Jack O’Neill Paddle Out in Santa Cruz, CA Sets Guinness World Record

Jack O’Neill is a legend in the surf world who is credited with inventing the wetsuit and starting the huge surf company O’Neill.

“I just wanted to surf longer.” – Jack O’Neill

He died on June 3rd, 2017 at the age of 94.

When a surfer passes, other surfers paddle out and create a circle to honor her/him and they call it a ‘paddle out.’  They hang out, talk, mourn, celebrate out there.

Skiing/snowboarding needs something like this…

The Jack O’Neill paddle in Santa Cruz on Sunday set a Guinness World Record as 3,000 surfers paddled out creating a circle at Pleasure Point on a perfectly glassy day.  Another 5,000-6,000 people stood on the cliffs and watched on East Cliff Drive.  The previous record was 511 surfers in Huntington Beach, CA.

They didn’t come to set a record.

They all came out to honor a man who changed surfing and where we can surf and for how long we can surf forever.