Meg Roh pauses for a moment to make the calculation.
At least five waves a day. Times 365 days give or take a leap year. Then multiply that by five years.
“That’s roughly 9,125 waves,” said the 17-year-old surfer, not factoring in leap year days.
“But, usually, I catch way more than that.”
In 2011, Roh made it a goal to surf every day, and Wednesday she celebrated five years of paddling out, rain or shine, every single day. The goal started when she was 12 and hoping to go just 300 days straight. Now, she’s on day 1,827.
When the waves are dismal and most other surfers scoff at the tiny waves, she paddles out. If it’s big and bombing, she pushes herself to catch at least five waves. When it’s pouring rain, it doesn’t matter, Roh still surfs.
Each year she casually says she probably won’t continue through the following year. But each year, she keeps going.
“I’m super-excited, it doesn’t feel like I’ve surfed five years yet,” she said. “It feels like yesterday I started surfing every day.
She’s become a quasi-celebrity at surf breaks like San Onofre and Doheny State Beach. The long-haired beauty shows up on her longboard, peppered with sponsor stickers, to take on waves. Longtime locals have stickers on their car that feature her name, some in the shape of pink hearts. A few years back she was honored at a women’s exhibit at the Surfing Heritage Foundation, and she even appeared in a surf film that also featured 11-time world champ Kelly Slater.
Roh planned to spend part of Wednesday celebrating with friends on her San Juan Hills High School surf team.
“My friends usually make me a cake or something.”
In the afternoon, she surfed Doheny State Beach.
We asked Roh a few questions about her journey:
Q. What’s the longest session you’ve had?
A. I think it was my first year in the summer, I surfed from like 9 in the morning and didn’t get out until 8 at night, with a little lunch break in between. … I was very sunburned. The waves were super-fun.
Q. What’s the shortest?
A. I’ve gotten pretty fast, just doing five waves before school when I’m rushed. The shortest has probably been about 20 minutes.
Q. How many boards have you gone through?
A. Too many to count. Probably like 10 or 11, maybe more.
Q. Favorite board?
A. Probably my Timmy Patterson longboard. It’s 9’3”.
Q. What’s the biggest day you’ve surfed?
A. I went to Hawaii last summer. It was pretty big. It felt overhead.
Q. What’s the biggest lesson been so far?
A. I feel like I’ve learned so much from surfing every day. I’ve learned to follow my dreams and to believe in myself. And to never give up when things are bad.
Q. Are you going to keep going?
A. I’m not sure yet. I want to take off this winter, maybe to go to the snow or something. … But we’ll see.
By the way, Meg, one beauty of Southern California is that you can surf and snowboard in the same day.
