Best surfing video of The Wedge... and a history lesson of surfing

This clip is from Beefs TV YouTube channel, and it's the best and craziest surfng footage I've ever seen at The Wedge, in Newport Beach, California.  How gnarly is The Wedge?  Count the broken boards in this video, that will give you an idea. 

 

A little look at surfing history and its ties to Southern California

As you may know, surfing originated in the Hawaiian Islands hundreds of years ago.  It nearly faded out in the late 1800's, due to the missionaries and haoles who took over the islands.  Right around 1900, a group of young watermen in Waikiki brought the sport back, and started surfing there on huge traditional Hawaiian boards.  

What few people know is that writer Jack London, best known for novels about gold miners in the Yukon gold rush, like The Call of the Wild, and White Fang, was also a travel writer.  He sailed to Hawaii, around 1907.  He wrote and article for a women's magazine about the surfers of Waikiki.  Thousands of miles away on the mainland of the U.S., Southern California railroad magnate, Henry Huntington, was showed the article by his wife.  At the time, Henry was developing an area of the beach west of Los Angeles, Redondo Beach.  Henry hired the expert surfer, swimmer, and diver, George Freeth, to come to California and give surfing and diving demos in Redondo Beach, to promote the new community.  

For any who may be wondering, yes, Huntington Beach was named after Henry Huntington.  It wasn't because he lived there, he didn't.  The developers of Pacific City, as H.B. was called around 1905, changed the name to Huntington Beach to encourage the railroad man to build a route from Long Beach to Huntington Beach.  They needed to attract more people down to the new beach town.  It worked, and more people started traveling down to the sleepy coast town in Orange County.  Then, in 1920, oil was discovered in Huntington Beach, and people flowed in, trying to strike it rich.  Huntington Beach became known as "Surf City" in the 1950's and 1960's, the name made famous in the Jan & Dean song, "Surf City."   

Back to the surfing, not long after George Freeth traveled to the mainland, a younger member of the Waikiki crew, Duke Kahanamoku, also came to California to show off his surfing skills.  Over the 1900's and 1910's, Both men showed surfing to many beach goers in California.  Freeth wound up dying during the Spanish Flu pandemic, in 1919, getting sick after a heroic act rescuing people from drowning.  Duke continued to show the sport of surfing to people in California, and around the world, and became known as the Father of Modern Surfing.  

Duke was alive to see surfing explode in popularity, driven by the music and movies from Southern California in the 1960's.  People began surfing around the world, inspired by the movies of surfers on longboards in Malibu, primarily.  While surfing was blasted to worldwide popularity from California, most SoCal waves really aren't that big.  As surfing moved to new areas, short boards were invented, and surfers improved, they kept seeking bigger and bigger waves.  Surf spots like Pipeline, Waimea Bay, Jaws, and others in Hawaii, gained fame.  Other huge breaks began to be surfed around the world, like Teahupoo in Tahiti, Maverick's in Northern California, Todos Santos in Mexico, and more recently ,Nazarre, Portugal, all with gigantic waves, when the right swells came in.  

While surfing and California go together in many people's minds, all of the biggest waves were located far away from Malibu, Los Angeles, and Southern California.  Almost all, that is.  There is one gigantic wave right on the beach, barely 40 miles from downtown L.A..  That wave is The Wedge.  Located at the end of the four mile long Newport Beach Peninsula, The Wedge rises up to a tumultuous, triangle shaped wave, when the perfect swell rolls in.  Faces can rise 20 to 25 feet, and it breaks right over the wet sand, which has led to many serious injuries,   The Wedge wave forms by the Newport Harbor entrance jetty, where big swells get squished into the corner of the beach and jetty, causing a huge, dangerous, and really deformed shaped wave.  For decades it was considered too crazy and dangerous to surf.  As surfers began chasing huge waves around the globe, big days at The Wedge were ridden mostly by Boogie boarders, and only the best and craziest of them.  

