SURF'S UP - ON THE RIVER?

Byline: Mark Baker The Register-Guard

He's surfing. With a helmet. On the Willamette River.

"I guess he's practicing for the ocean," said an older man who had abruptly stopped his walk along the bike path north of Valley River Center last week to watch Elijah Mack surf a rapid in the frigid river.

No, Mack wasn't practicing for the ocean. He was river surfing. It's his passion.

And he's not the only one who does it, although you'd be hard-pressed to find others in the Eugene-Springfield area who do.

Surf (no pun intended) the Internet, and you'll find references to river surfing in places like Wyoming and Tennessee, Germany and even the Amazon River in Brazil.

In contrast to ocean surfing, where surfers catch a wave and ride it into shore, river surfing involves positioning your board upstream, in a rapid, and just "hanging 10," if you will, right there.

The sport is growing in popularity, says Mack, a single father of three boys who was homeless for a bit after moving to Eugene in 2001 and now owns Mos Faded Barber Shop in Eugene.

He's even started the World River Surfing Association to promote the sport. He's the president. And, so far, the only member.

"I just love his enthusiasm," said Sam George, editor of Surfer Magazine in Dana Point, Calif. But George is skeptical that Mack can achieve his dream of elevating the sport to the point that the world's rivers are filled with surfers the way Southern California's beaches are.

"I would never want to rain on anyone's dream," George said, "but it's really hard to see it taking off in the public's consciousness."

Still, George said his magazine is considering dispatching a reporter north to do a feature on Mack, who has been calling the magazine and sending it videos of himself river surfing.

The 33-year-old Mack, who often ends his sentences by calling you "brother," grew up in the San Diego area and has been surfing since he was 6. He's trying to get sponsors, such as surfboard and wet suit manufacturers and surfing magazines, to back him in an attempt to promote the sport, so he can travel the globe and share his passion with others.

"My goal is to promote it so people realize these waves are all over the world, right outside their front doors," Mack said.

He surfs the Willamette, McKenzie and Deschutes rivers in Oregon and has surfed rivers all over the West - from British Columbia to Arizona to Wyoming.

He moved to the San Francisco Bay Area when he was 19 to surf "the big waves" there and was in the Chico, Calif., area in 1997 when he came across a rapid on Butte Creek that intrigued him. He'd heard of river surfing, but had never tried it.

"It changed my life," he said. "All the adventures in surfing have kind of been done, but that was something else."

Mack considers himself a pioneer. He likens his enthusiasm about river surfing to that of Southern California surfers in the 1960s. It's just a matter of getting the word out, he said.

"Nobody has really looked at how many waves there really are (on rivers)," he said.

"Wherever you have a current of water, you have the possibility of the formation of a wave."

Mack has even talked to Eugene city officials about building a permanent wave somewhere on the Willamette, possibly underneath the Autzen footbridge, and he's got a backer in kayak enthusiast Tim Patrick, the youth and family services manager for the city's Library, Recreation and Cultural Services Department.

"Personally, I'm kind of intrigued by it," Patrick said. "Kayakers do it. It's a major part of the sport of kayaking."

Patrick was talking about how kayakers like to paddle upstream, find a niche in a rapid and "surf" it. Flip around in it. Spin in it.

The city is soliciting input from the public on what citizens want in future recreation opportunities as part of its parks and recreation open space comprehensive plan update, Patrick said.

Exactly how a permanent wave would be built, Patrick wasn't sure, but he assumed some sort of barrier could be placed under the water so the current would pour over it and create a large wave.

In the meantime, Mack, a colorful character - literally, he stopped counting his tattoos at 77 - will keep talking about river surfing, popping videos in for his barber shop's clients to watch and surprising folks who live along the Willamette as he walks around in his wet suit, surfboard under his arm.

"That's the last thing I expected to see coming across my lawn," said Courtney Craigan, a resident at the Boulders on the River apartment complex.

MORE INFORMATION

World River Surfing Association: www.surfrivers.com

CAPTION(S):

Elijah Mack catches a stationary wave in the middle of the Willamette River north of the Valley River Center. He hopes the twist on traditional surfing will catch on the way the original sport did in the 1960s. Chris Pietsch / The Register-Guard A tatoo-covered Elijah Mack squeezes out of his wetsuit after a surfing trip on the Willamette River.