This is old.I ain’t gonna pretend.
Made in February 2016.
It flew onto my radar just then by virtue of, I don’t know, my
search history of old men roaming nude beaches?
Whatever it is, it’s a fine piece of short course cinema that
documents the three-time world champion Tom Curren returning to the
joint he made famous back in the eighties (took a wife there, too,
Marie, their kid Leanne Curren rips) and sloshing
around on ridiculous surf equipment. You know the sort, the
busted-in-half rescue board Tom uses to catch the wave before
abandoning and jumping into a deep squat on his skimmer. It’s all
very kooky, but all very cool.
I mean, you’re mid-fifties, you nailed riding the usual sleds,
why not shake it up? Tom is remarkably coherent in the clip,
something that always surprises me, given the times I met him in
the nineties and the most I ever got was a simian grunt and eyes so
red I wanted to lick them back to health.
The waves, meanwhile, don’t it make you want to bivouac at one
of these beaches for the summer?
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
Crime: Is Filipe’s season being
stolen?
By Chas Smith
Will the winner of 2017's WSL crown forever wear an
asterisk?*
Could it be argued, right at this moment, that
Filipe Toledo is the best surfer in the world? I think it could! Oh
of course there is a possible hole in his game (plus-size
Teahupo’o) but otherwise… what?
He was magnificent at J-Bay, surfing the best wave in
competitive history during a contest that saw nothing but A+ swell.
He was set to win Huntington in what would charitably be called
“below average” conditions.
He truly seems unstoppable. Doesn’t even the great John John
Florence seem kind of yawn at this very moment in time? Doesn’t the
whole rest of the tour feel a touch outclassed?
And yet he has been stopped. By the machinations. By the
structure. By the rulez.
Let us quickly rewind the tape. Filipe came out of the gate on
Australia’s Gold Coast surfing poorly and netting at 25th. He
turned it around at the Drug Aware Pro with a 3rd and backed that
up with a 5th at Bells and onto Rio where he was totally going to
win until the judges screamed
interference and he was bumped to 13th and also
cancelled from
Fiji.
But let us say the judges didn’t ding Filipe on a technicality
in Rio. Let us say he won the event like he was totally going to
and then traveled to Fiji. The waves that came forth during the
very slow OuterKnown Pro were custom made for him and just imagine
if he would have surfed them like he surfed the following
J-Bay.
He would have won. And he did win J-Bay. Which means his score
line would read 25th, 3rd, 5th, 1st, 1st, 1st.
The young man could have refused to surf Tahiti just for fun and
still easily win Trestles, France, Portugal and which point Pipe
would be nothing but his coronation.
Just yesterday he really should have won Huntington Beach’s U.S.
Open of Surfing and of course it is not a championship tour event
but still. He was called out. Denied $100,000.00 (is the purse
still $100,000.00?) on an interference decision the great Brett Simpson
lambasted publicly. Kanoa Igarashi went on to win but
examine his picture holding the trophy.
Those sad eyes hidden by sunglasses, a disingenuous smile pulled
taut. One limp finger half-heartedly raised to the sky.
Kanoa knows he was not, in fact, number 1 this day. He knows he
was only saved by rules and regulations.
His face is an asterisk.
And don’t you think whoever wins the title this year, if it is
not Filipe Toledo, might also forever carry an asterisk?
Let’s wait and see but I think Kanoa’s asterisk face is a clear
and present possibility for the winner of the World Surf League’s
2017 season.
Wilko should probably practice his.
*If the winner is not Filipe Toledo
Loading comments...
Load Comments
0
I know the conditions and the left was going to fucking
die out into a trenchcoat. It was going trenchcoat. The right was
the only wave.
Simpo: “Change that fucking 1970
rulebook!”
By Derek Rielly
An interview with back-to-back US Open winner Brett
Simpson on the Toledo-Igarashi interference…
When Brett Simpson opined on the WSL’s
Instagram that its rule book needed
refreshment after another interference hit on Filipe,
well, I had to call.
Brett, who is thirty two years old, a back-to-back winner of the
US Open and who lives a short drive north of HB pier, invites the
WSL to re-examine its “fucking 1970 rulebook.”
