Over 800 Santa suit-wearing surfers hit the waves for a good cause in Cocoa Beach, Florida. (Dec. 24) AP
COCOA BEACH, Fla. — While much of America shivered Christmas Eve, more than 800 Surfing Santas were catching tiny waves in the Atlantic south of Cape Canaveral.
Last year, 772 Christmas-costumed participants brought their surfboards and took to the waves in the largest crowd ever since George Trosset of Rockledge, Fla., went surfing on Dec. 24, 2009, dressed as Santa Claus with his son and daughter-in-law accompanying him as elves.
"Because of the lack of surf, it is going to be a great photographic opportunity," announcer Hunter Joslin of Melbourne Beach, Fla., who is enshrined in the East Coast Surfing Hall of Fame, told an estimated 10,000 people who had gathered to watch the festivities. "We have drones flying up above — we'll be able to take a count."
The official Surfing Santa total? 837, which was a little bit of a disappointment to Trosset, who celebrated his ninth Yuletide year in the sea. Aside from surfing, the festival featured a costume contest, live music and Hawaiian dancers.
► Jan. 13: Lake Michigan surfers hang 10 — with icicles
► December 2016: Florida Santas beat Australian 'Surfing Santa' challengers
► December 2015: Surfing Santas draw thousands to Cocoa Beach
On the beach, volunteers sold 1,420 Surfing Santas shirts. Proceeds benefited the Florida Surf Museum and Grind for Life, a Cocoa Beach nonprofit that helps cancer patients commute to and from medical treatments.
Last year, Crescent Head, a coastal community in New South Wales, Australia, had its fifth annual Santa Surf that brought out about 500 Christmas-clad surfers; this year, the town's Facebook post didn't show a count. Temperatures there were forecast to hit 84 degrees with a water temperature of 74 degrees.
Two Decembers ago, 320 Australian Santas set a Guinness world record by participating in history's largest surfing lesson at Bondi Beach, a suburb of Sydney.
Saturday, 75 costumed people — including the seven-time Association of Surfing Professionals world champion, Layne Beachley — hit the waves during an inaugural Santa Surf event at Freshwater Beach in Sydney. Australian organizers vow someday to overtake Cocoa Beach.
Trosset is worried they could do it.
"Our first year was three surfers. Our second year was 19. Our third year, we hit 84. So they almost caught our third year their first year. So I'm going to tell you, I think we're in trouble," Trosset said. "Sydney has 5 million people."
The weather Sunday in Cocoa Beach, known to the world more for the 1965-70 sitcom I Dream of Jeannie than Santas who surf, was mostly sunny with a high of 78 degrees and a south-southwest wind of 5 to 10 mph.
If you consider that great swimming weather, realize that the water temperature at Cocoa Beach Pier is about 69 degrees, and a comfortable pool temperature for adults is 85 to 89 degrees. Prolonged immersion in waters below 70 degrees can produce hypothermia, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Guinness World Records, the keeper of superlatives since 1954, has no category for Surfing Santas — yet — but Trosset said he keeps nudging them to create one.
► December 2014: Surfin' Santas hang ten in record numbers
► December 2013: 'Surfin' Santas' draws hundreds in Florida
"I've asked Guinness six different times if they'll give us a world record for most Santas surfing, and they keep coming back with single items. Guinness only recognizes a single thing," he said. So they have no category for, say, walking and chewing gum.
"So they’ll recognize the most Santas gathered together," Trosset said. The current record is 18,112 on Dec. 27, 2014, in Thrissur, India, so it will be a while before the Surfing Santas can top that.
"They'll recognize the most people surfing on the same wave for 5 seconds, and that's like 110 people in South Africa," he said. The simultaneous surfing happened Oct. 4, 2009 in Cape Town, South Africa.
Follow Rick Neale on Twitter: @RickNeale1
