On a chilly Saturday morning, Pam Orr drives to Campus Point at the University of California, Santa Barbara, surfboard in her backseat. It’s been a stormy few days. She and her five friends have been texting all morning about tide reports, wave height, and swell direction, unsure if surfing is a good idea.
It’s the first time in a few months the women’s schedules have aligned. So they go.
By the time Orr rolls up in the palm-tree lined parking lot, across from dorms where she went to college over 40 years ago, the rest of the women are already there, including Vanessa Kirker, who grew up in North San Diego County. She went to Moonlight Beach every summer but never touched a surfboard until she was her 60s.
Marianne McPherson, 68, is there, too, with her red matte lipstick and a torn rotator cuff. Her doctor told her not to surf, and if she’s honest with herself, she’s dreading this. Nevertheless, she stands by her car (emblazoned with a ‘Bichhin’ license plate) on an artificial grass changing mat Orr gifted her.
Orr, meanwhile, is “vibrating stress.” A 63-year-old third grade teacher—her classroom door has the kid’s names written on bright surfboard cut-outs—her week consisted of incessant rain that kept her students stuck inside. She still has a pile of essays to grade. She shouldn’t be here. But the chit-chat is a distraction, and she welcomes it.
“I have your tennis racket.”
“Do I need my hat?”
“The booties stick, so they don’t necessarily land where I want them to land.”
Gauzy fog lingers over the ocean beyond the fence, beckoning. The women unzip long, shiny bags and lay their boards down on the wet cement. They pull sweatshirts over their heads and begin the transformation. Ann Wilbanks, who has dirty blonde hair “proudly going silver,” asks if the wetsuit with neon blue calves Orr takes out is new.
She nodes and jokes. “It’s baggy on me. I was like, ‘Have I shrunk?’”
The women slip salt-soaked wetsuits onto bodies that have skied mountains, cycled hundreds of miles, raced sailboats, swum in triathlons, birthed babies, and cradled grandbabies, pulling and tugging until the spongy neoprene sticks like a second skin.
Photo Credit: Florence Middleton Orr, Arkin, and Kirker wait patiently for a wave.
Go to any coastline, and you’ll find that women have continued to reclaim their place in the surfing lineup. Look closer, and you’ll see an abundance of laugh lines on more and more faces of women lured by the beauty and thrill of the ocean.
It’s hard to say how many older women surfers there are in California. Nearly a third of the 60 members of the San Diego chapter of The Wahine Kai Women’s Surf Club are 50-plus—a number that tracks with their three other West Coast chapters. The San Diego Surf Ladies Community, a former nonprofit that’s now a Facebook group, also has its fair share. Co-organizer Alexia Bregman, 51, says there’s a circularity that comes with surfing older.
“There’sa wildness to the ocean that we don’t have in our lives anymore. The wind is in your face and the water is spraying you and the sense of play from being a child comes back,” she says. “It invigorates and reawakens something in your cellular being.”
Despite growing up in the ’60s in the heyday of Gidget, the movie-turned-television-series about a sassy teen girl surfer, surfing came much later for the Santa Barbara women. Careers and children took precedence, with some watching instructors push their kids into the waves instead.
After her children grew up and she had more free time, Orr, for one, finally decided it was her turn. She discovered Salt Water Divas, a Santa Barbara group created by then-46-year-old Toyo Yamane-Peluso in 2012 with the goal of getting more local women into surfing. To date, there are more than 600 members. Doug Yartz, owner of the shop Surf Country, teaches most of the lessons.
Photo Credit: Cole Novak San Diego Wahine Kai members hit the waves in Pacific Beach.
Orr took her first lesson on Mother’s Day eight years ago. She remembers second-guessing her decision shortly after signing up. “[I worried,] What will people think of this older woman going out and wanting to surf? Then I saw this older man with white hair, and he got a surfboard and walked down to the beach,” she says. “I thought, Well, nobody thinks twice about an older man.”
The second lesson went poorly, and she almost didn’t continue. A “Never Give Up” sticker she saw on a car afterward led her to the friends she regularly surfs with now: Nancy Arkin, a retiree from the US Forest Service whose daughter is a global surf photographer; McPherson, a mid-level manager at an aerospace company who always wanted to surf but grew up near Oregon’s frigid waters; and Mary Johnson, a retired physical therapist who is dedicated to keeping active.
They were a formidable foursome for a few years. The group expanded when two lawyers who changed careers joined later: Kirker, a therapist who often saw surfers while open water swimming and thought, I could do that; and Wilbanks, an art and antique dealer from Connecticut who spends half the year living near her grown kids, including a daughter who encouraged her to surf.
“There’s nothing I’ve ever done athletically that gives you that feeling of power and speed [like surfing],” Wilbanks, 65, says. “It’s like dancing on water.”
The women all took lessons through Salt Water Divas and gravitated toward each other because of their similar ages. They found they also shared athletic backgrounds, a level of comfort in the water, and another trait, perhaps the most important: stubbornness.
“We were taught to accept the world as it sees us,” Kirker, 66, says. “Learning to surf in your 50s and 60s is not accepting the world as it sees you but accepting you for yourself.”
Photo Credit: Florence Middleton Vanessa Kirker, Pam Orr, and Arkin suit up in the UC Santa Barbara parking lot before heading down to the water.
