Vic Bay Teaser

With USSA surf champs now just over a week away here's a little teaser of what the awaits the team next Sunday...

Let's just hope for bigger swell!

The Initiation of Andrew Mandy

If you’ve been to High School, heard about Camp Staaldraat or been on a road trip through the Transkei, then you’ll know that South Africans love initiation ceremonies. And the Maties Surf Team is no different.

Tradition has it that on one’s first USSA trip you are initiated by the senior team members. It’s not a nasty rugby initiation, featuring Deep Heat and physical humiliation. It’s a more playful initiation, featuring a pair of hair clippers and a noxious brew which is certain to have the newbies spewing chunks in the surf the next day. The beauty of the 2011 edition is that the club chairman, Andrew Mandy has confirmed that he will be making the trip to Vic Bay. And that means it’s initiation time for Mr Mandy.

Despite making the trip to the surf champs three times already, Andew has yet to be initiated. He dodged the clippers in 2009 and 2010 through his snaky lawyer speak, which employs the most circular logic and is sure to confuse most into submission. But this year is going to be different, he can’t fall back on the super supporters aren’t team members card, he’s the chairman and his appointment in the barber’s chair is booked. There’ll be no weaselling out of this one.

All that remains to be decided is the hair cut he’ll receive and in the interest of public participation I’d like to open up the floor to all Club members to have their say. The only prerequisites are that the initiate looks like a right chop for the duration of the event and that the cut is performed with the quintessential electric sheep shears.

Here are a few of my favourite options:
The Friar Tuck:
Bald on top and long on the sides. It’s a classic look and Andrew is Catholic which is an added bonus.
The Chess Board:
Like a chess board of alternating blocks of hair and shaven patches. It makes the essential task of applying sun cream to the bald spots nearly impossible but its hard work for the man behind the shears.
The Drunken Hack:
Let the clippers fall where they will and let the initiate suffer the consequences. Quick and easy with the sure-fire result of making the initiate look like a newly hatched eagle. It practically guarantees three days of hilarity at the wearer’s expense.

But don’t let my lack salon imagination hold you back. This is a public process so please use the comments section to offer your own unique suggestion for Andrew’s hair style.

With the initiation planned we need only discover which senior team member will be wielding the shears. And I have a sneaky feeling that they might be lining up to give Andrew’s locks the chop. Because anybody who knows Andrew will know that he won’t go down alone, which means that Ricki Allardice will be losing that dreadful mop of his too…

2010 Results

Below are the results of last years’ event at Victoria Bay:
Men’s Competition
Teams
1. NMMU
2. UCT
3. Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT)
4. University of Stellenbosch (US)
5. Rhodes University
6. University Kwazulu Natal (UKZN)
Individual
1. Clinton Gravett – NMMU
2. Kyle Beach – UKZN
3. Gary Muller – NMMU
4. Kyle Jacobs – NMMU

Ladies’ Competition
Teams
1. UCT
2. US
3. NMMU
4. CPUT
5. Rhodes University
Individual
1. Sarah Nicholson – UCT
2. Lisa Auditore – US
3. Kerry Hodgkinson – UCT
4. Jessica Genrich – Rhodes

The Venue

Victoria Bay is a small bay about 5km East of George, with a right-hand point break running off its Western edge. The point is the primary wave in the bay, but there is also a slaby left on the far side of the bay and a beach break. The point can get heavy when the swell jacks which can make the paddle out a little nervy. To make matters worse when making the jump there is a blind section where you simply have to commit, if you get it right it’s a dry hair paddle out, if you get it wrong, it can end in broken fins and embarrassment in front of the crowed on the pier.

For the super supporters if the contest is running there are a few other waves in the area which are worth a surf. Just south of Vic Bay there is Herold’s Bay which picks up more swell and can get super heavy. Less than an hour back down the N2 is Mossel Bay with Inner Pool and Outer Pool. While further up the coast you will also find waves at Wilderness and Buffalo Bay.

