Thursday, January 21, 2010

Big Friday – Enough already…

Lots of swell showing on Friday…but semi-stormy conditions and marginal winds will keep most spots from having a surf day.

The peak of the W-WNW swell (260-300) will hit on Friday…and really it will just be too much size for most beaches. Sure there will be some protected spots that will work on Friday…but the funky winds (not to mention funky water quality) may not keep the surf window at those spots open for all that long.



Pretty much all W-WNW facing breaks throughout Socal will be running in the overhead to well-overhead range on Friday. The better winter spots will be running well-overhead with some double overhead+ sets mixing in. The standout WNW facing spots of San Diego and the South Bay will go double-triple-overhead and see some occasional bigger sets. Ventura will be big…but may not see as many big-ass sets like the other areas…it looks like some of the swell has almost a WSW direction to it, which lets the Channel Islands shadow the region just a bit.

Current weather forecasts are calling for yet another cold-front to push through early on Friday…setting up S-SW winds around 15-25 knots with some squally conditions, more rain, thunderstorms, waterspouts…generally the same mess that we have seen for the past few days. A lot depends on how fast the front moves through…but there may be a chance for S-SE winds in the morning for a few areas, which means that a handful of breaks could see offshore/side-offshore conditions. This doesn’t seem as likely as the last couple of days, but it is still a possibility. Check out a couple of the wind models (GFS and the COAMPS)…both are showing SW winds…but the NWS is calling for weaker winds.





There will be plenty of juice on tap for Friday…but overall I am not expecting much in the way of quality surf since most spots don’t like the S-SW winds, and really there is just too much swell energy being thrown around. That being said…you may want to keep an eye on things tomorrow…much like the last couple of days, there may be a few nuggets out there, particularly if the winds cooperate by coming in a little more SE’erly than the current forecast shows. Personally, even as stir crazy as I am getting, I am probably going to avoid the poo-water for a couple more days…anyway let me know if you head out (or send some pictures if you get some).

Make sure to read the regional forecasts for more details on how the storm will affect each county.

Regional/County Forecasts

Santa Barbara Surf Forecast
Ventura County Surf Forecast
Los Angeles County Surf Forecast
Orange County Surf Forecast
San Diego Surf Forecast

Here are the tides…as always stay safe you guys.

01/22/2010 Friday
01:12AM LST 4.3 H
08:27AM LST 1.7 L
01:25PM LST 2.5 H
06:44PM LST 1.7 L

3 comments:

t. walt said...

Wavewatch got swallowed up by Surfer Mag?

Anonymous said...

my arms no longer function :)

Anonymous said...

offshore almost all day maxed out thundering peaks only a few souls out in one calis most populated surf town, best day ever?