The parking lot this morning is nearly empty. Campus Point is known for being beginner-friendly, often crowded with college kids, but every now and then the women have had to contend with jerks—teenage boys, mostly, who try to take every wave. Often, they’ll move to another spot or let the boys know it’s time for them to share, with letting a little of their annoyance come through in their voices.
It’s not always the boys, though. Once, at C Street, a more aggressive and advanced surf spot in Ventura, a woman yelled at Kirker for accidentally dropping in on her. Kirker apologized, but the woman still berated her, shouting, “What are you doing? You don’t belong here.”
Kirker said nothing, got out of the water, and cried. As a family law litigator for 30 years in a profession dominated by men, she’d had enough of feeling like she didn’t belong. She didn’t want to surf angry, and her board sat in her garage for four years until the pandemic started—around the time she shifted careers, which she attributes to surfing. She was tired of fighting with people.
Today, the wet weather holds the promise of fewer people. The women wax their boards, slip on booties speckled with grains of sand, and, one by one, head to the beach path. Their wetsuits squeak as they walk past the humble Marine Science Institute and over a driftwood-laden rocky shore. Johnson, the oldest of the crew at 71, has wasted no time snapping on a surf cap over her short, white hair and is the first one in the water.
Arkin brings up the rear, holding a longboard with a hook she’s attached so she can grip it better. Her forearm has a fish tattoo with a Buddhist design for freedom. She’s headed towards Poles, a left break named after three poles that used to mark an underground water intake valve. A bonus, they joke later, is that it’s out of range of the surf camera that continuously streams on a giant TV in Yartz’s shop.
Arkin paddles out, the whoops and hollers from her friends already mixing with the screeching of the seagulls.
Courtesy of Polynesian Cultural Center
Women have been surfing for a long time—as far back as the 17th century in Hawaii and other Polynesian islands (the daring Princess Kelea of Maui was legendary)—but you wouldn’t know it if you looked at any surf magazines before the ’70s, when women got their own professional circuit. Even then, it took two decades for lifestyle brands to embrace female surfers—usually ones that were blonde and conventionally attractive—in their marketing campaigns.
Representation in the sport has long skewed young, white, and male, but that’s changing. Women surfers who identify as queer, BIPOC, and curvy have led the way in advocating for a more inclusive surf culture.
Older women surfers are a smaller subgroup, though no less loud. When they’re not chasing waves, they’re in Facebook groups and Reddit threads, piping up whenever someone asks, “Am I too old to surf?”
The Santa Barbara women might still be outliers, but they say it’s becoming more and more common to see others who look like them—although it’s not something they fixate on.“I forget about the age thing when I’m in the water,” Johnson says, adding that she does get a kick out of surprising people.
Photo Credit: Cole Novak San Diego Wahine Kai member Carla Verbrugghen catching a wave at Tourmaline Surf Park.
Letting go and living in the moment is one of the draws of surfing. But it’s also a practical strategy, as timing is everything. No wave is ever the same. Then there’s the added variable of age, which comes with decreased flexibility or slower reactions that can make it challenging to pop up, ride a wave for a while, and try out fun tricks.
“We don’t have a pop up. We have a lumber up,” McPherson likes to joke.
The women have all experienced their share of injuries—broken toes and fingers, head gashes, face cuts and bruises—but it’s not enough to stop them.
Though gravitate toward cruisy waves, aware of their bodies’ limits, they are still addicted to the excitement of getting better and better each year. The friends might never go pro, but they have certain advantages that age brings: acceptance, patience, and unapologetic enjoyment of something they can claim as theirs after a lifetime of caring for others.
“We’re like these little lights out there communing in the surf. We all respect and honor each other’s individual experience. And we’re not in relation to anyone. We’re not someone’s mother, someone’s wife, someone’s daughter,” Kirker says. “It’s really freeing.”
Photo Credit: Florence Middleton Arkin and Kirker ride to shore.
The waves are better than they expect this morning. The water is glassy, meaning there’s little wind, the smooth sheen ideal for surfing.
The women are the only ones in the water except for two surfers who are far enough away to leave them alone. Johnson paddles to catch a wave. Kirker, the crew’s most vocal cheerleader, yells: “Go left, go left!” Johnson stands up, compact and still as a statue, and rides the wave nearly all the way to the shore. Kirker hollersl “Woooohoooo!”
A big part of the joy of surfing is being with each other. Some of it is a matter of safety, knowing that if they wipe out or have the wind knocked out of them someone will be there to help. But it’s the camaraderie that keeps them going out together week after week; everyone else knows to make plans around their surf schedule.
“There’ll be days when I don’t catch anything,” McPherson says. “But the enjoyment of being together and celebrating your own successes with an audience of people who love you, and celebrating their successes—it’s double the adrenaline.”
Nearly all are partnered, with husbands or boyfriends, but most of their men don’t share the stoke. Surfing has become a defining feature of their identities, met with a combination of raised eyebrows and subtle boasts. McPherson’s cousin will often introduce her to others and say, “This is Marianne. She surfs every day.” (She doesn’t.)
Now McPherson straddles the back of her board, lipstick still intact. Kirker is nearby and waits with the others for a good swell. Orr also sits close, her brown-blonde bob she has yet to dye now dark from the saltwater. The rocking of the ocean relaxes her shoulders.
