Finale

A day which began in the Autumnal chill of a dawn morning blossomed into a beautiful Porthmeor Saturday afternoon beach day to crown our season with a final session of tripping little waves by Mans Head for our juniors and some challenging surf by The Island for our Seniors competition. That early check-in for the comp and a ten o’clock start for the Nemos, Dorys and Swordfish brought us all to a climactic conclusion with a gathering by the surf school for the end of season celebration and awards followed by a sausage sizzle on the beach to cap a fine club day.

Super grom session below:

The competition attracted a healthy number of surfers including some plucky youngsters who fancied a chance to challenge the older cadets. It produced some memorable heats and a keenly contested final graced with the best rides of the day including a trophy winning ten point ride by our eventual champion.

And so to the summation of the summer’s efforts. We gathered our groups in turn for a photo and a commemorative medal before the coaches were given the unenviable task of choosing a surfer from their group in each of these categories: Most Improved, Most Committed and Surfer of the Summer.

If you hadn’t guessed, our banner picture today shows Bobby with Head Judge Jonny celebrating the ten point score which contributed to his championship-winning 18 point total in the final. It was a ride that deserved to belong in a final! Elyse was our Girls Champion and also ran a close second to Bobby in the final with a couple of scores that might well have won on another day.

It was fitting after such a celebratory awards session that the weather invited us to stay and enjoy our BBQ Sausage Sizzle on the beach picnic fashion and build those surf club memories to carry us through to next summer!

It only remains for me to thank our generous benefactors for another season of support of our young surfers. Principal among them is St. Ives Surf School and our magnificent coaches. Your enthusiasm fires those youngsters to meet challenges head-on and thrive in the water. Our many Saturday helpers, both in the water and around the check-in and administration are a boon, and we are always indebted to Porthmeor lifeguards and the management of Porthmeor Beach for their support. And finally, ‘Thank You’ to all our parents for your contribution and engagement with the Saturday morning surf club. See you all in 2025 to go again!

A Similar Story

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

Our previous session was ideal for our Nemos and Dorys, and they lucked-in again this week with another morning of perfect little runners to score some ace waves. There were a few green ones further out for the more intrepid surfers as well as those gentle inside waves that we are becoming accustomed to catching. As before, this presented fewer challenges for our senior groms at 10 o’clock, but there was a measure of blithe spirit and an end-of-term playfulness that translated into those goofy headstands, buddhas, reverse take-offs, nose-riding and other oddities to compensate for the lack of thrills that chest-high waves might have offered. So, once again ‘Satisfactory all round!’ September 24th will wrap up another season with our usual finale of a comp for the advanced surfers and a session plus group awards and BBQ conclusion. See you there!

Sweet Session

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

There was plenty to like about this week’s surf session. Porthmeor served up some sweet waves – little runners on the inside while the outside held challenging green waves that were hard to read and broke quickly. There were plenty of waves for our young surfers and lots of enthusiasm on show. As we pass the mid-season mark it is great to see the confidence with which the advanced groups are tackling their tasks. At the same time the nippers and their parents on the inside are developing teamwork skills that launch the children onto the best waves and give them a chance to demonstrate their new-found abilities. The next session on 17th August can’t come soon enough!

Surf and Rain

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

Our damp summer continued this weekend with a rain-sodden surf session for our junior surfers last Saturday morning. The waves, at least, were plentiful and encouraged some good surfing from the participants, but the rain defeated my camera long before the end of the second session so there were few opportunities to capture pictures of the Dolphins and Sharks in action. Here are some action shots I did manage, and we might hope for dryer conditions for our next outing on 3rd August!

Still Waiting

by Nog General Club News Groms St. Ives Surf School events Surf Club Events

Well, we are still waiting for summer to commence this year, and we issued an advisory prior to Saturday’s surf club that conditions were forecast to be quite lumpy with an onshore wind. Maybe a little off-putting for a novice surfer or a weak swimmer. However, our turnout was a healthy number of juniors keen to test themselves and we had fun challenging the short windblown waves and the washy conditions on the inside. Outback, our advanced surfers had problems to solve to find rippable waves and also to get out again to the green waves through the succession of broken waves faced from the inside. All-in-all it was a valuable morning coming to terms with conditions that were less than ideal, conditions that surfers often face when finding time to get in for a couple of hours! Here are some pictures of the session, and a list of forthcoming dates below .

July 20th

August 3rd

August 17th

August 31st

Sept. 14th

Sept. 28th

Take It As You Find It

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

Our second outing of the new season was served some very indifferent waves at Porthmeor on Saturday but found these young chargers determined to make the best of the conditions on offer. Scratching in to ‘so so’ surf is a necessary skill if one is to enjoy the sport whenever time allows, and there seems to have been plenty to entertain our participants here! The numbers in attendance suggest we are in for a bumper season and those who came new to the club quickly got into the groove. It was a very encouraging morning and the pictures below catch a few of our surfers in action.

