The noted polemicist examines the implications of Surf Ranch!
Some years ago, five perhaps, I spent a night with the one-time most notorious surf writer in the world, Lewis Samuels, then in his late-thirties.
I fed Lewis pastry and crème patissiere straight from the spoon which he described as “gay”. Soon, his mouth was open and he was begging for the eclair, greedily rimming the spoon. He wore a red flannel shirt, some sort of oversized pants and rectangular spectacles usually worn by English women who search for romance in Kenya.
Yesterday, Lew had a story about the Slater-Fincham Surf Ranch published in the American edition of Esquire magazine. It is called “Can Kelly Slater’s ‘Perfect Wave’ Save Pro Surfing” and it is, as if it has to be said, a sharply written four-and-a-half-thousand words.
Earlier today, I engaged Lewis, who is now forty-one, married with two children and (still) works at the noted search engine Google, in a back and forth about the story and the pool.
Before you rode the pool, what was your take on the joint?
Lewis: Seeing that reveal video for the first time was a “holy shit” moment for me, as it was for most surfers. I’m fairly obsessed with tubes, and I found the perfection of that lip line haunting. I’ve spent so much of my life trying to score tubes – making shitty, selfish decisions that often only eventuate in scant rewards, two-second head dips. So the idea that a lucky few could now go sit in a mechanical barrel for 30 seconds both horrified me and turned me on, and it horrified me that it turned me on. The roll of money in all of it bothered me too. Living in the Bay Area, a fair few people I know have gotten filthy rich, and I’ve consoled myself with the notion that I’ve gotten more barreled than they have. So it irked me that rich fuckwits could literally own waves like that now, available on demand. And a part of me wished I’d played my cards right and made fuck-you money, just so I could be the rich fuckwit with a left like that in my backyard.
The roll of money in all of it bothered me too. Living in the Bay Area, a fair few people I know have gotten filthy rich, and I’ve consoled myself with the notion that I’ve gotten more barreled than they have. So it irked me that rich fuckwits could literally own waves like that now, available on demand.
Did you have discussions with anyone about it?
Who didn’t? For the last couple years it’s been Trump and the wavepool. What else is there to talk about? Because I know Kelly, people kept asking me if I was going to get to surf it. Then Esquire called and asked me if I wanted to do the article, almost two years ago, so there was plenty of time to talk about it while Esquire worked with Kelly’s PR team to get me in there. Luckily they’d built a left by then.
I do think that something is being subtracted from surfing simply by that wave being in existence. In the long run, we might get more out of it than it takes away. But we are losing something – it makes real waves feel less miraculous.
Now, and even reading between the lines in the story, I’m still not entirely sure how you…feel… about the pool. Are you a end of days kinda gal like Matt Warshaw, a goodbye-pro-contests-in-beachb
Honestly, I’m still not sure how I feel about it either, even after getting to surf it, and after discussing it ad nauseam with man, beast, and Slater. We live in polarized times, and it seems like most surfers either love or hate the idea of the Surf Ranch. I challenge the notion that I have to be in one camp or the other. It was fun as shit to get to surf it, and I’d love to get in enough days there to really dial in my surfing. But for most everyone it’s just something you watch other people do. I’m certainly not a purist to the extent that I think they’re better off holding the Olympics in Japanese beachbreak. Now that the genie is out of the bottle, I’d rather see them use the pool for the Olympics. But I’m still coming to terms with what it means for surfing, and for me. I know the WSL line is that wavepools are an addition, and they’re not meant to replace surfing as we know it. But I do think that something is being subtracted from surfing simply by that wave being in existence. In the long run, we might get more out of it than it takes away. But we are losing something – it makes real waves feel less miraculous.
You write of not knowing whether to feel free or stripped of your identity. Have you examined this thought further?
Yeah, I feel a bit of both. It is freeing to be stripped of your identity. Have you ever talked to Warshaw about how happy he claims to be now that he quit surfing? For 25 years I’ve been really caught up with getting good waves and I’ve made myself miserable when I miss good waves. It really eats at me. And perhaps it’s better to let go of that identity, particularly now that the Surf Ranch barfs out 100 perfect barrels every day. Good surf means less to me than it used to, and I think that’s healthy.
I think it was Warshaw who told me Slater said you’d had enough after your long tube, which you describe as so easy all you had to do was hang on. Did it give you a thrill like an ocean tube? Was it a worthy facsimile of the sea?