“I just feel like the weight’s off,” she says.
“It’s because I’m here,” Kirker says. Orr laughs.
In an instant, the calm is broken. Orr spots a potential wave. She lies down on her board, turning its nose around toward shore. Everyone cheers. “Go, go, go!”
Careful not to strain knees that need replacing, she pops up for a few seconds before tumbling backwards into the water. “I blew it,” she says when she’s straddling the board again. “That could’ve been a nice, long wave.”
They all flail at some point, limbs flying everywhere, boards bouncing along the whitewash. “Come on, bitches!” Kirker says one time to the waves, furiously paddling, only to have them fizzle out.
It takes a lot for everything to be in sync, and learning how to cope with failure is one of surfing’s greatest lessons. There’s joy in that, too.
“You tend to become competent in the things you do at a certain age,” Arkin says. “But what’s been really fun for me is being incompetent at something new.”
Yet Arkin and the other women are far from incompetent, catching numerous waves, a testament to the number of years they’ve taken lessons together not only at Campus Point, but at surf clinics in Costa Rica and Mexico. They’ll also travel around California together—every Memorial Day for the past eight years, they’ve headed down to Beacons in Encinitas.
Just today, they’ve been out for nearly two hours. Onshore, more people are strolling along the nearby cliffs, while college kids in wetsuits stand at the edge of the water, about to paddle out.
“I’m getting cold,” Arkin says, metal in her finger from a surf injury stiff. They all agree to stop soon.
As they wait for the last few waves, Kirker hums The Monkees theme song. “There’s just something about the ocean that makes me want to sing,” she adds.
Photo Credit: Florence Middleton Nancy Arkin carries her board at Campus Point in Santa Barbara, California
The women carry the boards back to their cars. The parking lot is busier, and a 20-something-year-old wearing a UCSB sweatshirt walks by with an older couple, presumably his parents. One of them sees the friends pulling terry cloth surf ponchos over their heads and smiles. They don’t notice.
There’s talk of going to Starbucks afterwards. Over coffee and chai, they will laugh at obnoxious men on dating sites, reminisce about raising athletic children, and share their personal surfing stats from the Dawn Patrol apps they all have on their Apple watches. (Johnson had 11 waves, with one at 20 mph, nearly twice the average speed.) And they’ll make plans to go surfing again tomorrow.
For now, the focus is on getting warm. The clouds have parted. “Here’s your sunshine!” Kirker says.
“Well, I had more good biffs today,” Arkin says, brushing her wispy hair.
Kirker won’t hear it. “I thought you did fine.”
Photo Credit: Cole Novak San Diego Wahine Kai members catch a party wave.
Today, they’ve emerged both tired and triumphant, the ocean leaving them breathless at times. When they go home, they will be unable to fully articulate the feeling—of being themselves, of being together—but it is one they will continue to chase. Because with so much life still ahead of them, they unabashedly want more. Since she began surfing, “my whole world is better,” Kirker says.
She sits down on the side of her white cargo van with a “Soul of a Mermaid, Mouth of a Sailor” sticker and pours a jug of water over her head. McPherson towels off, her shoulder fine, at least for right now. Wilbanks helps Johnson slither out of her wetsuit.
Orr is the last one to return. In the back of her mind are the essays she still needs to grade, but they don’t seem as urgent. And, like the rest of her friends, she doesn’t ever foresee a time when she’ll stop surfing. “When I started, I thought, I’ll probably be able to do this for, like, five or six years, and then I won’t be able to do it anymore. But look at Mary. She’s my hero,” she says. “And now I think, God, I hope I can keep surfing as long as her.”
A Rare Look Inside Callaway Golf’s San Diego Test Center
The Ely Callaway Performance Center is where tour-level fittings, cutting-edge technology, and golf equipment you can’t buy yet all come together
Courtesy of Ely Callaway Performance Center
By Tina Mickelson
“Come test something.”
Those are quite possibly my three favorite words in the English language—all due respect to “I love you” or the highly underrated “you were right.”
I’ve been a PGA Golf Professional since 1994, and yes, full bias disclosure, a Callaway Golf Ambassador for 18 years. One of the bonuses that comes with that combo is access to the Ely Callaway Performance Center—a place so exclusive it gives “velvet rope” vibes.
Originally opened in 2006 as a highly functional (yet not exactly breathtaking) test facility, the ECPC got a serious glow-up in 2018 when Gil Hanse (along with partner Geoff Shackelford) turned it into what can only be described as a fully engineered golf playground. Hanse is no stranger to golf course renovations. In 2024, he completed an extensive redesign of the Omni La Costa North Course in Carlsbad, so it could host the NCAA Division 1 Golf Championships. He also worked on acclaimed courses like Winged Foot, Merion Golf Club, and Oakmont Country Club.
In just two months, it went from a standard test center and R&D lab to a fully dialed-in golf playground.
Courtesy of Ely Callaway Performance Center
What was once purely practical is now intentionally designed to be both precise and inspiring. The targets are staggered with purpose—forcing creative shot-making while also calling you out on your actual distances (no more “that’s my 150-yard club … ish”).
