Sometimes sitting at home in California or New
South Wales or Florida or Brazil we dream of tropical waters and
bigger waves. But how big? It is easy to mentally surf still images
and even easy to place oneself alongside a hero, dropping in to a
throbbing beast. But there is always a pleasant song overlaid,
isn’t there. And always a feeling of possibility. But, really, how
big? How big would you go and still feel fine?
This little clip by Ryan Moss takes us from dreamy to uh-oh in
Tahiti. Tahiti is magical and her waves are magical but think, as
you watch, about yourself here. In which minute would you tap out?
One? Two? Three? Me? I’m out after the first wave. But what a wave
it would be!
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Let’s get Makua a Teen Choice Award!
By Ashton Goggans
He is more than deserving.
I’m more than willing to admit that from the
outside, Makua Rothman is more of a man than I am. (Though
I’m fairly certain the arbitrariness of fate is responsible—I was
born in Florida, a gentle, pacifist, mailman’s son; Makua is North
Shore royalty.)
Makua charges. Pipe, Chopes, Jaws, shitty, massive Chile,
freezing cold Oregon. He goes for it. He sees what he wants and he
takes it. And he’s won most every award a Big Wave Pro Surfer can
win. Billabong XXL’s! the first WSL Big Wave World Tour
Champion!
And doesn’t this make him deserving of a coveted Teen Choice
Award? One of those amazing surfboards, the history of which was
documented beautifully by surfing’s scrappiest scribe, Lewis
Samuels? (here)
Today a press release arrived in my inbox, penned by his media
contact Klint Briney, titled “TEEN CHOICE 2015: MAKE PRO SURFER
MAKUA ROTHMAN CHOICE MALE ATHLETE. Big Wave Tour World Champion
Rothman Yearning For Choice Male Athlete Nomination”
The release went:
Hawaiian Professional Surfer and the #1 surfer in the world
as crowned by the World Surf League, Makua Rothman is longing for a
coveted TEEN CHOICE Surfboard Award as FOX has opened up requests
for nominees in various categories, including Choice Male Athlete.
The first step is getting Rothman nominated in the
category.
“I’ve always wanted to go to Teen Choice and win a
Surfboard,” said Rothman. “I mean, I surf for a living, so it’s
only fitting to be apart of Teen Choice, right. I’d truly be
honored to just attend. I’m hoping the surfing community rallies
around us to continue to push our sport even further…”
Let’s get him there! I am going on Twitter right now and casting
my vote like this:
My #TeenChoice nominee for #ChoiceMaleAthlete is world #1 Surfer
@MakuaRothmanhttp://www.teenchoice.com/nominate@TeenChoiceFOX
I suggest you cut and paste and do the same. I strongly suggest
it.
Viva Makua!
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Warchild
surf rage is so the rage!
By Rory Parker
Is there anything better than wipeouts? Yes.
I’m not proud of it, but I was in more than my
fair share of fights when I was younger. If you’d asked me then I’d
have sworn they were all justified, but if I’m being honest it was
really all because I had a chip on my shoulder and pubescent levels
of testosterone coursing through my veins. And also because I was a
greasy little punk and no women would have sex with me.
In the decade and a half since I’ve only hit someone twice. The
first time was an unfortunate mishap at a baby shower that I won’t
delve into right now. The second involved me squaring off with the
senior partner of my wife’s law firm in a Honolulu parking lot. I
won that one, but the dude was in his sixties, so I feel like it
deserves an asterisk.
On a related note, did you know you don’t have to hit an old man
very hard to hurt him pretty badly?
While I’m not an advocate of using violence to solve problems, I
do think that, sometimes, not often, you’re justified in delivery a
stiff right to the center of someone’s big stupid mug. And I do
enjoy watching other people fight, especially over surfing. It’s
just such a stupid thing to come to blows over, watching two guys
bash on each other over a totally inconsequential part of life puts
a huge smile on my face.
El Porto is such a garbage spot. A shitty closeout 364 days a
year, home to worst ten million freaks, boomers, egos, and assholes
that LA has to offer. I just love how the guy throws his nice white
…Lost on the ground before they go at it like two dudes who’ve
watched a ton of UFC but never actually tried to translate their
sweet mental karate into action.
