Glorious: A heckler carries the day!

Chas Smith

By

If David Johnston can do it so can we!

We’re all hecklers you and me. We sit on the sidelines and snipe. We laugh. We criticize and poke and advise and opine. We dig and dig and dig and dig. We know it all and better than anyone else.

But do we really?

Do we really?

If Mick Fanning, say, pulled me out of the crowd while I was there giggling and said, “You think I surf robotic? Like a microchip bogan? Well surf this wave better.” And blocked for me a perfect Snapper right do you think I would smash it an embarrass him or would I limp along and embarrass myself?

Wrong! Unless you said I would limp along and embarrass myself. We, you and me, are but clanging gongs. Noble assholes.

But!

There was a heckler this weekend that did us all proud. That gave us hope. Let’s read about him!

Tired of being heckled by a Ryder Cup spectator, golf pro Henrik Stenson went into the crowd and pulled out the offender, a man from North Dakota named David Johnson.

The Ryder Cup pits a team of U.S. golfers against their European counterparts, and the fans can get rowdy in their support.

Johnson had been razzing Stenson and his teammates after they had trouble Thursday with a 12-foot putt. Johnson hollered at Stenson, an Olympic silver medalist and British Open champion, “Silver medal is what we call first loser!”

The comment that sent the European squad over the edge was when Johnson yelled, “You can’t make this putt” at Justin Rose, Stenson’s teammate.

The pros challenged the loudmouthed American to make the putt himself, with Rose even throwing a $100 bill on the ground to sweeten the pot.

Dressed in jeans, a baggy red fleece, loafers and a baseball cap, Johnson kept yapping, joking about how small the putter was. Amid chants of “USA! USA!” Johnson calmly stroked the putt in, and the crowd went nuts.

All in good fun, Johnson hugged and high-fived Stenson, Rose, Martin Kaymer and Rory McIlroy.

Johnson later told the St. Paul Pioneer Press, “I closed my eyes, swallowed my puke and hit the putt and it happened to go in, so that was cool.”

Stenson joked with the paper that, “Now he can tell the whole world that the European team are the ones that have the most fun.”

Have you ever read a more beautiful story in all of sports? I haven’t and take it all back. If Mick blocked for me a perfect Snapper right I would get barreled and then aired and then barreled and then swallowed puke and then end on an eye-popping gouge.

And why?

Because hecklers are the life blood of sport!

Rumor: Fanning coaching Gilmore?

Chas Smith

By

Coaching is a noble profession and should never be taken lightly.

I don’t need to tell you how precious our BeachGrit comment section is because you make it so. It positively sizzles, sometimes with fun jokes, sometimes with appropriate and accurate tongue-lashings (for mostly me), sometimes with undiscovered rumor.

Oh I love this third sometimes!

In a cut n paste journalism story posted yesterday about The United States’ Department of Defense and its designs for Trestles there appeared a nugget from GBP:

Chaz, possible hot scoop on Fanning and an opportunity to get one up on Stab.

Go listen to the most recent Ain’t That Swell at 1:02:45

I could not log on/in fast enough. What might GBP have heard? What could be hiding in the proverbial bed sheets?

Racing the curser along, I stopped at the 1:00:00 mark.

Trembling.

The Australian voices of Jed Smith, Ozzie Wright and Vaughn Blakey soothed even though my American ears could not tell them apart. They were talking about the exciting finish to the Women’s Pro Tour at Trestles and how Tyler Wright (Australian but no relation to Ozzie) was going to win it all and good good bravo but then the focus switched to Steph Gilmore.

She’s so young still, you just forget that with Steph. And uhhhhhhhhhh I hear Mick’s been in her corner too (the room absolutely erupts in a chorus of giggle) uhhhhhh might explain her return to form but yeah…

I listened to it twice, three times, trying to discern what the giggling was about. Bending my American will toward some understanding of Australasian culture and came up short.

At the end, I simply feel it is necessary to admonish Jed, Ozzie and Vaughn for their chuckles. Coaching is a noble profession.

A sacred calling.

A most special purpose.

Watch: Slater talks Jiujitsu/drug movie!

Derek Rielly

By

A captivating 15-minute interview with Kelly Slater on his martial arts game… 

Have you reached the tipping point of too-much-Kelly Slater? Has our inspection of his activities (recent stories: four posts on Kelly’s art show, one post on his social media activities, another on his surfboard company FireWire) made you think a crowbar might be needed to prise us off him?

This interview, however, is too good to ignore. Recorded immediately following Slater’s win at the Teahupoo Pro, it concentrates, entirely, on his jiujitsu game, although Slater’s digressions include talk of his optioning the Peter Maguire book on seventies drug-trafficking Thai Stick and the benefits of food combining.