Add a massive hitting area, bunkers and greens that mimic real on-course conditions, a “Himalayas” putting green (named for its roller-coaster undulations), an upgraded indoor putting lab, and a 120-decibel sound system blasting a very golf-appropriate playlist, and suddenly it’s a rare blend of high-performance testing facility and “don’t mind if I stay here all day” energy. Since this isn’t exactly open to the public, SDM asked me to take you behind the curtain.
As the iron gates part, it feels less like arriving at a practice facility and more like being granted backstage access at a rock concert—if the bandmembers were made entirely of launch monitors and perfectly manicured turf.
There are no mats. No guessing. No “I think that one felt good?” Just conditions that mirror exactly what tour players see in competition. Because when you’re testing equipment at this level, accuracy isn’t a bonus—it’s the whole point.
Even the sand matters. Different textures. Different densities. Because bunkers have personalities, too, and they are often unfriendly. And the golf balls? Brand. New. Not the usual “these have seen some things” range balls. New balls mean consistent spin, truer trajectory, and no surprises. The older a golf ball gets—and the more it’s been baked in the sun, scuffed, or generally lived a full and complicated life—the less reliable it becomes. Think of it like this: fresh ball, predictable performance; old range ball, slight chaos with a side of mystery.
I’m escorted to my personal hitting bay—basically a pop-up shaded oasis stocked with enough equipment to make a gear junkie weak in the knees. Shafts in every weight and profile imaginable. Heads lined up like they’re waiting to be drafted by their favorite team.
Courtesy of Ely Callaway Performance Center
Toptracer technology was patiently waiting to track every one of my swings, each shot instantly delivering ball speed, launch, spin, carry distance, and dispersion (a polite way of saying consistency, or lack thereof), so there’s no guessing—just data telling the truth, whether I like it or not.
We start with irons. Different heads, different feels, different results. When I miss a shot, the ball tends to leak right, so we check lie angle. A quick adjustment—2 degrees upright—and suddenly the clubface is consistently square at impact like it remembered its job. Effort level: down. Ball flight: improved. Confidence: creeping back.
Next we look at the different shaft options—because nothing says “fun afternoon” like realizing a higher kick point can change your entire golf identity. Shaft flex (how much the shaft bends during your swing) helps determine whether you get more height and distance or more control, while kick point (where the shaft bends the most) influences your ball flight—lower kick point for higher launch, higher kick point for a flatter, more penetrating shot. In other words, one small tweak and suddenly you’re hitting shots you’d normally only describe later, slightly exaggerated, over a glass of wine.
Then we move through the bag: hybrids, fairway woods, drivers, wedges. It’s a full rotation of “try this,” “now try this,” and “okay wait … THAT one.”
And yes—the new Quantum driver and fairway woods made an appearance. Without getting too deep in the weeds, they’re faster, more forgiving, and smarter (thanks to AI face mapping) than previous models. Translation: Even your mishits are now slightly less embarrassing. And they were not the only things getting tested. My patience was under attack because the driver and woods would not be available to the public for a good three months.
Courtesy of Ely Callaway Performance Center
Watching the fitting team work is like watching a Formula 1 pit crew. Clubs are swapped in seconds. Shafts tightened, adjusted, replaced. One minute you’re swinging something that seems “fine,” and the next, you’re holding a club that feels like it is a part of your DNA.
Then there’s the putter fitting. Drivers are physics. Putters are therapy. Inside the putting lab, sensors track everything—tempo, face angle, path—things you didn’t even know could be measured. Within minutes, my data politely informs me that my putter face is slightly closed at impact. Not shocking, but also not ideal.
A few quick adjustments—different head (with a bit more weight at the toe to discourage the face swinging closed at impact), shorter shaft (so I feel more over the ball, which helps my eyeline)—and suddenly the ball starts rolling exactly where I’m aimed.
Same stroke. Same golfer. Completely different outcome. If only the rest of life worked like that.
And then there’s the part that feels slightly classified. The ECPC isn’t “just” a performance center—it’s also where future equipment lives before the public even knows it exists. I’ve been there when certain clubs were basically under surveillance. Not “don’t touch,” but more “please keep phones in your pocket.”
It’s golf’s version of Area 51. Except instead of aliens, it’s drivers that won’t hit shelves for another year—and like I mentioned, waiting is not my strong suit.
Getting to test the newest equipment isn’t just a perk—it’s part of the job. It’s what allows me to stand in front of students and say, “I’ve tried it. I know what works and what doesn’t. And more importantly, I know why.” And if I happen to sprint to my car every time the phone rings and someone says, “Come test something” … well, that’s just professional courtesy.
Callaway isn’t the only place to get your swing analyzed and clubs fitted. You can stroll into big retail spots like The Golf Mart or Golf Galaxy, book a next-level session at a dedicated studio like Club Champion or True Spec Golf, test brand-specific gear at various manufacturing companies (many located in Carlsbad), or even combine a lesson and a fitting at GOLFTEC. And let’s not forget your local golf course, where fittings happen on actual turf, on a driving range you have some history with—many times with the golf professional who is familiar with your swing so they can give you valuable input. With this many options, there’s really no excuse, other than pride, to keep blaming your clubs.
