Furry surfers hang 20 at competition

IMPERIAL BEACH — King, a bright-eyed Golden Retriever, is no stranger to the surf. In fact, he’s been hitting the waves with his board and his people since he was four.

That’s decades of experience in human years, and it helped earned him third place in the large dog heat during Sunday’s Surf Dog Competition.

“He loves it,” dad Bill Davis said. “It keeps him young.”

Davis said that King, a rescue, dove into the ocean during a father-daughter surf session nearly a decade ago. They plopped him on a board and that was that.

“Being able to surf with your dog is like the ultimate thing you can do with your dog,” Davis said. “It’s not like an agility course where he’s off doing his own thing. We’re out there as a team. You have to trust each other to do this.”

King was one of more than 50 four-legged surfers joining their two-legged best friends at the ninth annual competition, hosted by Unleashed by Petco just south of the Imperial Beach pier.

Canines of all breeds competed in heats based on size — small, medium or large. There was also a tandem heat and multiple dogs rode on one board.

Five judges — including professional surfer Taylor Knox — considered how long each dog stayed on their board, the wave’s size, personality, confidence, positioning and any special tricks to determine how bodacious their rides were. Each furry competitor was judged on three of their best waves out of five.

About 5,000 people and their dogs attended the competition, which also featured a dog wash, an adoption by the San Diego Humane Society, a giant inflatable slide for kids and a makeshift dog park. Money generated from each surfer’s registration fee was donated to the humane society.

When King finished his heat, he had just enough energy to sniff out his buddy, Faith. Both dogs and their owners are members of SoCal Surf Dogs, an organization that showed up in force for the competition.

James Wall said Faith was one of two American Pitbull Terriers he found, looking starved with belts around their necks, nearly two years ago in a parking garage.

“I decided to care for the two until the holidays were over, and that was when I became a foster failure,” he said in Faith’s biography on the SoCal Surf Dogs website.

Most of Wall’s dogs surf, but he admitted Faith was a natural. Her third surf session was during the 2013 Helen Woodward Animal Center’s Surfdog Surf-A-Thon. She took third place in her division.

“It’s a great bonding experience because it’s just her and me out there,” Wall said. “She knows I’m going to keep her safe, we’re going to have fun, and she’s going to get cookies.”

Spectators made sure canine surfers knew they weren’t the only ones having fun. The crowd roared each time a dog managed to ride their board to the shore and tricks like riding backward or walking the nose got plenty of applause.

In the end, most owners agreed the competition was really about celebrating the killer bond between dog and owner, surfing and having fun.