Bringing Back Foon's "Mommies on the Beach" Series
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| Giles' Longboard Challenge What a blast! Great to meet everyone else I hav'nt had a chance to yet. I've never thought much about competitions but team events I'd do in a heartbeat.It's like being in a band-lots of downtime to yuk it up with your group and when it's time to rock, good or bad, it's still a great time. Now will somebody pleeze send some swell our way. -Giles Mike Battaglia's Longboard Challenge Overall it was a very successful event. It gave me a chance to meet a lot more of the members and enjoy a festive day at the beach. We certainly have developed a presence. It made me realize that I enjoy free surfing much more than competing. Maybe it would have helped if it wasn't my first time out in 8 mths. Thanks to everyone involved and especially 7-11 for lending me a board. Battags Mike Baroco's Longboard Challenge "Second" Mike B's posting. Great time this weekend, nice putting faces to the "e-mails". It was my first TOTN contest and it was plenty fun. Special thanks Giles, greatly appreciate the use of your board. I owe you one. I think I need to save a few pennies to expand my quiver. Much "ALOHA" to the camping crew: Paul, Jeff, Swifty, Bill, Luke and the rest of the gremmies. Had a great time and I'll volunteer to bring marshmallows next time. Mike Baroco (DE) Bill Coffin's Longboard Challenge Likewise, it was a great weekend for me and the offspring. Thanks to Paul for getting me to do it (and for the 30 minute session Sat night), thanks to Jeff and Swifty and Mike B for letting us destroy the vibe at the campsite. Glad I can now put faces with names (Foon, Rod, KC, Chris Smith) and looking forward to the next slick day when I can concentrate on ripping and not diaper changes. Paul check your kids for ticks, I found 2 tiny ones which I think are deer ticks. bill Swifty's Longboard Challenge Great descriptive posts and the reference to the coffee table is still debatable. Thanks to all who made it a success. I”d like to thank Paul for lending me the use of his camping equipment and jeff for showing me the HOBO chicken recipe which turned out tasty. Chris Smith as mentioned earlier for his time effort with the accommodations at the event. It was great meeting new faces and sharing the ankle slappers. Summers just begun Swifty Jeff Marlow's Longboard Challenge I had the same feeling about free surfing after we did a practice session for my first TOTN. I was fortunate enough to surf "secret spot" by myself on Friday morning. Paddled hard for the mostly waist high waves and was rewarded with "titty ticklers" for an hour before the arms failed. Spent the afternoon with the advance crew for a session at 37th and then sipped wine and chit chatted with the locals at the party that evening. Headed to the campsite late and relaxed with a brew and some munchies. On shore breezes bumped the swell a bit, but it sure helped keep the bugs away. Swifty headed to the vehicle for beer and came back with cold German suds and a girl. Got to remember to bring him along more often. Slept like a baby until the sound of running horses woke me up. The local ponies resented our choice of campsites and decided to gallop through the site. They passed Paul's tent with about 6" to spare. Swifty slept through it all. Great event on Saturday. Many thanks to 7/11 for his untiring ability to set up a first rate venue. We had a single no show and I hope that she is OK, so that I can wring her neck myself. Just kidding, but please post to let us know that you are alive and well. Thanks to Mike Battaglia for rising to the challenge and filling the void. Plenty of support and our teams made a respectable showing of the minor swell. Swifty was flowing on his "vintage" cofee table. Giles was styling on every wave that came his way. Doug Rhodes seems to have overcome any confidence issue that he had last year. Chris D. gave his final performance on my Walden and will be sorely missed next year. John Walker made the bottem turn and kick out look like an art form. I didn't get many oppertunities to watch the team that I was on. Too busy trying to catch my own mushburgers. I did see Paul M. rip right after I lined up to snake him and saw Mike Barraco ripping into most of the set waves that came through. I think Giles loan of his Walden has sold Mike on an extended quiver. I maintained a professional attitude and left the women alone. Must be getting old. Sat down to a casual sushi lunch with Swifty and John and tossed a few brewhas down in preparation for the evening. Surfed an evening session with the Katie and Swifty. Katie tried my Walden and also fell in love with it. I may have to start charging Steve Walden a sales commission. That night we cooked HOBO chicken, killer California chili and tons of munchies. The beer flowed and so did the BS. Paul built a bonfire on the beach and our bionic member and Eeyore showed up with KC "Flies over the wood box" Flier. Bill Coffin showed up and brought his three youngsters along for their first camping trip. He said it was a better idea than sitting at home watching the kids fight. They spent Sunday roaming the dunes and watching the ponies with Paul's kids. Even the infant was digging the place. Sunday morning Bill won the brain award for his quick trip to the store and return with hot coffee before I woke up. Mike Borraco was cooking breakfast and Paul was dreaming that there was surf. We spent the rest of the morning gathering gear and packing up before check out. The combination of WAY too much fun and WAY too much sun required an early check out on my part. Looked for a swell at the usual places, but none to be found. Swifty and I hit the road at noon and only