History of surfing in France :
The cradle of surfing in Europe is in Biarritz. If September 1956 is the date of the first beginnings of Viertel and Hennebutte,we tend to consider 1957 as the the year of reference where a boiling of a group launched surfing on the way of posterity. If one often intends to speak about the Tontons Surfers, it is more often to evoke the Sixties than really the first years when surfing stammered with the variation of the large Californian and Australian currents, forcing a handle of ocean lovers to compete for ingeniousness and courage to compensate for a certain physical shortage (compared to the athletes of the Anglo-Saxon beaches) related to non-sportiing occupations and already advanced ages (except for Joel de Rosnay). Besides it is through the albums of Joel de Rosnay, meticulously labelled and illustrated, recently scanned, that the most enthralling side of the history of surfing in France opens.

Before 1956: one played already in the waves
Before a board of surfing embarks in Biarritz, it is already understood that the waves could be useful and pleasant. Because Biarritz was a village of fisherm. in particular with the whaling until XVIth century, one saw there boats (and the traînières) using foam to return at the edge. Then, because Biarritz was that Biarritz was in the fashion of Baths of Sea since the XIXth century, the bathers quickly realized on the ludic side of the swimming in the waves, that is called the bodysurf. Then, certain swimmers built a "planky", a small plank (90 cm X 40 cm) bent on the nose, to improve their slips on the wave. At that time, the spot of predilection of the planky is Miramar. The attempt nearest to surfing, before the official date, emanates from Jacky Rott in

 

1956: The surfers rise also
1957: 4 musketeers!
Jacky Rott, coming back from the war of Tunisia, takes the dimensions (3.40m X 65 cm X 7 cm) of the board of Viertel and makes two balsa counterparts out of it. Before the stratification, they weigh 15 kgs. and 25 kgs afterwards!. In June, Peter Viertel returns, strong with some sessions in California, with a 2nd board
1958: The first Australian wave: Peter Viertel imports 3 Hobie boards out of Balsa from California. The more the park of boardsis, The more the number of surfers can evolve. The young people who have fun to recover the lost boards have the right to make an attempt, it is as that one begins surfing.
1959: The first surfing-club, Waikiki
1960: the year of the first competitions
1961: Rott and Moraiz in Peru
1962: France in Surfer Magazine
1964: The war of the federations
1965: Surfshop and school of surfing
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However, surfing settled definitively in France only at the end of the Seventies, with the creation of "Lacanau Pro" in 1979 and the organization of the Championship of the Amateur World in 1980. From this moment, surfing obtained a considerable popularity among the young people and a new generation of surfer was going to be born. Today, France is a regular stage of the ASP World Tour, with three official competitions organized in Lacanau, Hossegor and Biarritz. The surfers are now recognized like athletes entirely apart. The majority of the schools on the territory carries the label of the French Federation of Surfing and the monitors all are titular of the federation diploma, which guaranteed the trainees a teaching of first level.

The climate of France is as varied as its geography and the Atlantic coast, from the Manche Channel to the Pyrenees, offers excellent conditions of surfing. The principal more famous spots of surfing group however on the Côte d'Argent et the Côte Basque, both located in Aquitaine in the western south of the country. the Côte d'Argent is an uninterrupted beach of 240 kilometers fine sand bordered of dunes and drills, which extends from the estuary of the Gironde to the estuary of Adour. . From De Pâques to Toussaint, this coast offers a powerful and constant swell, forming the best tubes of all Europe.From the Estuary of Adour to the estuary of Bidassoa, which marks the border with Spain, the Basque Coast is the cradle of surfing in Europe and it profited from many spots and an incomparable culture of surfing on the old continent. Contrary to its neighbor the Côte d'Argent, the Côte Basque has a broken littoral, formed by the last buttresses of the Pyrenees. Territory of powerful and round waves, the Côte Basque offers a variety of reefs which has adapted to almost all the conditions thanks to their changing orientation. Exceptional waves, a tradition of surfing well established, a hot sea in summer (in the western south) and the famous French "the Art of living",all contribute to make France a very popular destination among the surfers of the whole world.