Dino Adrian has his forehead lovingly kissed by Cyclone
Marcus bomb.
Watch: “Fucking Unsurfable for
Civilians!”
By Derek Rielly
A revealing three-minute short from hyped Cyclone
Marcus swell…
Just over two weeks ago, a cyclone birthed the rarest of
birds, a north swell in Western Australia. These sorts of
swells happen every five, sometimes ten, years and are tracked with
excitement. Even Perth, a waveless joint more famous for its insane
urban sprawl and just as insane summer onshores put on a reasonable impersonation of
Hossegor.
Seven years ago, and three hours further south, Taj Burrow, Jay
Davies and Dino Adrian were gifted impossibly perfect, and often
impossibly hard to get into sandbottom tubes. That was Cyclone
Bianca, when clean two-foot runners turned into eight-foot bombs by
the afternoon.
This year it was Cyclone Marcus, although the swell direction
had a little west in it which meant the most photogenic of waves
was “fucking unsurfable for civilians,” according to the former
Margaret River pro surfer turned real estate agent Mitch
Thorson.
In this three-minute short, shot by Scott Hammond and Tom
Jennings, we see Jay Davies, Dino Adrian and pals being spat into
out of tubes, and sometimes into the sandy spittoon, all via tow
rather than paddle, which was the preserve of bodyboarders.
Watch.
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I can feel your halo (halo) halo
Miracle: The Making of St. Mick!
By Chas Smith
The hero of Australian surfing on his greatest
journey yet!
You are well-aware, by now, that the 2018 Bells
Beach Classic is Mick Fanning’s last stand. The Coolangatta local
and 3 x World Champion, 37, will no longer don a colorful singlet
nor will his rich baritone fill a World Surf League branded
microphone again. It is almost over but not quite as Mick will
paddle out against stablemate Owen Wright in the quarterfinals when
competition next begins.
Breathless superlatives will flow, each and every one obviously
deserved, as Michael Eugene Fanning is hurtled toward full
sainthood.
And I must say that I have never seen anything like this in all
my days upon this earth. In order to achieve full sainthood it is a
well-known fact that a holy man or woman must first die and then
three miracles must occur in his or her name. The process can take
anywhere from six years to hundreds of them and is by no means
assured even for the holiest. But Mick is special and the hero of
Australian surfing has already been marked with his first
miracle.
Yes and as reported by the Daily
Mail, Mick’s ex-wife, wedding industry titan
Karissa Dalton, not only watched him surf on the WSL webcast and
not only cheered him on but posted an image of the affair to
Instagram. Let us read for it is meet and right so to do.
They ended their relationship in January 2016 after eight
years of marriage.
And despite ending things romantically, Karissa Dalton and
Mick Fanning are still on friendly terms.
On Tuesday, Karissa took to Instagram stories to cheer on
her ex-husband during a surfing competition, alongside best friend
Pia Miller.
Karissa shared a photo of her and Pia drinking martinis as
they watched Mick compete on a laptop.
‘Go Mick!’ Karissa captioned the photo, while Pia shared the
same image and wrote: ‘Go Mick you good thing!’
Karissa and Mick have remained on good terms, despite that
the surfer is believed to have moved on with American model Breeana
Randall.
Lending her support! Karissa shared a photo of her and Pia
drinking martinis as they watched Mick compete on a
laptop.
A true miracle without any shade of doubt. Turning on the World
Surf League’s webcast, listening intently to Martin “Pottz” Potter
and Joe Turpel, watching an ex muscle turns through chubby runners…
one down, two to go.
And I have written a poem to celebrate. Would you permit me to
publish?
Remember those walls I built
Well, baby, they’re tumbling down
And they didn’t even put up a fight
They didn’t even make a sound
I found a way to let you win
But I never really had a doubt
Standing in the light of your halo
I got my angel now
It’s like I’ve been awakened
Every rule I had you break it
It’s the risk that I’m taking
I ain’t never gonna shut you out
Everywhere I’m looking now
I’m surrounded by your embrace
Baby, I can see your halo
You know you’re my saving grace
You’re everything I need and more
It’s written all over your face
Baby, I can feel your halo
Pray it won’t fade away
I can feel your halo (halo) halo
I can see your halo (halo) halo
I can feel your halo (halo) halo
I can see your halo (halo) halo
Hit me like a ray of sun
Burning through…
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Zeke v John John: It was thrilling and almost wincingly
painful to watch, like a David Attenborough documentary where the
elegant ruminant gets savaged by a lion then has its insides ripped
out by a pack of hyaenas. The champ looked so helpless. All that
insouciance at the Gold Coast was gone and in its place was a
lonely blond-haired kid being frowned upon by an older man on the
stairs who shook his head sadly as the siren
sounded.