Yeah, Slater told me to get out after that one. He felt certain I wasn’t going to do any better than that. And yes, it gave me that thrill like the real thing. Not all the waves are the same in the pool, and that wave was inexplicably better than the rest of the ones I caught. But part of the thrill was just the bizarre circumstances – Raimana and Kaiborg screaming at me from the jetski, Slater watching from the deck – it’s a lot of pressure surfing in the pool, and I was relieved to have gotten a lucky one and not blown it. Or maybe Slater was just sick of me surfing his wave, a sentiment I’m sure your gracious readers will be kind enough to voice in ensuing comments.
I felt compelled to cleanse myself in a wild, untamed ocean; be part of a natural environment again, seals, sharks and all.
Your story concludes, poetically, with you staring at the horizon. Tell me your thoughts as you watched the sun rise, a happy seal swishing about.
Do I detect a dash of that brilliant, patented Rielly sarcasm in the wording of your question? It makes it difficult to provide an earnest answer. I doubt I was thinking about much. After leaving the Surf Ranch the previous night, I was running on fumes – a couple hours of sleep, more hours of driving, and a lot of expended adrenaline. I felt compelled to cleanse myself in a wild, untamed ocean; be part of a natural environment again, seals, sharks and all. Ironically enough, driving to the beach in the darkness that morning, I hit a deer with my car. It staggered off into the trees, leaving blood and tufts of fur in my mangled fender. I’ll never know whether it somehow survived, or simply wandered off into the night to die alone, felled by a machine it did not ask for or understand.
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Twillsy, what up, you missing the travel?
Make sense re the volume. Any of that modelling publicly available or does it just live in a shitty office database somewhere on Wall Street?
Yes, and that can be said of the Cable Stations project in West Oz too, some very smart people working on it for years. Yet, despite all the academia, theories and funding, they still failed, perhaps from a combination of group-think and over-thinking it. Enhancing some locations might only require simpler and cheaper methods undertaken by local surfers.
Hey Derek, that ‘intro’ was a little (very) weird. I’m a little worried about your mental health and your moral character.
Why? Because he referenced gayness without scorn?
Get a grip. It’s 2018.
I don’t know man. The way he wrote it, its just weird, very, very weird, and even though its 2018, some things never change.
Relax. Put the bible down and look at the diversity of nature which your god has supposedly given us. Even your bronze-age hacks were wrong / hypocritical sometimes eh?
The diversity of nature? Its contrary to the very laws of nature.
Say what you will about Kelly (and I certainly have of late), but I’ll be GODDAMNED if he doesn’t look fetching in a hijab.
Ever do mapping on beachies like Fitzroy/Aramoana where it’s outer bombies breaking up swell into refracted peaks? I always assume that those would be the easiest to mimic.
It was funny reading the article- of course brilliantly written- the harder Samuels tried to ascribe noble motives to Kelly’s creation the more Kelly came off sounding like a man desperately seeking validation and happy to revel in his kingdom with a minor-god complex.
Our very own Colonel Kurtz, minus the philosophical/poetic musings.
Kelly’s true genius has been in finding and enthralling second generation adult learner billionaires who are prepared to fund the dream, a dream that increasingly looks like Kelly private plaything, that he can dish out and dispense at his discretion to those who please him.
Yes , definitely not back down the beach assisting with some promising juniors
That’s the truest thing and it had never crossed my mind! Christ he’s a cunt.
Were you at Waikato with ASR? Interesting stuff.
This story made me feel more inadequate. I’ve also been “felled by a machine” it seems.
Alternate headlines: Data Harvester Lays Egg at Surf Ranch.
Get Out 2.
Nug, you’re on it. To riff on your post: Data Harvester Blows Load on his Spreadsheet!
Fuck Me. I don’t know if I’m just feeling a little joie de vivre tonight, but I thought the second paragraph of this was a top 3 paragraph ever on BG, then I read Lewis’ final anecdotal metaphoric forehand smash and got up from my chair and celebrated like I’d won the bloody World Cup.
the ender was a total hammer
“The last wave of the day is created at 4:00 p.m. Then everyone moves to the hot tub, wetsuits still on, for margaritas. The only salt is on the glasses’ rims. Slater and his friends laugh and snap selfies as the staff starts a barbecue and a campfire. Before I leave, I invite him to rejoin me at the desolate beach we surfed together in 2011. Rare circumstances have converged, and tomorrow’s forecast promises good surf. Slater politely declines; he has another crew of friends visiting the Surf Ranch the next morning.”
True statement or fiction?
Just a paragraph from the article, you’d have to ask Lewis
I think, non-fiction.
You alive Bitter?
I concur
You’re part of a crack squad of scribes here Chazz.
Nah. I’m not even a part-timer. I’m just a ghost of a tide, ebbing here and there but never quite able to reach full flood.
