Edwards makes waves at UCSD
By Etienne Emanuel

Following the waves has been good to Clint Edwards. A 1999 graduate of Villanova, Edwards is in his final semester in school at the University of California at San Diego. He is currently captain of the national champion surf team after spending a year as co-captain. Learning to surf at the tender age of 13, he and his buddies from Ojai spent summers all over the coast of Ventura County.

"I would say it has paid off," joked Clint. "We spent a lot of time driving and just following the waves."

UCSD showed a vast improvement from a year ago, where they placed ninth in nationals, compared to this year, when they placed first in the National Scholastic Surf Association Championships. The team traveled the California coast competing in San Diego, Huntington Beach, as well as the ever-popular C Street in Ventura, the spot where Edwards learned to surf .

"I really know the breaks well close to home. It's a nice home court advantage, you could say."

The win this year left Edwards ecstatic. "We had a thrilling season. It didn't really hit me that we were national champs until the awards banquet," Edwards enthused. "I feel really fortunate to be part of it. It was a lot of hard work. Our program got essentially no funding from the school, which is disappointing hopefully we can change that."

As captain, he struggled to run a structured program, organizing all the workouts. "But it would be nice to get some funding to help," Clint said. "It just goes to show hard work pays off."

Edwards not only spends time at the beach but pushes himself in the classroom as well. He majors in biology and currently has a 3.6 GPA in his major courses and a 3.0 overall. Good marks are nothing new to him though; Edwards graduated from Villanova with a 3.83 overall GPA. "I am looking at U.C. Davis and Scripps College for grad school. I need to finish up my credits here first. I still have some classes left to take."

He's also into keeping the beaches he grew up on clean for generations to come. "I'm taking organic chemistry this summer, and studying ecology, which really ties into surfing as far as working on solutions to clean up our beaches and water. We really need to stop wasting so much, it's hurting the planet," said Clint.

He laughs at some of the stereotypes that go along with surfing: "You have shows on MTV called Surf Girls and thousands of people watch it and formulate opinions. It is really just like any other culture - you develop a language with slang and all. I would say dude is probably the most popular word, and there are plenty more," he said. "It's silly to judge anything but yourself and especially other people's intelligence based on the fact that they surf. At the same time stereotypes don't come out of thin air, I know guys that are still bus boys and are 35 and say dude, bro, and brah."

But it's not all fun and games. Edwards said he's heard stories of "guys getting beat up by locals who are so territorial. I respect the order of the line up but to go to the point of punching someone over it, which is just ridiculous."

To sum it all up, he noted, "People just tend to grab onto whatever is available and stereotypes can be easy for some people to latch onto."

© 2003 The Ojai Valley News

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