Bells Day 5: “Florence’s insides ripped out
by hyena!”
By Longtom
Zeke Lay eats John John alive, Parko surfs like
new-born giraffe with foetal alcohol syndrome!
Isn’t life the most whimsical, curious and inscrutable
of affairs? It’s what I love about Pro Surfing, above all
else: this eternal tilting at the windmill of a mainstream
audience, its earnest and blackly (unintentionally) comic embrace
of total corpo-speak, the smoke and mirrors faking it until you
make it pieces in the mainstream business media. Its subtle and
none-too-subtle shifts and changes that seem to leave all concerned
– especially the surfers, sorry athletes – clueless
and gawping like goldfish in a bowl.
I do not jeer. Believe me. Especially after a day like
today.
People say to me all the time: “Why do you fucken write about
pro surfing if you fucking hate it so much?” Lovers of the game
think I should love and true haters think any attention is
legitimacy to the evil commercialisation in surfing.
Jared Diamond in his foreword to Guns, Germs and
Steel said in relation to similar objections to
writing about Human History : “This objection rests on a common
tendency to confuse an explanation of causes with a justification
or acceptance of results”, which sums up my response on the matter
perfectly.
You’d go a long way to find a more curious, bizarre in Strider’s
words, morning in Pro Surfing history. I tuned in and after
wrassling with the WSL webby which persisted in locking into
yesterday’s stream and got live action halfway into the Zeke
Lau/JJF round three heat. Replays showed Zeke, with a face like an
Easter Island statue and physique to match, had monstered John, got
all up in his grill and had sent the world champ into a tailspin.
Combo’ed, Florence fell, then fell again as the clock ticked down.
It was thrilling and almost wincingly painful to watch, like a
David Attenborough documentary where the elegant ruminant gets
savaged by a lion then has its insides ripped out by a pack of
hyaenas. The champ looked so helpless. All that insouciance at the
Gold Coast was gone and in its place was a lonely blond-haired kid being
frowned upon by an older man on the stairs who shook his head sadly
as the siren sounded.
John’s presser was abject. He looked terrible. Bags under the
eyes like a parkie who’d skulled a flagon of cheap port and spent
the night curled up in a bus stop. He called Zeke’s aggression
“kinda lame” and said “I might do it in the next event.” Which made
me snort my coffee and shout aloud “As if!”
John has no aggro in his game. None. Unlike Fanning, who brings
an intensity to any recreational lineup, I have no qualms getting
my quota if John showed at my local breaks.
Putting it bluntly, and regretfully, Parko’s surfing in his heat
with Fred Morais was farcical, almost risible. It was borderline
slapstick. He looked as coordinated and solid as a new-born giraffe
with foetal alcohol syndrome stumbling it’s way across New York’s
central park on New years Eve. Yes, it was that surreal.
Only a faint vestigial image of something graceful and elegant was
visible in the bumbling performance he laid on. To be charitable,
and in his own words, he had a shocker.
Strider said it might be something in the water, as even the
king of three turns and a solid finish Adriano De Souza struggled
with standing on a surfboard. But what? There are drugs that make
people smart, like Modafinil and Ritalin and Coffee. What could
have made the best in the world stumble about like English
accountants on a Friday night? Rohypnol? Ether? Had the earth’s
magnetic field been reversed, as has happened before, overnight and
suddenly everything was topsy turvy and upside down? Maybe it was
just sleep deprivation, the Top 34 seems like Daddy Day Care these
days and every Dad knows that wobbly burnt out feeling of being
kept up all hours by a screaming kiddy. I don’t know.
It took four heats before the curtain was drawn on the slapstick
and Filipe and Italo took the lineup. If you read any of the
Snapper coverage you’ll know Italo is my boy. Using Nick Carroll’s
objective analysis method I determined him to be the fastest surfer
on Tour and the best goofyfoot and believe, to date, he has been
crucially underscored. Like the Gold Coast, it’s a shame he had to
meet Filipe so early in the draw. It’ll probably be the best heat
of the comp. Toledo made a grey, wobbly lineup and grey sky shine
with the light of a thousand suns. He blitzed and shralped and
threw high speed edges at every half lip and corner he could find.
Alone, he made it seem like a different lineup. But Italo was
better. Very, very big high-speed cornering from bottom to top and
massive finishes with perfect handling. My heart was in my throat
watching Italo’s second ride with six minutes to go and needing a
score. when he stuck a huge landing I found myself fist-pumping and
saying “Yes!” First heat I’ve watched where Occy Skins ’97 looked
dated. Could have gone either way but I think the judges have
finally caught on to the fact that Italo is leading this wobbly old
peloton.
