Ready to put your money where your large mouth
is?
Let’s be frank. We all like to throw a
little cash into the wind, now and then.
Gambling separates us from the beasts, gives a spark of passion
(or a galaxy of nausea) as we grind away and grind away at jobs,
working like billy goats until eternity etc.
“Gambling is colourful and dramatic and theatrical,” Vegas
hotelier (Bellagio, Wynn etc) Steve Wynn said.
Recently, BeachGrit and the Australian betting
house PalmerBet held hands, one greasing the
other.
We’d offer a gambling-on-surfing service to readers (Australia
only unless you circumvent your country’s geo-blocking law via a
VPN) and for every bet you make, BeachGrit gets a little
piece.
If you lose, think of it as a donation; if you win we’re
thrilled for you.
So!
Pipe Masters. If you’re quick, you can bet on John John v Julian
onwards.
Sign up on that little banner on the side and
BeachGrit/PalmerBet will match your first
bet, up to $250.
Early in the new year, odds will drop for the 2018 World
Title.
Do you remember, four years ago, when the
greatest commentary duo in professional surfing’s history were
fired for illicit gambling? How could anyone forget. There sat Jake
“Snake” Paterson and there sat Damien “Dooma” Fahrenfort in the WSL
née ASP booth and there in the water floated now-forgotten
Frenchman Marc Lacomare and forgotten-tomorrow Australian Joel
Parkinson. It was a relatively uneventful heat, though many thought
Marc was robbed seeing as he caught better waves.
Snake and Dooma, anyhow, bet beers on the outcome. Our very own
Derek Rielly transcribed for us.
Jake: “I don’t know. I’m going to leave it
up to the professionals. That’s what they get paid for…”
Dooma: “Let’s leave t up to the judges.
It’s going to be a crazy finish.”
Jake: “(Bet a) Beer on it?”
Dooma: “I don’t know. I have a feeling
they’ll give it to Joel.”
Jake: “World title points?”
The judges did give it to Joel, the French got mad and then
Snake and Dooma were fired. Then head judge Renato Hickel
wrote:
To have Web Announcers betting beers, guessing judges scores
in almost every single wave, and telling thousands of web viewers
that Joel would receive World Title bonus points, is completely
unacceptable! A stain on a great Webcast.
A stain!
Well, guess what happened yesterday?
Kelly Slater, who had just beaten Jordy Smith out of his last
thread of hope, stood in front of the step-and-repeat being
interviewed by Kaipo. And here I have the transcript for you.
Kelly: Jordy pay up… uhhh not Jordy… (turns
to Kaipo) who did you bet with? Strider?
Kaipo: (Sheepishly) I’m not gonna bet… I
didn’t…
Kelly: Yoosh… Strider pay up. You gotta pay
him ten bucks (pointing at Kaipo).
Kaipo: (Trying to cut Kelly off) Hey
but…
Kelly: (Undaunted) I know Strider bet for
Jordy…
Kaipo: (Stuck. Mumbling)
Kelly: Hey that’s ok. I kinda wanted Jordy
to win that heat too.
Oh we know that gambling is considered a great sin by the World
Surf League née Association of Surfing Professionals, Renato Hickel
himself calling it “a stain.” Precedent tells us there is a zero
tolerance policy for such actions. Will the wonderful Kaipo
Guerrero and Strider Wasilewski be quickly and brutally canned via
righteous email?
Will they be punished in some other way?
Stay tuned!
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The fix is in says Albee Layer! | Photo:
@albeelayer/live.fast.die.old/@unholypotato/Stab
Pipe: No title for Julian or Jordy; Fanning
retires!
By Derek Rielly
A fix? A champ retired before his time?
At four pm on a North Shore afternoon, with the
sun a giant grapefruit, the curtin was drawn on a dreadful day for
two of the four title contenders, while a thirty-six-year-old
three-time world champ took a final bow.
Within the rules of probability it was unlikely that John John
Florence or Gabriel Medina would oblige outliers Jordy Smith and
Julian Wilson by losing early or that Jordy, especially, would
win.
But the ghosts of history, of Sunny Garcia, Tom Carroll, Damien
Hardman and so forth, whisper (in husky voices)… anything is
possible.
In 1995, all Sunny Garcia had to do to win the title was to make
it into round three.
He surfed against Occy in round two. Lost his board. Occy
offered him his. Occy didn’t hassle for sets (“It was a
very hard heat to surf,” said Occ after). Caught a
couple of insiders just to get a score for appearances sake. Then
it was all Machado’s until Slater cooked him alive in their
high-five semi-final.
