It has been a busy year for the possible 2015 world
champ...but not too busy for love!
Professional surfing, on the World Tour, is a
grind. Oh sure, the life is not nearly as taxing as, say, working a
coal mine or teaching English to native Chinese speakers but still.
It is a twelve month per year gig with precious little time off,
which makes Mick Fanning’s latest splash such a heartwarming
one.
There is a sixteen-year-old boy named Ben Beasley from Adelaide,
Australia, who was recently diagnosed with a brain tumor and has
been undergoing chemotherapy, a total drag by all accounts. His
family told him they were going on a little trip to the Gold Coast
and Ben thought it was “random” until out popped Mick Fanning,
Ben’s favorite surfer!
Mick is an ambassador of the Starlight Children’s Foundation, a
charity that makes sick kids’ dreams come true and Ben, of
course, dreamed of meeting with the three, maybe four time world
champ.
“Even to just get a photo with [Fanning] has been a dream of
mine for a long time…” the young man told the Brisbane Times.
Better yet, though, Mick paddled Ben and his twin brother out
and the three surfed for hours.
If you needed a little pick me up, which professional
surfer would you want to spend time with?
Mick with Ben and family.
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Chris Hemsworth looks charming in 'em and you remember
this gal from Wolf of Wall Street, I'm guessing. Margot
Robbie.
Surfer creates Celeb Must-Have Brand!
By Derek Rielly
Can you guess?
Incredible, yes. But this actually
happened.
Michael Crawley is a marketing guy and handler for Dane Reynolds
who was cut loose by his employer Quicksilver after 10 beautiful,
mutually beneficent years.
Crawley has dark brilliant eyes and aura of other-worldness
about him (he’s an excellent photographer, also) but even his
famous charisma couldn’t stay his execution during one of those
periodic rounds of blood-letting that have come to characterise the
brand.
With his and gal Tenielle’s redundancy cash (she was tapped from
Roxy during the purge), the pair used $54,000 to start a sunglasses
label called Valley.
And, now, well, you can just look!
Tenz and Crawley, from the ashes of unemployment
and the despair of poverty (they got chillun too! A Gold Coast
tragedy in the making!) the pair kicked Valley Sunglasses into
life.
Katie Holmes, Chris Hemsworth, Johnny Depp, Maz Manson, Kat Von
D, Margot Robbie all wear ‘em. It was also reported that the famous
Kardashian family will soon stock Valley in their chain of clothing
boutiques called DASH.
Katherine von Drachenberg aka Kat Von D is the
Mexican-born tattoo artist and she wears V.Maz Manson and Johnny Depp both wear custom
Valleys. This photo was taken by Michael Crawley. He’s
everywhere!
How did Crawley get Valley onto so many famous eyes and beaks? I
had to ask!
(Note to reader: this is an unpaid endorsement.
Hyperbole aside just for the moment, I think it’s amazing to rise
from the ashes of unemployment and the despair of poverty to
just… nailing it.)
BeachGrit: You’ve become such a celeb whore? Who y’been
screwing to get ‘em to wear your specs?
Crawley: Mate, come on. I’m not really sure why the celebs have
been so into Valley. Maybe it’s the silhouettes and they want
to be noticed. A lot of the musicians and celeb types talk
among each other and they know I’m cool to make custom frames
or get them into their own tinted lenses or custom variations so it
has kinda become a bespoke eyewear thing for a lot of them. Marilyn
Manson has about thirty pairs of custom aviators with all kinds of
wild tints. Johnny Depp got some yellow tints. Debra Messing got a
bunch of opticals. I just did some custom tinted aviators for Chris
Hemsworth. I also made some custom coloured frames in Slayer red
and black for Kerry King’s wife Ayesha with inverted crosses on the
face. Sure is fun to make them one-off pieces.
BeachGrit: Got some advice on how to get a celeb using
your gear?
Crawley: Talk to them. We don’t use a PR company. If they want
to talk to us they talk to me directly. I feel like that connection
with us directly makes a huge difference/ All the celebs are
friends of friends or connected by associates so it’s an organic
connection which goes a long way. Plus I’m a nice guy. Ha!
Tall and thin and frail like a quivering bird.
But those strong sunglasses just make Katie Holmes!
BeachGrit: Are you really in the Kardashian stores?
How’d you swing that?