Over the past 30 years or so, a few surfers began to venture into big days at The Wedge, and they take a beating for their attempts to ride it, and catch the huge, but short-lived tube that often forms, then quickly closes out.  I've shot video at The Wedge three times on big days, and it's just plain insane to see up close.  The force of the wave coming down in such shallow water, make you continuously wonder if the body boarders and surfers disappearing underwater are still alive.  It's an amazing site to watch people catch that wave on big days up close.  Crowds of 300 or more people are not uncommon, as word gets around that it's big at The Wedge.  This video has more great surf rides there in 12 minutes, than I've seen in all the hours I've shot video there on big days.  It's well worth watching.  

These days, there are now three gigantic waves in the Southern California area.  They are all remarkable for different reasons, besides the size of the largest waves that form.  The Wedge is one of the world's most dangerous beach breaks.  You can see that in the video above.  The next huge SoCal wave (sort of), is Cortes Banks.  It's a gigantic wave in the open ocean, about 100 miles west of San Diego.  Once holding the title for the biggest wave ever surfed, Cortes Banks is renowned to serious surfers, despite it's location.  But still largely unknown, there's an even crazier wave, off the west side of San Miguel Island, one of the Channel Islands, about 90 miles west of Los Angeles.  Shark Park is not only one of the heaviest, and least known giant waves in the world, it's also teeming with great white sharks, due to huge seal populations nearby.  In a sense, surfing has come full circle to California, which took the Hawaiian sport and spread the word around the world.  Now there are these three really serious waves on and off the Southern California coast, that have now been surfed, all rating among the craziest surf breaks in the world.  

Steve Alba tells the story of Baldy Pipe- The original epic skateboard spot

The place where full pipe skating and bike riding was born.  This almost certainly is the first world renowned skateboard spot.  Baldy Pipe.  In the foothills above the San Gabriel Valley, east of L.A..

Disclaimer

East of Los Angeles, in the SAn Gabriel Valley, known for getting clogged full of smog, there's a small reservoir built for flood control  Built in the mid 1950's, it wasn't until 1969 that a skateboarder known as Muck found a huge pipe going into the side of the mountain, part of a spillway for the dam.  Located in the mountains below an L.A. landmark, Mount Baldy, the 14 1/2 foot diameter concrete tube became known as Baldy Pipe.  In the video above, Steve Alba, Badlands local, and a guy who first skated Baldy Pipe around 1975, tells the tale of this skate spot.  For you young guys and gals who don't know who Steve Alba is, watch this, and this, and this, and this.  Known to many as Salba, he's the pool skater's pool skater.  So he's the perfect person to tell the story of place where full pipe skating was born.  

Why is that area called the Badlands?  In the first BMX article I read about Pipeline Skatepark, from 1983, they wrote that a dead body was found there once.  The article made it sound like the body was found in the skatepark.  That may be an urban legend.  If anyone who reads this knows if that's true or not, let me know.  

In any case, as Steve Alba tells the story in the video above, the San Antonio Dam was built from about 1952 to 1955.  The pipe has gates that allow water to flow through the pipe when the water is high, to prevent floods and landslides.  But most of the time the gates are closed, which means the giant pipe is dry.  A guy known as Muck (Pat Mullis) found the pipe in 1969, about 14 years after it was built.  Wally Inouye and friends first skated Baldy Pipe in November of 1973.  That's right, the roots of full pipe skateboarding go all they way back to 1973.  

OK, let's talk about that year.  1973.  That was the year the Roe versus Wade decision on abortion was ruled in the U.S. Supreme Court, the landmark case that just recently got overturned.  Jim Croce's "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" was one of the most popular songs of the year.  It was also the year that Chinese martial artist and movie star Bruce Lee died.  Skateboarding was mostly being done by a relatively small group of people, who kept skating after the original, mid-1960's skateboard boom.  This film was made of skateboarding in 1973.  Wheelies, 360's, downhill, and slalom were the main styles.  Evel Knievel turned 35 that year, and was gearing up for his Snake River Canyon Jump, which he attempted a year later, in 1974.    Steve Alba turned 10 that year.  Rodney Mullen, BMXfreestyler Dennis McCoy, and me, all turned 8 that year.  Tony Hawk turned 6, and BMX freestyle legend Mat Hoffman turned 1 year old in 1973.  Way back then, almost 50 years ago, full pipe skateboarding was just being born at Baldy Pipe.  

