11 14 16 morning call

Yesterday saw the completion of the Aloha Classic windsurfing contest at Hookipa.

Before that, the surfing conditions were pretty good until the wind filled in. This guy picked up a head high gem and did not waste it.


The number of total heats to run to complete all categories was pretty high and head judge Duncan Coombs pulled off a miracle and managed to complete them all.
To be honest with you, a 10 man heat with one competitor dropping in on me and stealing my best wave wasn't exactly what I had in mind when I signed up for the contest, but that was the only way to go through the vast fleet of the amateurs.


The pro men only had a total of three heats to run and I'm really happy that Kevin Pritchard managed to defend his position. He had previously won the single elimination in pure (huge) wave riding conditions, while yesterday it was head high and windy which favored younger competitors who have a better arsenal of jumps and rotations off the lip, but he hung on to the win thanks to a wave at the buzzer .
Complete results on the Aloha Classic page.


4am significant buoy readings
NW
14ft @ 16s from 324° (NW
Hanalei
13ft @ 15s from 320° (NW)
Waimea
7.8ft @ 18s from 314° (NW)

Pauwela          

2.9ft @ 18s from 326° (NW)

3.1ft @ 11s from 337° (NNW)

 

One of those days in which the graphs help a lot to predict what's gonna happen. Below is the collage of NW, Hanalei, Waimea and Pauwela. At the first one the swell went from 2f to 12f in 12h and the same exact thing happened 6 hours later at the second one. Waimea is well on its way up too and Pauwela is only starting the climb at 4am, and I expect the next readings to be a lot bigger.
Surfline's offshore swell tab (link n.15) calls for 10.5f 15s from 325 at 2pm today and the red dotted line is how I think the swell will rise during the morning: fast and steady.
(Note that the scale of all the graphs is different).

 

Not going to be easy to find a good surfing spot on the north shore, also because the wind will be on it from the very beginning (Hookipa's iWindsurf sensor reading 8-16mph at 5,20am).
Let me remind you guys that the Molokai shadow line for Honolua Bay is 335, so this swell will be partially blocked by it. But it's big and long period enough to wrap in there, unfortunately I have to work at 9, otherwise I'd be there at dawn and surf it until it gets too big/crowded.

The Haleiwa contest is likely to resume today (unless it's too big already). If they run it, it's going to be a great show with massive waves.

Here in Maui instead, I believe some of the pro sailors will tackle Jaws, so here's an "inspiring" photo of Jimmie Hepp showing a terrifying wipeout by Kauli Seadi. If you think you had bad wipeouts in your life, you might want to put them into perspective after seeing this one.


Current wind map shows the fetch that generated today's swell now moving out of Hawaii's swell window (north of us) and a new weak one forming WNW of us. That low is going to intensify and produce some more waves, but we'll have to deal with the high pressure's induced trades.
The whole second half of November looks pretty windy, unfortunately. Models can be wrong, let's hope something changes.


Definitely a windy day today.


The super moon will create an extreme tide swing of 3.5 feet, but that fortunately will happen during the night. It's gonna be pretty shallow at sunset though.