Victoria Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday 6th May)

Best Days: Surf Coast late Wednesday but more so Saturday, Surf Coast Sunday morning and then more so Monday and next week

Recap

Poor surf on the weekend with a building swell Saturday and onshore winds, workable for desperate surfers yesterday with a weaker onshore breeze and easing SW swell from 2-3ft on the Surf Coast 3-4ft to the east.

Today is smaller and with lingering onshore winds.

Today’s Forecaster Notes are brought to you by Rip Curl

This week and weekend (May 7 – 12)

Most of this week is still looking poor, with conditions due to clean up tomorrow under a N/NW offshore, but there'll be no size left on the Surf Coast, with bumpy waves on the beaches to the east.

A cold front moving in high through the Bight this evening and tomorrow will produce a short-lived burst of strong W/SW winds in our western swell window tomorrow evening, moving across us Wednesday.

We'll see a gusty but easing W/SW breeze on Wednesday and building surf to 2ft to likely 3ft later in the afternoon on the Surf Coast and 4ft+ on the Mornington Peninsula. We may see winds tend W/NW later in the afternoon as another cold front approaches from the west, creating OK conditions for a late surf.

Thursday will be clean on the Surf Coast again with a N/NW offshore but small easing 2ft sets and bumpy 3ft to maybe 4ft waves to the east. A SW change is due through the early afternoon, linked to the secondary cold front moving through and a possible late increase in windswell.

A stronger W/SW swell should fill in Friday from the earlier stages of the front bringing Thursday's change, that being a broad fetch of patchy strong to near gale-force W/SW winds projecting towards us through our western swell window tomorrow and Wednesday.

Size wise we should see the Surf Coast building to 3-4ft at magnets into Friday afternoon, smaller and likely more 2-3ft in the morning, with the Mornington Peninsula increasing to 5-6ft+ or so. Winds unfortunately look poor in the wake of Thursday's change with moderate to fresh from the SW, possibly W'ly for a period early morning.

Saturday should become cleaner ahead of another front with an all day offshore W/NW breeze and easing surf from 3ft to maybe 4ft on the Surf Coast and 5-6ft to the east.

Sunday is a tricky one firstly with the local winds swinging from a gusty W/NW'ly to the W/SW-SW around midday with another passing front.

A mix of new swells are due to build into the afternoon arriving from pre-frontal NW fetches, polar W/SW fetches, the later producing the best swell for Monday.

When winds are offshore Sunday morning, size wise we'll be in between swells and likely only see surf to 2-3ft on the Surf Coast (with our models incorrectly combining a distant long-period signal with mid-period swell).

Monday should see better surf to 4-5ft on the Surf Coast and 6-8ft on the Mornington Peninsula with excellent N/NW offshore winds. From here on through next week and beyond we'll see the westerly storm track set in motion with a conveyor belt of polar and mid-latitude fronts due to move in under the influence of a elongated and zonal Long Wave Trough. More on this Wednesday though.