Seven years earlier, Barton Lynch had to finish runner-up or
better at 10-foot Pipe to snatch the title off Damien Hardman or
Tom Carroll. Barton won the damn thing.
So, today.
If John John got better than a ninth, didn’t matter what Julian
did, he was out.
And it happened, despite some last-minute burlesque by Ethan
Ewing. John John won by zero-point sevenths of a point, 10.87 to
10.80.
Watch it here and tell me if Ethan won or the fix was in, as
Albee Layer suggested on Instagram.
“I don’t like winning heats like that,” said John John
afterwards.
In the last heat of the day, Jordy Smith surfed against the
partial cripple Kelly Slater, who turns forty-six in eight weeks.
Oh the fire’s out but the fowl lives!
“I wanted Jordy to win that heat but sorta not really,” said
Kelly, who expressed astonishment that Jordy didn’t push the button
on his priority on what would become Kelly’s heat winning wave.
Watch that here.
And Mick Fanning?
The most searched-for surfer on Google and therefore the most
famous surfer in the world?
He’s out, at least according to Conner Coffin.
“I don’t think I’ve surfed against [Mick] man-on-on man this
year so I was really stoked to have that opportunity today,” said
Conner in his post-heat presser. “But he made me feel bad like,
‘Aw, this is the last time I’ll ever surf out here.’ And I was like
‘Don’t make me feel bad about that!’ Because at the same time, if I
didn’t make that heat I might not have ever surfed out here again
either…”
Mick refused to confirm, or deny, the retirement suggestion
afterwards.
I do ask: is thirty-six too young to retire? Or has Mick, who
still surfs with a barbarous power, realised his use-by date has
arrived? Is he, therefore, an expert in legacy preservation unlike,
say, Kelly?
Billabong Pipe Masters Round 3 Results:
Heat 1: Julian Wilson (AUS) 15.26 def. Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 8.34
Heat 2: Conner Coffin (USA) 14.03 def. Mick Fanning (AUS) 12.60
Heat 3: Ian Gouveia (BRA) 8.60 def. Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 6.83
Heat 4: Joel Parkinson (AUS) 8.50 def. Miguel Pupo (BRA) 5.47
Heat 5: Caio Ibelli (BRA) 10.13 def. Michel Bourez (PYF) 6.57
Heat 6: John John Florence (HAW) 10.87 def. Ethan Ewing (AUS)
10.80
Heat 7: Jeremy Flores (FRA) 6.60 def. Adrian Buchan (AUS) 2.26
Heat 8: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 10.00 def. Josh Kerr (AUS) 9.83
Heat 9: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 10.26 def. Kolohe Andino (USA)
4.17
Heat 10: Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA) 15.87 def. Adriano de Souza
(BRA) 6.13
Heat 11: Kanoa Igarashi (USA) 13.34 def. Connor O’Leary (AUS)
9.73
Heat 12: Kelly Slater (USA) 11.87 def. Jordy Smith (ZAF) 7.87
Billabong Pipe Masters Round 4 Match-Ups:
Heat 1:Julian Wilson (AUS), Conner Coffin (USA), Ian Gouveia
(BRA)
Heat 2: Joel Parkinson (AUS), Caio Ibelli (BRA), John John Florence
(HAW)
Heat 3: Jeremy Flores (FRA), Gabriel Medina (BRA), Italo Ferreira
(BRA)
Heat 4: Leonardo Fioravanti (ITA), Kanoa Igarashi (USA), Kelly
Slater (USA)
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Flying betwixt one and the other. Always sad. But
always hopeful.
Confession: I will never be happy!
By Chas Smith
My heart forever torn between two great loves.
American surfers often gaze at Australia like
Narcissus gazed at his own reflection upon the waters. They stare,
tenderly, into the vibrant, high-spirited nationalism staring back
and think, “Having convict forbearers is much cuter, and equates to
a much better time, than having Puritan ones.” They smile at the
tanned, beer drinking, easy living, carefree, surf obsessed
doppelganger and sigh, “Australia is perfect. Australia is us only
better.”
I felt this same way when I was a young boy. My father taught
school, for two years, in Papua New Guinea and many of my
classmates were Australian. I envied them. I found myself calling
friends “mate” and saying, “G’day” to passers by. I told my
teachers that I was from Australia too and claimed the Southern
Cross as my own. Australians were just so dynamic and captivating
and it was only through some rude cosmic hoax that I had not been
born “down under.”
