pulled back and fell off to the side, the sweet left going past unridden. The cold water helped to tamp down the ouch.

The fisted pop-up was a bit unbalancing if I didn't compensate correctly, but I had a good number of successes among the failures, hauling myself back onboard with my elbow each time. After a few more rides, including a long stokeful right, my peak clotted up with shortboarders and I headed back toward the Jetty to J-Bird and Jacob, who were fighting the southward current to keep out of the drifting crowd. Jacob caught a nice right, crouching low and hooting as he zoomed past me. Soon after, I surprised myself by making a chest-high right, caught on the peak, for a fun drop and zoom of my own. Stokey-stoked!

Waves and wildflowers

Surfline: Clean, peaky surf on tap this morning with rising WNW (285-305) energy and some small S-SSW (180-195) swell running. Waist-chest-shoulder high waves show at decent breaks now, while top exposures see larger sets to head high and occasionally better. Light wind early builds out of the west through the afternoon. Buoy 46012: (Wave) SWELL: 5.6 ft at 10.8 s WNW 30 / WIND WAVE: 3.0 ft at 4.2 s NW / WVHT: 6.2 ft / APD: 6.4 s / MWD: 298° (Met) WSPD: 12 kn / GST: 16 kn / WVHT: 6.2 ft / DPD: 11.0 s / WDIR: 330° / ATMP: 50° F / WTMP: 53° F. Tide: 3' rising to 4'.