It’s Tougher to Ride the Tube in the Atlantic, New Jersey Surfers Claim

Think surfing and you think of California and Hawaii.

Think of New Jersey, and congested turnpikes, toxic waste and smokestack landscapes come to mind long before surfing does.

But riding the tube--that’s surfing lingo for all you landlubbers--is as popular in parts of New Jersey as, well, blond hair on a surfer.

True, the Beach Boys did not have the Garden State in mind when they sang “Surfing Safari.” But you wouldn’t know it after a visit to the 7th Street Beach in Ocean City, where the Atlantic surf is dotted with bobbing surfers.

“On a per capita-type basis, this area of the coast is as strong as California,” said Larry Friedel, a longtime surfer and owner of the 7th Street Surf Shop on the boardwalk across from the beach.

Desire and Mystique

“The waves aren’t as big, but it doesn’t tend to inhibit the kids as much,” Friedel said. “The desire is here, the mystique is here, the tradition is here.”

The Ocean City Surfing Assn. has been around for 25 years and is perhaps the oldest surfing association in the country, according to Friedel. It sponsors weekly contests in which surfers are judged on wave selection, style, maneuverability and how long they ride the wave.

Many local high school students belong to the National Scholastic Surfing Assn.--which is to high school surfers what the NCAA is to college football players. Surfers earn letters, just like their helmeted and shoulder-padded counterparts. They even have cheerleaders.

Surfing the New Jersey coast is different from California, where the waves are much bigger and more powerful and last longer. But the Atlantic Coast surfers don’t seem to mind. In fact, they are proud of the difference.

‘A Certain Talent’

“Though they are smaller and have less power, they are much more difficult to ride, so one has to have a certain talent for riding,” said Jim Kirk, 28, a surfer and lifeguard at the 7th Street Beach, the only guarded surfing beach on the East Coast.

“These guys go out to California, man, they just rip,” Kirk said.

The locals maintain that out-of-state surfers just cannot work the Jersey waves.

Also, it takes a certain finesse and sheer guts to surf at 7th Street, where the waves roll right under the boardwalk. Surfers have to be agile enough to maneuver their way through a maze of concrete pilings.

It is called “shooting the pier.” The crowds on the boardwalk take time out from cotton candy and Ferris wheels to stand at the railing and gawk as the surfers disappear below them.

“They’re always out there, morning, noon and night,” said Rachel Adams, who sells caramel popcorn on the boardwalk.

In fact, the die-hards are out there year-round, donning wet suits and smearing their exposed faces with a protective layer of petroleum jelly in the winter months.

Jellyfish on Their Heads

The surfers hang out together and are as much a clique as preppies, jocks or punk rockers. When they are not actually in the water, they eat pizza on the boardwalk, toss Frisbees or wear giant jellyfish on their heads.

“It’s because they don’t fit in in the high schools,” Kirk said. “They don’t play basketball. They don’t play football. They’re not good at it, so they end up doing this. They like to express themselves in a different way and still have an awful lot of fun in a really healthy sport.”

Dan Celluci, 15, of Somers Point, has been surfing for five years. He got started on a belly board when he was 7 and has only disdain for quarterbacks and point guards.

“They’re a bunch of jocks,” Celluci said, surfboard tucked under his arm. “I like individual sports. It’s a fun sport. It keeps you in shape and it’s competitive.”

Boards Cost $300

Surfboards go for $300 to $400 a pop, but, after that, expenses are minimal.

“The ocean is free,” Kirk said. “Once you have the board, you don’t have to pay anything else. Once you have a board, you’re it. Everything else is cake.”

Kirk would like the city to give surfers another beach because 7th Street has eroded so much. But he does not expect that to happen soon.

“There’s a stigma attached to us, that we are young radicals, we don’t adhere to the morals of society and we’re doing this kind of aberrant sport which nobody really understands,” Kirk said. “It was one of those things that everyone for a long time associated with the ‘60s, you know, with smoking pot and long hair.

In Good Shape

“Now, it’s completely different,” he said. “These kids are straight. They’re healthy. They eat fruit, yogurt and granola. When the waves get big, you have to be in good shape.”

Day after day, the surfers sit on their boards facing out to sea, feet dangling in the water, carefully eyeing each incoming swell for that perfect wave.

When one looks promising, they turn the board around, flop on their bellies and begin paddling furiously to stay at the crest. If the wave pans out, a whole line of fluorescent-colored boards gracefully glides into shore. And then they start all over again.

“It’s more than a sport,” Friedel said. “It’s a life style.”