Both interviewer and interviewee are seated, and it’s in this position that we watch as Slater’s triceps stand out like brown snakes, ready to strike. Readers of a rainbow stripe might feel compelled to knead the smooth brown skin.

Watch here!

In five short years you may have to fight to surf!
In five short years you may have to fight to surf!

Report: Military might reclaim Trestles!

Chas Smith

By

“It’s their property; they can do what they want with it!"

Did you know that southern California’s most iconic wave and North America’s only World Surf League tour stop might get disappeared? Might slip from the general public’s limp grasp back into the iron fist of the United States Marine Corps? The mighty hand of the United States Navy?

It’s true!

Potentially!

Today, the Orange County Register’s Laylan Connelly has reported that the lease between the Department of Defense and the state of California is set to expire in five short years. The Department of Defense actually owns the land but has leased it to California since 1971. The Nixon years!

Yikes?

Let’s read about it!

…the talks between the state and military are starting, and it’s anyone’s guess where the discussions will lead.

“The only thing we got from them is that it probably won’t be resolved until the end,” Long. “We won’t have an answer this year. The Parks are stating our position – that (the beach) continues to be accessible to the public as it is today, hopefully.”

Carl B. Redding Jr., public affairs director for Camp Pendleton, said lease agreements are usually determined about two years before a deadline.

A letter from state parks officials was submitted and received by the Marine Corps Installations West staff this month, and the military is preparing a response. Redding said the Department of the Navy will have final approval of any lease deal.

Among the list of possible changes: Modifying the public beach zone by changing the borders and/or the size of the park.

Dave Ethington, a San Onofre Parks Foundation board member, said there are other possibilities.

“It’s their property; they can do what they want with it,“ Ethington said, referring to the Department of Defense.

“They can take it back and administer it for themselves. They can renew the lease,” he added. “I think those are the options.”

Ethington believes it’s unlikely the land would be sold for development.

“The fear is they would chop it up and change the park,” he said. “That’s our concern, that they would take sections of the park. … Maybe they would want a little more space.

“Not that any of those things are sitting there in a plan.”

They have five years to sort out the details.

Can you imagine a world without Trestles? Where would young Brazilians flock? Which stop could Jordy Smith win? What would Kolohe and Dino do with their long afternoons together?

Let’s say the military did get it back though. Would you enlist?

Noa Deane slob
Since surfing has bitten skating’s style since the early air days of the 80’s, let’s peer through it’s lens and examine 2015/16’s en vogue move: the tweaked slob straight air. From Dane Reynolds to Noa Deane and every ‘aerialist’ in between, this move has been making the rounds ensuring useable clips. Through the lens of a skater, they are hideous. | Photo: Morgan Maassen

Opinion: “Ditch the Stinkbug Slob Airs!”

Samuel Einstein

By

Through the lens of a skater, they are hideous.

(Editor’s note: This story, by the Lisbon-based writer Sam Einstein, interests me because it demonstrates the perennial war between surfers who can skate, and those who don’t. Sam skates. Sam surfs. And while the tweaked slob straight airs of Noa Deane and Dane Reynolds render me breathless, Sam thinks they’re hideous. He reasons his case below.)

 

Airs. One day they are cool, the next they’re not. One contest everyone’s jealously sandbagging Brazilians for doing too many airs while getting a Pottz-sized hard on for (insert lighter skinned surfer)’s rail game.

The next, everyone praises Slater for aerially emasculating Jack Freestone.

“Too many reverses.”

“Not enough power surfing.”

“We need more progression.”

There was always something rather homoerotic about passionately preferring a big, strong man’s powerful, yet beautiful, aggressive, yet stylish, spray-sending rail game. I don’t know where I was going with that.

But airs and style do mix. Growing up skating vert, doing airs was the whole point. Rotations were easily distinguishable (Slater’s air was a 720 dammit) and there were clear style no-nos in regards to grabs. Things are not so simple in surfing, to the bewilderment of any other board sport patron.

Since surfing has bitten skating’s style since the early air days of the 80’s, let’s peer through its lens and examine 2015/16’s en vogue move: the tweaked slob straight air. From Dane Reynolds to Noa Deane and every ‘aerialist’ in between, this move has been making the rounds ensuring useable clips. Through the lens of a skater, they are hideous.

While I am relishing the fact that no-grab straight airs are kinda cool again (it’s all I got), the fact that between the legs stinkbug grabs are the shit in surfing is beyond me.

Call to action: grab over your front knee!

While I am undoubtedly coming across as a keyboard warrior, I am writing this as a Public Service Announcement. A proper, tuck-knee slob grab (or tuck-knee front side grab for that matter) will not only look infinitely better, but will separate you from the stinkbuggy herd.

Be the stylish slob you were born to be!

Photo: Jack English
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