Monday 15th November

Cracking sail at Littlehampton. Went to Paghama at first but it was a bit offshore and choppy - got better later apparently.

Went to LA instead, rigged 4.2 but then some bigger guys on 4.5s came in in a lull, rigged 5.0 instead. Got mullered in the shorebreak, then got out and wind came up honking. Good fun at first if a bit choppy and hectic, then tide dropeed the required amount and and it cleaned up and with a WSW wind had some great clean riding. Eventually the wind came a bit more onshore which made riding the short period waves frontside a bit harder as they were alwas behind you, but still loads of fun.

Monday 13th July

Fun windy windswell session at LA.

Thurs 3rd Sept

Goodbye Summer - hello Autumn. First proper windy-wavey session for ages. Decent rideable windswell at LA - boom to headhigh. Maxed on 4.7 and 78. Wicked fun. Ant and Nik Baker showed up as well as Jamie Hawkins and Mat Pearch. Nik Baker in particular was ripping the shorebreak to bits, one-handed airs, 360s and all sorts of classy moves all much faster and more critical than anyone else. Although Jamie landed only the second fully planing hair dry killer loop i have ever seen.

Some pics:





(the backy is my brother Chris)

Here's a quick video Chris filmed on a coffee break:

Friday 8th May

At last - a decent SWly!!

Stacked on the 4.7 and Guerrilla 71 at Littlehampton. Had lunch with my brother at East Beach Cafe, then a great session maxed out with waist hight waves. A bit too onshore and windy for many loop attempts, managed about 4 or 5 slightly pathetic ones, but loads of big jumps and some great chop bothering, both frontside and backside.

Love the tail on the 71, it breaks out in a much more controllable way and you can really feel it slicing the wave and chucking loads of spray.

18th January 2009

A decent blow went through overnight and left some reasonable windswell with a lame F4/5 WSWly. We went to Littlehampton and got there after the best of the wind had blown through. As it was sunny went out for a bit of float and ride, but with no real guts to the waves, it wasn't a lot of fun. As the tide came in, the combination of rip, light wind and overhead shorebreak made launching and beaching amusing, and I got spat up the beach in front of a gaggle of grannies.

Saturday 29th December

Great fun sunny session at Littlehampton with sideshore wind and some decent overhead waves on the Guerrilla and 5.4. Managed to pick a few out the back with J and Rich and bottom turn around each other in true festive spirit. A great way to end the year.

27 sessions all but one on the waveboard, and all on 5.4 or smaller - not bad :)

Thursday 8th November

Windy but flat (hence the moody gv pic rather than an action shot) session at Littlehampton on the 4.7 Session and Guerrilla 78. Getting cold now and came in for booties after 15 minutes. That' s it for bare feet til Easter! Will have to get a new winter suit soon, some seams came apart the legs of my summer suit and it was letting water in.

Persuaded my brother to come along and had a go on his Delta Euphoria, unconventional and fun, and stonks upwind on the thrusters - will be great to try it when (if ever) the winter swells start showing up.

Had a coffee in the East Beach Cafe afterwards, very chichi, far more Brighton than LA :)

Monday 24th September

Littlehampton on the Guerrilla with 4.7. Much better session than Thursday. Wind was Wly which is the perfect direction at LA, once the tide dropped a bit there were lots of small waves and plenty of riding and jumping fun, with only 3 of us out. The wave holds up well in the slightly offshore wind and has a good shape for smacking. Only takes 35 minutes to get there too. More please...

Friday 6th July

Maxed out on 5.0 and Guerrilla 78 at Littlehampton. It was probably 4.2 weather and there were plenty of bigger guys on smaller sails. Some lumpy waves to bash and there was a good half hour when the wind went cross-off and the riding was a lot more fun.

Finally met Weathercam (real name Gavin) who does the location reports I link to on this site and has a useful streaming cam set up looking out of his front window in Worthing.

The guy in the picture is Cliff, a graphic designer from Chichester.

Tuesday 8th May

Took the afternoon off and sailed at Littlehampton on the Guerrilla 78 and 4.2 Session. Having persuaded Bill and rod to come over, of course there wasn't much swell around. As the tide came in there were some decent sized lumps to do some onshore frontside 'riding' but it was all a bit short period and undynamic. Nice bit of wind though which meant you could go a long way downwind in search of a peak.

The picture above is of East Beach Cafe designed by Thomas Heatherwick, which is currently taking shape, it makes a great landmark when you are sailing against the backdrop of white Regency townhouses (when you are out at sea you can't see how rundown they are).

Sunday 11th February

LA
Originally uploaded by andytedd.

Quality down the line session at Littlehampton on Guerrilla 78 and 5.0. A proper long period groundswell (15s headhigh to overhead) hit the South Coast with a F5 Wly wind.

This meant long fast bottom turns where you could spot a peak 10-15m down the line and go for it knowing you were going to hit at speed. Sessions like this are so rare on the South Coast.

Earlier Pagham was firing with a cleaner wave (see pic below), but the wind switched from SW to W as I arrived there, so I headed to LA.

Still surprisingly warm, no ice-cream headaches or hot hand :)

Monday 4th December

Littlehampton 95l FSW, 5.0 and 5.8m

When we got there at high tide it looked pretty windy and there were decent (looking) waves coming well spaced in sets, over head-high.

A couple of locals were rigging 4.5s which looked optimistic so we rigged 5.0s (heavily downhauled out of respect) and watched. There was quite a big dump, but plenty of space between waves so not a bad launch. Its years and years since I sailed there, if I ever did (would have been with a tiga 280) and I'd say its the easiest S Coast shingly launch other than West Witts.

Anyway they went out and we went back to the cars to get FSW waveboards... The waves, and even the occasional bit of whitewater were head-high, but there was not much wind. We then sailed planing in the gusts for a couple of hours, I changed up to 5.8 which improved things a fair bit.

Quite a nice setup for backside riding but it has to be the slowest wave Ive ever sailed - it makes Pagham look fast. Got a few frontside turns but unless you are fully powered on a 5.0 or less I cant see people stringing consecutive turns together. Its a wave that needs to be sailed rather than surfed.

Got a bit of a shock when I fell in the first time, but after a while not too bad, probably could just about have managed without slippers, but didnt fancy adding cold feet to the list of woes.