Insanely popular: Tesla sells out of Musk x Biolos surfboards!

Derek Rielly

By

You wanted a Tesla surfboard? Too late!

You might’ve thought, two days ago, when Lost announced that it had combined with Tesla to make a $US1500 surfboard fashioned from carbon fibre that it might be a hard sell.

Of course, two geniuses and the might of the world’s most innovative tech giant made it a compelling sell.

For us poor men who work we must be careful how we squander our (pitiful) treasure, however. Food, a car, a little booze, maybe a gal of the night, occasionally, that’s about it.

Well, how about this?

Two days after the launch, all 200 boards had been sold.

Perhaps typical of the sorta consumer who’d buy a $US1500 Tesla board is Marques Brownlee, the tech YouTuber (six-and-a-half-million subscribers) and “ultimate frisbee pro”. New Jersey born Brownlee, who is twenty four and who doesn’t surf, announced to his almost three million Twitter followers that he’d bought the Musk x Mayhem collab.

Brownlee’s fans, predictably, went nuts, the tweet liked 11,000 times and retweeted 800 times.

Let’s do a little mathematics.

Two hundred surfboards at 1500 apiece? Why, that equals 300 gees.

Ain’t a bad biz model.

Vocation: The WSL wants “Airbnb Surf Experience” Hosts!

Derek Rielly

By

Must be "unique and super fun!"

The earth stood still for a moment four days ago when it was revealed you could buy the attention of a two-time US Open winner, the charismatic and taller-in-real-life Brett Simpson, for $US338.

The WSL offers these Airbnb “experiences” across the world. You can have surf lessons with the best-looking man in all of Mex, there’s an intro to shaping in Biarritz, a feel-good help-the-kids experience in Cape Town. And so on.

It ain’t such a bad way to make a little extra cash, anything to keep a man away from the stupefying toil of real work, and as the WSL’s CEO Sophie Goldschmidt pointed out there is the “potential to spread the stoke of surfing across the world…we are confident we can take surfing to a new level.”

Surfers and Airbnb, as Goldschmidt told the The New York Times, are a natural fit. “When you have a big surfboard, it’s easier to stay in a house, and many top surfing destinations don’t have a lot of hotels anyway.”

Anyway, the WSL wants hosts.

WSL Airbnb Experiences are surf activities designed and led by people like you. From lessons to SUP tours and everything in between – if it’s unique, super fun, genuine, and interesting, then its perfect for WSL x Airbnb’s program.

We’re here to help connect as many participants as possible to you and your thing. Here’s how:

  • Partnering with WSL lands you at the top of search results in the surf section. That means more clicks, more customers, and more cash.
  • There’s a wait time to get approved on Airbnb. With us, you skip it. If you’re selected, you’ll be up and running ASAP.
  • Premium! There’s limited space in this exclusive program, and we’re holding it for the best hosts out there.
  • Promotion. Once you’re in, our goal is to keep you as booked as possible.
  • Set your own price. We’re here to help you figure out how much to charge, when to change your pricing, and more.

So what’s your thing?

I suppose I could swing together an itinerary at my beach.

0600: Stand at south end of beach while I point out the non-existent banks.

0700: Paddle ’em out when the tide’s high enough to create a facsimile of a rideable wave.

0800: Staunch bleeding of first head wound when kook lets go of ten-foot board.

0900: Apply pressure to femoral artery after another charge is run down by SUP.

1100: Take broken boards to repair shop.

Noon: Visit a cold-pressed juice shop and marvel at small bottles of nine-dollar drinks.

1300: Get drunk.

1900: Beat hell out of those that’s got it coming.

Whatcha got?

(Sign up here…)

 

The brightest light at the US Open is Filipe Toledo, unbeatable at HB except via interference. Photo by @tsherms/Steve Sherman/WSL

Opinion: “US Open allows for mankind to swallow spoonful after spoonful of putrid filth!”

Chas Smith

By

Half-a-million fans excepted at world's biggest surf contest!

Today is the official opening day of the US Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach, CA, or it might have been yesterday. I don’t exactly know since I’m still in Copenhagen, up early with the summer sun, eating avocado on rye bread with rhubarb, tomato, mint, olive salad in the side, swimming everywhere.

Copenhagen is a dream and Søren Kierkegaard was smart to be born here and not Huntington Beach where the dirty feet of sex-crazed inland empirians kick up so much dust during the US Open of Surfing that lung cancer rates sky rocket.

I have very mixed feelings about the US Open of Surfing and I tried to work through them in the book Cocaine + Surfing.

I watch a dirty perverted teenaged boy with the words “Sexx Simbol” scrawled across his chest try and slap the ass of dirty perverted teenaged girl with the words “Slap dat” scrawled on her lower back. Giggling from both parties ensues as he swings and misses and almost runs into a three-hundred-pound man riding a motorized chair with off-road tires featuring many Vans and Volcom stickers.

Here is my ode:

And if Agenda, in Long Beach, is a tri-colored mural of the five-year surf apocalypse then the U.S. Open of Surfing is its taste. The decayed flavor of good times turned very bad. A Mad Max-esque dystopian mess where God has officially turned his back and allows for mankind to swallow spoonful after spoonful of putrid filth.