Vic Bay is situated a comfortable 4 hour drive from Stellenbosch so it makes the ideal first stop on a winter road trip. Many an epic university road trip has centred on the event before venturing further up the coast to Jeffries Bay and for the more intrepid travellers, even further north to the Transkei.

If you are interested in making the trip as part of the super support crew speak to Ricki Allardice who is standing in the club chairman Andrew Mandy as the prim of the Maties Surf Club at the event.

The Competition

The Maties team will be taking on the best surfers that Cape Peninsula University of Technology (C.P.U.T), Independent Institute of Education, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (N.M.M.U), Rhodes University, University Cape Town (U.C.T.) and KZN University have to offer.

The traditional powerhouses of South African university surfing are without a doubt, N.M.M.U. and U.C.T. who have shared the overall spoils between them for the past few years. Maties meanwhile have competed well in the ladies division but the men have begun to be regarded as a more socially orientated outfit. Since rejoining the fold in 2009, Rhodes University has given the Maties men a run for their money in that particular category though.

The inclusion of new boys the Independent Institute of Education, an umbrella institution which includes Cape Town’s Varsity College and Vega will defiantly shake things up. They along with C.P.U.T. can be counted as the dark horses of the event.

The competition itself takes place from Monday the 27th of June until Wednesday the 29th. The surfers competing in four person heats, with the top two waves counting and the best placed two surfers progressing to the following round.

The 2011 Team

The Maties Surf Club team for the 2011 edition has some big shoes to fill, as some of Boland surfing’s finest underground chargers having graced the USSA stage before them. The likes of Mikhail Thompson, has won the event previously and Nils von Delft, strung a succession of finals together in the first decade of the new millennium. The Maties men will therefore have to step-up if they are to make an impression in the water.

Men’s Team:
1 Brendon Booth-Jones
2 Devon James Ramages
3 Peter Thorpe
4 Gabriel Steyn Botha
5 Nick Van Wyngaard
6 Marcel Traub
7 Christopher Kenneth Fauré
8 Max Van Baarsel

The Maties Ladies have had more surfing success than their male counter parts in recent years with Lisa Mace having won the event in 2009 and Lisa Auditory having secured the runners-up spot in 2010. The ladies also managed a second position in the 2008 team competition when both Angelique Laurie and Lara Humby made the final. With both Lisa’s returning to Vic Bay in 2011 the ladies team is once again Maties most realistic source of medals.

Ladies’ Team:
1 Lisa Mace
2 Lisa Auditory
3 Chloe Humby
4 Sarah Havard

In previous years the club was able to send two reserve male surfers and one reserve lady to the event, but with the tough financial climate prevailing over the purse strings there is no such luxury in 2011. There will however be a dedicated crew of super supporters who make the trip with the team to ensure that Maties maintain their legacy of providing the entertainment for the other teams.

So if you’d like to make the trip up to the Southern Cape to support the Maties surfers feel free to join the super support crew.

University Sport South Africa Surf Championships 2011

To surfers the month of June conjures up special images. Cold fronts pummelling the coast, bringing with them massive swell and epic surf. But for student surfers the month of June holds more than just the prospect of good surf. Exams loom large early in the month but towards the end of June there is a blinding light at the end of the dark tunnel of all night study sessions and exam trauma. In late June the top surfers from South Africa’s coastal universities meet for the annual University Surf Championships.

Dating back to 1968, the fierce rivalry in the water is equally matched by the unique party atmosphere on land. The competitive atmosphere was fostered in the first 26 years of the event by alternating the venue between Durban and the Cape. But then in 1994 the newly formed University Sport governing body took over the organising of the event and decided to make Seal Point the championships official home. For 16 years the sleepy holiday resort of Cape St. Francis was battered by hordes of students every June, before the decision was made to move the 2010 event south to Victoria Bay. The 2011 event sees the amphitheatre like Vic Bay once again hosting the eventfrom the 26th to the 30th of June, with Reef Wetsuits coming onboard as the title sponsors.

And so, with no further ado, this is the Maties Surf Club guide to the REEF WETSUITS SA STUDENTS SURFING CHAMPIONSHIPS: