12 19 14 morning call

4am main swell buoy readings:
   
Maui north shore (indicative of what's in the water on Maui's north shore)
    6.6ft @ 8s from 76° (ENE)

5.1ft @ 15s from 327° (NW)

2.3ft @ 11s from 338° (NNW)

West lanai Maui north shore (indicative of what's in the water on Maui's south shore)

1.8ft @ 8s from 188° (S)

1.5ft @ 14s from 288° (WNW)

0.8ft @ 11s from 202° (SSW)

0.7ft @ 4s from 167° (SSE)
   

5f 15s from 327 sounds like a lot of fun!
Too bad that:
1) there's also 6.6f 8s from 76 that will ruin it. Or add a bunch of sub-peaks so that people can spread out and tackle the single peaks (there's always something positive in everything!)

 

 

2) the wind will be on it at Hookipa (which means that windsurfing will be pretty radical later in the day)

Fortunately, the wind is pretty easterly. That could leave the spots down the coast wind free for most of the morning, as the 2km map at 10am shows below.

My call on Pipe yesterdady was correct. Today they'll run as much as possible and it's going to be beautiful.

Unfortunately, the waimea buoy is up to 6.7f, but already down to 14s and the period is going to go down all day. That means that they will have to finish tomorrow in pretty small conditions.
This is the first time in which is pretty clear that they did a wrong call.

There was a day at the beginning of the waiting period (can't remember which one) in which it was small in the morning, but it was going to pick up in the afternoon and they called the whole day off.
Had they run it in that afternoon, they wouldn't need to surf on Saturday and finish the contest in non classic Pipe conditions. But what do I know about all the politics and stuff behind a money making machine like an ASP contest...

The fact that the period is going down already is not a good thing for Pipe. I've never surfed it (and probably never will), but it's pretty clear that it is a classic example of concave refraction. That is when a wave hits a spot that is much more shallow, slows down right in front of it while both left and right of it keeps travelling at higher speed and it bends around it giving life to the so called a-frame.
Well, the higher the period, the more the waves feel the bottom and bowl and throw. So the biggest barrels are created by the highest period.
But the wind will be offshore all day, so today it should be a great day no matter what.

Below is the waimea buoy graph.

 

 

Last but not least, below is the wind map of the north pacific.
I circled the big NW fetch that will send us yet another big NW swell (surfline calling for 11f 16s on Monday) and the fetch of trade wind that is creating the windswell that is devastating (I love this word) our waves in Maui. Nice and long and not going anywhere any time soon.

 

 

Have fun in the sun everyone!