Do you have a chicken wing or aussie sprinter pop-up?
Surfing ain’t easy. Worse than not-easy. It’s impossible. Until those pretty pools come online across the world, only way you’re gonna get to a level that ain’t shameful is thousands of hours in the ocean.
And who’s got the time? And the access?
Mal Gladwell’s 10,000 rule? You can quadruple it for surf, at least. Two hours in a skate park will yield ten times the practise.
And, therefore, we’re kooks. All of us.
Hesitant unbent knees. Straight backs. Tepid horizontal lines.
But are you a filthy kook? A state of being where your awkwardness marries to a grand delusion? You might remember the story, 10 Signs You’re a Filthy Kook.
Here are five more.
- You talk about your “Pop”. I didn’t know “Pop” existed until beginner surfers started offering advice to other beginners. Stories like, “5 Exercises to Improve Pop Up Mobility and Strength“, “Learn the Two Basic Ways to Master your Pop Up” and “Chicken Wing or Aussie Sprinter Pop Up” reveal a world of mega-kookdom, of surfers with lips pushed out in concentration doing push-ups and dumbbell training at home, thigh-gates spread, fists clenched.
- You pull back on a set and believe, truly believe, you can paddle for the one behind it. Have you seen this in real life? It’s a sight to behold, like a stained window in a medieval church. So bold and yet so out of place within its surroundings.
- Wave heights are described in metres. This might be a little cruel towards our European brothers who don’t know any better but just as surfboards remain imperial, so does wave height. No wave is two-metres. Heights allowed include, one, two, three, four, five, six, eight, ten, twelve, fifteen, eighteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five, forty, fifty, eighty and one hundred.
- You ride a longboard without a leash. Ain’t nobody alive who don’t lose a board occasionally. You want someone’s kid to wear an eye patch?
- You call slow mid-face direction changes a “wrap”. Do you refer to those things you do where you steer your surfboard back toward the direction you came from a… wrap? If it occurs more than once on wave do you call ’em “multiple wraps”? I remember, once, the head judge of the WSL telling me there were only a few people in the world who could actually complete a genuine frontside “wrap.” Jordy Smith was one. Mick Fanning another. Where do you fit in the pantheon of wraps?
#6- You have a brand new GoPro attached to your board in 1 ft. surf.
#2 is a lesson that I’m always willing to teach.
Wearing a leash pretty much makes longboarding not worth doing.
Absolutely nailed it on the heights call Derek – THERE’S NO FUCKEN SUCH THING AS A SEVEN FOOT WAVE YOU FUCKEN DONKEYS!
nine feet… say it aloud; the surf was nine feet today. weird huh
Harrison Roach calls leg ropes ‘kook cords’ on the reg. Fuck I’d like to belt him over the back of the head with a 10ft longboard.
Also, on wave heights, it’s knee high, waist high, chest high, head high, double head, lamp post.
Ain’t no one on here surfing bigger than lamp post so any bigger than that doesn’t matter
to his credit, harry roach is the only one of those fuckwits from noosa that ride logs that will surf a normalish board in waves over dick-high. the rest of them are that fucked.
Would have to agree with you there. He’s actually quite a good surfer, the prolonged exposure to fuckwit hipsters hasn’t done him any good
#46: you have taken to riding a 9 foot gun in all conditions(while blatantly dropping in then asserting your status when questioned) cause the younger surfers are in your estimation getting too may waves, when you have surfed the spot for 35 years and think you still deserve your greedy share!
#47 does not understand or respect what their elders have earned through years of dedication.
a modern self entitled youngster that was always given an award even if he came in last.
Sounds like every 3 feet and under day out at Hanalei 😤
Or every day out there maybe?
Or just about every freaking old dude thats taking up SUPing and now thinks they are ruling and shredding. Fucking kooks mate.
haha, i saw this happen when i went to hawaii for the first time and my very first surf at sorta boring but also really fun 2-3ft velzys. he was getting visibly frustrated by people who could actually do turns.
We’re all winners if we are surfing!
Adult learn to surfers. All fucken kooks the lot of them.
An truly unspeakable horror we’ve all witnessed is a young filthy kook that never quite transitions to a moderately skillful surfer. This, despite adequate breeding, means and access.
Wave heights are described in metres when it’s too big for me. Stormy Daniels said the same in her memoirs (unpublished)
Swell can be measured in metres, but wave height must always be in feet. Further, it must always be an even number – with the following exceptions; 1ft, 3ft, 15ft, 25ft.
Love,
A Massive Kook
5ft is allowed, but never 7 or 9
I think all those ‘pop up’ articles are from the Inertia, if that tells you anything.
i think that’s the point…
#23: you get called out as a lying poseur by a bunch of anonymous idiots in the beachgrit comments section and it finally sinks in that they are totally right! !
