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The surf team is up and in the water before many students wake up. With a successful club rush, the Santa Barbara High School (SBHS) surf team kicks off with practices and contests.
On Thursday, Sept. 25 the SBHS surf club had many new sign-ups during club rush located in the quad. The club is unique because it is one of the few at SBHS that meet away from school. The SBHS surf team began in 2002. Despite being a club, the team competes in surf leagues just like other high school sports. They practice on Thursday mornings from 7:00-8:00 a.m. at Hendry’s Beach. They also have coaches, competition, and sponsors, similar to a sports team.
The current coaches are JP Garcia and Isao “Tonma” Tomatsuri. The current teacher advisor is Travis Mañach and the former advisors were Mike Fair and Stephanie Rivera. The team also holds club officer positions: President of the SBHS surf team is Logan Gankas, Vice President (VP) is Aiden Albada, and the remaining two officers are Paylin Marcillac and Levi Zapata.
The competitions typically take place on weekends. The surf team practices and competes throughout the entire school year. Club VP, Aiden Albada, has been a member of the club for three years, but started surfing long before that. The team has participated in one contest so far this year. Albada said the waves were better than expected but still “pretty bad” on competition day. At a recent practice, the waves were small, so the team did dryland training.
This year the surf team is working towards competing at the Scholastic Surf Series league regionals competitions. In order to compete, they must have enough surfers on the team. When asked about his goals for the season Albada said he hopes, “to get enough kids to go to the regional competitions” because in the last few years there were “not enough kids able to go.” Marcillac said, “My personal goal is to get more girls to be a part of the club.” There are currently two girls in the club (Paylin included), so the club also hopes to add more female members to their group in the future.
The SBHS surf club is open to surfers of all levels and welcomes anyone interested in catching some waves. The surf team is one of the most unique and organized clubs on campus and the members are looking forward to keeping the club alive on and off campus for years to come.
