Where are you right now? At work in Australia,
the prospect of a dull but brutal Friday stretching out before you?
Just home from work in America, the prospect of waking up to face a
dull but brutal Friday stretching out before you?
The World Surf League President of Content, Media and WSL
Studios elect, Mr. Erik Logan, is in Namotu maybe taking an
extended vacation. He begins his new job in January and has been
social media-ing from his old job as President of the Oprah Winfrey
Network.
On Instagram he writes: @namotuisland Keep The swell coming
for 21 more days! #kalamakamp #wilks #tbt #rightsfordays
#blinebrotherhood
Oooee when was the last time you took a 21 day vacation? Very
fabulous but maybe a red herring, as it were, to distract from the
hashtags?
Let’s read the other ones not in the main subject line.
Traditional SUP fare, I suppose, but what is this #vdk_insta? My
heart thought “vodka insta” but upon further review it does not
relate to vodka, at least not directly. It is, in fact, closely
related to #ig_vladivostok and boom.
We have Russian intrigue.
Vladivostok, as any student of history knows, is a gorgeous
Russian city very near North Korea. It is most famous for being the
main naval base of Russia’s Pacific Fleet, one or two famous
oligarchs and the dreams of a Russo-centric world. Let’s now read
the Failing New York
Times.
MOSCOW — Compared to the sunny, palm-lined offshore tax
havens where Russians typically stash their fortunes — think the
British Virgin Islands or Cyprus — two chilly, windswept Russian
islands would seem to offer little.
Yet October Island, a glorified swamp in Russia’s European
exclave of Kaliningrad, and Russian Island, a former cow pasture
facing the far eastern port of Vladivostok, were highlighted by
Moscow this week as potential alternatives.
Washington’s imposition of unexpectedly tough sanctions
against several leading oligarchs is in many respects a game
changer for Russia, with repercussions that are only slowly coming
into view. Establishing tax havens within the country was just one
reaction by the Kremlin, seemingly caught off guard as aftershocks
rippled through currency and financial markets.
“Russia has no strategy on how to react to this situation,
to these new economic circumstances,” Evgeny Gontmakher, a
prominent opposition economist, said.
Etc. Etc.
Which seems maybe possibly to me that either the World Surf
League is going to build a Surf Ranch in Vladivostok, Russia where
oligarchs stashing their cash will come and barrel or…. it’s
probably just that.
Yet watching round three heats at the Supertubos this evening I
found my spirits elevated and a single rhetorical question: “how
fucking good is this?” kept repeating. If you like, or even love
surfing, watching live surfing from the best in the world is a
total no-brainer.
How can the WSL alienate surfers from a product featuring
surfing? Thats a special kind of talent. It should be the ultimate
shooting-fish-in-a-bowl scenario.
New boy Erik Logan has been
bought on to introduce some kind of pay per
view. Will you pay? Me? A qualified
yes. Most definitely on a contest by contest basis. Most definitely
for some kind of Grand Slam leg featuring Indo, J-Bay, Tahiti and
hopefully Fiji. Most definitely for any kind of slimmed down Super
Event in the Ments to determine a World Champ.
Pipe, yes.
Would I pay a year-long subscription to watch the Tour in its
current iteration and format? Probably not. Too much dross and long
arduous slogs to whittle away the deadwood and get to the good
match-ups. It’s punishment I’m not willing to pay for.
Looking back on the year and, inadvertently, the Tour has
stumbled on some portals to a future product that appeals. The back
to back Bali leg was sick. Especially because the field for Ulus
had already been whittled down and we cut straight to the chase.
Reduced field, Indo leg Doesn’t need to be G-Land, doesn’t need to
be Deserts or No-Kandui’s. Ulus is fine. That should be carved in
stone.
Surf Ranch was boring but the leaderboard and finals day after
the cut was the format of the future. Will they have the vision and
balls to take the opportunity to grasp that or will they stay mired
in a product rejected by the market for 40 years and suffer another
humiliating retreat?
The time is now. Got to be. You can’t expect people to pay for
the same thing they have rejected when they get it for free. That’s
a special kind of madness.
The first heat of round three was announced by Strider in a soft
pink scarf and beanie. To my eye, a nice offset to the weathered head
with the attack dog tits well sheathed. Mendes started
strong. Italo looked over-caffeinated. With Mendes enjoying a solid
lead Italo greased a far reaching air reverse. The first of many
passion claims for the day followed. 7.33.
Mendes was over-scored on a chunky right to take back the lead.