And your shopfront comes up easily on a Google search
Wow. I never knew #1 was a thing. I assumed it had to do with trying airs, but it’s so so so much worse. Now I’m upset.
oh yes it’s totally a thing!
Stutter wrap.
Just spent week in Byron and the kook is the definitely the “hipster” riding leggie free, pretending they are not hipsters whilst actually wearing ripped wetties that looked like they are designer ripped!!!
Agreed, I can’t stand wanna-be hipster long boarders, but, legit noseriders are a sight to see, especially in hollower waves.
is a hipster just someone younger than you?
nah nothing to do with age mate they’re hipsters pretending not to be hipsters to be hipsters, all surfing the pass sans leggie on the oldest boards they can find. None out Cabarita, Suffolk or Broken head when I surfed for the week
True. The fact that they can’t self-identify as ‘hipsters’ confirms they are in fact hipsters. It’s so self-evident, Dunning-Krueger used it as proof for their theory.
10 upvotes.
The Pass is absolute Knob Gobbler central. All too cool for leggies.
One such stray designer log missed decapatating my 10yr old son by an inch. Its a perfect environment to show why gun control in Australia is a good thing, without it, that carpark would be blood red.
Every guy there is identical.
Its the WestWorld of surf spots.
I had not been there for good 8 years to surf – Fuck me it was crazy at 1ft last sat and sun all no leggies soul arching and sitting on boards in barrels etc – biggest kooks ever seen. Reckon if had kids out there would be in fights daily!!!
#4 needs some clarification: you’re a kook if you ride a longboard without a leash and you suck, and you’re a kook if you don’t teach your kid to be out of the way and aware of kooks on longboards without leashes. Basically, don’t be a kook but if you are a kook, you’ll learn the hard way, one way or another.
If I see a guy on a mal with a leash on a 2 foot day, the kookism just pours out.
Yeah but remember that recent Cloudbreak swell was only 2 foot Hawaiian.
Come on, there were a couple three footers.
When it comes down to it, we’re probably all kooks, one way or the other, depending on the perspective, but, there are definitely a large portion of surfers who are consistently, objectively kooking it.
Depends on the lineup I think! If it’s crammed with small children and beginners who might do random unexpected things, I think leashes are pretty great on the whole.
Who the heck would want to surf a place like that anyway? Maybe only a kook?
a tired human with deadlines who just wants to get a couple waves before sunset please
You just described our entire generation, at least those of us who work.
sometimes we gotta make do, you know?
What we make do with is better than most have ever had or will ever experience. The irony of relativism never escapes me.
For reals. I am a pretty simple-minded human. Good surf is really really great. But mediocre surf is still fun and I am glad to go do it as much as possible!
If they didn’t have leashes, that crazed lineup would be almost empty because all their boards would be being battered against the rocks on the shore. Short or longboards, leashes just increase the goon factor 10x in almost any lineup.
Interesting perspective to be sure..
You ever been to the Pass.
Not wearing leggies when there are 100 kids down the line from you is a fucken ridiculous even at 2ft.
Your argument is very circular. You’re actually a kook if you’re at a spot where people can ride longboards.
Hmmmm, I must have my shapes all messed up bc I thought my comment was quite linear, ie, a kook is a kook if they’re kooking . . . but I can see that being circular too, like, what came first? The kook? Or the kook move? Anyway, I generally agree with your second sentence: HPSBs have no business at a longboard wave, and vice versa.
I wasn’t having a go at you mate just trying to spell out that all long boarders are kooks and vice versa.
Sorry if my reply came off as defensive; I understood that you were just making a point. The reason I went deep is bc I was trying to remember exactly what constitutes a circular argument – amazingly, the last time I confronted that phrase was in philosophy class, circa 2000. I’m gonna google it now.
Good advice. Not that long ago surfers new how to navigate a line up and dodge a loose board here and there. Teach the kids well.
For me “kook” is an attitude as much as it related to surfing ability.
Laird and Kelly are total kooks in my mind because of their attitudes.
I find that sort of kookness more annoying than the poor surfing ability kook type sometimes.
Oh Jesus… don’t start getting all pious on me now…
im not sure if you know what the word pious means.
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Deep (profound) Bro, I like your comment.
You all fucking know what I think of wraps. Sweet baby Jesus and all the angels in heaven.
JEBUS LOVES YOU
AND DEM ANGLES IS 540 – NUM SAYIN?
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Call me old fashioned, but that my dear man, is a cutback.
Like dis?
https://cdn.liveleak.com/80…
Who is the lucky man? A happy Christian with crucifixion fantasies being indulged by his Islamic brothers?
No, it’s a Cali surf writer after telling the faithful that their boy Mohammed’s alley oop is actually only a 360 revert out.
Richard Cram would be proud.
Feral mate.