There is no surfer more entertaining than Mason Ho. Everything he does is original, creative, skillful to the tenth degree. If surfing were politics, Mason would be the unequivocal leader of the alt-left. Ford Archbold weeps.
I get that Mason has a soft spot for competition. His uncle is a World Champ, his dad a Pipe Master, even his little sis has been on Tour for years. But that Mason continues to chase the QS brings sadness to my heart. Surf all the Hawaii events, win the Eddie or the Masters and have your name engraved into eternity, but do us a favor and skip the Aussie QS leg. Did you watch the Junior World Championships, Mase? Your star shines too bright to be doused by the hammering heels of Willian Cardoso or his likeness.
The QS is designed to mold talent into metronome, only those with the most monotonous rhythm being able to succeed. Up down up down tic tac toe, 8.5 and away you go! But your surfing is horizontal, diagonal, upside-down. No matter how hard you try, your crystalline structure will never fit into their perfect little parallelogram. Nor should you want it to.
Instead, focus on this. The videos. The finding cool waves. The pushing of limits that most of us didn’t even know existed. Hang with your friends, smoke a little weed, stay happy. Take the Rip Curl wildcards when they come and tear Parko a new one. Kidnap Turpell and commentate the final alongside Martin Potter. Just be you!
What's not to love about Beth's technique, charisma?
If you don’t appreciate Bethany Hamilton, you are anti-anti-depressive and should probably leave right now. The shark attack survivor/mother/world class surfer personifies class in a sport defined by egotism and insouciance.
I once watched Matt George cry while reading, aloud, his profile on Bethany Hamilton. Dramatic, yes, but it is a wonderful piece that one would only benefit from reading. For instance, did you know that Uncle Laird put a price on the assailant’s head, leading to the culling of a fourteen-foot tiger shark whose jaws matched the markings on her board within two micrometers? Derek would be so proud.
This year I had the fortune of sharing a few sessions with Bethany while she was warming up for the Fiji Pro. Her athletic frame cruised the Cloudbreak lineup with just the right combination of force and attitude. People cheered her into waves as if she needed the extra boost. She didn’t.
Bethany has invented a crafty technique for wave catching, wherein she positions herself to the meet the wave at its near-breaking point, pulls the nose of her board back into the lurching wall, and uses the board’s buoyancy and wave’s momentum to sling herself over the ledge. If unable to position herself for that maneuver, she’s still able to out-paddle most of her peers — dare I say out-surf them, too.
This video features Bethany cauterizing the unsuspecting walls of Pasta Point in the Maldives. Is it her best surfing? The most stunning piece of film? Nay. But it forces me to remember and appreciate everything she’s done for surfing and those living with disabilities. Bethany Hamilton has singlehandedly changed our game for the better.
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You want to know what drove the smallest kid in the entire seventh grade at Kahuku High School to one day ride giant waves and to mount the majestic Great White? Listen to this excellent podcast by the journalist (and pick-up artist) Neil Strauss and pro volleyballer and wife of Laird Hamilton, Gabby Reece. | Photo: @healeywaterops
Recently, Mark was a guest on The Truth Barrel, a podcast that takes place in a heated sauna and is hosted by the journalist and one-time pick-up artist Neil Strauss and pro volleyballer and wife of Laird Hamilton, Gabby Reece.
“There’s no fluff around Mark Healey,” says Reece, who posits that it wasn’t just Mark’s exposure to the ocean that turned him into the beast he is today, but growing up a small, white kid in a tough, local Hawaiian school.
In this episode, Mark speaks movingly of being the smallest kid of 200 in his grade at Kahuku High, girls included. The only kid who approached his diminutiveness was a boy with cancer.
“I didn’t break one hundred pounds until I was seventeen,” says Mark.
Small, white, no connections.
“I experienced real racism,” he says. “But then again it’s complex issues. A lot of white people did a lot of bad stuff over there. I didn’t. I wasn’t coming from land barons. My parents were just as poor and hard-working as anybody else, probably a lot more poorer than the local families. It’s human nature (to bully, exclude). You deal with a lot of stuff. Racism is obviously an issue and bullying is obviously an issue today but…
“Come on people, if they experienced the skin of stuff I experienced growing up. I’d be twelve years old, and small for twelve years old, and have a senior come by and give me his best shot. Straight down the pipe. Blow my face out. You were constantly on edge. You’d get in altercations twice a week. You learned to be either a doormat or stick up for yourself. Not a lot of kids stick up for themselves. You kinda snap every now and then.
