Last Friday, June 19, the Reunion Island-born surfer Jeremy Flores was pitched head-first into the reef at Lakey Peak. A tube gone wrong? A takeoff awry? "A fucken air," says Jeremy. "All frothing to learn all these tricks and ended up landing head-first on dry reef."

Jeremy Flores: “No major brain damage!”

By Derek Rielly

9 years ago

And despite catastrophic facial wounds, says he wants to be back for Teahupoo…

Last Friday, June 19, world number 10 Jeremy Flores face-planted into the reef in Sumbawa, Indonesia.

In four-to-five-foot low-tide waves at Lakey Peak, Jeremy tasted a little rock after… what… a tube gone awry? A mangled takeoff?

“A fucken air,” he says. “All frothing to learn all these new tricks and ended up landing head-first onto dry reef.”

When an emergency helicopter came to take him to the BIMC hospital in Bali, Jeremy posted a photo (the one on the left above) on his Instagram account (@floresjeremy) with the message: “Worst 24h ever. Hit my head on the reef in the middle of no where in Indo, lost My memories for more than an hour…deep cuts all over My head & face… 24h later the Helicopter finally came get me to take me to an international hospital where i just got 2h of surgery on My face…the good news is there is no fracture…I would post a picture of My actual face but it would choc everyone so i won’t lol #nevergiveup”

So what happened after he hit the reef?

“I lost my memory for an hour and twenty minutes,” he says. “Didn’t where I was or who I was. Wiggolly Dantas and Jake Paterson were there to hold me and take me back to land where I waited 20 hours for a chopper to come pick me up. So I had to stay up all night ’cause I wasn’t sure if I could sleep. I was super scared to lose my memory again. Wiggolly was there all night making sure I was alright. Then the next day, the chopper finally came and took me to the hospital where I finally had surgery on my face.”

Them sure is deep cuts.

“Thirty stitches on and around my face,” says Jeremy. “No major brain damage.”

Right now, Jeremy is back in France and doing tests there “’cause there are small fractures in two different places on my face, under my eye and on my cheek.”

I ask, have you lost your looks?

“I was putting pressure on the surgeon the whole time, telling him the whole time he better make me look good.”

Were you worried you might end up looking like Catherine Deneuve, the once-beautiful French actress now reduced to caricature? (Click here!)

“More like Frankenstein,” he says. “I’m still doing tests and MRI’s and shit. It’s pretty fucked but the cuts are healing super quick. Nothing if official yet but I’m hoping to be back for Teahupoo. But maybe sooner! Or later. Too early to say.”

In the meantime, here’s a little teaser from when Jeremy’s face was whole and he was ripping New Zealand.

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Breezy lil Cali kid? Yeah, kinda… let's prise apart the lid to his world!

A window into Andrew Doheny’s world

By Derek Rielly

9 years ago

Let's get to know Droid! A Californian surf star with… layers!

Andrew Doheny is your typical 20-something surf-star from Newport Beach, California. He is anxious around strangers, enjoys speed-walking, drinks whiskey and Diet Coke on aeroplanes and admits to getting… bummed…quite a lot.

BeachGrit likes Andrew aka Droid very much. We liked his cameo in Cluster (but too short!), we like the flavour of his surfing (drop-knee slides) and we like his alternative pro surfing universe (sometimes contest, not always contest).

We think you’ll like too.

Below, is a fine documentary-style piece by French magazine Desillusion.

… and below that,

his movie Metal Neck…

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Sean “Poopies” McInerney…skis… six-foot Off the Wall. "I'm so afraid of big waves," he says.

JOB: “We’re Going Skiing at Off the Wall!”

By Derek Rielly

9 years ago

Pipeline’s Jamie O’Brien tows best pal Poopies into six-foot OTW… on water-skis!

Who needs pals like Jamie O’Brien? In the latest episode of Who is JOB 5.0, we see the thirty-something Jamie towing his younger pal Sean “Poopies” McInerney into a series of bombs at Off the Wall on…water-skis.

Now this ain’t particularly friendly OTW.

It’s six-ish feet, a little wild. And Poopies, the kid from Carlsbad who has made a career as Jamie’s fall guy in the online series Who is JOB, actually nails it.

When I’d interviewed Poopies back in April, he’d told me, “I’m so afraid of big waves… I’m not a big wave surfer. Jamie is, but for me it’s terrifying. I just try and make the best out of it and charge as hard as I can.”

(Read that interview here.)

