Sunday, 25 July 2010

O'Neill Surf Academy 2010 Rocks Scotlands!

Hey kids, ever fancied trying surfing? We’ll now here’s a chance and it’s absolutely free!


In the final week of July the O’Neill surf academy will arrive in Scotland armed with 60 boards, 60 wetsuits and 6 professional surf instructors. The surf academy hopes to give kids aged from 6 to 16 the opportunity to try surfing for the first time under professional supervision.

The academy kicks off in Thurso on the 28th and 29th of July then moves on to Fraserburgh where it will run open courses on the 31st of July and the 1st of August. Each day the surf academy hopes to attract up to 50 kids; the aim is to start at approx 09:30 am where each kid will receive professional beach instruction followed by hitting the water for the first surf lesson, lunch will be provided before heading off for a second surf lesson in the afternoon (conditions permitting).

The format per day is outlined below:

09.30 - 10.30 Inscription & registration

10.30 - 11.30 Welcome and introduction

11.30 - 13.00 Surfing

13.00 - 14.00 Lunch

14.30 - 16.30 Surfing

16.30 - 17.00 Material back in trailer

17.00 - 17.30 Award ceremony + autographs

The Academy is open to all kids aged 6 to 16 however due to limited availability spaces will be allocated on a first come first serve basis. Spaces can also be reserved up front by contacting the following email address: oneillgrommets@gmail.com and providing each potential participants name/ age/ parental contact number/ home address and preferred location/ dates (as specified above).

All equipment will be provided along with lunch and tuition is free just bring a towel!

Hope to see you there!

Wednesday, 30 June 2010

Liked This Too!

Food for Thought...

Thursday, 27 May 2010

Now thats what I call surfing!

Here's a sick wee vid from Allyn Harper...


Slab Hunting in Scotland from Allyn Harper on Vimeo.

Wednesday, 19 May 2010

Scottish Champs Teaser


Scottish Surfing Championships 2010 Teaser >>

Time flies.....

Hey Everyone,

Well sorry about the shortage of posts lately, guess that's how it goes eh?!

Plenty happening since my last post, had the QS on for a week before I went away last time. Yet again been blown away by the standard of surfing in waves we wouldn't look twice at, one of the highlights would have to have been the free surfing at the bowl when it was onshore mush one of the mornings halfway through the contest. It's also pretty amazing to see the airs that the guys were doing, not just in free surfing but in heats too!

Must say that they boys put up a good effort, Boydie had a good game plan and stuck with it throughout. His knowledge helped him to get quite a few good waves however he was out pointed on better set waves. Georgie had a tough heat with not many waves going his way, the waves he did get weren't really keen on cooperating. Scratch put in a fine effort, his experience from the past two events helped him prepare for his heat. Surfing well throughout his heat Scratch did himself proud unfortunately he found his roll of the dice not in his favour. He found himself in one of the highest scoring heats of the first round, even though he did not make it through his heat he could still walk up the reef with his head held high.


I'm sure that everyone seen the photos that have come from the event, I'm going to upload some of my favourites soon. The photo above is Scratch just before his heat and for me this is an outstanding photo. It really sums up the feelings and thoughts that go through your head just before a heat like this. In all honesty its not a very nice position to be in, sure you have all of the journalists calling and talking about how you are the wildcard, the chosen one. Here we have the warrior that the Scots have chosen to put forward as our best.

The ego boost that the journalists give soon subsides leaving the cold hard reality, you are about to surf against some of the best surfers in the world. This is their job, they surf heats every week, winning means continued support and a shot at the big time loosing isn't really an option. Here you are waiting for the countdown, thinking... All I want to do is my best, if I do the best I can and fail that's OK I've done my best. The other option is to surf badly, make the wrong decisions, pick the wrong waves, fall, get stuck inside, it could go flat and I won't get any waves. There are more things can go wrong than right.

Then you have the walk back up the reef, that in itself is a daunting thing. If anyone knows anything about the guys who are at the top of their game it's that they HATE loosing. On the other hand if you win, the world is your oyster all smiles and life is good. winning means living up to the expectation, all the hype from the journalists, the support of the guys on the reef.  Loosing is something that you have to deal with and I think that some handle it better than others. Whichever way you look at it it's a long walk with your head bowed.


Anyway I'm getting sidetracked, as you can see from this photo here Scratch surfed well and as far as I'm concerned he did enough to walk up the reef with his head held high.

Later
Chris


Sunday, 11 April 2010

Better late than never!

Evening everyone...

Well I have to say a big sorry to Martina and James as I've been so long at posting about the great work they did during the weekend of the Scottish. I've uploaded a selection of shots that they forwarded onto me but if you would like to see mroe please visit...

http://surfingnorth.wordpress.com/

and

http://www.jamesgunn.co.uk/page80.html

As for me, I'm going to be hanging out watching the 'QS. Boydie sneaked up today to try and get a wee bit of practice in before the event, said that he had a fun surf out at the bowl with twenty seven other guys. One things for sure.. he'll be looking forward to his heat so that there are only three other guys out there with him!

Later
Chris