Three Days of Vintage Surf, Live Music, and Pure Stoke at Salt Creek

Cosmic Creek is back in the books. The 2026 edition of Vissla's annual vintage surf festival delivered everything we could have asked for and then some: a packed beach, good waves, nine divisions of competition, a sold-out field, and the kind of energy that only happens when surfers from every generation show up for the pure love of it.

All Photography by: Jeremiah Kline, JP Van Swae, Aaron Regan & Paul Naude

Here is the full recap of what went down June 5 through 7 at The Ecology Center & Salt Creek Beach Park in Dana Point, California.

Friday Night: The Cosmic Kickoff Concert

The weekend started the night before the contest at The Ecology Center in San Juan Capistrano. The Cosmic Kickoff Concert brought out a fired-up crowd for an evening of live music, tapas, drinks, and the official competitor check-in and heat sheet release before the weekend got underway.

DJ Brindles opened the night with an all-vinyl set that set the tone perfectly. Oog Bogo, the project of Kevin Boog, opened up the live show with a set of mutated, driving rock that had the crowd locked in from start to finish. LA power trio Primitive Ring followed with a set of proto-metal '70s-influenced hard rock that shook any ripe fruit from the surrounding trees. The gods of rock looked down and approved with a loosely thrown shaka.

Free, open to the public, and exactly the kind of pre-contest party this festival deserves.

The Format: Luck of the Draw

Here is how it works. Each heat is designated as either strictly 1970s single fins or 1980s twin fins. Before paddling out, competitors draw cards: the highest card drawn gets first pick from the Vissla vault of vintage shapes. From there, surfers can trade with each other before the heat begins, which is half the fun. Once the horn sounds, whatever board you are holding is the one you surf. No swaps, no excuses, no equipment advantages. Just you and a piece of surfing history.

It is one of the most equalizing formats in competitive surfing, and it is exactly why the contest sells out within 24 hours every single year. Registration for the 2026 event closed in under a day, with competitors flying in from across the country to take their shot.

Saturday, June 6: Day One

Contest day kicked off at 8:00 AM with a beach start and back-to-back heats across five divisions: 14 and Under Meteorites, 15-18 Cosmonauts, 19-24 Shooting Stars, 25-34 Rocketmen, and the SISSTR Celestial Spheres division. The Heritage Expression Session ran midday before repechage rounds and semi-finals carried the action deep into the afternoon.

Waves were running 3-5+, with light, offshore conditions throughout the day.

Sunday, June 7: Finals Day

Finals day opened with repechage rounds at 8:00 AM before the Creator's and Innovators division and Pro division ran their opening heats. Age division finals began at 10:40 AM, with the T. Patterson Expression Session breaking up the action before a full afternoon of finals across all remaining divisions. The 55 and Up Supernovas wrapped their final at 3:10 PM, and the award ceremony followed up on the beach.

Thank You to Our Sponsors

None of this happens without the people who believe in what Cosmic Creek stands for. A huge thank you to our 2026 sponsors:
Mini Cooper
I-Sea Sunglasses
Yeti
Turtlebox
Sisstr
Laguna College of Art and Design
The Ecology Center
Diamond Mind Inc.

2026 Final Results

14 & Under — Meteorites

1st - Rusty Merrifield — 16.34
2nd - Sidon Hodgman — 10.24
3rd - Tristan Edginton — 10.24
4th - Christian Rymsza — 9.3
5th - Slater Van Bruggen — 8.77
6th - Nash Webb — 8.1

15-18 — Cosmonauts

1st - Kai Finn — 16.24
2nd - Sebastian Peters — 15.37
3rd - Finn McCarty — 13.07
4th - Spencer Berry — 12.7
5th - Ryder Demichele — 11.87
6th - Kai Thompson — 11.57

19-24 — Shooting Stars

1st - Tosh Johnson — 14.84
2nd - Sean Macdonald — 14.8
3rd - Noah Gray — 13.8
4th - Callan Emery — 12.53
5th - Micah Abadie — 11.4
6th - Nate Caplinger — 8.93

25-34 — Rocketmen

1st - Fisher Quigley — 12.66
2nd - Lucas Taub — 12.6
3rd - Grant Richey — 12.17
4th - Josh Benjoya — 12.07
5th - Nick Holdman — 8.74
6th - Cole Futak — 8.3

35-44 — Astronauts

1st - Hans Homan — 13.67
2nd - Nick Watt — 13.16
3rd - Ryan Clancy — 12.33
4th - Anthony Maltese — 11.06
5th - Patrick Ryan — 10.67
6th - Garret Gossett — 7.03

45-54 — Quasars

1st - David Pinto — 15.17
2nd - Scott Finn — 15.13
3rd - Rod Brewster — 12.23
4th - Rob McCarty — 11.47
5th - Matt Buchhagen — 10.7
6th - Charles Beardslee — 7.6

55 & Up — Supernovas

1st - Derrick Erickson — 11.86
2nd - Chris Billy — 11.5
3rd - Eric Diamond — 7.3
4th - Paul Cernich — 6.57
5th - Bobby Lockhart — 1.17

Pros

Kolton Sullivan — 16.4
Max Beach — 16.1
Ian Gottron — 15.5
Dane Gudauskas — 11.93
Nate Zollar — 8.63
Andy Nieblas — 7.4

SISSTR — Celestial Spheres

1st - Isla Pinto — 15.1
2nd - Sara Freyre — 11.8
3rd - Lillian Young — 11.03
4th - Marlo Harris — 9.56
5th - Eloise Grewe — 8.83
6th - Indie Hoffman — 7.17

The Cosmic Series Heads East!

The stoke doesn't stop at Salt Creek. The Cosmic Series is hitting the East Coast this summer with four confirmed stops, then wrapping the year with two brand new Florida stops in the Fall.

If you want to surf a vintage board you didn't pick, in front of a crowd that gets it, now is your chance to sign up.

Cosmic Series 2026 Schedule

July 7 | Manasquan Inlet, NJ — Register Now
July 8 | Ship Bottom, Long Beach Island, NJ — Register Now
July 10 | Margate Pier, NJ — Register Now
July 13 | Atlantic Surf Park, Virginia Beach, VA — Register Now
Fall 2026 | Jacksonville Beach, FL — Details Coming Soon
Fall 2026 | Boynton Beach, FL — Details Coming Soon

Registration for the Cosmic Series is open now at vissla.com.

Shop the Vissla Boardshort Collection and Summer Collection — and we'll see you at the next one.