So Saturday will start with mosty leftovers, buried by the high tide, early in the morning…it will also have plenty of increasing S-SW winds and increasing periods of rain. By the afternoon a large shot of W-NW swell (275-300) starts to arrive, this will build overnight and eventually peak on Sunday. The stormy S-SW winds will turn NW’erly after midnight on Saturday and hold that NW’erly flow through most of Sunday.
Saturday will be pretty small in the morning…mostly knee-waist high at the average spots and some chest high+ sets at the standout WNW-NW spots. Shape will be slow and soft thanks to the high tide. Add in the S-SW winds (10-15+ knots) and it sounds like a good reason to stay in bed. There may be a couple of protected spots through the morning but the tide and lack of swell won’t really let much surf sneak into those areas.
Sunday a much, much bigger W-NW swell (275-300) arrives and peaks throughout the day. At this point the swell looks pretty hefty, particularly at the spots that have direct exposure to the WNW-NW.
Look for surf in the easy shoulder-overhead range for most W facing breaks. The better WNW facing spots will be running consistently head high to a couple of feet overhead…and possibly bigger at times. The top NW facing breaks, in Ventura, the South Bay, and San Diego, will have surf in the overhead to well overhead range and sets hitting near the double-overhead range. The swell actually gets a direct shot at Southern San Diego…so there is a shot at some bigger surf filtering into that region.
Winds look a bit suspect, but overall not as bad as Saturday…right now the models aren’t really matching up that well…check em out…
You can see that the COAMPS model is pretty heavy on the winds for the morning…showing steady onshore W-WNW winds, 10-20 knots, blowing through most areas pretty much from sunrise on.
The NWS graphical forecast is showing NW winds, strongest up around Ventura and Santa Barbara, but lighter as you move down through LA, OC, and San Diego.
Personally I don’t really trust either of the models all that much…a lot is going to depend on how fast the front moves through the area Saturday afternoon/night…if it can speed through we will see the ridge build in faster that would help clean up conditions. Based on what I am seeing I think that we plan on some light/moderate WNW-NW winds for the morning, maybe not enough to blow it out…but enough to get some bump texture on things. If you have to surf (in the poo water) then I would plan on sticking to spots that can handle the NW winds…you might even want to check some of the lesser exposed areas, there will be enough W in this swell to wrap energy into the more S-SW facing breaks, it won’t be as big as the W facing spots but they might dodge the wind a bit better.
When you get down to it this is another one of those weekends where, since we have a ton of swell in the water, that it may pay off to keep your “weather eye” on conditions…hopefully the dynamic nature of the storm will crack open a few surf windows as it passes on through. As usual if you surf send me a report and let me know how it is.
Make sure to check out the regional forecasts for the details for 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…
02/27/2010 Saturday
01:38AM LST 0.9 L
07:37AM LST 6.1 H
02:29PM LST -1.2 L
08:37PM LST 4.8 H
02/28/2010 Sunday
02:26AM LST 0.4 L
08:23AM LST 6.0 H
03:03PM LST -1.1 L
09:10PM LST 5.2 H
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