For thousands of years, the Kumeyaay who lived in this area called a mountain south of Julian Cush-pii, meaning “sharp peak.” Then, after the Civil War, Confederate sympathizers saw that same mountain and decided to rename it Stonewall Peak—after General Stonewall Jackson. The name stuck for nearly a century and a half, until Cuyamaca Rancho State Park announced earlier this year that the name will return to its original, Cush-pii. Hike to the summit for expansive views of the Coronado Islands to the west and Mexico to the south.
Courtesy of Culture Shock San Diego
Best Pop and Lock Spot
Culture Shock
In 1993, Angie Bunch gathered a group of hip-hop dancers—called Culture Shock Dance Troupe—and gave them a space to practice and perform. As hip hop grew through the ’90s, so did Culture Shock. It has since become a nonprofit, a space for young and old, beginner and expert dancers. Culture Shock has also expanded to Los Angeles, Oakland, Las Vegas, Chicago, Atlanta, New York City, and Washington, D.C., as well as Ottawa and Toronto, Canada.
In 2019, Amanda Leach created the Yoga Box method, which takes high-energy flows and adds strength-building poses in heated, vibey, lava-lamp-lit studios. What started on Grand Avenue in Pacific Beach has spread to 15 locations across the county, with even more trickling into Denver, Chicago, and Brooklyn. The best part? Mindfulness newbies who can’t touch their toes and six-packed contortionists can hang in the same class. You can customize each session based on your ability and fitness level.
Courtesy of Fit Athletic Club
Best Leg Day Turned Social Hour
Fit Mission Beach
A gym taking over a historic beachfront pool sounds like the setup for a new season of Love Island, but Fit Mission Beach operating the nearly 100-year-old Plunge at Belmont Park is real. The independent fitness brand has spent the past several years building a loyal following through group fitness classes, community events, and a members’ social club overlooking the ocean. Upstairs, members can work remotely, meet friends, or hang out long after their workout ends. Between the Plunge, the coworking-style lounge, and a packed calendar of events, Fit has evolved into something bigger than a gym. It’s a clubhouse for San Diego’s fitness crowd.
Best Place to Learn What a Vagus Is
Breathe Degrees
The wellness world is finally transitioning away from HIIT workouts and cult-like spin classes, where your heart rate hits Zone 5 within minutes and stays there until cooldown. Good. At Breathe Degrees, wellness takes the form of zenned-out communal breathing sessions or vagus nerve–activating cold plunges. Breathwork is said to boost your mood in the short term and improve your heart health in the long term, and maybe that’s why everyone’s coming back for more. You can’t run into someone in Carlsbad who hasn’t dropped into at least one breathwork session, and now the studio has opened a second location in Liberty Station.
Photo Credit: Shot On Us
Best Pilates Studio for People With Tiny Roommates
Soul Pilates and Care
Pilates wasn’t just popular this year; it was practically a requirement for maintaining your San Diego residency. New studios seemed to appear weekly across San Diego, each promising stronger cores and better posture, but Soul Pilates and Care found a way to stand out by addressing a challenge many parents know well: finding time to exercise at all. Fitness doesn’t have to compete with parenting responsibilities. Parents can drop their kids off with trained caregivers while they head into reformer classes, eliminating one of the biggest barriers to working out. The studio has earned strong reviews for both its instruction and family-friendly approach.
The Hotel del Coronado’s sweeping $550 million restoration touched nearly every corner of the historic resort, but one of the most anticipated unveilils was the debut of its redesigned spa. The oceanfront wellness destination now features 21 treatment rooms, a relaxation lounge, a sauna, steam room, and a treatment menu inspired by the coastal environment just steps away. The redesign blends the Del’s Victorian legacy with a cleaner, more contemporary aesthetic, creating a space that feels distinctly SoCal rather than generic luxury hotel. For locals who don’t have time for a vacation, it’s the next best thing.
Best Cheers Without Beers
Good News Bar
As non-alcoholic beverages continue their meteoric rise, Good News Bar has become one of San Diego’s most compelling arguments for a booze-free evening. The University Heights hotspot serves a menu of carefully crafted zero-proof cocktails that borrow techniques and ingredients from traditional cocktail programs (it’s not just fancy juices and soda water), minus the hangover. The space also hosts regular community events and has quickly become a gathering place for everyone from sober San Diegans to the merely sober-curious. In a nightlife industry built around alcohol sales, Good News proved there’s plenty of demand for connection without the buzz.
Rub some dirt on it. Walk it off. Be a man. The tropes and reasons for men ignoring their health and doing preventive care are many, reinforced by action heroes and generational norms. As a result, compared to American women, American men live an average of five years less, seek healthcare treatment half as often, and die by suicide nearly four times more often.
Many national campaigns have tried to change this. This year’s “Relax Your Tight End” ad from Novartis during the Super Bowl—in which NFL legends advocated for early prostate cancer screenings—was a high-profile example. Meanwhile, in San Diego, Evan Miller seems to have figured it out.
Miller founded Gameday Men’s Health in 2018 as a small clinic in Carlsbad. The idea was to create a space men would actually want to spend time in. So he built Gameday to feel more like a sports bar or a man cave—snacks, sports on oversized, high-def flat screens in the waiting room. He personalized the care for each client, made the experience more casual, and, above all, efficient. If the wait for payoff is too long, Miller says, men won’t show up for their health.
“We need to feel better quick,” he says. “So that’s where the real hook with Gameday is: It’s fast; it works quick.”
