Watch: Three Insane Filipe Toledo Shorts!

Tell me this ain't the world's greatest surfer in sub-three foot waves… 

Do you, like me, swoon when the aprés-heat interviewer Rosie Hodge pronounces Filipe Toledo’s first name Phillip? The brave little magician with eyes a soft clubhouse green meets brazen corn-fed beauty, she with the broad South African vowels and hair that flashes like warped gold who towers over her subjects, projecting a comely blend of intimidation and sex appeal.

Oh, but we’ll forgive Rosie anything.

I like the name Phil. It’s gritty, it’s colourful, full of self-mockery and cock-happiness.

Filipe sounds like the gay dancer in a Mariah Carey troupe who, inexplicably, falls in love with his master.

So let’s use.

Phillip Toledo’s influence on the world tour has been radically understated. We all remember how he made Julian Wilson look slow in the final at Snapper in 2015 and, shortly after, danced a ring around Bede Durbidge in Brazil. Two wins from four events.

Later, letting it rain holy terror in Portugal.

And it was only a blown groin in his semi-final against Matt Wilkinson that ended an expected win, and title run, this year. (It also propelled Wilko into unlikely world title contention).

In waves of three-feet and less, y’can’t get near the kid. Too fast, too light, too practised. And, so, the game is lifted. Boards are surfed lighter. Waves are surfed faster. Airs are higher, and hucked harder.

“Filipe’s technically superior,” says the surf coach and sorta-former-world number-one Brad Gerlach. “And he’s not thinking. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do. And that’s fucking awesome.”

Watch these three shorts and tell me he ain’t unbeatable waist-high and under.

(Perfect tens)

(on the twin screw)