The Breakwater-St Ives Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright, let’s get into it.

Look, the next couple of weeks are going to be a bit of a head-scratcher for us. There’s plenty of water moving, but it’s mostly going to be messy, blown-out, or just plain weak. We’re going to have to be patient and pick our moments, or we’ll be getting skunked more often than not. The beginning of the run is a total write-off, so don’t even bother waxing up until we get past that first block.

The whole weekend of the 22nd and 23rd is dead. We’re looking at tiny, weak swell – nothing over 2ft – and the wind is blowing onshore or cross-shore, chopping everything up into a mess. You’d be fighting it more than surfing it.

The start of the next week, the 24th and 25th, isn't much better. Swell stays small, and while the wind swings around to a cross-off, which cleans things up a bit, there’s just no power in the water. It’s ankle-biters at best.

We finally see a pulse of real swell arrive on Thursday the 27th. The wave energy jumps to a solid 374, and we get a 6ft SW groundswell. The winds are offshore too, which would normally have me frothing. But the period is only 8 seconds, which is pretty short-period for that size. It’s going to be a bit lumpy and disorganized. It’s promising, but not the cleanest window. And for the love of god, they’ve got thunderstorms forecast, so keep an eye on the sky.

That swell bumps up on Friday the 28th but the quality goes south. It’s getting big – 7 to 10ft – but the wind swings around to the west and goes cross, then cross-off at a solid 19-22 mph. With that short period, this is going to be a wind-blown mess. At this size, with these winds, this is looking way more interesting for the kite crew than for us paddle surfers. The energy is massive though, hitting 1040, so there’s a lot of water moving, just not in a clean, surfable way.

The weekend of the 29th and 30th sees the swell ease back, but the quality remains poor. The wind stays westerly, and the swell drops back to that junky, short-period stuff. We’re back to paddling around looking for a shadow or a bank that’s holding.

Okay, here’s the one, and only one, standout in this whole run. Monday the 31st of August. The wind fucking drops out completely. We’re looking at glassy conditions, with a clean 5ft W swell rolling in and an energy of 354. This is the window to be out at The Breakwater-St Ives (St Ives). It’s a point, and this is the size and clean condition it just loves. The wind is light and variable, so the face should be smooth as glass. It’s inconsistent, that’s the catch, so you’ll be waiting for the sets, and you might be sharing it with a few others who’ve been waiting for a window all week, but it’ll be worth it. This is your morning session.

After that, the surf drops right back down to tiny, onshore slop for the first few days of September. The 1st and 2nd are just poor, with cross-onshore winds and weak swells. Forget it.

The second standout, and it’s a long way out, so treat it with a pinch of salt, is Friday the 4th of September. The forecast is for a glassy morning with a 4ft WNW groundswell. Clean conditions, proper period at 9 seconds. That afternoon it looks even better with a 5ft WNW swell, and the period stretching out to 12 seconds, with a light offshore wind. This is a classic setup for a point break, giving us some proper lined-up waves. It’s a long way off, so we can’t get too excited, but it’s a promising sign that things might be turning around.

The final few days of the forecast, the 5th and 6th, get blown out again with strong SSE winds, so that Friday the 4th looks like our last decent shot in this window.

So, bottom line: it’s a lean couple of weeks. Get on it Monday morning the 31st if you can, and start holding your breath for that Friday the 4th of September. The rest is a whole lot of nothing that’s too big, too sloppy, or too weak to bother with.

Rusty

Read more