Oh to be freed from the shackles of fear!
Some days ago in his round one Margie’s analysis, Longtom wrote this:
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.
I did not see the incident and wasn’t about to scour the WSL site to find it, so I took Shearer’s word. But it turns out he was half-wrong. There were b- trillions of people watching online all over the world.
As for the Owen part it’s safe to say Sheaerer slammed it on the noggin. Here’s an Instgram-turned-Facebook post from the Avatar himself, agreeing wholeheartedly with ol’ Longtom.
And… ouch! Have you ever been pelted by a wave with such mass and acceleration? Otherwise known as force?
Me of course yes because I charge the biggest waves Swamis has to offer but you, dear readers, may not know the feeling. It is cold, dark, violent. Enough so that, in the case of Owen’s 2015 Pipe beating, the result was a mature case of shaken baby syndrome.
But what have we learned? After a year plus of rehab, Owen is ready to handle a proper skull-shaker — both physically and mentally. That’s a huge step for world number one.
I really liked what he said, by the way, about emotional scars being just as important as the physical ones. I was once run over by a scooter kid in the skatepark, leaving me with a bruised knee cap and a fist full of anger. My leg hinge was fine seven minutes later but to this day I still yell “Fag!” every time I see one of those handlebar douches. And I don’t even use ‘fag’ as an insult anymore! Old habits die never.
Oh and, would you look at that… O Dawg has made it all the way to the quarters. Could we have a title contender or just an elongated Wilko on our hands? Will he go at massive Teahupo’o?
Only time will tell, but I think yes because Owen is a brave man.
You’ve missed the real story here MC. Previous stories have mentioned the Mother of Dragons, which up until now, I wasn’t sure who exactly was being referred to. A quick look at Owen’s sponsor thankses reveals all.
Besides, Avatar was just a weird cartoonish fairytale about left-wing imperialism. GoT was multi-level real time Machiavellian politics and a bit of full frontal nudity. No brainer.
Doesn’t change the conversation, but Shearer was talking about Owen’s tube-exit-to-ax in Round One. Owen is talking about getting caught inside in Round Three. Carry on.
Owened
Fuck this! I’m not going to be popular for saying the following but it has to be said. While we all want to see Owen back charging (which he is) and it reflects greatly on the man’s courage and tenacity – applauding a man in the process of recovery from a traumatic brain injury, who is taking massive risks is callous! Now I’m not a brain surgeon but any casual observer of sports head injuries over the past ten years would have to fear for Owen. Has anyone seen the film “the crash reel”? There is one scene where Kevin is showing his neurosurgeon footage of him wakeboarding, his surgeon goes apeshit, telling him small impacts like falling whilst wakeboarding could set his recovery back indefinitely. There is also some other kid who refused to quit snowboarding despite massive concussions, and now he doesn’t know his elbow from his knee. Now I hope Owens injury is very different from Kevin Pearce’s but until I know I’ll refrain from applauding. It’s a nice story for the WSL but if they really gave two fucks about the health of the competitors helmets would be mandatory in chopes and pipe for heats! Let’s face it – emotional scars are fucking nothing compared to serious brain trauma!
And scuba masks would be mandatory in Brasssiiill
Oxygen mask maybe?
Valid valid valid! Please explain to Micheal at least one of his readers and I hope many here know what its like to have a mountain of water land on their head. His “youth arrogance” is.. Well.. Exactly.
Methinks you missed a bit of satire…
I anonymously comment on internet articles. I cant believe you would question my bravery.
I haven’t looked into the extent of his injury, mostly because I haven’t taken the time do so so, nor will I. I don’t think it’s courage or bravery. Everyone makes his/her own decisions. If this is putting him at risk, this is his choice but not one everyone would make. Let’s just hope it is an informed decision. The brain is nothing to fuck with.
Yeah, I was kinda cringing watching that heat, honestly. Brain injuries are hella unpredictable.
But also, helmets will only help in terms of like blunt-force hitting the reef. There’s no real way to guard against the brain shifting inside the skull and bruising during an impact like falling or getting slammed by a ginormous set.
Congrats you’ve earned this! https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
all i see are the chemtrails
I’m sure Rip Curl paid the best doctors to tell him the time was right to get back out there. Their investment rides on his willingness to huck himself over ledges right?
Paying a doctor would imply that there’s money in surfing. Which there isn’t. Just like the WSL claiming that 4 million people are watching Jadson Andre in a heat. Which they’re not.
Ah but there is still money in the slave trade!
Good point but I don’t think rattling brain injuries are that common in surfing, even at pipe. To compare it with snowboarding or wakeboarding is not apples to apples in my opinion. Owen could be entirely healed and his odds of reoccurring another head injury are of equal odds of any other charging pro surfer. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve taken some beatings on big waves. I’ve cracked ribs and dislocated my patella twice. But still, I’m not repetitively taking blows to the head.
I take your point, but Shawn Dollar has spoken at length about concussions in big wave surfing and from what I gather, you don’t need a succession of concussions to develop CTE, lesser impacts to the head can lead to it. Familiar sports are going to change beyond recognition in the coming years as a result of what science is teaching us about brain trauma! I hope you are right that Owen has fully recovered from his injuries, and that his long term health isn’t being compromised for this Hollywood comeback tale!
As long as I can see the wipeout coming, I can protect the noggin, which is 90% of the time. It’s those unexpected smacks that screw you up.
Surfers are a bunch of poker faced bastards, and Owen doesn’t want to go into detail about what happened. I don’t really understand how a hold down can result in brain bleed (though going over the falls, I do understand) and I don’t think we’ve heard the full story.
It would be good to assure fans with some objective evidence that Owen is not putting himself at risk for our pleasure.
Think twice about doggy doors at 12 foot pipe.
It’s all a bit unclear. Could we please arrange for his medical records to be transferred to the Beachgrit site so we can comment with more assurance? I’m sure Owen will sign the Authority.
Ha! But you will observe that this is a sport conducted in public, and they are making the story line “from debilitating brain injury to yellow jersey glory” rather prominent. I remember so much being made of Fanning’s psychological state, and the penetrating interviews on “can you go back in the water?”
Most pro sports have whole programs dedicated to the health of a footballer’s joint or strain, mentioning exactly what injury happened, how it happened, and even showing scans and assurances they are fit to play. Surfing needs similar transparency, particularly when the injury is part of the appeal for the surfer.
When you post about “healing” from brain injury by wearing waves on the head, you are opening the door to such an analysis, and to shy away from it looks suspicious.
Head injuries are probably what makes surfers so stupid. I’ve had two major concussions in my life and I’ve never even thought of wearing a helmet . . . it could be worse, I mean, at least I don’t smoke cigarettes.
OK. Cigs are shoot. Yet this is a ” Surfers” website, no? So shooting where you eat is testimony to the severity of your two concussions. Shoot!