And when I say surf schools I am referring not only to schools but also to coaches and surf clubs and so on.

There is the misconception that surf schools are the one to blame for the increase of the crowd and for the lack of safety in the water. 

However surf schools have not increased demand – on the contrary, they are a response to  an increased demand. The media coverage of surfing in recent years, the olympiads and other factors has led to an exponential increase in practitioners. This fact is very visible in Ericeira where most of these practitioners are beginners – intermediates.

This greatly affects the safety and quality in the water. 

New practitioners have two ways to start and develop in sport. They can do it alone and/or in the company of friends or look for surf schools or coaches to help them in a more specialised way.

Which of these two options will be better for beginner surfers and for the organisation and quality of the line up?

Let’s imagine that there were no surf schools in Ericeira and that all these new practitioners, instead of being under a coach, who explains the rules and helps them navigate the line up, instead they rent boards and go out to line up after seeing some youtube videos. The chaos and lack of safety in the water would be even worse.

It is much better for the organisation and quality of surf sessions that new surfers go with schools or coaches who help them to be in the line up, on proper conditions for them and who teach them the rules and etiquette of surfing.

Yes, it’s true that some schools and coaches don’t respect some rules but let’s not generalise. It’s not because some are not doing it right that we’re going to blame everyone.

So if the increase of practitioners is not possible to stop, the best thing to do is to have them under surf schools to help them surf on conditions proper for their experience, teach them to respect the rules and surf etiquette and help them develop.

Surf schools, surf coaches and surf clubs are not the problem, they are part of the solutions for the exponential increase of new surfers.