When Doug and Ariel Ogilvie talk about their passion for tandem surfing, a sport that's about as difficult as it is obscure, it's easy to tell they are close-knit teammates; they even finish each other's sentences.
And in their sport, the father-daughter pair--who have been surfing together since Ariel was a toddler--need to be perfect partners above everything else. Especially this week, when they head to the far-eastern edge of Australia for the World Tandem Surfing Invitational in the tiny resort town of Noosa, Queensland.
It's something like the world championships of tandem surfing, Doug Ogilvie says, and even after a lifetime on the waves (his first surf contest was in 1964), being at the top of his field is still new territory for him.
It's also something they wouldn't have been invited to last year. Last summer, however, they surfed in the fiercely competitive Call to the Wall contest in Malibu and placed fourth out of a field of 17 pairs. They also surfed the Buffalo's Big Board Classic in Hawaii, the biggest contest.
"We finally broke into the inner circle," Doug says. "That contest showed us what we were capable of." But this is the big time. "Australian couples practice for an entire year, and all the current and past world champions will be there."
Photograph by Bob Torrez
Ariel and her father, Doug Ogilvie, do a one-arm lift.
Ariel will also be surfing solo against a field of accomplished women surfers.
Even so, she isn't worried. "I just want to do my best and have fun. I don't really care about winning," she says.
The Los Gatos High School freshman has competed with her dad for two years, but they've been surfing together for much longer. Doug, whose father, Bruce Ogilvie, taught him to surf when he was a child, brought all three of his daughters--Tandem, 16; Ariel, 14; and Morgan, 9--out on the waves at an early age. "It's a good way for young people to learn to surf," he says. "We took them all out when they were babies."
Tandem surfing, which dates back to pre-colonial Polynesia (the sport turns up in paintings and photos) and Southern California beaches in the '60s, is an emerging performance art in the surfing world.
"A lot of people don't even know what tandem surfing is," Doug Ogilvie says.
"It's kind of like couples skating," adds Ariel.
Photograph by Bob Torrez
The Buddha, a one-arm lift, is quite difficult, but it's a high point earner in competition.
Back in the '60s, on Muscle Beach in Santa Monica, the cross-pollination came when circus performers started hanging out at the beach, and surfers started learning their tricks--out on the waves.
Doug remembers those earlier days of surfing, when the sport was more of a lifestyle. "When I was growing up it wasn't like it is now. There was no competition, and everyone just did it for the love of it. Most of the kids who are excelling now are trying to make a living out of it," he says. "We were going out without ankle cords, without wetsuits, and using heavy longboards. I used to hitchhike to Southern California every summer, and all the surfers used to crash at this place called Cottage City, by Camp Pendleton."
Ariel teases him for skipping school to head over the mountains to Santa Cruz.
Doug's father started him body surfing when he was a boy, and his uncle gave him a homemade board made from instructions in a Popular Mechanics magazine.
In a typical half-hour routine, pairs paddle out to catch a set of at least three waves, and as they glide toward the beach, they run through a planned set of lifts, shoulder swans, arabesques, Buddhas, high stag and other maneuvers that fit in somewhere between dance and skating.
The Ogilvie team also has a trick up its wetsuit sleeves that very few other teams can duplicate: the hand-to-foot, in which Doug holds his daughter by her feet, as she stands up on his hands.
Photograph by Bob Torrez
The hand-to-foot stand is the most difficult in the Ogilvie's repertoire.
Because of the performance aspect, more non-surfers are able to enjoy the show, Doug Ogilvie says. "It's easier for the public to see the performance, and it's easy to see who the winners and losers are." The judges look at the difficulty of the lifts and the quality of the surfing. The more waves a team catches the better, and wipeouts earn a penalty.
To practice, Doug and Ariel hit the waves in Santa Cruz and in warmer Southern California and practice lifts and maneuvers in the living room. "It's like practicing dance, you have to have perfect combinations," Doug says. The most important part, however, is their status as teammates and family. "The relationship is the most important. If we have a bad day and we're cranky with each other, then it throws off the whole partnership."
As a performer, Ariel already has a long résumé. As a cheerleader at LGHS, she's a flier on her squad (look for her standing on shoulders and being tossed into the air), an actress who's had parts in several plays, four television commercials and two movies, a tap and jazz dancer and a soccer player.
Maybe she gets it from her grandmother, Diane Ogilvie, who sang in San Francisco nightclubs years ago. "We both inherited the same blood, I guess, we both love to perform," Ariel says.
Photograph by Bob Torrez
In addition to tandem competition, Ariel also competes solo.
Doug also surfed with his oldest daughter, Tandem (yes, named after the sport), until she outgrew the weight classifications imposed on competing teams. And as Ariel grows up, she'll probably outgrow the limits before she gets out of high school, but she's not worried about that, either.
"It's not like this is my whole life," says Ariel, who wants to follow her acting to Hollywood and keep surfing recreationally.
"And we've also got Morgan coming up," adds her dad.
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
