February 11, 2015 Wednesday

Jeff Clark

"Hey was that THE JEFF CLARK?" I asked an aging local surfer while standing on the bluff at Kelly Avenue.

"Yes it was!"

Jeff Clark is one of the most noteworthy and respected big wave surfers, famous for discovering Mavericks, the big wave reef break in Half Moon Bay, and surfing it alone for fifteen years from 1975 to 1990. He founded the Mavericks big wave contest and currently builds custom big wave surfboards at his Mavericks Surf Shop.

Kate and I made our first pit stop on our drive to Ventura at the Half Moon Bay State Beach at the end of Kelley Ave. We purchased an Annual Day Use Pass (something all surfers should have) from the park ranger in the entrance booth and then drove over to the main parking lot and restrooms. A few cars were lined up along the curb nearest to the bluff that over looks the beach and the waves. In the middle was a white van with "Mavericks Surf Shop" painted on the side.

"That's Jeff Clark's surf shop, I wondered if he is here?" I said to Kate, and he was. "Kate, that's Jeff Clark over there." He was zipping up his wetsuit and chatting with two other guys.

His board was lying on the grass near a picnic table. It was short, about 8 feet, thick (at least 4 inches thick) with lots of rocker and a sharply turned up nose, definitely not a big wave board. At first I thought he was into short boards, then I noticed the paddle laying along side the board. Jeff grabbed his board, saluted his friends and headed for the water. He was into stand-up surfing.

The waves had some size and the strong offshore east wind was holding up the curls and sending arches of spray back over the tops of the breaking waves. Kelley Ave breaks like Ocean Beach only closer to shore with big powerful peaks and lots of current. My son Kevin loves this place and I hate it. Six short-boarders and one other stand-up surfer were out there. I watched one of them connect on a big left peak. He screamed across the top of the wall in a tight crouch, the lip folded over him, on he went completely barreled until the wave smothered him in swirling white water.

We met John, one of the guys Jeff was chatting with. Like Jeff, he too grew up in Half Moon Bay and has known Jeff for years. He provided us with some interesting details.

"Yes that was Jeff. He's now into stand-up. With age and creaky joints, he took it up."

Per John, Jeff's father was into construction and constantly had Jeff and his two brothers moving material like rocks and lumber around, causing Jeff to grow up physically strong. The Clarks' house was close to the water, allowing Jeff to check out ocean conditions every morning. He and John took up surfing at an early age. Jeff was always going for the big ones. He was never afraid of them. John, like all us normal surfers, knew his limits. John and Jeff used to sit on the cliff above Mavericks and contemplate if those big waves were rideable.

John remembered being with Jeff out at Ross' Cove, the inlet just north of Mavericks. Jeff was always paddling further and further outside of the rest of them and was drifting towards the peak at Mavericks. I'm familiar with Ross' Cove. On a Mavericks day, you can see the Mavericks break from the cliff above Ross' Cove. My surfer buddy Randy, who I worked with at Visa, loved Ross' and told me of many encounters of double overhead waves.

One time Jeff took John and a friend on a Zodiac out to the Mavericks. Jeff jumped off the front while John and friend stayed in the boat, safely in the channel. Jeff paddled about 50 yards over to the impact zone. For Mavericks it was a small day, maybe 10 feet. They watched Jeff catch a few. This was John's first time being close to the break and to him it was huge.

He claimed that he went out to Mavericks once, got pounded on three waves and never went out there again. As he put it, "big wave surfing, either you have it or you don't. And I don't"

I'm with John – love to watch the big ones, but for me nowadays, it's old men, longboards and four to five foot waves.

John and I watched Jeff paddle out through the white water of some pretty big walls and take off on two waves – one right and one left. On the first one, Jeff cut right on a head high wave and easily cruised through the peak out to the shoulder. On his second wave, he did the same thing going left, having switched his stance (right foot forward) to face the wave the whole way.

"I read that Jeff was originally goofy-foot, but he taught himself to surf normal foot forward because most waves at Mavericks break to the right," I said to John.

"Not true! He always could switch stance, from the get-go." I thanked John for his interesting tales and wished him a long life of surfing.

Now two of my absolute heroes, Laird Hamilton and Jeff Clark, are stand-up surfers. Someday I'm going to have to give SUP a try.