The big-wave surf competition known as Mavericks (a.k.a. The Jay at Mavericks) looks like it won't be happening this year because the window of time for the contest closes February 28 and this year's La Niña weather pattern hasn't been good creating the ideal swells and wind necessary for the biggest waves.

The break at Mavericks is a quarter mile off the coast at Pillar Point, where a reef just below the surface can, around this time of year, create massive waves of twenty to forty feet, and sometimes even higher. Since the competition started in 1999, seven of the eleven Februaries have produced the right combination of wind and weather for the minimum 20-foot waves.

"Looks like we're skunked [this year]," said Mark Sponsler, chief wave forecaster for the event. La Niña years in the past have been known to screw up the combination of conditions, and next week isn't looking any better. The org that produces the event has, in the last year, changed, after the original founders were seen as getting too greedy; it's now being produced by a group composed of the surfers themselves.