ran into a few traffic issues. Sorry that I didn't get to see the Kahuna or party with the DC Surfriders, but a man is only permitted a certain amount of fun in a weekend. Now back to work to rest..... A Foon TOTN Report Nice wrap up Jeff. I would just like to add my thanks to everyone who supported, attended, supplied, participated and represented our club. In several trips back and forth to the concession stands I caught a few comments from other groups about the number of people in our crowd and the "tent city" as one guy put it. I think the ASC banner caught many people's attention and the sheer number of our contestants and the woodpile of equipment made an impression on some. From a cheerleader/spectator/handicapped backbencher point of view I can assure you our guys represented AS very well this year and though we were eliminated in the middle bracket I know I saw some good stylin from our guys. Special kudos to Chris Smith for honkin down all the equipment and tents. It really made a huge difference in our appearance to others and having the creature comfort of some shade and windbreak plus a base for everyone to congregate made for an oasis of fun in a sea of mediocre waves. I look forward to the posting of the pics. As others have mentioned it was great to put faces to names on the listserv and I sincerely hope all that came down to join us had a sufficiently great time to repeat again next year. -Foon Kirk Mantay's TOTN Wrap-up: Doug Cost Me the Wave of The Day Selective memory had me recalling that I skipped TOTN last year due to wife's birthday. This year came around and we bargained to do her birthday up beach style, hence, TOTN! We rolled into Doug's beach place late on friday night. Doug had been unsure if he'd be called off to work, but at the last minute, it was all systems go! Saturday AM we got to 37th street around 8am to find....very little. Chris and Tim had already whipped up an amazing, professional looking tent setup for our crew and the mysto board racks were ours this time!! Watched all the boys compete and it was great to check out everybody's style and the way their boards handled the nonexistent surf. It was amazing how even the windchop would disappear for 10 minutes at a time. WHat a pain in the arse for our teams! Both teams were the most "on par" (or better) than other teams than they seemed to be in past years (including some less-than-stellar performances on my part!!); you guys did great. Was awesome to finally meet the 3 Mikes, Giles, John W, and Justine. Spent better part of the afternoon catching crap from Marlow about the appropriateness of taking my wife to the ASC bonfire for her birthday (Marlow is the next Dr. Phil, I can FEEL it), so we backed out and had dinner up north in DE, put a few local brews back and popped back over to Doug and Kate's for some AC on our burnt legs and a very bad yet scary movie, which no one would take responsibility for choosing after the fact. Doug and I hit NSIRI at about 630am on sunday and found it clean knee occ+ ESE but very weak and very short period. Got some fun rides on my 7'8" (the shortest board in the water!) and watched Doug slide around smoothly on his G&S classic. We switched and he was amazed to see my paddling into near invisible waves on the G&S, and I was psyched when he kicked the 7'8" around for a nice OTL turn against the inside section. Nice style! Alas, by 930, the waves were gone. I mean, it was "no joke" how flat it was. Headed back and managed to stay at the head of the traffic. NICE! Was great to get back in the water and it was an honor to meet some of the "New Guard" of the ASC! Let's do it again soon!! Kirk PS Doug did not cost me the wave of the day. Any resemblance between Doug and He Whose Name We Do Not Speak is strictly coincidental and is probably the result of an error in pharmacology. Kahuna Carver's Apologies I apologize for my absence on Saturday night/ Sunday. As we got closer to the weekend, Amy's plans fell through and so she decided to go with me and the kids to Teauge. This would be the first family camping trip and the first for Amy in over 25 years. Saturday was hectic with two soccer games and BBQ/ trophy presentation. We did not get out of dodge until just after four o'clock. We checked into our campsite around 7 and set up camp. Kids and wife were starved so grilling burgers was a must. I had seven pieces of fire wood for the bon fire that I promised I would bring. My wife wasn't real keen on packing the camper back up to drive to the fire but walking from where we were at was also not an option. It was about 9:30 when we found Marlow's van and Rod's car. The kids had fallen asleep and I was starting to feel the stink eye from my co-pilot. I advised I would try to find them and drop off the wood. I walked up that boardwalk to just about the dune. Did not really see any bon fire and I watched one campsite that seemed to have a group but I was not able to recognize anyone from the lantern light. I called Rod's cell but got immediate voice mail. At this point I figured I had better give up if I ever wanted to do another family camp outing. I figured I would see everyone at the beach the next day. The broke the sky and we had breakfast. I could not pack up and get to the ocean soon enough for the kids. Camp site A11 got the firewood donation. I assumed that we would have the family day in the same location as last year. Near the bath house. We arrived beach side at 9:30. I guess I had missed the memo on that one cause no one else showed up. I figured there was no use calling anyone since there was no way I would have asked the family to pack up just to go down the beach 600 yards. Oh well, I blew it. I hope you all had a good time. Sorry I missed it. Neal Carver |