You have an eloquent nasty side.
I’m reading a wonderful book right now called “Why Buddhism Is True”. (Much better than the title suggests). I’m trying to be better.
don’t go getting soft on us mate, writers need to be hard.
Been meaning to read that
question, brothers and sisters…why the fuck would kaiborg be screaming at anybody from the jetski or wall or where-evs? patroling the lineup at logs or somewhere, sure, but a pool? wtf?
With you Tony, the jet-ski is just another energy hog attached to Kelly’s atomic pool..!
But let’s not forget that OuterKnown uses recycled fish nets!
This story is covered in the patina of Kelly Slater ass worship. Get on your server now and erase this insanity!
Two quotes that will go down in beachgrit infamy:
1. “But we are losing something – it makes real waves feel less miraculous.”
I ask you, is the surfing industry now the owner of the dumbest thing to roll
out of a cake hole (or pastry hole to follow the storyline) in this new century?
2. ” Good surf means less to me than it used to, and I think that’s healthy.”
Seriously?????? Does Lewis really work for Google now? If he does its
turned his brain to total shit and Chas Smith will have gotten his wish to
make Surf Reporting shitty again!
Get that Samuels cunt to write some damn articles for the grit. Chas and Derrick sound like retarded 3rd graders on whipits writing stories about their retarded cat!! This guy is like the Shakespeare of surf writers!!!
I think even without Lewis’ example we still sound, very much, like eight year olds with persistent learning disabilities. And, FYI, I’ve asked Lew many many times, as have many others.
Silicon Valley is a sick place. It makes highly-successful people – for instance long career at Google, intact family, (assuming) home ownership in a place that prints money, (assuming) stock options (in Google for fucksake) – self-identify as fuck ups.
Depending on where that house is, you’ve got hundreds of fun-to-epic waves in your range from Moss Landing to Ocean Beach (I’d take one good day at that beautiful magical monster over 50 waves in Kelly’s pool). You’ll retire a multi-millionaire at a reasonable age, and be easily able to move to your choice of more affordable beautiful places with blissful recreational options (surfing, if you still want it). No doubt on a global scale you’re the top 2/10th of 1%.
And yet bitter the “real money” didn’t find you, self-blaming about not making all of life about maximizing the opportunity to be “really rich.”
I’m as dedicated as the next American yuppie dickhead to getting ahead, and Seattle’s alway’s been a mercenary town, but the headspace Silicon Valley drags its minions into is straight up a disease.
The money and privilege is so in your face at all times, must be difficult to keep a normal outlook. Yes there’s tons of great waves between OB and Monterey but so many spots are over run by rich kooks on SUPS who retired at 40. I grew up in Santa Cruz, don’t live there anymore and yet I’m still bitter at seeing dotcom kooks buying up everything. Hard to imagine keeping a normal outlook in SF with all the fucked up changes there…
My older sister used to be the most down to earth person I knew. She’s been in tech in Silicon valley for 30 years now, and even though she generally lives like a monk, still has developed this notion that less than 10 mil net worth is just gettin’ by, and you don’t really sniff rich until 50 mil or so. She worked quite closely with her old boss for a long time, that racing yacht billionaire guy. You’re right – the distorted scale you mention was always in her line of sight and eventually seemed normal.
You’re right too that it’s hard to get displaced by that bullshit, hard not to be bitter. I looked around me at the explosion in wealth in the Bay Area years back and knew that that treadmill was spinning too fast for my at the time broke ass to jump on no matter how hard I tried; moved to a slower moving place on the upswing that now is also kicking off anyone not already at a full run. Leaving the Bay sucked but shit changes, tide does what it does
I’m available if she’s looking for a 44 year old toy boy?
Are you really looking for a sugar mama? And what do you offer the elderly gal with cash? What is your signature pleasure?
I got semi-forced into a therapy session last week, apparently I’m a highly evolved spiritual being… that’s gotta tick afew boxes for a sugar mama with issues?
I showed up on opening day at Mavericks in 2007 and it blew out early. Headed to burly 8 foot ocean beach and decided on a thick 7’6. Seeing the beach full of guys and chicks with brand new guns I was like, wow lots of chargers here. Soon, after watching no one read any rips and all get denied entry I kind of felt bad for all these 30 year old rich fucks with all the best surf gear. You can buy it, but I know how to use it!!!
Yeah, the paddle definitely regulates, and once you get out it’s so shifty with so much drift it usually doesn’t feel crowded even if it looks busy (once it’s 3 or 4 feet OH anyway); more like you pick a spot and sooner or later the bombs finds you.
