Long boat rescue

Sweep - the person in charge of steering the boat and, as they're the only one who can see what's ahead, they generally call the shots on the water.

The boats race by rowing out to a marker buoy placed several hundred metres offshore, turning around it and returning to shore as quickly as possible.

The surf factor is where things get interesting as boats slew sideways, roll, crash into each other, have sweeps and rowers thrown into the water - generally creating an exciting spectacle for spectators.

In 1940 a Piha crew comprising; Tom Pearce, Haden Way, Max Cleary, Jack Rae and Tiger O'Brien rowing in a randomly allocated boat were the inaugural winners of the National Surf Boat Championship Series, held at Wellington's Lyall Bay.

The first attempt at rowing a surf boat from Onehunga to Piha over the unpredictable and treacherous Manukau Heads Bar was made in April 1971.

As the crew comprising Andy Sekula, Mike Zainey, Ray Markham, Brian Sullivan and Alan Foubister rowed down the narrow northern channel with big dumping surf on either side, huge swells came up and the channel petered out leaving the boat in the surf zone.

There was no route to get through the surf line leaving no option but to wait for a lull and head for the beach on a wave.

At one stage in this row George Thomson was thrown overboard after the surf boat hit a three-meter-high (9.8 ft) swell.

In 2008 Piha crews comprising James Dallinger, Brad Mytton, Hayden Smith, Craig Knox, Matt Kirke, Mark Bourneville and Bruce O'Brien won the European Open Surf Boat Championships (also known as the World Surf Rowing Championships) at Biarritz, France.