There is a hum of heavy machinery coming from the periphery of the surfing world as the race to build a perfect wave pool heats up.
Man-made waves have been around for a while, of course. It’s already possible to go surfing everywhere from shopping centres to party islands and even in the middle of the Arabian desert.
This is not real.These waves are surfable but none match the exhilaration, power or potential of a standard ocean beachbreak – yet. As the number of surfers around the planet increases so will the demand for perfect, consistent waves.
Table of Contents
Surfing beyond the ocean
Microcosms of surf culture have already mushroomed around the strangest of surf spots, like the Eisbach River wave in Munich, Germany. Here the guys laugh at how we “ocean surfers” don’t quite grasp the intricacies of back-foot-heavy, stationary wave surfing.
But these guys have it wired. It’s their passion and they hit it every day of the year.
Now fast forward a decade and there’ll be teenagers who have grown up surfing the Wave Garden in the Basque Country of Spain. Or dudes from Dubai who shred walls at the Wadi Adventure Park in UAE. Will they feel the lure of the ocean? Nature’s heartbeat throbbing across reefs and sandbars from Uluwatu to Hossegor, Rocky Point to Noosa. Will they look at underwater photos and dream of duck diving?
This is real.I recently surfed the last remaining stand-up wave at Gateway Shopping Centre in Durban, South Africa and it kind of sucked. The proper, barreling wave has been decommissioned because of energy consumption and possibly because a guy broke his neck on it. I visited the wave pool at Siam Water Park in Tenerife and was impressed – no expense has been spared here.
But it was unfortunately packed full of screaming pink-roasted European kids and only available to surfers at 600 Euros per hour in the evenings. I’d rather put the cash towards a flight to Bali or a new board because, while it’s different, the wave is just not that exciting. So I went and surfed a two foot shorebreak down the road instead.
Skate parks and crowds
When the first purpose-built skate parks were constructed, some skating purists certainly turned their noses up, preferring abandoned swimming pools and the open road. A large percentage still do. Because, let’s face it, the primary concern about wave parks for most surfers is that hordes of newly hooked “poolies” will invade our local break.
If you’ve grown up surfing perfect chlorinated walls would you really want to go and wait hours in the salty ocean for waves that may or may not come? I doubt it. Not to mention the shark other factor. There will be a cross-over but I don’t think the advent of a wave pool era will be bad for surfing. Bad for the environment, yes, with all that energy being burned for such a vacuous pleasure but I suppose it’s no different to the amount used to light up a football field for a major match. The difference is that in our pastime the visitors get to participate.
Healthier kids
Surfing is cool. If wave parks help get kids off the sofa and into a sport then that is positive. According to the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council around 25% of Aussie kids aged 2–16 are overweight, with 6% classified as obese. This statistic would no doubt be similar in other parts of the Western world.
Riding waves provides a whole new channel of fun and certainly could promote a healthy surf lifestyle in landlocked areas. Of course we need to consider the impact of skin cancer with all these people getting hooked on an activity that takes place out in the sun on a warming planet. And, of course, seriously consider the carbon footprint and sustainability of these facilities. But overall, it will add a new dynamic to the surf world and deliver a healthy pastime to countless lives.
Competitive surfing and wave parks
My bet is that it will be a long time before a pool surfer beats an ocean surfer in competition outside of a pool. There will be two circuits for sure: the WCT and WPT. Some guys will do both. It will happen in John John’s competitive lifetime. There’ll be a WCT event held in a wave park within the next three years, that’s for sure.
But When you paddle into the ocean life’s noise gets washed away. Waiting for waves is probably the most unique element of the surfing experience. It’s this spontaneous connection with nature that makes surfing the sport of kings, whether we realise it or not. It’s why we’re not in the Olympics. It’s absolutely beautiful.
When you put surfing in a pool with rules, regulations, predictability and time limits it’s just a sport. But I don’t think we ocean surfers need to fear it.