Video of Rob Kelly’s ride viewed worldwide
By BILL BARLOW/Special to the Sentinel
MANAESQUAN – Picture a cold, rolling hillside built of 52-degree salt water. Then imagine Ocean City’s Rob Kelly sliding down the face as that hill rolls over itself, tucking him behind an overhead waterfall to eventually pop out the far side.
On a stormy ocean Dec. 1, pro surfer Kelly took on what many are calling one of the largest waves they’ve ever seen in New Jersey, captured in a video that has been shared around the world.
Kelly is not so sure it’s a record-breaker for New Jersey, which can get massive swell during winter storms and when hurricanes pass off the coast, but it was the biggest wave he’s seen in the East Coast for years.
“It’s definitely the biggest successful ride I’ve had this year,” he said in a later interview. “There were a lot of big waves coming in. There was a lot of raw energy out there. I got pretty worked trying to get those one or two good ones.”
In the 11-second video, you see Kelly drop down the face of the wave as it begins to break, with the cascade of water forming a curtain in front of him. Behind that water, he continues to ride inside a small pocket of space inside the wave, what surfers call the barrel.
Sometimes, that space closes entirely, or any of a myriad of potential miscalculations will throw a surfer from the board to be pounded by all that falling water. Getting beat up that way is often described as getting worked.
“Especially in waves that size, you have no control,” Kelly said. “Some are worse than others. When it doesn’t work, you paddle back out and try for the next one.”
Estimates of the wave size vary. In the video, it appears to be 12 to 15 feet as it starts to break. While on the wave, Kelly said, it’s not possible to make a good estimate.
“The easiest thing to say is it was well overhead,” he said.
The wave came in near Manasquan in Monmouth County, where Kelly and some other Ocean City surfers traveled in search of ridable waves as the swell came in. Most of the surf spots near Ocean City saw more chop than waves, conditions sometimes described as “victory at Sea.”
Locals Matt Keenan and sisters Mia and Brynn Gallagher, young sisters who have been making a name in competitive surfing, made the trip with Kelly, as did film producer Ryan Simalchik, also of Ocean City, who often goes by “Smallcheck” on social media.
It can take years of experience to find the best place to paddle out when big waves are due, Kelly said.
“Half the work is in the five days leading up to the swell, looking at the weather charts to see where we want to target to get the biggest set waves,” he said. Following surfer tradition, Kelly was not willing to get too specific about where he rode the wave. Some surfers are very protective of their local break and fear publicity leading to overcrowding.
Kelly is sponsored by Billabong and is part of the surf team with 7th Street Surf Shop. He said he’s surfed all over the world, including taking on massive waves on the West Coast, in Hawaii, in Europe and Indonesia and elsewhere.
The fact that the Dec. 1 ride was an East Coast wave has added to the interest. It’s rare for New Jersey to see truly massive waves.
“Bathymetry plays a factor,” he said, meaning the shape of the ocean floor under the waves. New Jersey’s coastline drops off gradually for miles. “The biggest thing is that weather patterns tend to move west to east, which means it’s always going to be the west that gets the entire front.”
A storm building strength as it moves across the ocean will have a more of a running start.
“That same swell might hit Portugal by the end of this week and the waves could be four times the size,” he said. “It’s the same reason Hawaii and California get the waves they do.”
The water temperature was about 52 degrees, relatively warm for this time of year. Kelly said that was probably the last session for the year without gloves. He does not mind the cold water much, but said it is additional motivation for a successful ride.
“The incentive to make it is a lot higher. Otherwise, now you’re getting worked and an ice-cream headache,” he said.
On social media, many surfers are already calling the ride the “Wave of the Winter for the Northeast,” a contest sponsored by O’Neill running from Maine to Maryland. Dec. 1 was the first day for potential entries.
Kelly said there is a surfer’s cliché that time stands still in the barrel. He said that’s not quite true, but it seems like the experience lasts far longer than it looks on the video. Ironically, for how much effort goes into getting inside the wave, after that the priority is getting back out.
“It’s a cool experience. Everything kind of goes into slow motion and you just try to get to the exit,” he said. “When you go back and watch the clip, it looks like it’s fast and violent. When you’re in there, it feels like it takes forever. As soon as you get in, the goal is to get out.
“It keeps me chasing that feeling all over the world for those few seconds,” he said.