An hour’s break and back to Winki with more gurgle to deal with
for round four. Maybe something is biding its time, over the
horizon and is ready to announce its arrival. Give this year it’s
shape and definition; the way John’s performance at Margaret River
did last year.
Michel Bourez was simply sensational and for all the big new
meathead journeymen on Tour with hams the size of Sally Fitzgibbon,
there is no one even close to him as the premier power surfer on
Tour. That reminds of a post Chas Smith wrote about the rise of
midget surfers… hold that thought, we’ll come back to
it.
Mick Fanning was several shades off the pace in his round four
heat with Wilko and Pat Gudauskas, and I feel like a worm for
insinuating yesterday that Pat had nothing to offer except a few
miserable sixes and sevens. He just looks… a little too hyped up
for my taste. At least he didn’t get his coffee spiked with
rohypnol this morning. Mick made a mistake, gave Wilko a scoring
wave, looked resigned to losing and having his last heat, was
over-scored on a ride which got him back into it and then loosed
the old instincts to win the heat. Pressure now for a fairytale
finish will be acute and severe.
Zeke Lau, Fred Morais, Italo and Gabe are through from round
four.
Am I seeing this correct?
I often lie awake in the wee hours, unable to sleep, listening
to the whine of a mosquito, wondering. what if I’m dead wrong? I
don’t do Facebook much but I saw an update from the surf journalist
Nick Carroll who stated, “There’s a potentially great and very
challenging round three draw in the Bells men’s event. A lot of
good surf coming, and some of the heats could go very big. I don’t
normally hype the CT, it gets enough of that, but whoa. Take a look
if you can.”
That is a totally different perspective to mine. I have to
cleave to the view of commenter Wiggoly’s Paddling Style, who with
his great flair for the scatalogical, sent me an email today
saying, “This Bells is about as exciting as a half-sucked cock at a
wedding.”
What are you seeing? Where does the truth lie?
Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach Remaining Round 3
Results:
Heat 7: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 13.07 def. John John Florence (HAW)
9.76
Heat 8: Frederico Morais (PRT) 11.60 def. Joel Parkinson (AUS)
9.07
Heat 9: Conner Coffin (USA) 9.83 def. Adriano De Souza (BRA)
9.63
Heat 10: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 16.60 def. Filipe Toledo (BRA)
15.40
Heat 11: Jeremy Flores (FRA) 11.86 def. Adrian Buchan (AUS)
11.73
Heat 12: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 14.16 def. Willian Cardoso (BRA)
13.30
Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach Round 4 Results:
Heat 1: Michel Bourez (PYF) 15.77, Owen Wright (AUS) 12.00, Wade
Carmichael (AUS) 10.60
Heat 2: Mick Fanning (AUS) 14.33, Patrick Gudauskas (USA) 14.00,
Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 13.17
Heat 3: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 12.57, Frederico Morais (PRT) 11.16,
Conner Coffin (USA) 11.10
Heat 4: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 13.33, Italo Ferreira (BRA) 12.17,
Jeremy Flores (FRA) 11.00
Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach Quarterfinal
Matchups:
QF 1: Michel Bourez (PYF) vs. Patrick Gudauskas (USA)
QF 2: Mick Fanning (AUS) vs. Owen Wright (AUS)
QF 3: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) vs. Italo Ferreira (BRA)
QF 4: Gabriel Medina (BRA) vs. Frederico Morais (PRT)
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How smart is Pat Tenore? He got the biz, he got the
cash, he got the girl. Want life advice? Direct questions directly
to Mr Pat Tenore.
Biz: RVCA founder’s $37 mill payday!
By Jazzy P
Why Pat Tenore is the smartest cat in the surf
game…
How much do you know about the RVCA story? It’s
as odd as it is mysterious.
Two twenty-somethings start an underground surf label in 2001.
One is the pro surfer, Conan Hayes, the other is a designer, Pat
Tenore.
“Our relationship has always been ‘One foot in a limo, the other
in the gutter,’ meaning we’ve always been fortunate enough to view
and see many things that aren’t normally accessible for a pro
surfer and a designer,” Tenore said at the time. Their debut range
was called the “Recession Collection.”
What’s a short sale? In the US, if you’re doing it tough, a bank
agrees to the sale of a home for less than the amount owed on the
loan. In Conan’s case, the bank claims he fraudulently told ’em he
was unemployed and broke hence the sale. The bank says it lost
$586,245 on the short sale.
The prosector in the case was so zealous in hunting Conan she
illegally obtain his tax records. Conan’s bail was set at exactly
the amount the bank says it lost.
It gets weirder.
