Local wave riders make their mark in Umhlanga contest

Athlone Park surfer, Josh Smit (19) was one of the stand out surfers at the weekend’s Wave Wizards Surf Club event, posting some of the highest wave scores at Umhlanga’s main beach on Sunday, 9 November.

This was the second competition of a three-part series that ends with the Lizzard Summer Surf event on 13 and 14 December, which kicks off the annual Umhlanga Summer Festival.

Perfect weather and highly contestable waves were the order of the day. Starting off with slightly messy two to three-foot waves, it improved to three to four-foot with the Umhlanga bowl offering some fun left wave options.

Mikey Venter of Warner Beach tied first with Dan Redman, but the latter was rewarded as he got a higher scoring wave during the heat.

Toti’s Chanelle Botha also took part and placed third overall in the U18 girls division, following up on her winning both the U18 girls and open division in the first event in September.

Josh attended Glenwood High School up to grade 10, but opted to finish matric through home schooling to concentrate on his surfing.

“The event on Sunday was really fun as usual and the weather played it’s part as well,” he said.

“My goal was to sit as far out as possible and just try get really long rides, which the judges seemed to prefer.

“I finished fourth in the open men, just losing steam in the final.

I was feeling on my game again after finally recovering from a long-term ankle injury that affected my year, but I definitely owe it to Lynne Mackey at the Ocean Riders Academy for drilling me the last few weeks in preparation for Hawaii in January. Hopefully from there I’ll do some events on the world qualifying tour.”

For more results of the second Wave Wizards event, go to www.hurricanesurf.net.