Shin in S.D.

So my brother finally came out to visit me from Hawaii on April 4th. It was great to have him out here since I did not get a chance to visit him this last winter in Hawaii. My birthday was on April 5th so that was also a treat having him here for that as well.

We ended up planning for a trip into Mexico since my brother in all his years had never driven into Baja for a surf. We both traveled via plane to Sinaloa back in 2005 for a trip in Mexico but as a surfer he had never done the traditional drive through T.J. and on to Rosarito, and all the K38, K40, etc. breaks that line the coast near San Diego. My friend Bob has a place on the beach in a semi-secret location. So I planned to post up in front of his place and utilize his fire pit and horse shoe pits as a safe zone for camping.


After picking up my bro at the airport at 10pm We headed over to my friend John's house. We ended up at the proverbial Jimmy O's in Del Mar, which is usually the case when hanging with John and Dave. We had drinks and chatted it up and had a good time before heading home. John owns a surf wetsuit company named Matuse, Inc. and my brother is the Hawaii Sales Rep for Matuse. So it was good to hang with all under the same roof since normally the mighty Pacific divides the face time.

The next day my brother and I woke up and packed for our trip. We headed out of town from La Jolla at around 2pm. 40 minutes later we see the famous freeway sign that says Last U.S. Exit. I pulled off to top off my gas tank and buy the Mexico Insurance. In the back of my mind I usually wonder how good the coverage would actually be if something were to happen. I always envision me calling the number and getting a recording that says "Sorry this number no longer in service. If you feel this message to be a mistake please hang up and try again." Luckily I've never had to test it out. We cross the border and get the green PASE sign so no secondary check coming in. They might of been suspicious of us smuggling in our fresh water and food filled cooler. I make my way through the confusing streets of T.J. and try not to miss the unmarked off-ramps and merges to get me around T.J. and onto Rosarito. Luckily I dodged a few crazy cab drivers and hit my mark using past experience. As we buzz through lanes with no markings and pass buildings that look like they should be condemned my brother remarks on crazy it is that people are allowed to build a ply wood house cut into a hillside with no foundation or framing. I just shrug and say this is Mexico. Kind of like the wild west.

We finally get to the coast and cruise down the toll road. Here Mexico doesn't look so crazy as we pass by new development near Baja Malibu. Soon we reach Rosarito and I exit to visit my traditional stop that is Sergio's Tacos. Unfortunately he is closed this day. As most places in Mexico just because it's a work week in the middle of the day does not guarantee the place will be open. So with a frown we go to my next pick and we sit down for some carne asada quesadillas. Freshly made tortillas, cheese, carne asada, onions, cilantro and fresh salsa make for some awesome grub. We both eat two large tacos and wash it all down with a Coke. We pay our $5 and get back into the car.

After driving a while we drive down through houses, over very large speed bumps and down some washboard roads. We finally reach our destination which is my friend Bob's place. As we pull up I see an individual I've never seen before sitting on my friends porch. In Mexico people have been known to squat in residences that aren't theirs but I don't jump to any conclusions. I walk over and introduce myself. I quickly find out that he and his friend are the co-renters of the place with Bob. I quickly remember Bob mentioning this but never met these guys since we never crossed paths before. They graciously let us set up camp in front of the trailer and so luckily we had our safe haven for the next two nights.


Soon after arriving we were greeted by fellow neighbors. A bunch of Americans who I might guess don't want to be found by authorities in the U.S. This of course was mainly just my imagination since no hard facts presented itself but you know the feeling you get when you meet some people and hear them talk for a while. Lets just say my suspicion meter was going off a bit. Anyhow, they were all pretty hospitable. Also greeting us were the local neighborhood dogs. We let the 6 or so dogs familiarize themselves with us so that they would feel comfortable at our camp site. This also helps at night since they would defend us from outsiders if something were to happen. The only cost was seeing one dog piss on two of my rims to mark the territory. At least it wasn't my tent.

