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The hosts, The Scarborough Malibu Surf Club, were forced to postpone the event back in September as Phil Thacker, Club Chairman, explains, "We had no choice unfortunately as the forecast was for a flat sea with no swell on the horizon at all."

Luckily the weather was far better during the first weekend in October, "The waves in the South Bay were really impressive on the Saturday morning."

Phil, who's been surfing for over 20 years says that nothing beats the sport for an "adrenalin rush". That feeling perhaps explains why the popularity of the sport has grown over the last few years. "When we started up you would only see a few people out on their boards, now you can see hundreds of people out all along the coast".

Although surfing is usually associated with the south coast, in particular the coast around Cornwall and Devon, Phil says that the attractions of the North Sea are becoming more and more evident.听 Many professional surfers are willing to travel north for the excellent surfing conditions that the Yorkshire Coast provides.

No greater challenge

So how do the championships work?

The longboard is the traditional style of surfing using a board that has to be longer than nine foot. At that length you need to exercise considerable control over your board.

Phil Thacker says, "Each club has one or more teams of six surfers. Each team member surfs in a 20 minute heat with other surfers from different clubs with points awarded for first, second and so on. The clubs accrue their points over the two day event.听 The team with the most points wins."

This year 12 clubs from around the country competed for the title.听 The Scarborough Malibu Surf Club were beaten into second place by Devon's 'Hotdoggers', Britain's longest running longboard club.听 It was a tight contest, though, with only two points dividing the teams.