Getting mad at a little kid is such wasted effort. The little
shit can run his mouth at you, even take a swing at you, and
there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. Because, if you try,
Richie Collins is gonna come flying out of nowhere and kick your
ass!
I take back what I wrote earlier about surfing always being a
stupid thing to fight over. It’s a little more nuanced than that.
For instance, I feel like Nathan Fletcher’s reaction in this clip
is totally reasonable.
Thank the good lord for giving everyone video cameras, otherwise
I’d never have seen a guy come pretty close to drowning a dude
while two foot mush crumbles softly in the background.
There’s a moment in here when he realizes, “Oh shit, I’m way too
old for this to end well for me.”
Remember, keep your chin down and your hands up and, until next
time, here’s an old man falling down an escalator.
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Peel off $6200 for 12-days of personal surf photo
instruction with the great Art Brewer! And you'll do it all in
Sumba, that unspoiled little corner of Indonesia yet to be overrun
by the barbarian west. | Photo: Art Brewer
Art Brewer’s 12-day surf photo school! In
Sumba!
By Derek Rielly
Have the secrets to surf photography unfurled
before your eyes! By real-life icon!
Art Brewer, oowee, he good. Maybe all-time
number one. Art owned the seventies, eighties, nineties in the
American surf mags before splitting to do more lucrative commercial
work, although his surf spirit still soars.
The Encyclopedia of Surfing has a lovely entry on Art,
reproduced in part here.
“Brewer’s size (he once weighed nearly 300 pounds) and flaring
temper, meanwhile, further suggested the idea of grand, even
explosive creative talent. At times Brewer played on his
aggression. Asked to supply a self-portrait for a 1997 portfolio,
‘this big elephant seal of a man,’ as described by surf journalist
Evan Slater, provided a green-tinged face shot negative, jaggedly
cut in two, then taped and stapled back together, with the
handwritten caption: ‘Surf photography constipates me!'”
But also: “Brewer’s eye for color and framing is unmatched in
the surf world, and much of his best work has been done as a
portraitist, when he has unfettered control over light, texture,
and mood.”
Which all leads into his on-location learn-to-take-surf-photos
course on the Indonesia island of Sumba April 28 to May 9.
For $US6200 (excluding international airfares) you’ll shoot surf,
water and boat, the sparkling indigenous community there as well as
in-depth post-production instruction. Which, let’s face it, most
photographers, suck at.
And it’s all wrapped up in a gorgeous, but very eco-aware
resort.
As the tour operator Epic Photo Tours writes, “To spend 12 days
shooting with Art Brewer will be a game changer. As long as you are
a swimmer, you will be safe as we are providing a full support team
to help you. If you are already a surf photographer, Art Brewer
will take you to a new level.”
This time Jon Steele and Grant Ellis square off and
we are the winners!
Jon Steele is a well-known surf photographer
with stylish glasses and a keen eye. He has worked as a model. He
has also gotten very angry at Surfer photo editor Grant Ellis. In a
recent Instagram post he said, “Fuck grant ellis @grantellis1
and his ego fueled photo editor dictatorship! For the past 15 years
I have been working to get Texas surfing into the magazine only to
have him shoot the article himself and take money and work away
from me. Congrats on being the shittiest photo editor ever!Take my
name off the photographer mast head!!”
Why the anger? Jon Steele, you see, was born in San Antonio and
reared in Corpus Christie. He spent the first half of his life
surfing those Texas gulf oil tanker waves and if they were going to
be shown to the world, he wanted to be the one to do it.
Surf photographers are very proprietary. If you want an angry
email, post surf photos online without permission. Of course it all
stands to reason. Their images are their currency. Their knowledge,
connections, access are also their currency and Grant Ellis spent
Jon Steele’s. Should Jon, though, have taken such a torch to
Surfer’s office? Should he have burned a bridge? Probably. I once
got fired from a restaurant job. I was a bus boy and moved as
quickly as I could but it was, admittedly, slow. Once night the
manager took me aside and told me that everyone else was in fifth
gear and I was in second. I became so enraged that I went home, put
my uniform in a brown paper bag, wrote cuss words inside, had my
dad drive me to the restaurant and threw the bag at the door.
It is nice to see the fire from Jon and BeachGrit will be sure
to bring you Grant’s response. I don’t know how the Surfer story
looks, nor will I, because I am not 73 years old and don’t read
Surfer. But fuck you Red Lion Coos Bay!