After setting up our camp we walked down the short road to the beach. We checked the surf to see it was fairly large but blown out. The predicted South swell was hitting in full force. The current looked pretty bad as well so we decided to wait until morning for better conditions. The night came and we ended up making a fire. Duralog to the rescue. A must have when you have no room in a Mazda 3 hatchback stuffed with surf gear, camping gear and food. Luckily Jessie and George had some wood to cntribute and we got a pretty good fire going for the night. We all had fun talking and drinking Tecates. Jessie was super hilarious and he and George went back and forth throwing insults at each other as long time friends often do. The two together looked exactly like Cheech and Chong. Jessie being Chong and George being Cheech. Jessie even had the long hair and glasses just like Chong. My brother later on the next day asked me if I thought of the same thing. It was funny how we both thought of it. This further reinforced the obvious similarities between them and the famous duo.

We ended up surfing the next morning as the conditions cleaned up coercing us to paddle out. My brother has been in Hawaii for the past 12 years and hates the cold. Not only is Northern Baja generally a lot colder than San Diego but the week leading up to my brother coming out we had strong onshore winds that brought windswell to our coast. This usually also means that we get cold water up-wellings from the depths of the ocean. This drops the water temp a good 4-5 degrees on average over night. S.D. went from 60 degrees down to 56 overnight. Mexico this morning felt like it was around 54 degrees or even less. So seeing my brother suit up and step into the water was quite amusing for me. His feet instantly turned to giant rocks and he had a look of pain on his face as he made his first duck dive as we paddled out. He did well and lasted about 45 minutes. Luckily he was wearing a Matuse fullsuit which kept his body super warm. His problem was he got a headache from duck diving and his hands were frozen as well. He paddled in and I went in shortly after. I ended up paddling out later that day and came into contact with something very large in the water. I guessed it to be a small whale since I didn't want to image a shark being that size. Whatever it was my brother saw it from the beach and I saw the water footprint. Luckily I did not get attacked or anything but I did make my way out of the water shortly after the incident.

We played horse shoes with Jessie and George and drank some more Tecate. Night fell and we sat around the camp fire again. More laughs as we watched the interaction between drunk Jessie and George. We talked story and jokes until about 11pm and then hit the sack. Morning came and we checked the surf one more time. It looked fun but it was overcast and cold. My brother wanted no part of the cold so we decided to pack up and head for home. We said our goodbyes and made our way back up towards T.J. to make our way through the border.

The border crossing is always interesting. You see the funniest and most peculiar things for sale. Some items are so large you wonder how anyone could fit the thing in their car even if they wanted to buy the item. My personal favorite is the huge fake stone carving of the Aztec god covered in silver glitter. My other favorites are all of the NFL and Disney character knock-offs so blatantly infringing on copyright law. But again this is the modern day wild west. It only takes us about an hour to get through the border. No passport was requested although it is now required by law. Once again we hit the U.S. highway and how good it feels to be back on U.S. roads. I love visiting Mexico but I always love returning home.

After returning home and washing up we met up with the Matuse crew at Nobu in Solana Beach. This consisted of John, John's brother Joe, John's dad Mr. Campbell, Dave and my brother. We all talked about the future of Matuse and had a great meal at Nobu. Mr. Campbell, always being most generous, picked up the bill for all of us. It was greatly appreciated as the sushi was awesome. It was great to have my brother meet Mr. Campbell and also give his ideas of what was important for the product and the Hawaiian surf market.


The next morning I dropped my brother off at the airport sending him back to paradise and warmer waters. It was great seeing him again and spending time with him. He was huge part of my life growing up and I miss all the time in and out of the water with him. That's why these trips mean so much. I can't wait to visit with him this winter out in Hawaii. Til next time bro!

