Movie: Albee Layer’s slob grab judo!

And more! Episode five, The Habitat…

I’ve never understood “air wind.” I get the concept, it’s pretty obvious how well a side shore gust can loft you up and out, but knowing and doing are two vastly different things.

As far as I can remember, the last time I tried to take advantage of it was a few years back, surfing the rights that swing wide between Rocky Rights and Turkeys. Overhead whitewater section mowing slowly towards me, nice steep wall got me flying, mid face turn, bend those knees, wind kicked the board from under my feet straight into my face, turning my awesome boost into a flailing fat lip cartwheel into the flats.

These days I’m a power surfer, meaning I’m too old and too fat and have given up trying to surf above the lip. No great loss. My goal was always to surf as well as the guys did in Momentum, an ability level I reached, kind of, sometime around 2010. But, hey, I had those floater to 360 things on lock for a minute.

Albee Layer gets the air wind though. 540 ‘oops, giant sailing airborne section skippers, this ridiculous slob grab judo that put the final nail in Christian Fletcher’s relevancy. Huck and spin and twist and, for the love of god, take care of those joints!

And he paddles Jaws! A charger without a wack small wave steez, I thought that was impossible. For decades it’s been the stink bug or nothin’.

Kai Barger’s killing it too, but I’m not really a fan. He paddled out once when I was in the middle of a magic session, everything coming together perfectly. Just dialed, in the zone, whatever you want to call it. I was feeling godlike, such a ripper, so fucking cool. I should quit my job and join the ‘QS, take the tour by storm, blow everyone’s minds. Who’s this dude in his thirties who came out of of nowhere to win the title his first year on tour? It’s me!

Then Kai caught a wave, tore it to shreds, and made me feel like the biggest kook on Earth. No fair, doesn’t he know how fragile my ego is? Couldn’t he have just let me ride that manic swing while it lasted? It’s only a matter of time until I come crashing back to the ground.