Of all the problems attached to the Makaha International Surfing Championships, which was the world's premier surf contest from the mid-'50s until the debut World Championships in 1964, the most vexing by far was the judging system—and at this point, I don't think there is anybody left alive who can recall in detail the intersecting vectors of math, rules, and politics that went into sorting out winners from losers at Makaha. In any event, by 1963 the competitors themselves were beginning to sound off about the contest. One of the most eloquent was Mike Doyle of California.

"Makaha Contest '63: An Interview With Mike Doyle," ran in the March issue of Surf Guide magazine.

For two consecutive years now they’ve had big surf at Makaha for the International Surfing Championships. How did it compare this year?

Last year the surf was big for only one day, really, and even then it was about fifteen feet and pretty sloppy. This year it was much larger—a good solid twenty feet, and there were two swells. During the first week’s preliminaries, it was between eighteen and twenty and extremely bumpy. You’d take off and fly through the air, it was so chopped up. Then they said the contest would be held Thursday (December 26th), Friday and Saturday of the following week. The surf went down during the week until suddenly on Thursday the North Shore closed-out again. They held the Juniors at about eighteen feet and on the next day, Friday, conditions were excellent and the Men's Finals were held. It went down to about six feet on Saturday, and on Sunday they held the Tandem and Women’s Finals at a perfect four and five feet.

Although conditions were excellent the general feeling here on the California Coast is that there were many internal problems involved in the contest, and that something should be done.

That’s definitely the case. One of the major problems is the judging system at Makaha. They appoint a single judge for each surfer, which presents a difficulty in standardizing the distribution of points. One judge might see a particular ride as being worth six points; another judge might see “his” surfer get an identical ride, but award him eight points. After five or six waves you can see that this would really make a difference in the final results. Here on the coast it’s different: all the judges evaluate the performance of each surfer as he rides a wave and everything averages out fairly in the end.

Do you feel there was undue favoritism shown in the contest?

As in all major contests, there was a certain amount of prejudice. Nearly all the judges came from the Waikiki Surf Club, which only makes it look bad for them. If they’re going to have an International Contest they must have International judges!

Makaha Point surf breaks at a considerable distance from shore. Wasn’t there a problem in spotting and identifying surfers?

Each judging tower had a spotter—and that brings up another point: In addition to International judges, they should have International spotters who can readily recognize the styles of their surfers. It’s difficult for Hawaiian judges to recognize any but Hawaiian surfers with any degree of certainty. It was extremely difficult to see a surfer's number as he took off in the Bowl and kicked out quickly after the fast part of the ride was over. And I think this is how several surfers who got fabulous rides didn’t get credit for them. This must have happened to Phil Edwards who got some great waves. His points were probably given to other riders.

Phil had never been in a contest before, and he said it felt like being in an army—being pushed around and told when to go out and what to do. It really bothered him, having to wear a shirt with a number on the back; he feels surfing is an individual thing and it’s important to him. But once he got out there, and found the surf was good and that the people around him were all good surfers, he actually enjoyed it. Of course, Phil broke his board in half and that didn’t make him any too happy.

What were some of the other problems in the contest?

I already mentioned that the judging system needs changing; the way they allotted points was also many times unfair. They were giving one point for Bowl rides, two points for takeoffs between the Bowl and the Point, and three points for Point rides. Some surfers would take off on a mushy wave up at the Point that never even built up in the Bowl, and they'd get three points. Then another surfer would take off in the Bowl, come driving across that hollow steep face—and end up getting only one point for his effort.

Were there many Australians in the contest this year?

Well, about 35 of them flew all the way over only to find that they were a day late with their entry forms, which made many of them ineligible. Midget” and Nat Young (the Australian Champion) were automatically put into the semifinals, as were all former Makaha winners and local champions. Midget was sponsored, but Nat came over on his contest winnings. When they win a contest (in Australia) they win cash, but they don’t receive it all at once because that’d make them professionals, so they receive it gradually in the form of trips, etc.

Buzzy Trent was spotting in one of the judging stands, wasn't he?

Yes, but only for a while. I heard several stories about that. One was that he had loaned his board to someone and got so excited each time he saw his board on a wave that the judges felt he was influencing them. Something else happened, too. Several of USC's top swimmers were caught in a rip and Buzzy jumped off the Judge’s stand, ran and grabbed his board, and went out and saved them. Some say that he was kicked out because the judges said he should have been there spotting for them.

How did you feel when the contest was over?

Well, when we came out of the water everyone was photographing Joey Cabell and me—they thought that first place was between the two of us. It was even announced on the radio that it was obviously between Cabell and myself for first. Then I was out surfing and Midget paddled up to me and said, "You won’t be happy with the results." I asked him what happened, and he told me, "I don’t know, but you didn't get within the first five."

MIKE DOYLE ON THE HARD MATH AND EVEN HARDER POLITICS OF THE MAKAHA CONTEST

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