“The crappy thing is,” says Mark, “you get forced into a situation where you have to react and if you lose, you lose. If you win, then you have their entire family looking for you.”
And don’t go expecting the other small white kids to help. They’re “shaking in a corner with PTS,” laughs Mark.
Thing is, he says, the fights, the racism helped him become who he is.
“I was dealing with an environment where I was, a, a minority and it was a little rough, b, being the smallest guy, c, being poor… I always tell kids this. If there’s anything that’s really served me, it’s this. I learned at an early age that sometimes you have to work twice as hard to get the same results as the person next to you. Life’s not fair. Do you want it or not? Do what it takes to get it.”
The greatest there ever was knocked out by a wily upstart!
If you are an observer of the surf game, even casually, then you will know that Kelly Slater is the undisputed, never before grazed, 10000000 times world champion of the passive aggressiveunprovoked and unnecessary take down. Who could ever forget such classic bouts such as “Adriano de Souza wins his first (likely only) hard fought hard earned world title only to be upstaged by Kelly Slater and his wave pool hours later?”
Devastating!
Or “John John wins his much celebrated title and while the world (save Brazil) rejoices Kelly Slater claims Jordy Smith has better video parts?”
Crushing!
Kelly is a master. His timing, his delivery, his approach flawless and conventional wisdom had him only being bested in the passive aggressive unprovoked and unnecessary take down scene once dementia started to creep more fully.
Until yesterday.
Yesterday a challenger stepped into the ring. A young man out of Los Angeles with a quick wit, a crooked smile and a mischievous glint in his eye. Lady’s and gentlemen… put your hands together for…
Alllllllllllllex Graaaaaaaaaaay!
The big wave surfer took to Instagram praising his sponsor Body Glove new product offering.
Body Glove created the first wetsuit and now they’ve created the first heat moldable bootie! I’m really stoked to be part of the new technology. Having the bootie mold to your foot takes any extra room out, preventing any of that typical sliding around inside the bootie. I also really like the new pattern on the bottom for extra grip. If you have a narrow foot like me now we get to have the perfect fit for those cold days! And also feel like ninjas with glue feet. Thanks etc. etc. for having me along the process.
Very kind, thoughtful and sincere. Alex, I believe, was let go by the vicious Volcom earlier this year and would be forgiven being grouchy. This is the sort of generosity of spirit that makes me smile and I’m sure Body Glove was smiling too. Kelly Slater, though, couldn’t stand these smiles directed away from him and dropped a hammer in the comments.
I like it but didn’t Oneill make the first wetsuit?
That blow should have staggered poor Alex Gray. Should have knocked him out entirely. But like Rocky Balboa he took it right on the chin then countered with an even bigger hammer!
@kellyslater is it true ur wave pool is currently broken?
And there goes the champ. Reeling! Spinning across the canvas unable to find his feet… going… going… going… down!
Who would have ever guessed that? Who would have ever guessed Alex Gray was surf’s Buster Douglas? Well, you should have quite frankly. Alex is no spring chicken. He once even battled Filipe Toledo’s dad!
But how will Kelly Slater respond? Will he ask for a rematch with Alex or go and lash out at another unsuspecting foe to build confidence back up?
And is his wave pool currently really broken? I’m going to get to the bottom of this as soon as I’m done cruising Harajuku!
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"I got stitches for Christmas!" | Photo: lairdhamilton.com
A pleasingly loose interview with Size King Laird Hamilton.
Yesterday at four am, sometime BeachGrit reporter Anthony Pancia was awoken by a phone call from the wife of Laird Hamilton, the model and volleyballer Gabby Reece. The reporter had been chasing an interview with Laird and had taken to sleeping with his portable telephone under his pillow in case of an unlikely callback.
But miracles do happen, and it is the season for the miraculous afterall.
And with Laird stuck in a car for an hour, and in a very good humour, the pair talked Christmas gifts (“This year I got some stitches!”), hip replacements (“Too many lifetimes in one!”) and the history of foil-boarding (“The only way to ride the biggest waves on the world will be on hydro-foils.”)
Listen!
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Jon Pyzel and Matt Biolos by @theneedforshutterspeed/Step Bros