The idea has worked. Big time.
Gameday now has 430 locations spread across 46 US states and parts of Canada, with hundreds more set to open over the next three years.
Prior to Gameday, Miller—who has a Ph.D. in clinical psychology—ran Akua Mind Body, an addiction treatment center in Newport Beach. After selling the center, Miller says he searched for a new way to help his community.
He drew from his behavioral health training and dispiriting past experiences with “sketchy” men’s clinics, albeit with a slightly different concept at first.
Courtesy of Gameday Men’s Health
“My original idea for Gameday, funny enough, was men’s group therapy,” Miller says. “I wanted to put it in this ‘man cave’ environment because I knew guys wouldn’t show up otherwise.”
Initially envisioned as safe spaces to encourage men to open up emotionally, Miller pivoted to a more clinical approach with an athletic design that personally appealed to him. Soon, it evolved into a one-stop shop of compounded medication treatments for weight loss plans, hair loss treatments, anti-aging injections, sexual wellness strategies, and testosterone replacement therapy. The hotly debated trend of peptides—mini amino acid proteins that the FDA has yet to approve—has become a popular feature.
New patients undergo in-clinic assessments for testosterone and prostate levels with the goal of producing test results in just a quarter of an hour. “Our philosophy with our treatments is we only do what the research supports,” Miller says.
An Orange County native, Miller found Carlsbad to be a natural headquarters. He found a much bigger market in coastal North County of men seeking a boost—both in their marriages and their overall livelihoods. The pandemic proved to be a watershed moment, with front-yard gyms and outdoor, highly visible exercise sparking a wave of self-care. According to Cleveland Clinic, after the pandemic, about 20 percent of men started to exercise more and eat healthier, with a quarter of men reporting they scheduled more sleep and spent more time with family.
“When Covid happened, [suddenly] everyone looked in the mirror and was like, ‘I need to take care of my health; I have to do everything possible to get in shape,’” Miller says.
Two years after Gameday first began, Miller opened a second clinic in Temecula, followed by locations in Laguna Beach and Newport. Demand kept coming, so they started franchising in 2023. They sold 1,000 licenses in the first year. By 2025, they had over 400 clinics across the country.
When asked about the rapid growth, Miller cites the feedback he received along the way: “People were so excited about men’s health, cash-pay medicine, and not having to wait for insurance. They understood the model. It was for guys; it felt like ESPN meets healthcare.”
Now Miller says Gameday is starting to map out a global expansion—to Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. Since the company first cultivated a following, Miller says there have been persistent questions about whether Gameday would ever expand its focus to include women. Their answer: Her Way.
“We only offer a very narrow menu, almost like In-N-Out Burger, because we stay in our lane, we do it really, really well, and we gain trust that way,” Miller says. “So we created the Her Way model to do the same thing for women [that] we’ve done with men.”
Her Way Health & Hormones launched in 2024 in clinics with more neutral and calming décor. With locations in Carlsbad and Mission Valley, it will officially start franchising this summer. Miller seems incapable of thinking small and expects around 1,000 Her Way locations to open nationwide within a few years.
Ryan Hardison is a freelance arts and entertainment writer and recent graduate of San Diego State. When he's not staring at his laptop, he's likely eating an adobada burrito or getting sunburnt at the beach.
A perfectly designed home rarely happens by accident. Those kitchens that feel effortless and rooms that seem to tell a story the second you walk in? They’re usually the work of someone who knows exactly what they’re doing.
It’s knowing which ideas will actually work, which materials will hold up over time, and how to turn a collection of choices into a space that feels intentional. That’s where a professional interior designer comes in.
For the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) California San Diego Chapter, the goal is to help people see interior design as more than just the finished look. Behind every well-designed space is a process built on technical expertise. Designers are educated in everything from professional software and construction details to building codes, space planning, materials, and functionality.
Courtesy of ASID
“People don’t always realize how much goes on behind the scenes,” Kirsten Recce , current president of the ASID California San Diego Chapter, says. “Our designers are not just doing furniture placement and color selection and picking out new fluffy pillows. That’s not what they’re trained for.”
ASID members bring formal education, continued learning, and industry knowledge to their projects, helping create spaces that are not only beautiful, but designed to work. A paint color that changes completely depending on the lighting. A material that looks beautiful in a showroom but doesn’t make sense for everyday life. A layout that photographs well but doesn’t function for the people living there. These are the details where professional guidance can make all the difference.
Still, one of the biggest misconceptions about hiring an interior designer is that it’s reserved for massive renovations, luxury homes, or people who already know exactly what they want. The process can feel intimidating. Where do you begin? Is a designer worth the investment? What if you only need help with one room?
ASID’s answer: start with one hour.
ASID’s Spruce Up events break down one of the biggest barriers between homeowners and professional design: knowing where to begin. Held twice a year, the community program gives homeowners the chance to work directly with an ASID designer through a one-hour, $125 consultation in their own home. Whether you’re looking for advice on furniture placement, window treatments, kitchen and bath updates, remodeling ideas, vacation rentals, color selections or something else entirely, the upcoming September 2026 event offers an approachable way to get expert guidance before committing to a full project. Signups are open through Sept. 7, with consultations taking place Sept. 21 through Oct. 31. Proceeds benefit ASID San Diego’s educational and community programs. Register here!
