Here is a quick question for you; what has 7500kms of beautiful coastline with thousands of beaches, uncrowded surf, warm water, cheap and beautiful food, fantastic accommodation and nobody knows about it? That would be India.
A couple of months ago I was invited to India by Arun Vasu, the President of the Surfing Federation of India (SFI). He and his energetic team are based in the beautiful little beachside town of Kovalam just south of Chennai (Madras). The surfing community in India is new, in fact very new. And small, in fact very small. But the size of the community belies their enthusiasm, organisational skills and not to mention their surfing prowess.
Whilst I was there, I was fortunate enough to meet both the board of directors of the SFI as well as the Indian Surfing Team. The team is young and energetic and committed to bringing India out from the wilderness into the wide world of competitive surfing. And the board of directors governing the sport are committed, highly talented and from a wide variety of backgrounds. One of them for example, Somdev Devvarman, was a former professional tennis player who was on the international circuit for 10 years. He nearly beat Leyton Hewitt!
Last year, for the first time in its surfing history, SFI hosted a QS event in Mahabalipuram. The competition was a wonderful success and surfers from Asia and Australia travelled to India to compete. This year, in August, the Indian surfing team competed at the Asian Surfing Championships in the Maldives and took home the prize. Make no mistake, this surfing community might be small but it’s on the rise.
India has a long way to go before it’s a major force in the world of competitive surfing. But it will happen. The movement has started and it’s picking up pace. A few years ago, there were approximately 12 surf schools in the whole of India and now there are over 75 and that number is increasing exponentially. One of the surf schools I visited is run by Samai from Pondicherry. This is a beautiful French town which is situated an hour and a half south of Chennai. Samai and his brother Juan run a very successful surf school and surf shop. A generation ago their parents left France to settle in the French conclave of Pondicherry. I was fortunate enough to go to ‘Pondy’ and witness a beautiful Kirra like right hand point breaking perfectly for over 100 metres with one longboarder in the water. “It gets good,” said Samai. “We had it at three to four feet the other day with only a few of us out. And there are plenty of other waves around here which pretty much no one surfs and no one knows about”.
India is the world‘s largest population at over 1.4 billion. With a committed surf community and a very well organised governing body, you would be a brave man to bet that an Indian would not be on the CT tour within 10 years. Tracks is committed to helping the Indian surfing community develop and prosper. We have established a relationship with the SFI and the first Tracks India mag will be hitting the news stands shortly. Watch this space.
South India may not have yet discovered the perfect waves of its neighbours Sri Lanka, the Maldives and the Anderman Islands but it does have thousands of kilometres of relatively untouched coastline just waiting to be explored. Do something different and go to India for your next surf trip. You wont be disappointed.
