Introduction
A two page article by Midget Farrelly on amateur and competitive surfing, ending with an assessment of the recent Expression Session held at Foresters Beach, north of Sydney.

The edition also featured articles on Bondi by Geoff Luton and a reflective piece, A Disconcerted, Dissertation on dis scene, by the masterful Bob Cooper.

Also in this edition is a radical photograph of North Narrabben's Col Smith, a two page advertisement for Gordon Woods Surfboards featuring Queensland's Peter Drouyn, and a double page spread of Wayne Lynch.

Also see:
Bob Cooper  - Gordon Woods Surfboards  - Peter Drouyn  -  Wayne Lynch.

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There are few waves in the world that can be called challenging to man.
Man, as a surfer, sets out to do something very unique when he goes into the ocean to pit himself against big waves.
It is true that every surfer has a different standard for himself for what is big surf and what is challenging surf.
Over many years a skilled surfer experiences so many kinds of waves and at varying sizes that  he becomes almost at home in what would seem to most people to be a very dangerous situation.
This is the difference between the absolute best surfers and all others.
How many people in the surfing world, particularly those who are making their way up to what they think is the top in surfing, may think that I am attempting to glorify the position of the best surfers in this country.
These people may feel that I have words only for a group that they are not amongst.
They should be less insecure perhaps.
My real purpose here is to establish that there are surfers in this country, of world standing, who should be recognised as a group who need a new platform that will enable them to express themselves, in surfing, other than in the contests of today.
Since the organisations in this country cater for the average surfer on the whole it may be left up to the top surfers themselves to carry out whatever it is they need done. Getting back to the surfers themselves.
The kind of surfing they are capable of is greatly different from that needed in today's contests.
In a contest the surfers are riding against a system the judges judge by, a time limit that doesn't often provide enough of the waves one needs to win on, and a concept of what is 'good' or 'in'.
All then things are irrelevant in surfing in its purest form.
The board must be designed to the waves, not the current vogue.
The surfer must wait 'til the wave of his choice comes, not when the time limit dictates.
When his wave does come, it should be ridden by him in a manner that reflects his greatest skills that have been acquired over many years.
A two foot, onshore, shorebreak does not  require these things.
Contest organisers may feel bound to send everyone out in poor waves but this can not truly be called good surfing.
Really the surfer is one man alone with the waves, not six men fighting for insufficient waves.
He is one man using his mind, his body, his board, to come into contact with a far greater force then himself, a big wave, fast moving and a potential killer.
A kilter?
Yes.
Big waves are very dangerous, this is what makes surfing them the challenge that I have already mentioned.
A man is alone with big waves.
He must have a love for what he is doing when he rides them.
The average Australian surfer probably never rides waves above three and six feet.
There are surfers In Austria who are capable of riding waves as big as twenty feet.
These big wave riders are not lusting for glory in a magazine or amongst their friends.
They are putting all their years of experience on the line.
They want to brush,  perhaps death or injury, most of all they want to survive,  it doesn't take a twenty foot wave to best these surfers.
High performance surfing can be had in most any larger wave that moves very fast.
This kind of surfing can realistically be called art form.
Here the surfer creates.
Here the surfer is pitted directly against greater force.
Here he can lose, but it is here that he hopes to come closer to that power, to ride into its very depths, to take the leap over the precipice, then put all he has learnt, all his knowledge, all his expertise into a sure recovery.
If he falters in the process he detracts from his performance.
If he is uncertain in his execution of major manoeuvres, if he is balked by the waves ferocity, he is almost disgraced.
He detracts from his performance and his reward is without satisfaction and full of doubt.
On the waves that he rides perfectly, no matter what their strength, he is the master.
When he is the master,  his surfing is sheer poetry.
He is as free on the water as a bird.
He is as fast as the porpoise, as fluid as the gulls.
His motion is

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beauty, and in this beauty lies his art. Any person who sees this art cannot help but acknowledge it. They may not understand the finer points and motives behind what they are viewing, but they will instantly recognise the forms and postures used in relation to the wave are are similar to those of an accomplished dancer, and his partner, or the matador and his bull. Man works with the wave but the wave must apply the maximum challenge. If the wave does not, then the actions of the surfer are mimicry and all in vain. Young surfers practising on small waves are compared to boys encouraging the baby bulls so that they can learn of their courage and acquire skill. There is no end to what I feel can be said of good surfing. It is much more than the much hacked "then my mate ripped the glassy tubes to pieces," that we see so often in magazines. It is unfortunate that many of the people who see surfing prefer to remain so inarticulate as to be unable to give credit to each of the really good surfers and insist on siding with whoever is 'in' at the moment. Perhaps when the surfers themselves can appreciate where their surfing has led them they will come up with answers to many questions that non-surfing association officials cannot answer.

Several people in Sydney did try an alternative to contests by running an exhibition at Forresters Beach, just north of Sydney.
Forresters is a large left slide when it breaks and reaches heights of up to twelve, fifteen, and eighteen feet.
The best surfers available at the time were invited to demonstrate their surfing over one day.
Awards were made for obvious achievements though they bore little relation to the overall surfing of the day.
The object of this was to acknowledge certain different surfers for unusual techniques.
The outcome was similar to that of a good day's surfing.
We were all able to see what the others amongst us were capable of in the eight to ten foot conditions.
There were no restrictions on who could or couldn't ride or how long a surfer could spend in the water.
As it turned out John  Monie, Greg Boeder of Hawaii, and Johnathon Paarman of South Africa were presented with awards by Captain Ron Ware, an active surfer of long standing.
Forresters may not have been the answer, it really only scratched the surface.
One thing, there was no growling after the event by anyone who might hove been robbed in a regular contest.

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Col Smith

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Contents Letters Dana Nicely The New Zealand Championships — Kim Wesierskov North - Richard Harvey Harvey Winter: Refraction and Release Sounds - Richard Kavanough Invisible Tracks - Kemp Aaberg Bondi - Geoff Luton Midget A Disconcerted, Dissertation on dis scene - Bob Cooper Profile on a Club-Manly Pacific

Pages 40-41                                                                                                                                   Pages 62-63

Gordon Woods Surfboards - Peter Drouyn

Wayne Lynch