Crawley: Yeah, the DASH stores have picked us up for all their
stores across the USA and our line drops in there next week. They
have a crazy following so let’s see how that goes…
BeachGrit: Who’s your fav Dash? Something about Khloe
kicks me good. And Kendall? What a transformation! If you weren’t
tied down like an anchor who would you squat down on one of your
chubby knees to marry?
Crawley: Ha! You’ve lost it. Chubby knees, are you high? Kylie
is the best one for sure…
BeachGrit: What does it take to get a biz where you are?
You’re a driven sonofabitch, I know that much. Do you ever take no
for an answer?
Crawley: Nope, if you take no then it means you give up easily.
Mate, it’s all about being unique and creating a seriously good
quality product. If you make a dope product people will come back
for more or tell 10 friends, “Fuck, those Valley frames are insane,
the quality is out of hand.” The power of the people is the key.
You can’t fool consumers these days. Making a successful
business takes a long list of points but also you have to
give it 110% at all times …
Ain’t she cute! That’s Gwen Stefani!
BeachGrit: Were there naysayers when you were starting,
saying it couldn’t be done, crowded market etc?
Crawley: For sure. People said we were crazy blah blah blah and
that’s cool and I could see their point but we have a unique
product that’s been accepted well by the market we have hit… I
know that what we do isn’t for every one which is cool and I can
appreciate that… but… we also have a strong following of
people that do love what we are doing and are dedicated valley fans
or followers that wait for every new product we do which is really
insane…
BeachGrit: Was it about the Quik talent pool? You and
Tenz doing Valley, Blackwood doing his XMax thing, Ryan and Need
Essentials, Strider owning the commentator sphere. Was it a
wonderful place to work?
Crawley: Yeah, it’s crazy the talent pool that came out of
there. Casey Egan does this denim line too called Deconstructed
Indigo Garments and I reckon these black tapered jeans are the best
jeans on the planet. They’re fuckin mind blowing. And, yeah,
Scanno’s NEED stuff is dope as well. Quiksilver was a cool place
for a little bit. I feel like they knew how to spot talented people
to put into their business but they never knew how to utilise it to
its full potential. Or maybe there were too many old dogs in there
that would get their noses outta joint if a young guy wanted to do
something wild which was out of their comfort zone.
It was a great learning tool for us. It showed me to encourage
people to look outside the box and when you’re uncomfortable with
something maybe that’s a good thing.
I work closely with an artist in LA named Jesse Draxler and he
does a bunch of artwork for us and I never give him a brief. He
knows my brand look and feel and I let him just go wild with my
imagery or whatever and create these pieces and we don’t fuck with
it and it is so raw but so fucking insane it fits right in
perfectly and creates a unique side of what we do.
If the old guys at Quiksilver embraced their employees and
encouraged them they’d have NEED basic wetsuits which have sold
like wildfire, Casey’s insane jeans and product, Valleys eyewear
collection and optics and much more from past employees.
With their dollars and distribution could you imagine the
revenue that could have generated on those three products just
there alone? Jesus! Someone fucked up didn’t they.
BeachGrit: You getting bites to buy the company? I hear
stories that include the world “million.” Tell me!
Crawley: Right now, I’m just focussing on working on our next
collection and 2016. But, yeah, we have had interest. Rumours,
mate! I have no complaints right now that’s for sure!
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
How to: Leave Hawaii
By Rory Parker
Sometimes y'gotta fly the coop…
If you can make Hawaii work, and I think the
wife and I have, it spoils you quite a bit. Hard to drum up the
motivation to get the hell out of Dodge, the best places are more
of a lateral move than improvement on current circumstances.
I know a lot of guys bail to Bali during the Summer months, but
since I’ve gone full retard on the freediving and spearo kick flat
spells don’t bother me much. It’s actually been a problem this
Summer, haven’t been able to hit my favorite holes ‘cuz the surf’s
been too good.
I’m in the process of preparing for my first surf trip in
ages. I leave the islands fairly frequently, but never for
surf.
Why bother? If I want warm water barrels I can drive to ’em, no
need to board a plane.
But I got offered a free trip to Nicaragua, and there’s no way
I’m turning that down. It’s really the only thing I miss about
living in California, quick and easy jaunts to Central America.
Also, In & Out.
First, a few days in LA, to break up the trip. The quickest
“direct” jaunt from Kauai to Managua would have taken me 26 hours.
Fuck that noise, I’ll do three days at my parents’ house before
flying South.
Just a few things left to do before I leave.
