San Antonio Del Mar Surf Stats

This image illustrates the variation of swells directed at San Antonio Del Mar through a typical August. It is based on 3472 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coast so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about San Antonio Del Mar. In the case of San Antonio Del Mar, the best grid node is 20 km away (12 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours illustrate increasing wave sizes. Blue shows the smallest swells, less that 0.5m (1.5 feet) high. These happened only 71% of the time. Green and yellow illustrate increasing swell sizes and largest swells greater than >3m (>10ft) are shown in red. In either graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell occurs. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was W, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WNW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from San Antonio Del Mar and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are good for surfing at San Antonio Del Mar, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average August, swells large enough to cause clean enough to surf waves at San Antonio Del Mar run for about 29% of the time.

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