The hometown champion came home from the Philippines with a trophy and several contusions, and the city council would like to keep all of them.
OCEANSIDE, United States (Surfing.LA) – The Oceanside City Council voted 4-1 in an emergency session to begin designating Caity Simmers’ bruises as protected local landmarks, hours after the hometown surfer won the first Championship Tour event ever held at Cloud 9 in what the surf press described as a battered but triumphant condition.
The vote followed Stab’s finals report, which said a bruised and bloodied Simmers rocked and rolled into world title contention on the same day Gabriel Medina claimed his first Championship Tour win in three years. Within minutes of the result, the city’s website crashed, the pier’s light posts began blinking in what the harbor department called “an unauthorized but heartfelt pattern,” and a man on Coast Highway was seen honking at a pelican for reasons he later declined to explain.
“This city has produced a world champion, and that world champion has produced bruises in service of this city’s reputation,” said Council member Rafael Quintero-Haas, who introduced the motion. “Other towns build statues. We are proposing something more honest. We are proposing to honor the actual cost of excellence, which in surfing is usually purple.”
A Hot Start on Siargao, Followed Closely From Oceanside
Residents had been tracking the event from the first horn. In her opening heat, Simmers posted a 9.00 and a 6.17 for a 15.17 total against Caroline Marks in four- to six-foot surf, according to The Philippine Star, which also reported that she called Cloud 9 “one of my favorite waves on the planet.” Oceanside residents took that sentence personally, then decided to be gracious about it.
Because of the time difference with the Philippines, most of the city followed the heats in the middle of the night. A study of 400 Oceanside households by the North County Sleep Deficit Project found that 58 percent watched the final live, 26 percent watched it “with one eye,” 11 percent set alarms and slept through them, and 5 percent said they did not watch at all but “could feel it happening.”
Local stand-up comic Tasha Mirabal-Kwon, who headlines a monthly show above a surf shop on Mission Avenue, said the overnight vigil had united the city in an unusual way. “Normally the only things that get Oceanside out of bed at 3 a.m. are a rumor about a sandbar or a car alarm,” Mirabal-Kwon said. “Now we have a third thing. We are a growing community.”
The Solidarity Bruise Registry
The landmark motion has a companion program. The city’s newly formed Office of Hometown Contusions has opened a public registry where residents may submit their own surf injuries in solidarity. Officials stress that the registry is a celebration and not a competition, although it does have a leaderboard. The intake guidelines, taped to the door of the Parks and Recreation building, read as follows:
- Bruises must have been acquired in Oceanside waters or while defending an Oceanside parking space.
- Bruises caused by the Oceanside Pier pilings are eligible for Heritage status and a small brass plaque.
- Bruises from a soft-top surfboard will be classified as provisional pending further review.
- Bruises acquired in a wave pool will be referred to a subcommittee and almost certainly rejected.
- Bruises from slipping on a fish taco do not qualify, regardless of how emotionally significant the moment was.
Within the first six hours, the registry received 1,140 submissions. Officials accepted 312, rejected 790 and flagged 38 for “possible exaggeration,” including one resident who claimed his bruise was shaped like the Philippines and another who claimed hers was shaped like the ratings.
Interference, Applied Citywide
The council’s enthusiasm has spread to the rulebook. Inspired by the Championship Tour’s priority and interference system, Quintero-Haas has proposed applying formal interference penalties to the harbor launch ramp, the left-turn lane at Coast Highway and Mission, and the line at every breakfast burrito counter within a mile of the beach.
“If a surfer can lose a heat for paddling in someone’s way, a man can lose his parking privileges for idling in mine,” said Deputy City Manager Lorraine Feeley-Okafor, who will oversee enforcement. Residents who believe they have been interfered with may file a grievance through a new city hotline, which a skeptical council aide compared to a petting zoo goat that eats every complaint handed to it. The aide later clarified that she was not suggesting the city purchase a goat. She was describing the hotline.
Comic Benji Strathmore, who works the late set at a brewery near the Sprinter station, was unimpressed by the plan. “Oceanside wants to adopt the WSL interference rule,” Strathmore said. “Great. Who is the head judge? The last time this town agreed on anything, it was that the people from Carlsbad should go home.”
The Road to Pipeline Runs Up Coast Highway
For all the celebration, city analysts are watching the math closely. Simmers arrived on Siargao fresh off a runner-up finish in Portugal, where Molly Picklum beat her in the final at Supertubos. The Cloud 9 draw then produced its own surprises, including Yolanda Hopkins knocking out world No. 3 Gabriela Bryan before meeting Simmers in the quarterfinals. With the Pipeline finale weighted more heavily than any other stop, the Oceanside Chamber of Commerce has commissioned an economic forecast predicting that a world title would generate 14 million dollars in local spending, 9 million of it on parking.
The forecast has drawn notice outside San Diego County, with editors at Bohiney Magazine (bohiney.com) calling it “the first economic impact study in which the largest line item is circling the block.” The chamber has defended the figure, noting that it was conservative and did not include parking tickets, which it described as “a separate and much larger economy.”
Meanwhile, the landmark process is moving forward. The city’s historic preservation consultant has been asked to determine whether a bruise can legally be designated when it is attached to a living person who travels internationally for work. Early guidance suggests the city may instead landmark photographs of the bruises, to be displayed in the harbor village beside an existing plaque honoring a very large fish.
The lone dissenting vote came from Council member Gordon Pettibone, who said he opposed the measure “only because I got a bruise off the pier in 1987 and nobody ever made it a landmark.” The council has agreed to review his claim at its next meeting, provided he can produce documentation, and provided the documentation is not, in the words of the city clerk, “just him pointing at his shin again.”
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/