A couple of minutes into this ep and Poopies ride a tube bigger than most of us will see in a lifetime.

“He rides the skis better than he rides his surfboards,” says his cruel master, JOB.

“That thing was triple diamond on that one, dude” Poopies says.

Watch here!

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Raw, honest and undeniably Quicksilver! We like! | Photo: Quiksilver

Just in: Quiksilver wants you to “Stay High!”

By Ashton Goggans

9 years ago

International mega-brand debuts edgy new creative direction! We like!

Today Quiksilver unveiled their new “raw, honest, and undeniably Quiksilver” creative direction, introducing their brand narrative “Stay High!” (Our emphasis.)

“Our lifestyle is about finding positives,” Quik’s recently added CEO, Pierre Agnes writes. “Getting Stoked. Keeping the high. It’s Quiksilver’s Job to remind everyone of that spirit. Stay High!”

It’s a not-so-well-kept-secret that most of the major surf brands were built on serious drug money. But what a bold move for Quiksilver to absolutely own it!

According to the company, the new direction’s “creative blueprint echoes the fertile environment of Quiksilver and the surf community in the 70s and 80s as the company approaches its 50th anniversary.”

Oh, those fertile ’70s and ’80s! After a decade wrought with tough financial times, not to mention the loss of Kelly Slater, it’s not surprising that Quik would look back upon the 50-year-old brand’s “fertile” infancy with rosé-tinted prescription lenses.

But can a stoney nostalgia make Quik’s barren fields bare fruit?

The new line will debut in Spring of 2016, and is split into AM and PM collections inspired by a specific surfy destination.

For the first season, Quik’s team “immersed themselves in Rio de Janeiro and drew their inspiration from the unique culture of Brazil – from the brighter colors of São Conrado beach to the darker side of the Rocinha Favelas.”

Quiksilver Stay High — Quik’s team “immersed themselves in Rio de Janeiro and drew their inspiration from the unique culture of Brazil – from the brighter colors of São Conrado beach to the darker side of the Rocinha Favelas.”

Oh, what a surely debaucherous “inspiration trip” must have ensued! Quik does Rio! If only those favela walls could speak!

You can see what Quiksilver’s smoking next week at the Agenda Tradeshow in Long Beach, California.

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Captain John Shawcross is a relaxed and humorous man who commands the Ratu Motu, previously known as the Indies Trader IV. For many years, he was the super-yacht captain billionaires begged to hire. First, Shawcross skippered the 114-metre $100 million Octopus in the Mediterranean and Caribbean. Later, a very rich Russian for whom no words can be spoken nor written due to a confidentiality agreement, sought his rule. In a darker time, this master mariner would be hauling Sperm Whales alongside for slaughter. | Photo: Derek Rielly

(Audio): I was robbed by pirates in the Amazon!

By Derek Rielly

9 years ago

Mentawai boat cap’n on the time he was robbed and lined up to be shot, execution-style…

Having the barrel of a gun shoved into your head is a helluva game. Years back, on Australia’s Gold Coast, I was robbed at gunpoint, the villain pushing the barrel of his shotgun into my gut, first, and, later, when I baulked at handing over my precious twenty-dollar bill (this was the nineties! I was poor!) into my forehead.

That feeling of a person you’ve never met having the ability to extinguish your life in an instant is something I never want to feel again. The hopelessness, the stupidity, the injustice.

And just when you think you’re about to die, you have a thought: if he ever gets caught, he’ll weep for the judge, be out in ten years, while I rot in the dirt.

Anyway, two weeks ago I was enjoying the company of the very well-regarded international boat captain, John Shawcross, during a Mentawai vay-cay.

Captain John Shawcross, now don’t that have a regal ring to it!

For many years, he was the super-yacht captain billionaires begged to hire. First, Shawcross skippered the 114-metre $100 million Octopus in the Mediterranean and Caribbean.

Later, a very rich Russian for whom no words can be spoken nor written due to a confidentiality agreement, sought his rule. In a darker time, let’s say a century ago, this master mariner would be hauling Sperm Whales alongside for slaughter.

In the wheelhouse of the Mentawai-plying vessel the Ratu Motu (formerly the Indies Trader IV) Shawcross told me about the time he woke up on the super yacht he was skippering for a German billionaire with a gun to his head.

Pirates!

At one point, he, the crew and the dozen or so guests were told to kneel and prepare for execution.

Yeah, he’s here, so he didn’t get it, but what a story!

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Eat beach grit spam!