Three years ago, I moved to Sydney in order to fulfill my
childhood destiny. Everything seemed exactly perfect as I stepped
off my Qantas flight and breathed the Eucalyptus tinged air. I was
now “Australian” and things were the way they always should have
been. I looked around at my new countryfolk and saw that the entire
population lived within twenty minutes of fantastic surf and that
living well was prized above all. Wild nights cascaded,
effortlessly, into barrel-filled days cascaded back into wild
nights. Men wore v-neck t-shirts so low that their tanned
midsections were visible to the blonde and easy sheilas prowling
for a “go.” I gazed deeply into the waters and was thrilled by the
lateral inversion beaming back. Cars drove on the left instead of
the right. Steering wheels were on the right instead of the left.
Winter was summer and summer was winter.
Fannies were on the front of women and not the back. It was just
different enough to be very very cute. And better. Everything
around me was better. I believed that those first convicts, shipped
across the Pacific, had created a heaven on earth for surfers. They
had been seen as undesirable in their home Britain and so the
crown, in its wisdom, sent them away. Left to their own devices,
they cast off cultural stratification and the very idea of noblesse
oblige. They were all one, dirty, fun-loving lot.
They were all one and the same. They were fathers of a nation
nonpareil. And I strove to be the best Australian I could be,
wearing very very low v-necks myself, cheering the footy, eating
meat pies for breakfast, drinking Tooheys by the glass and
pronouncing it “Choo-ees” and calling the glass a “schooner.” I
surfed Bondi, Byron, Snapper and Bells. I added –ies to the end of
every word I said, as in, “Mate, let’s go for a surfies at
Snappies.” But I soon realized something profound. “Striving” is
quintessentially un-Australian. I found that a condition called
Tall Poppy Syndrome inflicts the entire continent. In Australia, to
achieve anything at all is an affront to the nation. They mock
excellence. They despise upward mobility. To become someone, or
something, is not valued. Tall poppies are meant to be cut down to
size. It was a grimy cockney pickpocket accent sneering, “What?
Yous think yous betta than me, govnah’?” at the well-bred and
well-fed. It was making sure everyone stayed down together.
I looked around without rose-coloured lenses. Australia has no
good architecture, save the Sydney Opera House, no good university,
no seriously lauded scientist or thinker or author save Derek
Rielly who just released the greatest political book of all time.
It has plenty of pretty actors and actresses and models and surfers
but, let’s be honest, none of them strive for more. Each is happy
in his or her lot. I fell into a deep existential funk. The
reflection of my dream, of our dream, was no more than a fraudulent
trick of light upon the waters.
I flew back to Los Angeles, one year after moving to Sydney, and
wandered the streets, looking at art-deco buildings and upwardly
mobile execs driving Porsches. I watched people judge other people
and envy what other people had and I realized that judgment and
envy makes for great art. I thanked God that he made my forbearers
Puritan and not convict. But then I remembered the good times. The
lack of pressure. The easy smiles.
The surf, surf, surf and surf. I missed my Australia and
realized I was forever twisted. I would never be happy in either
place. I would forever need both Australia’s easy going and
America’s upward toil. Well, so be it. God save the queen and God
bless America.
(This piece first appeared in Surf Europe)
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Not true! | Photo: WSL/Kelly Cestari
Revealed: Photos are the worst liars!
By Chas Smith
A picture is worth the thousand words it takes to
clean it up.
I knew it. I just plain new it for all these
years but it remained a gut feeling. An instinct that I couldn’t
shake. My whole professional career, you see, I’ve had beef with
photos. Damned photos. That’s what everyone wants. That’s what
everyone craves. No one ever bought a surfing magazine to read the
articles. And so the surf photographers got fat paychecks and fat
heads. The old adage “a picture is worth a thousand words”
emblazoned across their smug expressions.
But I knew it all along. I knew their photos were liars. That
the surf photographer, with all his skill, could capture anyone in
the most marvelous light. That what he shows us ain’t necessarily
so. I knew it but had no proof.
Until today.
Oh yes I watched the first three heats of the Gums Masters and I
watched the Italian Ferrari try the best he could by pitching some
pretty… you know… air things. They looked alright, I suppose, but
nothing… you know… epic.
But look above. How epic does that look? I’ll tell you, it looks
almost iconic making it a total lie. Can we now start saying “a
picture is worth the thousand words it takes to clean it up” as our
adage?
