Stephanie Gilmore is a six-time WSL world champion and has 25 career victories. She is a great surfer because her shoulder and body rotations are extreme and her manuevers are very smooth. She is also one of the best when it comes to cutting deep into the waves and creating spray. Although not as victorious as Stephanie Gilmore, Jordy Smith has his own loyal following. This is partly because he was one of the first to progress the aerial type maneuvers, and persistently displayed them for movies, magazines, and competitions. Similar to Stephanie, Jordy has great rhythm and creates a lot of spray with his turns.

In her final, Stephanie was incredibly smooth and had near perfect scores. In his final, Jordy had smooth, massive turns and tenaciously continued his last ride in order to pull from behind for his win.

If you are new to surfing or haven’t tried it yet, watching pros like these could make you want to paddle out.

Relaxed Surfing Closer to Downtown

Trestles can get very crowded and is an hour north of San Diego. While, without traffic, the following beaches are about 30 minutes from downtown:

• Del Mar
• Swami’s, Encinitas
• Cardiff, South of Encinitas
• Pacific, Mission, and Ocean Beach (great for beginning surfers because of their smaller waves)[1]
• La Jolla
• Coronado