Finish cleaning the house: Since I’m forsaking
my wifely duties for a bit I need to get the homestead in a state
nearing clean. I can’t stand returning to a filthy home, and I know
the missus won’t lift a finger while I’m gone. No doubt she’ll be
too busy struggling to stay afloat in a sea of dicks.
Find my passport: It’s around here,
somewhere, I’m sure. It had better be.
To bring a board or not? Such a hassle, way too
expensive. Hitting two different airlines on the way there and
back, it’ll run me around $500, round trip, to bring a single
board. Highway fucking robbery is what that is.
But I’ve got my boards dialed, and I’d hate to get a solid run
of waves without something under me that works. Decisions,
decisions. Probably just head down with a pair of flippers and hope
there’s something for sale that works for my fat ass.
Buy condoms: Rubbers fucking suck, no way I’m
wearing them with my wife. But I used to keep a stash around. You
never know when you’re gonna trip and fall dick first into some
warm pussy.
Which is exactly what happened on our last trip to Nica. We
spent a month there in 2004, got utterly skunked for surf. No big
deal, it’s a cool country. Instead traveled inland, saw a bunch of
sights we’d have missed had it been going off.
We met an attractive Australian couple about our age. Linked up
and hung together, always nice to have another pair along for the
ride, if for no reason than to cut down on arguments. Which happen
on couples trips. Stress and exhaustion in a new place, one of you
is gonna blow up at the other.
A few days in the woman I’d later marry said, “I think they want
to have sex with us.”
She was right.
A night on Ometepe, a ton of very cheap rum, and a women’s
softball team from the great white North, turned a late night
skinny dip into a very fond memory. Trying to push my semi-flaccid
member into an overweight French Canadian girl’s asshole was
fun.
Waking up with a crippling hangover, awash in the stench of a
handful of different pussy, was not.
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Manda is a sunscreen fashioned from the paste of a tree
indigenous to Burma (BeachGrit doesn't formally recognise the
military junta there) and Cyrus Sutton promises it won't harm
reefs! | Photo: Kane Skennar (kaneskennar.com)
Cyrus Sutton’s Magical Gumbo!
By Derek Rielly
Set your bitch free!
Although he might deny it, Cyrus Sutton, at
thirty-three, is one of the few real geniuses of surfing.
Everything he touches turns to gold, a fact of life which has
earned for him the mantle of The Midas of Surfing.
His resume is extensive. Let’s examine.
“Cyrus Sutton is a filmer, director and rad surfer who lives in
a van, even when he’s at home (he parks it in a shed in the yard).
Cyrus’ movies Compassing, Riding Waves,
Stoked and Broke and the website Korduroy.tv all
feed into the modern need to back off from all our electronic
devices and conveniences. But don’t go thinking Emmy-award winning
Cyrus is a dull boy. Ask him about his travel philosophy and he
says, ‘Drive fast, take chances.’”
If you have a simplistic view of the world, like I do, you tend
to divide people into good and bad. I equate Cyrus with the very
special pleasures of life.
Two weeks ago, Cyrus sent me an email asking that I report on
his and biz partner Reis Paluso’s Kickstarter project for a sun
cream called Manda. The pair learned to make sunscreen for an
episode of Korduroy TV, which you can watch here.
Cyrus wrote: “I wanted to alert you to the sunscreen findings
and give you content for a potential article about it. You
may have seen in the news the discovery by
The journal of Environmental
Contamination and Toxicology,
and reported inTime magazine, The
Washington Post,Gizmodo, etc. that there is ground
breaking evidence of the extreme impact chemical sunscreens
have on coral reefs. It’s been shown that one drop of
sunscreen in six swimming pools of water can kill corals and 1,400
tons of sunscreen is estimated to wash onto reefs annually from
beach goers. The chemical is Oxybenzone and it is found in over
3500 sunscreens on the market today has been directly linked to the
destruction of reefs… We are less than a week from ending our
Kickstarter for our organic edible high performance sunblock. We
were fully funded within a few days of launch but want to pass on
this issue. Whether or not you include us, we feel it’s important
to get this message out there.”
The sun cream uses a paste called Thankaka made from the ground
bark of a tree indigenous to Burma (BeachGrit refuses to recognise
the military junta which changed the name in 1989). Cyrus says
Thankaka has been used “by the Burmese people for thousands of
years to protect their skin from the sun.”
Such an important message! What is more fundamental than the
environment?