I watch a dirty perverted teenaged boy with the words “Sexx Simbol” scrawled across his chest try and slap the ass of dirty perverted teenaged girl with the words “Slap dat” scrawled on her lower back. Giggling from both parties ensues as he swings and misses and almost runs into a three-hundred-pound man riding a motorized chair with off-road tires featuring many Vans and Volcom stickers.

A Monster Girl holding a T-shirt cannon watches too with a blank expression. I wonder if she ever fantasizes about shooting people in the face. I wonder if she could please just shoot me in the face. It would be a fitting end and my grave stone could read: “He died how he lived—like an asshole.”

Maybe I would even get a paddle out. Have you seen one of those? Where surfers paddle out on their boards together when someone dies and sit in a circle and splash water in the air and sometimes wear floral leis?

Ugh.

The U.S. Open of Surfing is like an unfortunate paddle out on land for an elderly and very bad horrible performance longboarder who died of a coronary or something. Much to everyone in the surf industry’s chagrin it is the biggest event of the year, and by far. Thousands upon thousands upon hundreds of thousands of perverts drain into Huntington Beach for one week near the end of July to make a mockery of decency and of my career. There are art exhibits, some skateboarding (maybe), some BMX (I think), free industry garbage like Hurley Frisbees and Mayhem temporary belly tattoos, underage drinking and a World Surf League qualifying tour event in the worst waves imaginable.

There used to be live music, but it got cancelled after the 2013 U.S. Open of Surfing turned into a riot.

Matt Meola air instructional: “Hopefully this stops that stupid fucking (360 or 540) argument!”

Derek Rielly

By

Matt Meola uses hunting knife to explain diff between skate/surf/snow rotations in compelling instructional!

Are you weary of the air-rotation debate? That whole thing on whether it’s a “full rotation”, a 360, a 540 and so on?

The question, Do surfers, skaters or snowboarders have carte blanche on naming tricks?

The fun’s been going on for years. For background, read:

Rotation: Surfers are Math-tards! 

Kelly says, ‘It Was Actually an 810!”

Definitive: The Full-Roter is Dead! 

Even The New York Times deemed the matter of such world significance it threw a reporter and a couple of thousand words at it. Read that here. 

Yesterday, on Instagram’s version of YouTube, IGTV, Maui’s Matt Meola, who is twenty-nine years old and from Maui and whose Spindle Flip 540 caused a brief sensation three years ago, got into the debate with a to-camera instructional.

Using a hunting knife as surfboard and in a manner that could either be described as thoughtful or sluggish, Meola turns the rotation argument on its head.

Surfing is different, posits Meola, pushing the so-far discredited line that because surfers hit the lip at different angles and because fins means we gotta revert out of spins it can’t be compared to skate or snow.

“What makes the most sense is if we call it the exact degrees but that would be too confusing,” he says.

It’s a strangely beautiful and thoughtful mediation.

Watch! 

'BFGoodrich will feature a custom surf garage at the Vans U.S. Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach, Calif. (PRNewsfoto/BFGoodrich Tires)'

Fuckin Boom: WSL snags new sponsor!

Chas Smith

By

Our World Surf League just snagged a new sponsor and I think you’re gonna like it. I think you’re gonna be very pleased.

I’m still in Copenhagen, staying up late with the gorgeous summer sun, riding bikes and enjoying comfortable footwear. If you have never been here it is well worth a trip. The Danes are proud of what they have built, as they should be. Raping, pillaging, raping and pillaging during those viking seasons has paid off handsomely and now there are many Michelin stars and many bottles of natural wine.

Speaking of Michelin stars FUCKIN BOOM! Our World Surf League just snagged a new sponsor and I think you’re gonna like it. I think you’re gonna be very pleased.

Who?

Why BFGoodrich Tires of course. Or Tyres for when the tour is at Snapper, Bells and not Marg River. Every surfer knows the feeling of walking into Tires Plus or Tires Etc. and shopping for tires. Running ginger hands along the grooves, pulling those little rubber stubbly hair things and watching them snap back. Life is better in radials and the options for ad copy etc. is endless.

What does the press release say? Oh, it says:

Whether conquering extreme off-road trails, getting to remote fishing holes or accessing an isolated surfing spot, BFGoodrich consumers are always building for their next adventure. At the Vans U.S. Open of Surfing, BFGoodrich will bring a customized garage built for surfing adventures to the shores of Huntington Beach.

The garage will feature surfing accessories and the latest must-have equipment for serious off-road adventure enthusiasts – the BFGoodrich® Mud-Terrain T/A® KM3, an extreme off-road tire with better climbing, traction and toughness in mud and over rock.

“Partnering with the World Surf League is a natural fit for BFGoodrich. The surfing community seeks adventure and performance. They need vehicles and tires that can be depended on to get them wherever their passions lead them, even if it’s far off the pavement,” said Jess Parris, BFGoodrich brand communications director.

Damn it. I didn’t read the press release before starting and am frustrated that the tyres are not going to be at Snapper, Bells and not Margs.

Sorry.

Photo: Justin Jay/@justinjayphoto
EAT BEACHGRIT SPAM!
It's Daily!