We have arrived!
Don’t you swoon when you see surfing featured in major media outlets? Can you not help feeling we, as a culture, have finally arrived? That they like us? They really, really like us? I mean, not enough to buy our clothes anymore or anything like that but, you know, at least want us to come hang out? With Scott Eastwood? He’s got a great bod!
It was a major sporting weekend, anyhow, around the world what with soccer in Europe and the basketball playoffs here in the United States of America. Toronto beat Miami and will face Cleveland in the Eastern Conference Finals. Out west, Oklahoma City will take on a juggernaut from Oakland. Barcelona beat Madrid too, am I right? Not directly, I don’t think but won their Liga. And there was a massive brawl in baseball as the Texas Rangers’ second baseman slugged Toronto Blue Jays’ star Jose Bautista right in the jaw. Clenched fist and everything.
Drake is from Toronto and is very excited about his city’s sporting rise. The “ten best Drake fan moments” made ESPN’s main page, near the bottom. But do you know what was a few stories below that? Our very own Gabriel Medina!
The words read: Surfer backflips for a perfect 10 and there was the video of him launching so high into the sky, grabbing both rails so tightly and spinning spinning landing. Did you love his air? His double grab? I have only met one expert on double grabs in my life and his name is Jimmy Wilson from Surfing magazine. Let’s tuck into one of his older pieces and see how he describes the two-handed two-railed approach:
I come to you today to help bring an end to something that should have ended years ago: the double-grab air. Let’s face it: this is the worst air in surfing. It would be the same in any other sport, too, but no one really does it besides surfers. If a skateboarder even attempted one they’d be immediately laughed out of the park, or wherever the f–k they were when someone saw it happen.
I have many problems with the double grab air, and I know I do not stand alone in this way of thinking. When asking aerial surfing phenomenon Dion Agius his opinion of the double grab, he replied with a simple “They suck.” Let’s discuss…
1. They’re ugly. Period. You can’t tell me they aren’t. I won’t believe you, and you won’t believe yourself if you’re being honest. Do me a favor. Drop what you are doing and take a stance on the ground somewhere in the vicinity of a mirror. Now reach down and grab at the ground with both hands in the form of how you’d grab your surfboard to go for a double grab. Now look at yourself in the mirror. You look like hell. You hate yourself no matter how you move around or where the mirror lies. It’s just basic logic. Grabbing ahold of a surfboard with two hands while standing on it looks awkward, horrible, death sentence, the worst, etc.
2. They’re easy. Now this is where I can accept someone doing a double-grab air: when learning how to do airs, and for learning purposes only. It helps you learn to keep your body above your board, and even when launching into oblivion, you can kind of keep control of what you’re doing. Now that you learned how to do airs and you’ve already landed maybe 5 or 10, it’s time for you to end your hideousness and try something else. It would be pointless to try and get better at doing double grabs because no body on earth will ever think you did a good one. You’ll just be ignored as if you don’t even exist in the lineup. People should probably start burning you on every wave.
He goes further and you can/should read it here but what do you think? Did you love Gabs air or find it ugly and easy? If Drake surfed what sort of airs would he do?
If JJF did that air we’d all have hard ons right now……JJF is so hot right now. h8trs gonna h8 Gabby.
Yes….but isn’t surfing so much more difficult on so many levels than skating –whaddyareckon, Ross?
Skating is the hardest but the opportunity to practice the same thing over and over has always been there. Now the wave pools are semi-decent surfing will progress faster than ever. We may even see river surfing kooks from Belgium winning events. When that happens I think I’m going to eat my 22.
You are a funny cunt, just hope Derek’s sending the occasional cheque.
Na mate sadly I do it for fun. I’m just thankful Derek and Negatron give me a place to put my thoughts. They’ve even spared me the guillotine on more occasions than I probably know of.
That’s why I stopped doing them. The shame got to much.
the next air Gabbie will pull in a comp is the xoxota air
The Legionnaire
I told that he would pull, so then today he pulled the XOXOTA AIR, and it’s a 10 for the XOXOTA AIR
Jimmy Wilson sounds like a prick here. Grab whatever, wherever the fuck you want. Who cares if it’s not “cool”. I used to find them harder to do than straight no grab airs. I was a dyslexic aerial tadpole and during the Y2K season I mindfucked myself out of straight airs and could only reach slob. Slobs were “gay” back then and I adjusted accordingly to look “cool”. So yah kids, clutch your balls, squeeze your nips, and hold your horses…it’s all good if you’re having fun. Just don’t grab that 18 year old wahine’s arse. Her dad might be out the back. And btw, I’ve heard Jimmy is a very nice person.
They look like absolute shit, but sometimes they’re a necessary evil. Throwing a sizable air with no rotation is fucking hard to land without two hands on the rails, weight low and centred over the board, and your arse puckered out like you’re about to shoot a wet one airborne.