Courtesy of ASID
“It’s a great opportunity for people who are in that exploratory phase,” Recce says. “Maybe they’re not sure they want to hire an interior designer yet, or they think it sounds daunting or expensive. This gives them a chance to discover what working with a designer is actually like.”
Design is personal. A good designer isn’t just creating a beautiful room; they’re helping create a space that fits the way someone lives.
“We’re a resource to all of San Diego County,” Recce says. “It doesn’t cost anything to pick up the phone and call and ask. We’ll answer.”
Everybody’s talking about hormones. Celebrities like Michelle Obama, Sex and the City’s Kim Cattrall, Oprah Winfrey, and the irrepressible Gwyneth Paltrow are waxing poetic on menopause, and, according to industry publication BeautyMatter, the market for products related to that particular life stage will hit $24.4 billion by 2030. There are more than 225,000 TikTok posts under the hashtag #hormonehealth, many of them focusing on “balancing” out-of-whack levels of estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, and more. Those often-mysterious little chemical messengers are having a moment.
According to Dr. Ashlee Schelsier, a Sharp Community Medical Group board-certified OB-GYN, “hormonal imbalance” isn’t a clinical diagnosis in and of itself, since “our hormones as women vary hour to hour, day to day, and by what part of the cycle we’re in, so it is normal to have big fluctuations.”
However, she adds, “we do have clinical diagnoses that result in changes in our hormones that are a symptom of a disease.” And with age comes the palpable shifts of menopause.
Dr. Ashlee Schlesier Courtesy of West Coast OBGYN
The associated symptoms—annoying at best and debilitating at worst—frequently leave ovary-havers scrambling for solutions, from medications and supplements to foods said to help our hormones achieve equilibrium. “It’s really important to partner with a medical team and a physician that is willing to sit and listen and understand your experience,” says Dr. Meredith McMullen, a San Diego OB-GYN with Kaiser Permanente. “In the past, there has been a tendency to underplay or dismiss these symptoms, both on the patient and provider side. But you don’t have to suffer in silence.”
The first step is working to understand exactly what’s going on. Per the World Health Organization, polycystic ovary syndrome, or PCOS, affects approximately six to 13 percent of reproductive-aged women globally. Doctors typically diagnose PCOS if you have some combination of irregular or absent periods; the titular cysts on your ovaries; and signs of elevated androgenic hormones like testosterone, including acne and excessive hair growth. People with the condition might also experience insulin resistance, chronic inflammation, issues regulating cholesterol, and even depression and anxiety.
“The syndrome itself actually runs with things like Type 2 diabetes … and obesity,” McMullen explains. “That’s why we call it a syndrome, because we see the effects across multiple body systems. This disorder is really specific to women who are still menstruating.”
Courtesy of Dr. Meredith McMullen
Others experience the lesser-known premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), “defined as recurrent, severe, and distressing symptoms that occur during the luteal phase, which is the week or two before menstruation, and significantly improve within a few days after the onset of menstruation,” McMullen says. Symptoms include anxiety, depression, headaches, and severe fatigue, all more extreme than your garden-variety PMS.
Perimenopause (the period of transition just before your cycle stops permanently) and menopause (which you’ll have officially reached once you’ve gone 12 months without a period) are different—they’re normal, age-related stages, but they can come with uncomfortable symptoms and side effects. “What menopause really signifies is the end of the ovaries producing consistent levels of estrogen and progesterone,” McMullen adds. “But instead of the ovaries stopping like a light switch, what we see is that the light switch ‘flickers.’ It’s that flickering time frame that corresponds to the perimenopausal phase where you’re getting irregular secretion of estrogen from the ovaries. That’s why you see these perimenopausal symptoms”— things like night sweats, hot flashes, fatigue, weight gain, even joint pain—“start to become more prevalent.”
But because the symptoms people experience can be so diverse and far-reaching, it can be difficult to tell whether what you’re dealing with is truly a hormone issue. For example, “there are a lot of things that mimic PCOS, like androgen disorders [or] thyroid disease,” Schlesier explains. Clinicians use tools like physical exams, patient history, blood tests, and ultrasounds to diagnose conditions such as PCOS and PMDD.
While many hormonal diseases are not curable, there are plenty of routes to treat them. “There’s a supplement that is helpful with PCOS called inositol,” Schlesier says. “The main treatment for PCOS is going to be an oral contraceptive pill. It increases something called your sex hormone–binding globulin, which binds up those excess androgens. It also regulates your cycle. It is important to have four cycles a year … to protect your uterus against potential pre-cancer and cancer.”
Amelia Rodriguez is a writer and journalist and winner of the San Diego Press Club's 2023 Rising Star Award and 2024 Best of Show Award, she’s also covered music, food, arts and culture, fashion, and design for Rolling Stone, Palm Springs Life, and other national and regional publications. After work, you can find her hunting down San Diego’s best pastries and maintaining her five-year Duolingo streak.
Listen to our Ultimate California Mixtape below featuring each artist
Some of the most famous musicians on the planet got their start in California—the Eagles, the Grateful Dead, Cher, Snoop Dogg, and Fergie, to name a modest handful. But before they were topping charts and selling out stadiums, these heavy-hitters were just kids with a dream.