Summer Sign-Off

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A Sunday afternoon surf is one of life’s enduring pleasures and our young chargers had the chance to experience it for themselves at our final Kids Club session of the 2023 season. The weather was kind and the waves were friendly – the water as warm as we are likely to find at Porthmeor. Our banner picture shows most of those who came to make this a fitting send-off and was taken as a prelude to the afternoon activities. Our youngest crew had a session with their coaches while the Sharks and Dolphins held a competition further down the beach.

Those coloured rash vests certainly brought out the competitive element in our advanced surfers. We witnessed a couple of interference calls which scotched hopes of winning a heat and the judges followed the full rules protocol to guarantee fairness and to educated these newbies in the game.

And then it was back under the awning for the distribution of prizes and compliments to our high achievers. There were commemorative medals for all participants in Kids Club 2023, and then came the group awards in three categories: Most improved surfer, Most committed surfer and Surfer of the summer. Our coaches found these selections as difficult as always, all youngsters showing distinct improvement over the course of the summer. We then came to the results of the main competition and the time-honoured tease of announcing the result in reverse order. Bobby Smith triumphed in the boys event, while in the girls section Leila retained the crown she won last year. Congratulation to both of them, and to all our competitors for their participation.

The conclusion of the awards was the signal for the committee members to demonstrate their skills at twizzling, balancing and splashing the sauce as we fired up the barbie to share a Sunday Sausage Sizzle among family and friends to toast another fine season of surfing for Saints Boardriders Kids Club ( Super sibilant sentence structure seen there! ). We acknowledge the great support of Tregenna Castle in providing both the food and the beer, while also thanking Porthmeor Beach for chips and hot drinks for all the kids. We feel a depth of love and gratitude to Harris and the surf instructors for their unstinting support, to the check-in crew and administration for another summer of supervision, and Porthmeor lifeguards for another safe season. Our judges this afternoon were Tassie Swallow, Jayce Robinson and Josh Martindale, with Johnny Fryer co-ordinating. Thanks to you all, and to our parents and helpers who made our Saturday mornings tick like clockwork despite the usual car park congestion. We finish with a picture of Jack in a pinny. We haven’t seen enough of him this summer but the day will shortly come when his girls will want to join surf club! NB: Ben on quality control – We never let our standards slip!

The Porthmeor Cup

by Nog Competition news General Club News St. Ives Surf School events Surf Club Events

It has been five years since we enjoyed the St. Ives Cup, an Autumn handicap competition between local surfers that was so well-received by the community. Towards the end of last week Harris looked at the surf chart, checked that the tides were favourable and put out the call ” Who fancies it?” On Friday afternoon it was called ‘On’ for 8.30 Saturday morning and around forty competitors checked in for “The Porthmeor Cup”, a new incarnation of that fabled beast. There was a generous support of families and friends on a warm late-September day as the battle began in challenging chest-high surf that tested even the highly ranked chargers and created a thrilling spectacle for everyone on the beach.

I fear we didn’t capture all the action, or even all the competitors, on camera over the day, but here are a few more of them and a couple of beach scenes to round out what was recorded by our reporters on the day.

Our thanks are due to Harris and the Surf School crew for running such an ace competition flawlessly. Our gratitude also to Porthmeor lifeguards for their help and support, to Porthmeor Beach for feeding the competitors and to St. Ives Brewery for their refreshing ales. We also recognise the support of our community, particularly the families and partners of our competitors for sharing them with us for a precious day among friends. Thanks too to Barry Walker for the action shots of the surfing and to those competitors who took a spell in the judging chair during the day. Congratulations to all our surfers, and particularly to our champion, and first holder of the Porthmeor Cup, Johnny Fryer!

Most Satisfactory!

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

September’s bounty continued to deliver as we experienced another perfect Saturday morning for Kids Club, albeit that the waves were a tad smaller than last week! A well-attended session enjoyed an hour of peelers that were easy to stroke in to with time to trim and fashion turns to impress the coaches. Most satisfactory! There is one more session due next Saturday before the Grande Finale, which has been moved from the announced date of 9am on Saturday 30th September to the following day, Sunday 1st of October at the later time of 3pm to incorporate a regular session for the youngest surfers, a contest for the more competent older surfers, then end-of-season prize-giving and a club BBQ to complete the day and the season. Something to look forward to – but don’t forget that we meet for a 9am session next Saturday to polish those moves in readiness for that final exam! See you there.

Second Sight

by Nog General Club News Groms Surf Club Events

We got a second look at our new season’s chargers last Saturday. There was a friendly wave which could suit all abilities and an early summer warmth to the morning which offered the prospect of a long family day at the beach. The new recruits to the Dolphins were having to sharpen their game in the company of more experienced surfers, and similarly the new arrivals in the Nemos were facing a brand-new learning challenge in moving from prone to a standing position on a surf board. We have a whole summer ahead of us to work things out. Bring it on!

Next session is at 9am on July 1st.