Jonny Dorman's dog, Brandy, competes in the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Homer Henard, of Santa Cruz, watches as his dog, Skyler, catches a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

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Mike Uy, of San Diego, and his dog, Abbie, wait for the next heat during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)



Homer Henard's dog, Skyler, catches a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Jonny Dorman's dog, Brandy, wipes out during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Jonny Dorman's dog, Brandy, waits to compete in the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)



Mike Uy's dog, Abbie, rides a wave as Homer Henard, with his dog, Skyler, looks on during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Homer Henard, of Santa Cruz, helps his dog, Skyler, catch a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Homer Henard, of Santa Cruz, watches as his dog, Skyler, catches a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)



Homer Henard, of Santa Cruz, helps his dog, Skyler, catch a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Homer Henard's dog, Skyler, is covered by a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Homer Henard's dog, Skyler, wipes out on a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)



Mike Uy's dog, Abbie, rides a wave during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Mike Uy's dog, Abbie, top, and Jonny Dorman's dog, Brandy, do a tandem surf during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Mike Uy's dog, Abbie, top, and Jonny Dorman's dog, Brandy, do a tandem surf during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)



Trophies await the winners during the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

Mike Uy, of San Diego, accepts a trophy for his dog, Abbie, after the World Championships for Dog Surfing at Linda Mar Beach in Pacifica, Calif., Saturday, Sept.10, 2016. The event brought together dog surfers to raise money for charity, and to bring home the gold. (Patrick Tehan/Bay Area News Group)

PACIFICA — Surf was up Saturday in Pacifica and so were the pups.

Big pups, little pups, in-betweeners, all hanging ten.

Make that eight.

With a beach full of smartphone-camera-bearing humans looking on, the contestants in Northern California’s first-ever and hopefully annual World Championship for Dog Surfing hopped on their boards one by one and headed out.

Some were veterans, like solo surfer and world-record holder Abbie Girl.

“People ask me, how do you teach a dog to surf?” said Abbie’s partner, Michael Uy, a San Diego tech entrepreneur who’s helped turn this Australian Kelpie into a canine rock star in the world of dog surfing. “You don’t. They first just got to like it, and they kind of discover surfing on their own.

“Abbie started surfing even before I did,” he said. “And now she’s the only dog to have surfed both the East and West coasts, not to mention having met the mayor of Maui.”

All morning long, Linda Mar Beach drew more and more spectators to the event, part surf contest, part beach fashion show, with a $30 entry fee that went to support local canine-related causes.

“Dog surfing has gotten really big in Southern California and spread to places like Florida, Texas and even Australia,” said event organizer Andre Crump with San Francisco-based TasteTV, a food-focused multiplatform content producer. “But since it hadn’t come to Northern California, we decided to bring it here.”

Abbie was joined by other canine celebs like Jonny Dorman’s 8-year-old pug Brandy, a GoPro-sponsored fur ball whose water-bound prowess is on display all over YouTube and Instagram, at brandy_the_pug. Brandy was all business as she got ready for her cameo before the judges. Spectators swarmed around her like paparazzi. Kids tried to feed her treats (“No thanks”). And Dorman, a 24-year-old from Vista, got the girl ready for her ride.

The plan: Each dog got 10 minutes to take as many runs through the surf as they could, being judged on style and distance surfed. Some rode in alone, with their owners swimming in behind. Others rode it out with their human partner on the board.

“Brandy kind of learned to surf accidentally,” Dorman said before the show. “She loved jumping into the pool, so we got her a boogie board, and she liked getting on it. Then we took her to the beach, and she worked her way up to a surfboard and then started taking part in competitions three years ago.”

Oh, and did we also mention that Brandy snowboards and her videos on the GoPro channel have garnered over two million views? Well, she does, and they have.

That kind of celebrity has fueled the dog-surfing trend ever since Crump, author of “The Dog’s Guide to Surfing,” helped organize the first competition at Loews Coronado Bay Resort in 2006. Insiders say the sport, especially in Southern California, is becoming so popular that it’s now infused with its own high drama and peopled by “stage parents” who push their pets to excel out there, just off the beach.

“It’s like ‘Best in Show’ for surfing dogs,” said one dog owner at Pacifica on Saturday.

And with the toot of Crump’s small bullhorn, the contestants were off, at times literally falling off their boards, but usually hopping right back on, with or without the help of their owners. Sure, there were wipeouts, but nobody got hurt, not even the first-timers out there trying their paw at surfing, still wet behind the ears.

Credit: Patrick May