With 30 seconds to go, Italo aimed a solid two-turn combo into the
lip of a groomed semi-close-out. In the presser that followed the
close victory he announced a disdain for the human judges.
“Only God can judge me,” he said.
Strictly speaking Italo, those judges do too. But they sometimes
get it wrong.
Not this time.
Heat two with Zeke and Kolohe was a classic. Zeke over-powered
Kolohe. Brother answered back. There was a helluva lot of body
language communication with the judging panel. Zeke rode a wave
with 45 seconds to go and the judges awarded it a perfect tie.
Which meant, highest score wave went to Zeke and he took the heat.
A vision of surfing as jock sport heaven isn’t for everyone, true.
But I think Noa Deane would have quietly applauded, in his heart of
hearts.
Wilko edged out Jordy. Morais was just a whisker too good for
Connor. Bourez survived a miracle tube-ride, the first deep dark
drainer of the event but was judged incomplete. He got a three for
a ten but still won against M-Rod.
The Medina-Callinan heat did not disappoint after a slow start.
Medina laid the biggest upside down backside hook of the event into
the wind to take the lead. As the heat wound down he started living
all over Callinan, smothering him like an elephant seal. That
forced Callinan into an interference and it was game over.
The tactic was not Fanning approved. “If the wave’s not there I
don’t think you need to be that close,” he said.
With the anti-hassling rule brought in after the Zeke/John John
incident, it could have backfired spectacularly for Medina. With
black eyes glinting in the presser, he gave Callinan, he told Rosie
“no space.”
Medina’s win put extra pressure on Toledo. A loss means Medina
can clinch in Portugal. He hasn’t looked the same since that close
loss to Callinan in France and against Joan Duru he again looked
brittle and flaky. It was tight, and his best ride was lowballed.
It could have been a low seven and not a mid six. Have a look and
see what you think. The door was left open for Duru and he slammed
it with a six with a minute to go.
Wilson got through. One long deep sand sucking tube was enough,
with a minor back-up to get past Gouviea.
Close-out beachbreak ain’t really my bag, but you couldn’t deny
the challenge. The tide dropped and the predicted North wind
started howling.
Italo smashed round four heat one with a pair of sevens, the
second a seriously throaty one. Wilko through, Zeke bounced.
Medina through in heat two.
The tide bottomed out, raggedy closeouts finally forced the hand
of Trav Logie. He called it off after the third heat of round
four.
The title is still live. Wilson out, Medina wins is Ziff’s worst
nightmare.
MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal Round 3 Results:
Heat 1: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 13.66 def. Jesse Mendes (BRA)
13.30
Heat 2: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 13.40 def. Kolohe Andino (USA) 13.40
Heat 3: Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 12.83 def. Jordy Smith (ZAF) 12.77
Heat 4: Frederico Morais (PRT) 11.33 def. Conner Coffin (USA)
10.40
Heat 5: Michel Bourez (PYF) 12.33 def. Michael Rodrigues (BRA)
11.14
Heat 6: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 13.60 def. Ryan Callinan (AUS)
7.33
Heat 7: Joan Duru (FRA) 12.50 def. Filipe Toledo (BRA) 12.10
Heat 8: Kanoa Igarashi (JPN) 13.60 def. Jeremy Flores (FRA)
9.77
Heat 9: Wade Carmichael (AUS) 10.17 def. Tomas Hermes (BRA)
5.30
Heat 10: Owen Wright (AUS) 15.27 def. Patrick Gudauskas (USA)
6.97
Heat 11: Adrian Buchan (AUS) 9.66 def. Willian Cardoso (BRA)
7.03
Heat 12: Julian Wilson (AUS) 13.90 def. Ian Gouveia (BRA) 7.17
MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal Round 4 (H1-3)
Results:
Heat 1: Italo Ferreira (BRA) 14.60, Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 13.30,
Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 6.00
Heat 2: Gabriel Medina (BRA) 11.67, Michel Bourez (PYF) 7.84,
Frederico Morais (PRT) 3.63
Heat 3: Joan Duru (FRA) 11.50, Kanoa Igarashi (JPN) 9.10, Wade
Carmichael (AUS) 7.93
MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal Remaining Round 4 (H4)
Matchups:
Heat 4: Owen Wright (AUS), Adrian Buchan (AUS), Julian Wilson
(AUS)
Yesterday it was revealed that Facebook had
allegedly knowingly lied about the numbers of people watching
videos on its platform for years. The Wall Street Journal uncovered
that the possible malfeasance was much larger, and much greater,
than previously reported.
