Austin Sneed RIP (1990-2014)

Seaside and groms go hand and hand. There is always a high talent pool that comes out of Seaside. When I first saw Austin Sneed surf I thought there was a young Dane Reynolds out at Parking Lots. I watched him wave after wave, race down the line and commit to the biggest move he could.  It got me pumped up and I paddled out and said “your tail hucks are mental”.  Then I asked him what his name was, he said “Austin”, I was a lil shocked to hear we had the same first name. I figured it would be confusing if we called each other by our first name, so I asked him what his last name was, he said “Sneed” and from then on we called each other by our last names.  I started to get to know him while he was in High School while doing a bunch surf missions together. I became a big fan of his surfing and found myself trying to go bigger because of him. He came off mature for his age because he was never scared to flare up the older guys at Seaside and he would suggest they should turn a lil harder or take off a lil deeper next wave. This would make me laugh but he had good heckles for me too, when my airs didn’t make it above the lip, he called them “Ware-aerials” 😉  As time went on I saw less and less of Sneed but when I did see him he was surf stoked and would froth me up to get above the lip and catch a few at waves with him.   At the age of 24 years old, Sneed has passed away and I feel remorse not to be able to see more of his tail hucks and hear more of his heckles at Seaside.  In memory of Sneed and his tail huck turns, the “Sneed-huck” is what I will be calling tail hucks for now on.

If any groms or surfers are struggling with problems and need help, they can reach out to me.

Photos by

Billy Watts, Chris Straley, Rob Keaton, Darlene Conolly