Beached sub-career happily caught in a magazine

ROBERT GARDNER

I see Sports Illustrated has once again focused on The Wedge. Thirty

years ago, the magazine decided to do an article on the place. I had

recently written a book about bodysurfing, and they contacted me,

asking if I would agree to appear in the article.

Agree? What red-blooded American boy wouldn’t agree to be in

Sports Illustrated, especially one who was so small that he was on

the C swim team all through high school, who played golf with his

wife only to inevitably hear, “You’re away, Bob.” This was my big

chance, and there was a certain amount of poetic justice about it. I

had been part of the group that pioneered that sport -- an unwilling

part, but a part nevertheless.

Back in the early days, bodysurfing was the water sport of choice,

and one of the premier spots was the Balboa pier. The waves were so

good then that on a big day, if you took off and looked to your

right, you would see water running down the surface of the pier. Look

straight ahead, and you had a good view of the Pavilion. When they

dredged the harbor, however, they had to put all that sand someplace.

They dumped it all along the peninsula and in the process destroyed

the Balboa pier for surfing. Nothing was left but a shore break.

However, the same sand that ruined the pier for surfing created

another surf spot.

Before the dredging at what we call The Wedge, a rock groin ran at

right angles to the west jetty, making it impossible to surf there.

Waves coming along the jetty smashed into the groin. Anybody trying

to surf would have been killed. However, they dumped enough sand

there that the groin was covered and The Wedge, known as the Point in

those days, was born.

The first man to surf The Wedge, to my knowledge, was Tagg Atwood.

Tagg was one of those people who didn’t know fear. When he was dying,

I asked him if he’d ever been afraid. He gave me a perplexed look.

“Of what?” he said. A friend like that makes for adventure.

One day, when a swell was running and we were moaning the demise

of our favorite surf spot, Tagg said, “I know! Let’s go check out the

Point.” Off we trekked, none of us thinking we were going to do

anything but look at the place. We got there, and those big, peaked

waves were coming in and crashing down with a noise like thunder. We

sat on the sand that now covered the groin, admiring the power of the

ocean, and then Tagg said, “Let’s go in.”

This was in the days before fins, and looking at the mountains of

water out there, it looked like an invitation to a drowning, but Tagg

had a way of making the craziest thing seem logical. Soon we were all

in the water, and to this day I can remember taking off on a big one,

certain I was going to my death, and next to me on the same wave was

Tagg with a huge smile on his face. Somehow we survived the

adventure, and it got a little easier once we all had fins, but by

the time Sports Illustrated called, my big-wave years were well

behind me. Still, to be in Sports Illustrated ...

A swell arrived, and so did the magazine crew. I sat on the beach,

watching the best bodysurfers in the world getting pummeled,

wondering if my 60-year-old body could possibly hold up and getting

more and more nervous with every moment as I waited for them to give

me my cue to get into the water. Finally, the moment was there.

“Okay, Judge,” the photographer said. I stood up, heart pounding,

knees knocking. “Thanks for your time,” he said and gathered his

equipment and left. There is a picture of me in the article sitting

in my beach chair, watching the hotshots in the water, but I can say

I’ve been in Sports Illustrated.

* ROBERT GARDNER is a Corona del Mar resident and a former judge.

His column runs Tuesdays.