Victoria Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday 2nd October)

Best Days: Thursday, Sunday, Monday morning Surf Coast

Recap

Monday's SW groundswell eased off slowly through yesterday with good clean, 3-4ft waves across the Surf Coast in the morning, 4-5ft+ to the east with workable winds all day, smaller into the afternoon and down into today.

Conditions are good again across most locations with a northerly breeze and leftover 2ft sets on the Surf Coast, 2-3ft to the east. The Portsea cam is also back, better and clearer than ever..

This week and weekend (Oct 3 - 6)

Tomorrow is looking really fun with most locations offering a clean, fun sized wave through the day. Our new S/SW groundswell is on track, with a polar fetch of healthy W/SW gales being generated through our southern swell window the last day or so.

There's been no change to the expected sized with good 3ft surf due on the Surf Coast, 4-5ft to the east and there's the chance for the odd bigger bomb through the morning at swell magnets across both coasts, with the swell easing into the afternoon.

A moderate to fresh N/NE wind will favour the beaches through the morning, shifting W/NW on the Surf Coast around midday ahead of a gusty mid-late afternoon S/SW change.

Friday will then be poor with smaller easing surf with fresh W/SW-SW winds.

We then look towards the inconsistent and long-range W/SW groundswell for Saturday.

The storm generating this swell has broken down south-west of WA, but as talked about on Monday, before this a great fetch of severe-gale W/SW winds were generated in our far western swell window.

The swell will be very inconsistent but should provide 3ft+ waves across the Surf Coast swell magnets through the day Saturday, 4-5ft+ to the east.

There should be some slightly smaller mid-period SW energy in the water Saturday afternoon and Sunday as the swell eases, generated by relatively weak but broad polar fronts moving through our swell window over the coming days.

Easing 2-3ft waves are due on Sunday across the Surf Coast, 4ft+ to the east.

Coming back to the local winds, and Saturday now looks average with E/SE breezes across all locations, fresher S/SE into the afternoon, with Sunday performing better with a gusty NE breeze, shifting NW mid-afternoon and W/NW into the evening. This will open up options across both regions again.

This shift in winds will be related to a mid-latitude low moving in and across us, generating no additional swell but dragging a polar front up behind it early next week. Freshening W/NW winds will favour the Surf Coast as the weekend's swells continue to ease.

No major swell is expected off the initial polar front being dragged up towards us, but a slightly and stronger polar front behind it should generate a mid-period SW swell for Wednesday. We're looking at waves around 3ft on the Surf Coast, 4-5ft to the east with S/SE winds, but we'll have a closer look at this on Friday.