But, amid Dane leaving Quiksilver and John John’s blood feud
with JetBlue, I forgot to post. It didn’t seem to dent the
Kickstarter jam, which raised around 40k, more than twice their
original goal.
Anyway, it’s never too late, I believe, to spread the message of
cleaning up our dirty old planet. This interview took place between
Sydney, Australia, and the Californian desert.
But, wait. Midway through, a meteor shower or an ICBM launch,
lit up the sky above Cyrus. Look below!
“This just happened?!” said Cyrus Sutton during
the interview, turning the camera to the desert skies? After
posting the photo to IG, reports came through that it was either an
ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) test by the US Navy or a
meteor shower.
Anyway, the interview commences.
BeachGrit: Some pal I turned out to be. Y’tell me all
about your organic creamies on Kickstarter, I promise the world,
and I don’t write shit about it. Do you hate me?
Cyrus: Haha, I still love you. Kickstarters are so 2010 I don’t
blame you, I was just doing my job.
BeachGrit: Tell me, real quick, and not in PR speak,
what your creamies are like? Why they spesh?
Cyrus: I’ve had trouble getting my hands on a natural sunblock
that doesn’t rub off in California. So my friends and I decided to
make one. It smells like chai and stays on all day. It doesn’t mess
up the coral reefs too which is a big plus.
BeachGrit: Who wants that white coral, huh! I like the
colours! Where’s the most beautiful reef y’ever seen?
Cyrus: The east side of the big island has some crazy spots
BeachGrit: But, anyway, you got the cash for launch,
yeah? How much y’get and where does it go now?
BeachGrit: While we’re rapping, what happened to your
old but iconic surf van? How much y’get, who
bought it and tell me about the new one?
Cyrus: I sold it to the owner of 2 mile surf shop near San
Francisco. He’s known for his cosmic surf forecasts. They are
really worth check out just for their literary value. The guy’s a
scribe and pretty hilarious. I got about 10k which is a fair price
considering the work that went into it so we’re both stoked. I got
a new sprinter van which gets double the gas mileage and is twice
as roomy inside so I’m loving life.
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Rumor: Kelly Slater a Scientologist?
By Chas Smith
It's a helluva religion so why not?
Kelly Slater is a magnificent specimen. The
closest thing our little world has to Tom Cruise. A massive,
worldwide superstar. A man who grows sweeter with age. A winner
time and time and time again.
Handsome?
Check!
Rich?
Check!
A smile that stops people frozen?
Check!
Eyes that plumb the very depths of a soul?
Check!
A broad global reach?
Check!
A wild intergalactic reach?
Check!
Scientology?
Check?
My coconut wireless buzzed yesterday, whilst I was sunning, and
the message skittering across its skin told me that Kelly Slater
and Tom Cruise maybe do indeed share the same religion?
Scientology is, of course, the path of stars! Many famous
celebrities have embraced the esoteric teachings of L. Ron Hubbard
which gives, maybe, such freedom and wonderful film roles (hello,
Frank T.J. Mackie!), or to quote its soothing website, “Scientology
is a religion that offers a precise path leading to a complete and
certain understanding of one’s true spiritual nature and one’s
relationship to self, family, groups, Mankind, all life
forms, the material universe, the spiritual universe and the
Supreme Being.”
Tom Cruise says, “It’s extraordinary, it’s extraordinary. And
you know, you always have to look at someone who criticizes you,
you have to look at them and say, okay, so? Who is that person?
Why? What do they know? And I can tell you, you’re sitting in front
of a Scientologist who knows. And I can tell you from my personal
experience it’s been extraordinary for me. I wouldn’t be here where
I am today without, you know, those things to help me out.”
And Kelly? My source tells me he is maybe an Operating Thetan V
and he knows this because he possibly gave surf lessons to other
Scientologists through the Church.
The Church of Scientology’s pamphlet What is
Scientology? says the OTV is “The Second Wall of Fire consists
of 26 separate rundowns and has been described as dealing with
‘living lightning, the very stuff of life itself.’ This level
addresses the last aspects of one’s case that can prevent him from
achieving total freedom on all dynamics. An audited level
ministered at Advanced Organizations or Flag.”
Kelly Slater certainly dealt with White Lightening for many many
years and very successfully. Those eleven world titles, many at
Mick’s expense, didn’t win themselves.
In any case, wow! I mean, wow?
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Jon Pyzel and Matt Biolos by
@theneedforshutterspeed/Step Bros
