JUST GET STARTED
Frank Solomon has forged a unique career as a professional big-wave surfer. Now 38, he first learned how to surf in the closeouts of Hout Bay beach, before graduating to the heavier breaks around the Cape Peninsula.
Hout Bay is barely considered a wave for most Capetonians, let alone a training ground for an aspiring big-wave rider, but that never bothered Frank. “I always had a go-for-it attitude,” he says. “And I was determined to be a pro surfer.”
Conveniently, the Solomon family lived next door to the house that Red Bull rented for the first Big Wave Africa event at Dungeons in July 1999. By then, Frank had already hiked across the mountain to surf smaller Dungeons a few times with good friend Mike Zietsman. Enthralled by the fledgling scene, Frank asked the BWA organisers if he could tag along on the contest boat – only to be flatly refused.
Instead, he drove to the fishing village of Hangberg that lies on the western edge of the bay, waxed up his 8’0, then hiked barefoot over the Sentinel pass, jumped off the rocks and paddled out. But rather than impressing the BWA crew, Frank endured several heavy beatings without making a wave, and had