Pat Tenore Snr, an Orange County realtor and daddy to Conan’s
former partner, facilitated the short sale. (No wrongdoing is
alleged on his behalf although the prosecution is attempting to
limit contact between Pat Snr and Conan.)
And, then there’s the sale of RVCA to Billabong shortly after
Conan apparently sold his piece to Tenore.
What’s mysterious about the sale are the words “undisclosed
amount” given for the price of the sale. And while I was digging
around financial statements in the post-Quik buyout the words “RVCA
Compensation” kept popping up.
So how much did Billabong pay for RVCA, a company the Wall
Street Journal estimated to be worth US$50 million in mid-2013 and
what was the “RVCA compensation”?
As with any good deal there was a cash amount, some targets to
hit (for more cash) and a share-option grant.
But what strikes me as odd in this deal is that there appears to
be no cash laid out up-front for RVCA.
All the cash (or at least the majority) was deferred till after
July 1, 2015 (five years after the sale date). Those targets aren’t
available for public scrutiny. I’m assuming Tenore, who is forty
four, had a pretty salary, so the prospect of waiting five years
for the big pay day wasn’t too tough.
On Feb 6, 2014, Tenore signed a four-year contract to remain at
RVCA till 2018. With this came a slight restructure to his ‘earn
out’ from the acquisition contract he signed in 2010. Pat pocketed
$20 million cash, had a $7.5 million loan forgotten about (Was that
the money that paid-out Conan? It ain’t clear.) and was granted 1.2
million share options in Billabong (worth about $720,000).
Over four years, the total “earn out” package, as they like to
call it, looks like it was worth $37 million in guaranteed cash. A
further $45 million would be earned if performance targets were hit
before 2018. However, as at 31 December 2017 Billabong reported
that the targets are unlikely to be met.
In 2017 Billabong wrote down the goodwill on RVCA from $78.1
million to zero.
Weird? Odd? Mysterious? Confusing?
That’s surf biz!
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Jordy Smith at his freesurfing best, Reunion Island,
2009, for Modern Collective. | Photo: Kai Neville
J’Accuse: “The tour castrated Julian and
Jordy!”
By Samuel Einstein
Two great surfers forced to suppress their native
brilliance…
Is there a
sadder tale than the one of Julian Wilson and Jordy Smith?
Two men whose brilliance was beaten out of ’em? Two men for whom
the world title beckons but remains out of reach? Yesterday, Jordy
was beaten by Wade Carmichael and Julian by Pat Gudauskas, “those torrid journeymen
viciously hurling sixes and sevens.”
How? Why?
Jordy and Julian, both
of whom will turn thirty this year, began their tour lives at a
time when progression and risk wasn’t adequately rewarded. In other
words, the progressive surfing that they were known for before
joining the tour had to be dramatically suppressed.
Over the years, Jordy and Julian adapted
their surfing and fully embraced a castrated approach to surfing
heats. As a fan, it was devastating to watch. The difference
between their freesurfing and their contest surfing was so wildly
exaggerated it allowed movies like Modern Collective to
have the impact they did.
Surfing safe, smooth and
consistent is what racked up the scores and led to world
titles. Cue: Mick
Fanning and Adriano de Souza.
Over the years, Jordy
and Julian adapted their surfing and fully embraced a castrated
approach to surfing heats. As a fan, it was devastating to watch.
The difference between their freesurfing and their contest surfing
was so wildly exaggerated it allowed movies like Modern
Collective to have the impact they did.
The tour was for boring,
athletic surfing and Kai Neville’s movies were for exciting, risky
surfing.
Jordy and Julian obliged
and continued to live their double lives.
Then, out of nowhere,
came John John and the Brazilian Storm and the floor fell out from
under them completely. Within a season, the paradigm completely
shifted and the best surfing in the world, by a long shot, was
happening on tour.
Jordy and Julian spent
the first half of their careers reigning in the progressive aspects
of their surfing only to be blindsided by the highest level of
in-jersey progressive surfing ever seen by John John, Gabriel
Medina and Filipe Toledo.
The saddest thing of all
is that they never truly did their best surfing in a
jersey.
Fanning, Parko, Slater
and Andy did their best surfing during contests. Look at any of
their movie parts and the level is the same while Slater pulled
shit in a jersey that you would never have seen from him in a
movie. The same can be said for John John, Medina and Toledo. Their
heats are the ones to watch and are at least as
exciting/progressive as their freesurfing clips.
Jordy and Julian have
been left to wallow in the void left between Fanning/Slater and
John John/Medina/Toledo. As hard as they tried, they were never
able to beat Fanning at his game and sure as hell aren’t going to
beat the progressive young-bloods of today, at least over the
course of a season.
