Wet n Wild -- Rockin’ Fig

Rick Fignetti

The second event for the National Scholastic Surfing Assn.’s Southwest

Conference Explorer Season was held last weekend down at San-O, San

Onofre.

The event lucked out ‘cause most of the coastline was seeing a

dropping trend in the surf outta the southwest. But at San-O some small

pulses kept rolling in, with pretty nice shape, to give the surfers

something to rip it up on.

The wind was almost nil all day long, too, giving way to glassy

conditions, nice and smooth, just like we like it. Again Huntington Beach

surfers were on a roll there, taking a lot of divisions and placings, and

here’s how it went.

In the menehunes, looking good, ripper Tommy Steury won another one --

he’s undefeated right now. In boy’s middle school, shredders Ian Eckberg

and Bert Farley placed first and second, respectively.

In the juniors, Alex Grey from Palos Verdes won another, with Willie

Safreed coming in fourth and Brett Simpson equal seventh.

Stepping it up in mens, Jason Franko of Carlsbad has won two in a row

now, while Dan Fennell pulled into third with some nice moves, too.

Masters saw Seal Beach’s Chas Wickwire, surfing a division down, go

ballistic, catching a lot of sets and tearing them apart. Hot on his

heels, though, was surfer/shaper Barry Deffenbaugh, who had some mean lip

bashes out there and took a close second.

Seniors saw Chas come back again and dominate for another win, picking

up the gold twice.

Super seniors saw the Figster smack the lip a couple times, placing

third, with Pat Schlick fourth.

Heide Tschauner got fifth in women.

Mixing it up in the longboarding, Dodger Kremell couldn’t be stopped,

taking first place honors, with Darren Moody finishing up second in the

bodyboarding.

The next Explorer event is Nov. 17 and 18 at Church’s, San Clemente,

right by Camp Pendleton, which usually features some fun rights this time

of year.

The Huntington Beach Surf Series Championships are finally here, after

a great season, and will be held Oct. 27 and 28 at 1st Street, just south

of the pier.

Top ranked surfers are eyeing prospective divisional champion spots.

Also the Huntington Beach Surf and Sport has four spots for the United

States Surfing Championships, too.

Contest director Seth Matson is giving away round trip vacations to

Cabo, that’s Cabo San Lucas, for amateur overall winners. The awards will

be given away at Duke’s, at 8:00 p.m. Sunday. The public is welcome to

come on down and join in with the festivities. Raffles will be going on,

too, with the proceeds given to the Surfrider Foundation for protection

and enhancement of our coastal environment. Yeah now, I like that!

There’s still a few open slots in some of the heats, but ya’ better

hurry and get that entry in. See ya, Fig over and out.

* RICK FIGNETTI is a six-time West Coast champion, has announced the

U.S. Open of Surfing the last eight years and has been the KROQ-FM

(106.7) surfologist for the last 15 years where he’s done morning surf

reports. He owns a surf shop on Main Street. You can reach him at (714)

536-1058.