Thriving in the Crowd

A lifetime of surfing and consuming surf media and, as far as I can remember, I’ve never read a single word about how to cope with, adapt to, or even thrive in crowds, despite that being the daily reality for most of us. 

We bitch and moan, deny, obfuscate, escape to B-grade spots, or try to pretend slipping into 6 millimeters of rubber is somehow fun. We also spiral into denial, impotent rage, violence (though less and less often), or a weary resignation that having to split the pie into too-small pieces is the cost of doing business these days.

There is another way. There are many, in fact. 

For context, I live on the Far North Coast of New South Wales. I surf the full gamut of spots here, from unattended beachbreaks to some of the most crowded points on earth. Holiday crowds have gone nuclear, and I’ve shared the water with the complete spectrum of surfers now extant in our modern culture, ranging from absolute beginners to backpackers from every continent, sponno’ed groms, QS aspirants, achingly cool babes, walruses on logs, CT incumbents, retired legends with multiple world titles, cube monkeys, ancient mariners on the final strait home, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. 

You name it, and I’ve traded waves with them. We’ve been, in aggregate, a crowd.

It got me thinking, a process further crystallized by a conversation with Indo charter skipper Jody Perry, who advanced the notion that crowds in the Mentawais could largely be mitigated by a bit of education and consideration. 

Something so simple seemed revolutionary. Thus, during a recent period of daily surfing among the teeming masses of the Australian summer, I tried to formulate a framework to alleviate the worst of it, even allowing for the possibility of enjoying it.

I present my findings below for comments and criticisms.

***

The most radical proposition, to start: Even the most chaotic, aggressive crowd (Superbank, Pass, or Noosa, for local examples) can be improved by simple courteous behaviors, an approach that I have termed “creating zones of civility.” 

The people in your immediate circle can be competitors or comrades. By communicating with them and helping them catch a wave, you create the conditions for reciprocal behaviors.

In crowded point surf, for example, the ability to steal an extra second via someone beside you calling you in when the inside rider has fallen (or calling no, if they are still up) is invaluable. It makes things safer. It gives confidence.

If you can create this small zone of allegiances within an immediate circle, even with complete strangers, it’s amazing how many prime sets can be safely ridden in a huge crowd.

This is not always the case, but even if this tactic fails utterly as a method for snaring a set wave, you’ve established a better, more civil environment—more fun as a collective, certainly, but also, most importantly, for yourself. In the race of life, claimed former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating, always back self-interest, since at least you know he’s trying. This isn’t original thinking. Academics like Australian Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton, have identified the source of ethical behavior in these reciprocal arrangements. In short, you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Except in this case, consider applying the reverse order: You make the first move to try to help someone out, even a stranger. 

Indeed, there is a litany of brinkmanship tactics, chess gambits, and subtle mind tricks that can be applied, to varying degrees of success.

Having a better surf in a crowd by helping others have a better surf may seem counterintuitive, if not downright crazy, given that waves are generally regarded as finite resources. However, so-called tit-for-tat behaviors are widespread among chimpanzees. In 1960, primatologist Jane Goodall landed in Tanzania with the idea of the “noble ape” in her mind. After 18 years of study of the Gombe chimpanzees, she found that the evils of human societies had antecedents in the behavior of our nearest biological relatives.

Aggression, murder, infanticide, warfare—all were in evidence. But so were compassion, kindness, and cooperation. Her studies illuminated a paradoxical reality of humans: Aggression is innate, but so is coalition.

Look, I won’t lie. Goodall’s research demonstrated our preference for the in-group, meaning it’s easier and biologically hardwired into us to look after family first, tribe second. Therefore, in a crowd, you’ll probably block for your kids and show preference to your mates over an unfamiliar face.

Nonetheless, our evolutionary biology shows a strong positive effect from cooperation. Almost all of the major evolutionary transitions, from replicating molecules to complex animal societies, have relied upon solving the problem of cooperation. Understanding it, according to a 2007 paper titled “Evolutionary Explanations for Cooperation,” has been one of the few truly fundamental advances since Darwin in our grasp of natural selection.

Even the most aggro, testosterone-driven roosters can be corralled into this behavior. Sure, they may be a little slow in the reciprocal aspect of it, but at a minimum you have created a human connection that disrupts, if not entirely eliminates, the urge for them to drop in. Plus, it gives you some agency in a throng.

A recent example: In October, I ran across a frothing pack of Argentinians, who were staying at a camp in G-Land during the swell of the season. They wanted a wave quota. They strongly desired the tube of a lifetime at Speedies. They had with them camera guys, yoga instructors—the full complement of modern enablers for both living the dream and documenting it. 

The default response was anger, annoyance, impotent competition. Instead, I encouraged them, called them deeper, kept them moving. It created space for me when it came time for my ticket to be cashed in. In the end, it was them hooting me deep into a cool, blue drainer at Speedies, one of the best waves of my life. (Yes, their camera guy got it.)

***

A quiet word between comrades is apt here. Before paddling into the maelstrom—let’s use behind the rock at Snapper as an example, but this applies to any black-diamond wave—it’s useful to first ask yourself whether you possess the skills, and the confidence in those skills, to be able to cash in your ticket when it comes due. If not, would it really be so bad to start farther down the line, find a little more space, if at all possible? The easiest solution to all potential conflict, after all, is simply to walk away.

