"It saddens us to make this call but we can confidently say we will be back again with the product you all have seen and hoped to experience."
Less than two weeks ago, Southern California’s surfers rejoiced with the opening of the region’s first commercial wave tank. The Palm Springs Surf Club, tucked into the magnificent Coachella Valley, promised glorious on-demand thrills for an altogether reasonable price. 200 U.S. dollars guaranteed an hour of joy in Hollywood’s playground.
Our very own Com Turren opened his pocketbook and made the trip, recently, sharing, “What is the experience of a public session like for your average peasant of average surfing ability? Pretty fun, just so long as you recognize that this is not surfing—it’s riding waves in a pool.”
Though he was not allowed to enjoy the “slab setting” as it was broken.
The month of January sold out almost as soon as it was posted.
Alas, sad news is trickling out from the desert. The tank is being shuttered indefinitely due “technical challenges.”
“In recent days,” a missive to those who had booked began, “we have been experiencing technical challenges. We have been working through them but our goal here at The Palm Springs Surf Club is to consistently deliver epic waves. In order to maintain the quality we have worked so hard to achieve within our wave settings, we need to take the whole system down to make it strong again. As a team that has been dedicated to the stoke, it saddens us to make this call but we can confidently say we will be back again with the product you all have seen and hoped to experience.”
Further information is included regarding refunds, booking in the future etc.
But did you have a slot pre-paid and a trip all planned?
Where were you going to stay?
The Parker is always a wonderful choice and I’d recommend you keep to your schedule, minus the surfing bits of course. There are two bocce courts on property as well as tennis and oversized chess.
Still, still, though hopefully issues are worked out and the waves pump in February.
David Lee Scales, who has surfed the place twice, and I did not discuss this bit of misfortune during our weekly chat though did delve into the origin story of Kelly Slater’s obsession with turtles. It is as whimsical as it is shocking.
Have a listen, won’t you?
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this is how i felt after wisemans got fingered
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oppie…oppie…oppie…Barbie…
All right, everybody in the pool!
‘Tis a fine barn, but sure ’tis no pool, English.
D’oh-eth!
you will be pleasantly surprised by the wave too. Not Rincon, but has a couple fun sections.
Didnt Lochtfeld say this pool was going to make every other one “irrelevant” or the like?
Fuck
Two weeks ago Lochtefeld said Kelly’s pool is “headed for the junkyard” when interviewed by BG. Keep in mind PSSC was already having major tech issues leading up to that interview, that many people were aware of (but Chas, Derek, and Tom somehow didn’t know or acknowledge).
The Journalism part of Surf Journalism is a tough gig!
It’s not easy to build a wave.
Boise, Idaho has a couple of fun standing waves on the river through town. The river provides the power, and the fast water going up the face is like an overhead barrel, on a waist high face. It takes a lot of tweaking, but it’s highly adjustable and operated by people who are surfers. It’s challenging and fun.
Bend, Oregon saw the success of this wave, and did something similar on their river. The wave is less challenging but easier to ride forever (which can be annoying to the line waiting). But if you do wash out, there’s a real potential for shoulder injury because it doesn’t wash you into deep water like the one in Boise. It’s a sheet wave, designed more like a submerged Flowrider.
Boise then embarked on a project to build the ultimate standing wave on the river. The wave was a success — big and fast. But it turned out to have a Pipeline-level danger factor, with surfers being slammed into submerged riprap that tore wetsuits and caused injuries. Helmets are mandatory. I never tried it because when they fired it up, I was recovering from a concussion didn’t want permanent brain damage. This was a few years ago and they’re still trying to get it to work right.
Standing waves are relatively cheap. In Alberta, locals have even built their own. Wave pools require a lot of expensive energy to move all that water, and very tough, expensive hardware to handle it.
Slater’s wave pool is really impressive, not just because it produces good waves, but even more because it didn’t self destruct within a few months. But surfing there is anything but cheap.
If Lochtefeld can really pull this off, for these prices, long term, I’ll be impressed. He, himself, Mr Flowrider, diverted his efforts to sheet waves years ago because he fully grasped the engineering and economic challenges involved in wave creation.
But for the price, I at least don’t want to be wearing a 4/3, booties and gloves.
At some point, it’s going to be a lot more fun to take a week and go to a warm water surf camp, for the money.
The big appeal of the artificial river waves in Montana, Idaho, Oregon, etc., is that they’re free to play on.
Pretty big stretch to call those waves. A standing wave and a moving body of water are way different. They don’t even use actual surfboards. But you do you.
The river waves work with foam, fiber, and fins. Shapes have been optimized for the weird combo of more speed and less size, but they’re surfboards and there’s plenty of water under them, unlike a Flowrider.
Some river waves even work with longboards. It depends on the structure.
The point is, they’re relatively easy, compared with these projects. Slater’s was ungodly expensive, costs a lot to operate, and frankly, is pretty ugly.
What they’re doing in Palm Springs is extremely ambitious on many levels.
I’ve never been to Waco, though I have known people who went. No brain infections, fortunately.
River waves are fun, but boring as. Ones i’ve tried have felt nothing like surfing really.
deliverance…paddle.
As a lover of Montana river waves, there is no comparing the waves on rivers to the ocean, nor the style of surfing. Not sure what you’re going for here
Engineering.
