North Point is like Mundaka. Unless it's pumping, holding a contest there smacks of desperation.

Margaret River, Day one: 

Were you convinced after Snapper, that Slater had lost control of his fundamentals? I contacted my old buddy Nate Silver from sports/politics blog 538.com to run the ruler over the stats for Slats’ opening event as soon as Dell asked me to cover day one at Margs.

Apart from screwing the pooch on Trump like every other pollster, Nate’s the best numbers man in the biz. Me and Nate got tight after an horrific aquatic accident on Lake Okeechobee chasing a fall edge bite when Todd Kline rammed us at 50 miles per hour in his new Skeeter. That gave me an invaluable insight into the American judicial system, another story for a different time.

For now, lets look at Kelly’s numbers. They’re bad, man. How bad? Real bad.

Kelly rode 44 waves for an average wave score of, what? Take a guess. Five? Six?

3.87.

Under four in surf that was mostly good to great Snapper Rocks, one of the most rippable waves on earth. Only one of those 44 waves (2.27%) made the excellent eight-plus range. A perfect wave he flubbed so badly it should have been a 10. That wave was the source of the awks Fanning locker-room, bun-in-the-oven exchange (more on that in a minute.)

His average heat score after seven heats including today is a princely 12.57. It’s a miracle Kelly made the quarters at Snapper. His is a surfer in steep decline, according to the numbers.

You think, surely, something has to happen. Something. In the way that something always happened when Kelly paddled out in his prime. John John chose to live or die on the back ledge and finally speared a keeper. And then a flat-spin-to-full-rote with a duck-pillow landing. But still it wasn’t quite… happening.  

We won’t go heat by heat from today. That’s crazy when the heat analyser is up and the twelve rounds saw so few highlights.

But, a few observations from day one.

• There’s now no functional difference between backside and frontside for tuberiding at the elite level. North Point is a technical tuberide with a secondary section, pinching top tube and waves that split in two. None of which bothered the goofies.
• Pros got totally lost in the lineup whether front or backside. The cognitive dissonance between the hype from the commentary and the often embarrassing performances from pros who clearly had no clue about the lineup reached it’s sparkling apotheosis when the best wave of the heats rifled down the ledge unridden, to be mind-surfed by Strider in the channel. It was a day to give viewers blueballs. So much teasing, so little release.
• You think, surely, something has to happen. Something. In the way that something always happened when Kelly paddled out in his prime. John John chose to live or die on the back ledge and finally speared a keeper. And then a flat-spin-to-full-rote with a duck-pillow landing. But still it wasn’t quite… happening.  

It’s tempting now to spend every minute of the webcast as an indulgence in disaster porn, as a front row seat to the last days of the Roman Empire. North Point is like Mundaka. Unless it’s fully pumping, holding a contest there smacks of quixotic desperation.

Will Margies be cut from the Tour? Put yourself into the heart and mind of a suit from the city of Perth getting duchessed by the WSL and local glad handlers. Was that an impressive spectacle? Worth the few million a year the WA state government pumps into it? That would get a whole series of comps in Indonesia. A backup plan for the WSL? Go Third World while the brown man is still cheaper than the white man. How much of a Tour do they need to make a title?

It’s tempting now to spend every minute of the webcast as an indulgence in disaster porn, as a front row seat to the last days of the Roman Empire. North Point is like Mundaka. Unless it’s fully pumping, holding a contest there smacks of quixotic desperation.

Would three events in Indo do it? So many gorgeous what if’s.

What did you think of the rookies? Yes, they can surf, as Mike C noted. But as far as a bankable skill set for pro surfers go that’s not the number one priority. You need a marketable narrative. Unless your name is Bede Durbidge, pro surfing hates a hype-free rookie, a potential journeyman. A story is shield and spear for pro surfers. A story-less pro is a wounded gazelle on the savannah. They get chewed up and spat out and no-one laments their passing. Shrinking surf industry money meant a shrivelled up ad revenue for mags and hence less copy space, less ads for chancers on the QS. They now come to the CT as rank unknowns, a pretty queer turn of events for a pro sport.

I found one today though. Ian Gouveia. What a little card. He’s the Brazilian Mason Ho. An insanely stylish little hyper-active fire plug of a surfer. How was that little double shaka kick out and the instinctive backside tube-riding? Brazilian goofies got the best waves of the day. That’s truth.

Owen Wright made the millions watching online all over the world wince when he wore a sledgehammer lip to the head. He paddled away. Is that a successful stress test of the brain? I say yes.

Unlike Chas I see surf journalism as noble, as spiritual defence against days like these. I aspire to be the very best under-employed ( by choice, motherfucker) surf journalist in the game. It’s hard to come up with the words to summarise the game today.

The day got weird. Those backlit buffed Indian Ocean lines but no scores. It was a patient with the lifeforce ebbing away, leaving a beautiful corpse.

Those Drug Aware ads killed me. Aspire to be the best you can be. I haven’t touched a drug for months/weeks (at least weeks), not a beer, not a joint, nothing, apart from one dexy when my mate sold his house.

Unlike Chas I see surf journalism as noble, as spiritual defence against days like these. I aspire to be the very best under-employed ( by choice, motherfucker) surf journalist in the game. It’s hard to come up with the words to summarise the game today.

In the grand scheme it signifies nothing apart from a governing body looking for novelty to energise a stale Aussie leg.

Now go home and get your fucking shine box Sebastien Zietz for dropping that ten as I was about to hit send.

How sick was that? This sport kills me.