Poker Tournaments

So recently I've been on the tournament scene to try and change up the type of action I'm seeing at the tables. I learned the hard way that the limit games are very fickle. Good hands don't often win when you are trying avoid to many land mines. Raising a hand by a small increment doesn't get people to drop out of the hand. So Skalansky's book on limit holdem is very true. He states that you basically need to build big pots when you are the favorite in a hand so the extra cash will cover those suckouts you will invariably suffer at the limit game. What he doesn't tell you is that when you build pot after pot but loose runner runner or on the river to two outs you also loose a lot of money. So my story goes that I went on a two month downhill slide that bared witness to some horrendous beats. I could only limit damage so much over the long haul. I had finally hit my first significant loosing streak in two years. I don't know how the pros can handle these types of runs. It makes me understand Mike Matasow's type of behavior I see on TV. Luckily I only do this for recreation and don't depend on paying bills this way.

So I made a conscious effort to move to the No Limit game. However, this by no means guarantees better play just a better chance at defending a good hand against draws and such. So this leads me into why I started playing tournaments. This was a good way for me to limit my risk while gaining some much needed No Limit play experience against players I have never met before. Now I play a friendly No Limit home game with my friends but I know all of them and have learned poker with them for the last two years. Reading them is much easier than reading new people in the casino environment. Also I wanted to get comfortable with the large bets and all in moves you are susceptible to in the game. The tournament play also allows me to practice new strategies and recognize new tactics used against me as well. In short I felt the the tournaments would help me transition into the No Limit cash game. I do however know full well that tournament play is far different from the cash game. But I think that any No Limit experience is good to get comfortable with the money swings.

So my local poker spot is Barona here in east San Diego. It's not the closest one to my house but is probably my favorite one to go to on a regular basis. They give good membership comps, the staff is really nice and I now know a lot of the dealers which helps me not get bored when I'm not getting cards. Boredom can equal some very bad play. I also golf so my time on the tables gets me "free" rounds of golf on a very very nice course. Setup wise I prefer it over Torrey Pines which is 5 minutes from my doorstep. Torrey has better views but the Barona golf course is usually in better shape.

So started my tournament campaign. I went to Harrah's with two friends on a Saturday morning because I heard rumors of horrible play. The buy in was $40. We had 33 players in the tournament. I ended up chopping the 1st and 2nd place prize money for $424. Not bad for tournament #1. This was to cut my teeth which worked out pretty well. Barona started to hold their first tournaments starting the week after my first tournament and win. Mon-Thurs at 6:30pm and Sat and Sun mornings at 10am. I have visited 4 of these tournaments. My first Barona one was a Sat morning tournament which has a buy-in of $30 with $5 of the money going to the house. We had about 74 players and I cam in 15th place. I made the final two tables. Not bad but no money back. Then I went the next day for the Sunday morning tournament and ended up finishing in 10th place. Better but money is paid out to the top 9. I was the bubble boy. Out of 68 players not bad. The following weekend I went back on a Saturday morning and ended up winning the tournament that had 68 players. My win gave me $514 dollars. The great thing about the win was that Barona also entered me into a Freeroll tournament on July 4th. Only winners of the tournaments will be in it. It's free, only 110 people will be entered and the prize purse is set at $15,000. I like my odds on this one. I was pretty happy as you could imagine. My last tournament I was in was the Thursday night tournament at Barona. It's a $40 buy in and the # of people is much larger so that means so is the prize purse. Out of 115 people I finished 5th. My payout was $219. First would have been over $800. I was pretty happy getting through that larger field and making some cash.

So out of 5 tournaments now I have a 1st, 15th, 10th, 1st and 5th place finish. I'd say so far so good on my record. Now of course these are all considered small time sit and go type tournaments that don't last longer than 3 hrs. but I'll gladly take the wins.

