Sydney, Hunter and Illawarra Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Wednesday 26th July)

Best Days: Thurs/Fri/Sat: Plenty of south swell with mainly great conditions. Next Wed/Thurs onwards: possible moderate S'ly and large SE swells on the cards. 

Recap: Tuesday’s south swell built steadily throughout the day, punching a little higher than expected with late sets around 5-6ft across Sydney’s south facing beaches. This swell peaked overnight and has eased today but we still saw strong sets through the early morning. Conditions have been excellent with offshore winds. 

This week (July 27th - 28th)

We’ve got some great surf ahead for the rest of the week. 

A steady undercurrent of long period southerly swell will persist through Thursday and Friday, thanks to a broad, slow moving polar low that’s been sitting south-west of New Zealand for the last few days (and was responsible for yesterday’s solid afternoon pulse). This should maintain 3ft sets at south facing beaches both days. 

In addition, Thursday will see a strong secondary short range south swell originating from a brief but vigorous low/front pushing north-east of Bass Strait this afternoon. This should equate to easy 4-5ft sets at south facing beaches (bigger in the Hunter near 6ft+) though conditions are at risk early morning for a lingering S/SW airstream. This won’t affect to many locations (most coasts will see early W’ly winds); if anywhere the Hunter stands the most chance to be affected. Even then it shouldn’t be too bad, and will improve during the day. 

Surf size will obviously be much smaller at beaches with less exposure to the south. We will see winds drop right off around the middle of the day to become variable, and there’s even a risk for a moderate afternoon north-east breeze, as a new front approaches from the south-west. This is unlikely to kick in until early-mid afternoon at the earliest, so conditions should be safe for most of the day. But if possible, avoid aiming for only a late surf (northern corners should remain fine though). 

Friday will see the south swell settle back into the 3ft range at south facing beaches (smaller elsewhere, but a little bigger in the Hunter), and we may see a few bigger sets into the afternoon from a brief embedded pulse. Winds will swing north-west for the early session, then westerly during the day, so it’ll be nice and clean across the beaches. 

This weekend (July 29th - 20th)

A strong front will exist eastern Bass Strait on Friday afternoon, and the latest model runs have swung its trailing fetch more in our favour, compared to Monday's guidance.

In addition to some lingering S’ly groundswell from Friday, we’re looking at an early pulse of south swell on Saturday that should push wave heights into the 3ft+ range at south facing beaches for the dawn patrol (smaller elsewhere, but bigger in the Hunter) and it’ll be clean with light W’ly winds. 

Expect an easing trend throughout the day. A slight northerly tendency is possible in the wind field throughout the afternoon.

Winds will then freshen from the NW into Sunday and both swell sources will ease rapidly, leaving south facing beaches with 1-2ft waves (slightly bigger in the Hunter) for the early session, that’ll probably halve in size by the afternoon. It’ll be clean but you’ll struggle to pick up anything worthwhile.

So, Saturday is the pick!

Next week (July 31st onwards)

The first half of next week has a series of small flukey swell sources from a poorly aligned series of fronts riding quite north in latitude. 

However a couple of synoptic sources are suggesting good waves for the second half of the week. I’ll be keeping an eye on a small polar low modelled to track north-east from a position south of Tasmania (around Monday, for a Wednesday arrival), but more interesting is a possible Tasman Low forming around Tuesday that could deliver a large S/SE tending SE groundswell from later Wednesday or Thursday through until next weekend. 

More on this in Friday’s update.