With a score of 73-62, the students of Cathedral Catholic’s surf club have started their season off strong with their first successful competition of the year last Saturday against Horizon.

The club of 55 members meets each Monday for practice, but only 30 members actually participate in the monthly competitions. Spanish teacher, Mr. Theobald leads the team and serves as the club moderator. This is his third year as a coach for the team and second year as head coach.

Because the members have many different skill levels, the team breaks up into groups during practices. Mr. Theobald said, “We focus attention on the competitors during practice. The other non-competitors still attend the practices and participate in the warm-ups, but we break off into groups. We start as a group of one and split up in order to better accommodate everyone.”

The surf season is year-round, starting in October and ending in April. Each competition is team-versus-team, and the top three placing individuals in the competition go into a head-to-head competition at the end. It is possible but very rare that the top three finishers are all from the same team.

Cathedral’s team has participated in the state championship held at the end of the year for many successive years. Walker Fraser, a senior and team leader, placed third in the state championship last year.

Remarking on the team’s potential for the upcoming year, Mr. Theobald said, “We have a strong group of seniors this year, three or four strong participating females, and a strong short board team as well as a group of underclassmen looking to see what they can do. The team is looking promising and is very excited.”

To Cathedral’s surfers, the terms surf club and surf team are used interchangeably.

However, they hope to set the record straight. Mr. Theobald said, “We may have club aspects, but we are definitely a team.”