Plenty of good woodwork type surfers down there though who paddle like few others and totally charge, for sure you just didn’t see them that day …
I saw them once I was lost at sea. Saw Grant Washburn and he said I hope you did not check mavs, this is the spot!!! Very similar to beachbreaks I grew up surfing in Oregon but maybe has that extra 10 foot ledge that breaks wayyyyy out!!! fun times!!
God, that was my thoughts too.
It’s because there’s no middle class here. Downtown San Francisco is like a post-apocalyptic DisneyLand, occupied by only two classes of people. The homeless who are barely clinging on to life. And at the other end of the spectrum, the tech crowd who whiz by on electric razor scooters, one wheels and motorized skateboards. And truthfully, a big chunk of those folks aren’t making enough to settle down in SF.
The average price of a home is topping $1M now. So assuming you can cough up the $200K cash downpayment, you then have to remain 100% employed until you own that shack, cause the next $4K mortgage bill is coming in 30 days. Not to mention the $20K/year for daycare. Without the cushion of family money, it’s thrive or get the fuck out.
Shit come to Sydney a million will be lucky to get you a dog box apartment anywhere near the beach. Houses near the beach 1.5million up and I am talking very average at this price. Average wage is 80k as opposed to big bucks over there i am guessing.
don’t blame silicon valley – dude thinks like that because he’s a writer. its in the blood.
more lewis samuels please.
So I’ve surfed 3 times this week. We talked about the pools between sets, but their existence did not influence the fun we were having one bit. This whole thing is overblown.
Its an American thing . Money can buy waves
let it. makes no difference to me.
Surf Ranch and other wave pools coming on stream now and in the future are good for the sport, training surf competitions, Olympics etc. They will also help cater for the growing appetite of surfing’s hungry and ever increasing greedier crowds. But as perfect as wave pool designs become, they will still never fully replace the buzz we get from tapping into the magic and unpredictability of Mother Nature’s vibrations derived from celestial forces and naturally formed storm-driven waves. The funny thing is, for a fraction of what wave pools cost to build and maintain, that money could easily be spent enhancing lots of existing surf breaks all around the world, potential locations that only need a few well placed submerged boulders here and there to transform them into world-class breaks, which would immediately help alleviate overcrowding. But i guess there is no profit in that…In the meantime Lewis, you know where to find me to share some waves again. Cheers.
Show me the proof of dumping a submerged boulder here and filling some concrete over there. Awesome in theory Mr M.
MHL Bouy, well, for proof of what is, we already have groynes all around the world, some of which, like Kirra of old, have helped form world-class waves, though they are expensive enough. Other groynes of course are poorly designed and badly located which are not good for surf, produce more erosion etc. But for more proof of what can be, we can look back to the Cable Stations set up in Perth. In the 1990s it was promoted as the world’s first “artificial reef project”. Funded by the State government in conjunction with the University of WA, it was actually more of a reef enhancement program than anything artificial. It was good in theory. But they picked the wrong spot because that particular reef and area doesn’t get swell most of the year. Plus they didn’t add enough boulders to make the existing reef there shallow enough for when it does break in winter. I was reporting on it at the time and argued that the money could have been better spent a little further north (where there is more swell) by gradually extending the Floreat groyne underwater with a simple wedge-shaped A-frame design to allow for longer waves there to break either side of the groyne. That whole stretch of beach from Floreat to Trigg, which mostly closes out, could also have had some big boulders placed in well shaped permanently anchored clusters underwater to let the sand naturally flow over them and produce good shaped sandbars separated by channels. For proof of viability, there is already a very small chunk of reef near Trigg that sticks out of the sand now and again, which allows the sand form around it which, in turn, helps produce some of the best shaped waves on that entire stretch of coast. You can imagine it wouldn’t be hard to replicate nature and follow suit elsewhere. Same for all those potential locations around the world with so many reefs where you can see the makings of really good set-up for waves, that are almost there, if only that deep hole was filled in, or that rock ledge was taken out etc. But you are right MHL. It is only theory. We will only ever know if and when we try. Cheers.
Wasnt this tried at El Porto and did not work? Can someone explain why it didn’t work?
Agree on the try – I think about waves near home a sand pump here, a groyne there, dump a shipwreck 500m of the beach, divert a river mouth etc etc. Yet Of the 20 or so groynes on the east coast of OZ 3 have made a good waves the rest have their day but nothing special. Swellnet did a few good articles on them last year. Structures made for another purpose sometimes work but mostly not. Artificial reefs set up around the world have just been a straight up failure from an ROI perspective. So much of how waves break ain’t just about the bottom under the waves it’s what’s happening 1-3km offshore and the refraction.