“As a surfer,” says Brett, “the goal is to be as deep as you can
to maximise the ride, whether it’s a ride or a left. I look at that
wage, I surf there a bunch. I know the conditions and the left was
going to fucking die out into a trenchcoat. It was going
trenchcoat. The right was the only wave. Filipe got a seven
something on the wave even after the collision. I understand that
the rule book simplifies it for the judges. But even then, one guy
gave it a double, another guy gave it to red (Filipe). It wasn’t
conclusive.
“I’m sure Rich told ’em, ‘This is what the rule book states’ and
it obviously makes it easy for him. The call was right as in the
sense of what the fucking 1970 rulebook says. But as it’s 2017 I
feel like, we’re looking at waves and we know which one is better,
which wave has more of a score. That’s the most irritating part.
Kanoa’s a smart competitive surfer, he’s my friend, and I’m not
saying he’s wrong, but I look at the wave and Kanoa goes left and
even if he did a huge air in the shorey he gets a five. Kanoa was
up against the best surfer in the fucking world right now and
probably the only way he was going to win was to get an
interference.
“The waves are shitty, the one wave that was going to break was
the right. The time has come for the rule book to say, look at this
wave, well he was going from the deepest spot and was going to get
the bigger score. But he gets the interference! Obviously Filipe
will tell you one thing but in his gut he probably knew it was a
remix of fricken Brazil.”
Filipe, blue, Kanoa, red, clatter in their semi final
at the US Open. Again, like Rio, Kanoa wins the interference
battle. Oh the perilous magic of nymphets! | Photo:
WSL
Encore: Filipe Interferes with Kanoa at US
Open!
By Derek Rielly
"It's 2017 and the judges are still 1970!" says
Filipe Toledo
If this was cinema, the camera would pan over
the surfer’s face, striped in afternoon shadow. His little paws
cradle a sad face as family gather around to provide humanitarian
shade.
And the viewer, recoils from the screen, made aware, again, of
the perilous magic of nymphets.
Just then, Filipe Toledo and Kanoa Igarashi clattered rails on a
peak in their semi-final at the US Open. Kanoa “commanded the peak”
and took out Filipe on an interference.
Bobby Martinez was a bright comet that streaked
across our sky. Oh we all cranked our neck to the heaven’s and
admired the Santa Barabarans’ backhand attack, his fearless tube
weaving, his opinions on this and that. He was a beautiful
distraction. And then, just like that in 2011, he was gone and we
looked back toward earth. Toward each other.
Toward Todd Kline.
Truth and honesty are two rare traits in our surf world and
Bobby wasn’t afraid to share and still isn’t afraid. A
just-published, wide-ranging interview in the Men’s
Journal brings him back. It is vital that you
read the whole thing but here are some outtakes.
On his 2011 explosion: They wanted a
ranking system like they use in tennis. They wanted surfing to be
this broad-scale sport — like soccer or something. I knew it was
wrong, and so did a lot of other people.
On his relationship with the WSL: I never
heard from them ever again. I haven’t heard shit from these
people.
On being part of the surf industry: I get
nothing from the surf industry. I didn’t want to stay in their
little box and be a yes man.
On the surf industry in general: But I’m so
thankful that they have been with me like that because other
companies like Billabong and Quicksilver — that are 100 percent
about the tour and all this fucking surfing blah, blah, blah —
would have cut me regardless. You can’t be yourself with those
companies. The industry is horrible. It’s hard to find a company
that just respects you and is going to let you be yourself. Surfers
can’t say shit because where are they going to go?
On surfing in the Olympics: It’s the
dumbest thing in the world.
On small waves: Brazilians are the only
ones who surf good in small waves…
On surfers who will surf in the Olympics: I
think they’re just going wherever their sponsors tell them to go. I
don’t think they have a voice, or else they would have been
speaking out when I spoke out.
On wave pools: Surfing isn’t done in a
pool. Surfing’s done in the ocean. I mean, are you fucking really
going to travel to Kansas to surf the world’s best wave
pool?
On surfing Kelly’s wave pool: Maybe if it
was literally in my backyard. But, no, I wouldn’t drive to
it.
What is your favorite line? I can’t choose. Each is like a
beautiful but different child.