If you need to push the water with artificial energy, it’s expensive and highly subject to breakdowns.
Yes it is engineering. Let’s divert the LA river to make a river wave in Santa Monica
There was a big Flowrider installation in Mission Beach. I never went there because WTH the were waves right in front of it.
Probably should have, because as you said, it’s different, and fun.
Artificial energy is that a Zappa song ?
Most likely.
driver keeps burning out the clutch
thx
I went to lances rights and it went onshore and flat for 5 days
Quick and cheap flights from LAX to DFW, $300.
Yeah, any time i’ve ever been to an amusement park there’s always a couple of rides closed. Complexities of moving water would be next level compared to a rollercoaster. Hence maybe why Kellys pool is very simple in comparison.
just a boat wake.
Dude, what’s your water temp in summer… now?
Since I answered you yesterday? Still dont know but last of the Snow melt has passed though the rivers, so finally warming up.
What’s your other username and i’ll check. Apologies for the Surf Journalism.
Check the comments on this thread if anything was deleted. You can also see my posts over 2 weeks ago bitching about posts disappearing. I admit, it’s possible I posted below another Palm Springs BG puff piece, but the UI here sucks and you never know what thread will come up: https://beachgrit.com/2023/…
It’s fucking BG man, just go with it. Bexy has had more comments deleted than everyone else combined but he never whines or complains, just keeps posting.
Well, Bex did whine very publicly on the DLS podcast. But im sure looking back he’d acknowledge that me banning him was for his own best interest.
He should be banned for constantly changing his name and being a POME living in Sydney.
Beach Grit Tough Love. It’s good for you!
That would be a fun analysis. Palm Springs V Waco.
Hot, both. Food? PS has a bunch of tourist traps so one good smoke house tips in favor of Waco. Parties? Well, one def appeals to gays and the other maybe indy guitar coffee bars?? Dunno. Flights? Waco prolly easier. You can’t even fly from PS to Vegas. Everywhere flies to Vegas. Hotels? Uber expensive motel rooms in PS, dunno bout Waco… do they Airbnb the Koresh Compound… wait, no, burned to the ground by the deep state.
I stayed at the hotel rooms at the Waco pool, down the hall from Tony Hawk, whose entire crew was there at same time. It’s somewhat bare bones, but overlooks the pool with a common balcony with the other rooms (TH apologized for all the shit they had on the balcony in front of their room). You fly into Dallas, which is roughly an hour plus drive from Waco, so we rented a car with a big engine and took advantage of the TX high speed limits. There’s not a ton in Waco, basically Baylor and the Magnolia home renovation empire – but found a good restaurant downtown, the waiter told us he had served lots of pro surfers, including Kelly (maybe lying, but it was a good story). The pool itself is a few miles outside the city in the middle of nothing. But it’s a pretty quick drive to civilization, i.e., Waco proper. Vibe at the pool is very casual and upbeat, about as friendly a surf destination as you will find outside of the old days down in CR. Everyone pretty frothing, very friendly in and out of the water, good times actually. I’ll be doing it again for sure.
Good bouldering in the vicinity too..
Kelly did go to Waco once. It’s on youtube
I second Barrelled’s comment. And from personal experience at some of the more crowded spots in North America, including a spot I know you frequent, the beauty of not hassling for waves and not being dropped in on is something to experience at least once.
Go to Waco Jen. That pool is a blast and the wave is WAY longer than Clay Marzo’s red headed step brothers pool.
truth
heard the same thing from several people.
AND, Waco was pretty fun on top of the park.
You ain’t getting me in lazy piss filled river under any circumstances. The number of fat asses I saw entering that thing with a case of Dr. Pepper was mind boggling.
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Com did PSSC refund you?
Not yet. Still also waiting on a response to my email inquiry about that.
It’s sad/funny that we have to go to BG comments to get any real info on what’s going on.
Just call me the Ice Cream Man—I get the scoop
When will you involve an industry heavy like Chas?
when $100 is a hill worth dying on, I suppose.
Logic and reason are rare traits on the pages of BG. BRAVO!!!
Think they have DR handling their email system.
I would have left a Brown Trout in their tub.
Xox
shocked face
First, Chas fails to report the real scoop on their mechanical problems even though word was out weeks ago. Instead he shills PSSC like a salesman, also writing a cringeworthy puff piece on Lochtefeld. Second, Chas fails to post an official link of PSSC’s statement of shutting down. Surf journalism hahaha
What do you expect? Surf journalism? Hahaha indeed.
This is BeachGrit: come (i.e. get suckered in) for the clickbait; stay for the comment section.
it’s you, it’s always been you.
You’re right. Chas still never responded to my call out re: the Filipe Toledo supposed fight / grab in the water at Lowers. Chas posted that clickbait sht and never backed it w any footage, evidence, witness interviews. It should be on the surfline cam if it were real. Nobody supposedly involved or there ever acknowledged it as real.
That free session Chad was hoping for just went down the drain. Wonder if they plan to refund all the deposits they already got for pool time or if they plan to steal everyone’s money like they did to Com.
They better hope Kalani isn’t involved with the finances. Who knows how much he learned from his parents.
Dropped a tip to Chad regarding Kalani’s potential “uninvolvement” that was awkwardly alluded to on the Monday MASS. Awaiting the story
Let me ask!