Disagree, almost all the groynes used to train rivermouths have created good to epic surf spots on the east coast Aus.
Well more so up your way… plenty further south that aren’t anything special. How many potentially epic river mouths were lost in the process?
Fact remains though that they weren’t made to create surf and sometimes we get lucky, but when we actually tried to make an artificial wave the results have been average to poor.
I agree with the second point but not the first.
But with what we know now creating waves using sand pumping is almost a no-brainer.
I just wrote an article in the next ASL about it……not to blow my own trumpet but it’s something I’ve spent a lot of time researching.
Will have a read – been a fan of your work since the Swellnet days.
The interruption of sand budget migrating along the coast due to all the groins etc is the reason for the erosion on the east coast.
depends on the timescale you are looking at.
Some places are eroding regardless of groynes, some places are accreting in spite of them.
There are short term sand budget storm and accretion phases and longer term cycles.
Fair enough. I don’t think the Northern beaches (Sydney) or Stockton (Newy) are doing too well out of the deal though!
Agree.
Stockton once had great waves but as they kept extending breakwalls for Coal ships entering into the harbour it changed sand patterns badly.
Apart from the disastrous rock wall construction in the late 80s, up toward the Sygna has even felt the affects of it.
Stocko the neighbourhood ain’t even going to exist for many more years if the erosion keeps going.
They fucked up crowdy head thats for sure
probably a better fishing spot now than it ever was as a surf spot.
Oh Wayne I have a list of breaks that could be made EPIC by the simple application of dynamite by frogmen on a calm day. Three midsized explosions would transform Troncones Point from a useless annoying tease to 150 yards of screaming, race the section then blast the bowl left.
Make it happen buddy. You could be the Kelly Slater of blowing shit up in the ocean.
Ok, Pacific North Pest, who are you? Live in Seattle, talking Troncones, I’m quite positive I know you.
Me? I’m no more than a friendly ghost brah. Out of my last 5 surf trip: 3 alone (including Troncones trip), 2 with my wife and kid. I basically always surf alone except when in the North County town where I grew up. I don’t really know anyone up here even though I’ve been here a long time, just chat in the water sometimes with: Peter (top 3 surfer in Washington for sure, along with two guys I don’t know: Dane, and Jonathan Grubbs who is a stone-cold wave murdering maniac); Tyler from Seaside; Greg from PA; the big handsome kid who’s a winemaker in Oly and his buddy; Aaron; Aaron’s dad John the bodyboarder who sell hospital supplies in Aberdeen; that other old Westport bodyboarder who always looks a little high and happy; his buddy Rusty the kneeboarder; Mark the other kneeboarder who looks like Eddie Rothman; Brian who longboards and flies a drone; Gaelen; that chatty skinny guy from Tumwater who paddles really fast; the guy with Parkinson’s who shapes his own boards; the tall Dutch brothers who work at the surf shop in Fremont; the dude who is best buds with the guy from Lincoln City who owns the other surf shop in Seattle; the nice kinda hippy guy who smokes cigs and seems to know everybody on the Strait and on the coast; the Oly longboarder who teaches art to elementary school kids; Daniel the Hawaiian guy whose boys are great combat sports athletes; the handful of standard issue Westport locals at whom I open my face and exchange good mornings; and Pepsi, whose van I’m always happy to see in the lot because the line up will be orderly and I’ll hear something dryly funny. He surfs good that guy, improving all the time.
All good dudes as far as I can see, but I’m a loner for sure, just drifting in and out of the line up, happy for the goodwill from the guys that live closer
I love that part of the world.
PacificNorthPest, I think it could be done fairly easy in the future (when overcrowding gets beyond ridiculous) with an internationally linked up third-level education program for marine engineering and tourism departments sponsored by governments and big brands who can name there own surf spots with enhanced reefs, points and beaches. It is the blue planet after all.
Enhance nature , say that a few times slowly.
Thanks Linda. “Work with nature” would have been a better choice of wording. PS – You could find work as a proof reader or sub-editor, if you already haven’t.
I miss his power rankings dearly.
Reckon the Grit could lure him back to do them for you guys?! Please make it happen Mr Rielly
His power rankings were maybe the greatest surf writing ever…. make it happen DR!!!!!
I concur and second the request.
Get in line. I hear Ashton has been camped outside his house for months, crying, like a schoolgirl at a pop concert.
And I’m not sure if there’s any truth to the rumour that he spends all night throwing small pebbles at Lewis’ bedroom window, strumming shit love songs on an old acoustic guitar, and heaving deep, shaky sobs.
https://youtu.be/uXxN_ylX7Tw