South Side Day One
Words by Woody Harris
Just as Matt Adams and I walked over the dune South of the Indian River Inlet this morning, we were instantly greeted with a perfect waist high regular foot wrap rolling down the beach, in classic South Side fashion. At that moment, we knew the pros were going in the water first.
The wind started off a little breezy from the North West which, to the advantage of the regular footers, blew open some wide right hand tubes. The reggy foot advantage seemed to regulate all of the goofy footers but one, Morgan Just, who is known to thrive when he is at a disadvantage.
After a short break from round one, the pros, rightfully so, voted to head back into the water for round two. By this time, only about an hour after round one, the swell seemed to have switched from a south to a north, which had Morgan Just grinning I’m sure. He was grinning because he was one of the two goofy footers still in the event. Morgan went on to advance out of his 2nd heat behind a red hot Tim Fulton. Although he lost today, I thought Dereck Shenton really preformed well, floating out to far out wraps effortlessly, and then throwing poppy tricks on the way back in, I could see him in a UST final very soon. Other standouts from the first day of competition were Blair Conklin, Brad Domke, and Perry Pruitt. Blair got one of the best waves of the day on his first wave of the day, a text book driving in and out tube all the way back up to the beach, reminiscent of the wave he got last year at the Exile Oktoberfest. Brad seemed to be skimming different today, shredding waves apart with an approach similar to surfing, which I really enjoyed watching. Last but not least, Perry Pruitt. I believe Perry would have placed first in any heat today with the performance he put on. His repertoire consisted of multiple in and outs, backside and frontside, a gnarly full rotation backside 360 air drop, and one layback slash that reminded me of one of Blairs hacks. It appears that Perry has been inspired by Blairs recent flair up in the professional division. Hopefully these two can keep pushing each other to raise skimboarding to a higher level.
The forecast for tomorrow looks very promising. I checked the waves tonight and there was still a solid waist high swell, and the winds are predicted to be blowing from the South West tomorrow which could mean we might see even better conditions than today. Check back tomorrow night for a day two write up and don’t forget to check out our Facebook tomorrow, as we will be posting live updates from the beach.
Day One Gallery:
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