While we are behind the rock, so to speak, an observation on how the alpha male gets it done may be instructive. For the purposes of the example, we’ll use Mick Fanning. In one of the thickest and most competent crowds on the planet, there are three elements I have observed to the Fanning Approach, likely universal. 

First, identification: A flash of eyes indicates Fanning has determined the incoming set wave as his. The second element follows instantaneously, as Fanning takes action: sprint paddling into position. Whereby comes the third and final element: possession of the set wave. 

Before he has even gotten to his feet, Fanning has performed three vital actions at a higher level than anyone else in the water: identification, action, possession. There’s very little space between them for an interloper, even with 80 people within 50 yards of him. Getting spat out of a deep tube from behind the rock usually results.

Millions of hours of instructional and inspirational YouTube videos focus on what happens next—the execution of the ride—but no matter how many thousands of hours you watch or dump into expensive wave-pool sessions, you’ll never improve the three critical steps before it. That can happen only the long way around, via time, ocean knowledge, and possibly genetic advantages, same as it ever was.

***

Now, a less-radical claim: Someone paddles out on top of you onto an isolated peak? (A total annoyance, I think we can all agree.) Call ’em into their first wave. Message is, “I see you, and we’ll be sharing this patch of water. We’re going to sort it out, one way or another, hopefully taking turns and having fun, not hassling each other.”

The absolute beginner backpacker or COVID surfer who just has no business being anywhere near the peak? Is it so hard to offer a brotherly or sisterly word of advice for them to move down the line and find a safer spot to take off? Conversely, is it so hard to call a kid into a wave? “Give a wave. Give a smile. Meet a friend,” as Owl Chapman so eloquently pleaded in Five Summer Stories. The leashless log careening in the whitewater that almost kills your kid? Punch the fin out and send them in. Kidding, kidding. But say something. I’m still working on a calm response to this one.

As I was talking to Derek Hynd before the sun rose at the Pass—one of the most chaotically crowded waves on the globe—he shared with me the Makaha Protocol. Paddling around at the famed Hawaiian wave with his head down as a young pro, trying to keep a low profile, Hynd was broadsided by a very large gentleman. 

“Hey, brah, what’s your problem?”

“Nothing, sir.”

“Then come say hello and don’t ignore us.”

Surf rage gets the headlines, but it’s the uncountable little positive interactions that determine the quality of the surf for most of us.

A pal described a similar situation at an isolated Pacific island. The incumbent surfers were tremendously offended that my pal had not made overtures of friendliness upon arrival. Sometimes, despite our reputation as rugged isolationists, we need to connect. 

Hynd further described a separate method of crowd control he utilized at Jeffreys Bay, this time with a repeat drop-in offender. The free-friction practitioner induced his foil to paddle with him way, way too deep—somewhere almost to the next point—and described the method as successful as long as one was “prepared to write off the whole surf.”

Indeed, there is a litany of brinkmanship tactics, chess gambits, and subtle mind tricks that can be applied, to varying degrees of success. These include false set-wave whistles, back paddling, peak squatting, performative splashing techniques, head fakes, left-go-rights, blocking, and decoy committals—the latter of which is intended to incite positioning transposals or, in ideal scenarios, true committal by your neighbor to inferior options, thus, again, clearing space for yourself out the back. A common tactic at my local point is simply known as trolling—paddling too deep to attract a non-knowledgeable crowd the way a fishing lure might attract a fish, then slowly making your way back to the takeoff button in time for the next set.

In the long run, though, at the very least, it seems the Makaha Protocol outwits and outperforms the J-Bay Protocol.

***

Localism in Hawaii gets a bad rap, or has in the past, as the standard bearer of violent retribution for infractions, or hostility toward outsiders. Hollywood surf movies have traded hard in this currency, which strikes a chord in mainstream Joes. The reality is more nuanced, or even directly counter to what economist JK Galbraith refers to as the “conventional wisdom.”

The Californian surfing psyche is still tortured by the deforming influence of one of its founding statements: “In this crowded world,” John Severson famously declared in Vol. 1 No. 1 of Surfer, “the surfer can still seek and find the perfect day, the perfect wave, and be alone with the surf and his thoughts.” However, it’s quite likely—if we accept that a misanthropic genius like Bob Simmons was an outlier—that before the Severson Declaration, Californians behaved like Hawaiians and embraced surfing with friends as the pinnacle of the experience. There are many historical accounts to buttress this view.

What the Hawaiians and other Polynesians continue to show us is the happiness of a well-functioning lineup. It can still be experienced at some of the more localized breaks in Australia, particularly if you are lucky enough to have a place in the set rotation. It’s a type of bliss, a well-developed “theory of mind” in play, in which everyone in the lineup knows the others’ strengths and weaknesses, who is next in the rotation, who will somehow be out of position when a set comes—not so much hierarchical as cooperative, even though the best guys still get the best waves. 

In our current era, crowd behavior has evolved scarcely mentioned, away from violence as a solution. Even implied violence is now rare in the age of litigation, smartphones, and jujitsu. The greater influence of women in worldwide lineups, and increasingly in waves of consequence, has also played a role in the diminution of aggression. 

At my home break, once famed for its enforcers, the sons and daughters of those who thought nothing of throwing hands in the surf (and on land) now get their wave quotas by skill, positioning, and varying amounts of cooperation, employing tactics that have been described above.

Surf rage gets the headlines, but it’s the uncountable little positive interactions that determine the quality of the surf for most of us, most of the time, no matter how big the crowd. I’m just saying, you can rig that game in your favor.