No, not necessary. They are pros, they are supposed to be able to do harder tricks than the rest of us. If you can’t throw a sizable air without two hands, then you can’t do the trick!
haha, fuck off. How many guys can do that in a heat? Can Kelly? Mick? Julian? Chloe? Go on. It’s was a good little air and he pulled it clean.
Trogan you are so terribly butthurt over all this you might want to see a doctor. That or you could just respond to every single comment online, whatever eases your anal pain. It wasn’t a flip and Medina is a crybaby bitch. Those are the facts.
I don’t care what it was. It was fucking hard and he landed it as cleanly as it gets. When Kelly starts doing those in heats, or Chloe, or anyone other than maybe Filipe or Italo, wake me. Until then, you lose.
You are a humorless, insecure cunt!
Not a back flip. It could’ve been worse. He could’ve failed to do what was called a Kerrupt Flip three times in a row like Jezza Flores.
Kelly technically used two hands on his 540?
Technically you don’t need a question mark at the end of a statement?
More a proposal for your opinion than a statement. But yeah I guess I am right…?
I’m not sure what any of this has to do with Kelly, but yes he used two hands, no he didn’t land a 720. If you’re fishing for some sort of bias, it’s not there. If you can’t do the air with only one hand, then you can’t do it.
what about matt meola’s spindle flip? cant use 1 hand for that. when you get inverted/upside down (not speaking from experience btw) you need both hands to control the spin and keep the board to your feet.
Not even remotely true, how many inverted double grabs do you see in skateboarding? McTwist double-grab? Never happened.
It’s just a matter of time and wind for guys to be doing proper flips with one hand in the water.
theres also not a moving landing zone, 20+ knot winds, and potentially a shark ready to take a bite. it will be a lot longer than you think before we see video game style 360 judos, combo’d to a one handed backflip, rebound off the top to finish..reset to the ski
Not with Kelly’s new wave it won’t!
Yeah then you’ll just have the WSL buying more power for certain riders who generate revenue and watchers, the main thing will be, an ability to cheat, look at the videos, you can tell they can manipulate it’s power and speed, What’s not to say the next world champion is decided by a slower speed of wave? Were gonna need like 30 confused turpils and potz’s all willfully,”I didn’t see anything” it’s already been bought.
I’ve got a feeling that John John’s actually working on a variation of that combo right now..
True, it will all happen but surfboards are a fair bit bigger to throw around with a bit of air under them so it hasn’t got there yet. There will be a day when we’re calling older guys kooks because they “don’t even flip their board”.
the physics of airs on a skateboard aren’t the same. When guys are doing airs on 6 foot long skateboards then you can start to compare.
So… now then? https://youtu.be/n_gQ7IpUDx…
board is maybe 3 feet – not close to 6 feet long. With a tow. And a ramp. I think you proved my point.
I said 540?
I know, but it wasn’t that either. You’re confused about both spins and punctuation.
Well that one was confusion.
Best way to learn to land a sizable air though. Just like Jimmy Wilson said, they are appropriate for learning purposes. It’ll be a looong time before people start landing inverted airs with one hand.
As a kid I went through a stage of double grabbing upwards of 70% of the time. Seeing one on footage fixes that habit quick-smart.
Totally agree they are a critical step in learning.
Yet gorkin clings to a flip that was a 180 cork in any other sport, you hear that gorky? You are almost relevant again!
this was a wag-the-dog moment. don’t look at how unwatchable the wsl has become, instead look at this gimmick. shake the flashy car keys in front of toddlers face!
I agree the double grab usually looks bad but this one Gabe pulled off pretty clean. I like it.
i believe it is a necessity when going as inverted as gabs was. you cant pull that off with a one handed rail grab..this isn’t KS pro surfing yet…
I spent way too much time playing that game [Kalani Robb at Kirra(dusk) specifically]. I think the most unrealistic part of it was making people think Donovan was actually any good… that’s including jumping the pier…
Sooo surfing from first peak to monster hole while shooting the ” Sebastian pier” doesn’t do it?
I loved getting bazzed off my titties in Antarctica or punting triple kick flips and methods out of twenty foot waves landing backwards in the tube to coffin ride and then shove-it, shove-it, shove-it to special move.
jaws, 540 kickflips, to 40ft coffin ride drainers. never gets old
Quickly….
On second thought i think i am but i got attacked on IG By the real von…
I’m confused.
Me too so here’s jimbo https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
the donny bottom turn had his style on point though. i still get baked and play that game for hours on end..especially since i’ve already unlocked every board, destination, and surfer
We are the 99%…
I always chose Donovan cos of his steez. It wasn’t fuckery back then to enjoy a bit of steez, long hair and Jack Johnson’s music. What a fucking mistake. I could never have predicted a wimp like Craig Anderson would become so good.
ive never even thought of that evolution. i was too blind by drive thru vids, and the full on hilarious kookery..im ashamed ive been so blind