I am now planning on going to a bigger tournament this Saturday up at Pechanga. A couple of my poker buddies are headed up with me. It's the 91x radio station sponsored poker tournament. The buy in is $91 and the prize pool is guaranteed at $10,000. So we'll see how many people show up and what the prize pool ends up to be. I'm expecting a couple hundred minimum and hopefully they pay out to the top 10 spots. Also some radio personality named Cantore will be playing. If you knock him out you get a pair of tickets to the Cochela concert this year which is pretty sweet. Anyhow, this is more for experience in a format more similar to the World Series of Poker type tournaments. Blinds only go up every 30 minutes and so we'll see how that effects people's play. The sit and goes I've been in so far raise the blinds every 15 minutes which causes a lot people to play mediocre hands way to strong. They think they are on TV or something. Hopefully I win all my races and let my big hands hold.

Matuse Wetsuits

So recently I've been working with Matuse Inc. to try and help build the wetsuit brand. Since I've been surfing for over 14 years and have owned my share of wetsuits I was really impressed with the wetsuits produced by Matuse Inc.(They produce fullsuits and wetsuits tops.)

The materials are by far the best in the business. No cost was spared and you can definitely tell when you get your hands on one. The material is Yamamoto rubber but rubber doesn't really tell the story. Matuse calls it Geoprene. This is because this stuff is derived from Calcium Carbonate or Limestone. A renewable resource that is harvested from the ocean floor. All neoprene is derived from crude oil. Yes your wetsuit, cup cozy and mouse pad are all the product of that sludge we call oil. I for one am stoked to see a new product for surfers that uses a better source material. The fun doesn't stop there. Geoprene itself performs better in every measurable way. It's warmer, it stretches more, it lasts longer, it absorbs solar heat better and barely absorbs any water. So what this means for me and all that use it is you stay warmer and perform better in the water which is how I measure the success of the product.

The design of the wetsuits are also top notch. After many years of trial and error from other surf companies the proven designs and new ideas are coming forward in the Matuse wetsuit line. Matt who is one of the founders of the company has been a contract wetsuit designer for major wetsuit companies in the industry over the last 6 years. His concepts and designs are now being utilized in a company that is not afraid to offer the industry a truly top of the line wetsuit. The price point will be in the mid four hundreds but I think people who are serious surfers will pay for the performance and quality of this wetsuit. If you asked someone "Do you want a pimped out BMW or a Pimped out Buick for $65,000?" I think most people would pick the BMW over the Buick simply because they know the quality over the long haul will be there. Of course everything new feels pretty good but what happens a year from now after you beat the product up for a bit? I think once people experience the warmth and performance of Matuse Geoprene they will never want to go back to normal neoprene again.

With my help and encouragement we've been able to open up a piece of the Hawaii market. My brother Shin has signed on as the rep for Hawaii and is doing well in his first season. Shops are responding well and people are buying the product. We also just finished signing on a big pro surf team to help promote the product. The Pipeline Posse's team has signed the dotted line. We acquired Jamie Sterling, Flynn Novack and Jason Frederico. Unfortunately Braden Diaz is with another sponsor but we are stoked to have the rest of the guys represent Matuse out in the heavy breaks of the famous North Shore and throughout the world. Another huge team member is Makala Jones. He's on the current cover of Surfer mag pulling into a sick Pipeline pit. This guy is super cool and rips. A perfect representative for Matuse Inc. We also have local California rippers such as Darrick Dunfee and Zach Plopper. We also have a bevy of young up and comers representing the local San Diego scene.

I'm stoked to help see the brand grow. I think over time my role might increase and maybe become a part of a hugely successful surf company. Something I'm very passionate about and would love to see blow up and compete worldwide with the likes of Rip curl and Billabong. Time will tell but with the team and current growth rate I think this product and company can go far.

You can check it out at www.matuse.com.

The Beginning

Well here is the start to my personal blog. Mainly I created this to allow my family to stay up to date with what's going on in my life. If you happened upon this blog by chance I hope you find the information and thoughts entertaining. Enjoy.