Wally Inouye told Waldo Autry where Baldy Pipe was, and Waldo became the first skater known for skating it, scoring film footage skating there in the the 1976 film, The Magic Rolling Board.  Waldo was clocking in above 9:00 back then, and full pipe skating was beginning to evolve, as the 1970's skateboard boom raced across the U.S. and the world.  Pipeline Skatepark in Upland, in the San Gabriel Valley, below Baldy Pipe, opened in 1977.  It was the first skatepark in the U.S. to have vertical walled pools, and to have a full pipe, paying homage to the local Baldy Pipe.  It became the home park of Steve and Micke Alba, and many others.  Here's Micke Alba tearing up the Combi Pool and the Pipe Bowl in 1987.  The Pipe Bowl at Pipeline was also frequented by BMX vert riders like Eddie Fiola, Mike Doninguez, and Brian Blyther, among others.  Those guys not only shredded the full pipe on bikes, but took BMX vert airs from the 4 to5 foot range up to the 8-9 foot out range, in the mid 1980's.  The Pipe Bowl at Pipeline Skatepark played a key role in the evolution of BMX vert riding.

So that's a look at Baldy Pipe, the undisputed start of full pipe skateboarding and BMX riding, and a quick look at Pipeline Skatepark, a direct descendant of Baldy Pipe.  This was probably the first skate spot that became legendary in both skateboarding and later in BMX.  

Vox talks to Tony Hawk about legendary skateboard spots

Two years ago, Vox.com got Tony Hawk on Zoom, and made this video about legendary skateboard spots, asking for Tony's input on them.  

Disclaimer

For a group outside the skateboard industry, Vox produced a really cool look at many of the best known skate spots, and how obscure urban places become famous worldwide in skateboarding.  I am, by no means, the first person to look at the history of action sports spots, and how obscure places like a ditch, a set of stairs, or some dirt jumps, become legendary worldwide, in one sport or another.  

In this blog I want to not only dig into the history of legendary spots, but find some new ones, and also look at the effects these spots have on action sports culture, and even mainstream culture later on.  That's a lot to dive into, but I'm now over 2,500 posts into my 14 year long blogging career, so I'm used to looking at subjects piece by piece, over a long period of time.  I have no real idea where The Spot Finder blog/concept is headed, and that's half the fun.  We'll find that out together.  In the meantime, this 13 minute video is a good primer on spots made famous by skateboarding, and how skaters, and other action sports people look at the urban environment, and the whole world, differently from average people.  Enjoy. 

Skateboarding and the City: A complete history- by Iain Borden, the book mentioned in the video.  Not a paid link.

The Endless Halfpipe of Umea, Sweden

The Endless Halfpipe of Umea, Sweden.  

Disclaimer

I didn't know about this until I searched "amazing skate spots" YouTube.  This appears to be an old logging flume, or possible just a aqueduct for spring floods, or something like that.  What it reminds me of is The Gauntlet from American Gladiators, which I actually did ride my bike in, when I was a crew guy on the show in the early 90's.  In any case, the "endless" halfpipe turned into a high banked metal ditch, then ends.  So it's not endless, but prety freakin' long.  

In any case, this looks like a fun place to skate or ride, if you make it to Umea, Sweden.  Umea is on the east coast of Sweden, a couple of hundred miles (or a whole bunch of kilometers) north of Stockholm.  The video is pretty funny.  These guys skate for half the video, then the local guy guides the other around the weird spots of the town.  Weird spots to ride and skate are all over the place.  That's kind of the point of this blog.