California’s still full of dreamers, talented artists playing garages and filming TikToks in the hope of making their voices heard. Among them are the next Metallica, Dr. Dre, or Billie Eilish (three more Golden State stars). So, we asked 15 music experts from venues, record shops, and radio stations throughout the state to cut through the noise and tell us who they think is poised to go platinum. Here’s your chance to beat the inevitable Ticketmaster battle royale and see ’em while they’re still up-and-coming.
Courtesy of The Schizophonics
The Schizophonics
Recommended by: Tim Mays | Founder of The Casbah | San Diego
“I’ve long thought that The Schizophonics (@theschizophonics) are on the verge of going big. They just played a high-profile opening slot for Jack White at the Hollywood Palladium. They’ve got an established national booking agency working for them and a couple big tours over the next few months. They’ve consistently drawn large local crowds and their show is one of the best live shows out there—it must be seen to fully understand.”
Must-Listen Track: “Desert Girl”
Courtesy of Wikipedia
Rexx Life Raj
Recommended by: Pendarvis Harshaw | Arts & Culture Writer KQED-FM | San Francisco
“Rexx Life Raj (@rexxliferaj) can rap. He can sing. He’s a clever jokester who talks about the powers of psilocybin, as well as a poet who readily discusses the -isms that plague our society. He is from Berkeley, played college football in Idaho, and [has] done shows around the world. There are a lot of entry points to his catalog for someone who has never heard of him—the California Poppyand Father Figureseries are dope. And he’s done a number of remarkable features on other people’s projects.
But The Blue Hour album is a must-listen. In the wake of losing both his parents, he took that pain and made beautiful music for those who are in pain. (Isn’t that what music is for?) He’s dropping another project; it’s titled In Rhythm. I expect more of all of it.”
Must-Listen Track: “New Normal”
Courtesy of Anna Thoresen
Anna Thoresen
Recommended by: Jake Perry | Talent Buyer Whisky a Go Go | West Hollywood
“I’ve been the talent buyer at The Whisky for 15 years, and an artist named Anna Thoresen (@anna__thoresen) recently sent over her music and I’m very impressed. She’s in her early 20s and lives in Los Angeles. Her music is a blend of soulful rock and pop—a Gen-Z Stevie Nicks who produces her own music. I think she’s the next big thing!”
Must-Listen Track: “Dirty Laundry”
Photo Credit: Carlo Aranda
Shua
Recommended by: Julia Dixon Evans, KPBS Arts Reporter & Host of The Finest KPBS-FM, San Diego
“On my radar is Shua (@shuatheshua), a San Diego–based artist who, in his words, creates music ‘for lonely people.’ Throughout his career so far, he’s seen highs and lows—[he’s been] on the brink of making it, with record deals inked and songs with millions of streams, and he’s also been on the brink of homelessness, unsure where his next meal might come from. Throughout it all, he’s committed to raw, compelling, and honest storytelling—all with a stunning voice and sonic energy that’s both urgent and delicate.”
Must-Listen Track:“How To Let Go”
Courtesy of Mareux
Mareux
Recommended by: Brad Schelden | Head Buyer Amoeba Music | Los Angeles
“Mareux (@__mareux__) is a totally unique, new LA darkwave genius that also sounds completely familiar—a new kind of goth making music to help us cope with our brave new world.”
Must-Listen Track: “The Perfect Girl”
Courtesy of Live Nation
Sitting On Saturn
Recommended by: Candace Mandracia | Talent Buyer Humphreys Concerts By The Bay | San Diego
“Sitting on Saturn (@sittingonsaturnband) [is a] really upbeat trio playing a blend of ska, punk, and indie. Best of all, they are from San Diego and graduated from [San Diego State University]. They’ve made appearances at festivals like Riot Fest and toured with 311, Sublime with Rome, Dirty Heads, and even the Jonas Brothers and have collaborated with artists like G. Love, NOFX, and Simple Plan.”
Must-Listen Track: “Tokyo”
Courtesy of The Neighborhood Kids
The Neighborhood Kids
Recommended by: Lou Niles | Co-host of Loudspeaker, San Diego Music Foundation Executive Board Member, 91X FM | San Diego
“The Neighborhood Kids (@theneighborhoodkidsmusic) are poised to break out. They are a young, emerging hip-hop group produced by Jon the Funky Monk. They have a great, old-school hip-hop base to their sound while speaking to important political and social issues happening today. The Neighborhood Kids recently won best new artist at the San Diego Music Awards.”
Sloane Moriarty is a rising Junior at the University of California, Berkeley where she studies English and Education and writes for the Daily Californian newspaper. When she is not at a coffee shop doing work, you will find her in front of a bowl of pasta and a good book.
In 2004, Scripps orthopedic surgeons made history when they implanted the world’s first electronic prosthetic knee, replacing a patient’s failing joint and subsequently collecting valuable data on how everyday activities impact the knee. Now, research at Scripps is applying the same approach to the shoulder. Scripps Clinic researchers have secured grant funding to develop a prototype of a rechargeable “smart shoulder”—a Wi-Fi- and sensor-equipped device that will track shoulder usage and provide new insight into the joint’s inner workings. Click here for more about the smart shoulder and other innovative research taking place at the Shiley Center for Orthopaedic Research and Education (SCORE) at Scripps Clinic.
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