Facebook acknowledged in 2016 that it had been overstating
to advertisers the average time users spent watching videos on the
platform. But when exactly Facebook found out about that error—and
how long the company kept it under wraps—is now the subject of a
federal district court lawsuit in California. The suit, filed
earlier this week, was brought by Facebook advertisers who allege
that Facebook knew about the measurement error for more than a year
before it was first reported publicly in The Wall Street
Journal.
But advertisers aren’t the only ones seething over the
prospect of Facebook knowingly inflating its video viewership;
members of the press are, too.
According to the complaint, which Facebook has dismissed as
being “without merit,” the company may have been alerted to the
analytics error as early as 2015 by advertisers who reported seeing
an unrealistic 100 percent average viewership rates on some videos.
It was also around that time that many newsrooms across the country
began laying off reporters, in what has become snarkily known as
the “pivot to video.”
Now, of course this relates to surfing because everything
relates to surfing but also because just last year the World Surf
League announced a partnership with Facebook that it called
“groundbreaking.” The subsequent roll-out was marred with troubles
and grumbles and odd explanations for the number of viewers that is
still impossibly murky.
Beyond the World Surf League, the surf media, alongside the
lame-stream media, began its almost exclusive relationship with
Facebook years ago. It is difficult/impossible to grow any sort of
audience without the publishing giant and “likes” and “shares”
became the new currency, with certain properties better at juicing
those “likes” and “shares” than others.
All publishing, it seems, geared itself solely toward attracting
a mass audience, a completely oddly unrealistic audience in both
size and scope and Facebook fed this beast.
So, who cares?
Well, I do because I hate bullshit and Facebook is bullshit. Oh
I know it’s just a tool and railing against a tool is tool-like but
I still don’t understand why everything has to be such
bullshit?
So damned fake and fraudy.
Everything is so damned fake and fraudy. I know it has always
been sort of this way, that surf magazines used to print way more
than they could ever sell, burn the extras and claim massive
subscription numbers but that seemed like real work. Like, going to
a burn bin and catching physical things on fire.
Facebook has streamlined the fraud and maybe even convinced
people that it’s real. Like, the World Surf League. Do you think
the powers that be in Santa Monica’s gilded offices really believe
that there are millions upon millions of potential surf fans
because Facebook has taught them that millions upon millions of
“likes” and “shares” are out there or do you think the powers are
in on the game, juicing the “like” and “shares”, lying about
engagement to advertisers just as Facebook lied to them?
A lie multiplier.
Hell if I know and hell if my caring about it will make any
difference but since when did a few hundred thousand people really
loving something and engaging with something become so… small? So…
immaterial?
Gimme the hardened little core and fuck the potential
trillions.
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Deaf, Jewish, big-wave stud Ido Dar-el chasing trinkets
at Cloudbreak, Fiji. Ido says he'll "never forget the only time I
actually heard a tube at Zicatela (Puerto Escondido) riding at full
speed on a thick seven-six, a brown, dark, sand-sucking cave and
the… kaboom… in my ears just before being spat out into the light.
I had tears of joy. It was so emotional." | Photo: Scott
Winer
Besieged: Do Israeli surfers have a little
PR issue?
An incident in Sri Lanka, when she confronted an Israeli man
who’d dropped in on her, almost went very badly. The Israeli’s
legrope was tangled around her arm, causing her a lot of pain. “I
came up and lost it at him and he then started threatening to kill
me… I was very angry at the time but his aggression and intentions
were very visible and I really did get very scared for my
well-being… I went in crying and had a huge purply, green and black
bruise on the inside of my arm for months.”
Now, Israelis are pretty touchy about how they’re portrayed in
the press. And you can get it.
For seventy years they’ve been held to a higher moral plane than
their Middle Eastern neighbours, told to hold their arm while the
Jew-haters plot their annihilation and so on.
I was in tears of anger and shame reading this
caption. Many israeli surfers dont have proper etiquette in the worlds
line up,similiar to brazilians we come from over crowded impatient
scene in beachbreaks.i have done several articles and posts in the
israeli media educating the proper way of line up and crowds
universally. We have a booming surfing and sup scene of women here. I dont recall anyone threathening a woman in surfing in
israel.since its a small country and uncool behave that
way. I apologize from the depth of my heart in the name of all cool
exprienced israeli surfers for that incident. Im going to publish this screen shot in every fb surfing
israeli page. No way it could be performed again.
Of course, Israeli surfers do have an image problem. Great on
land, feisty as hell in the water. Most surfs over there in the
Holy Land, and I love the joint, I’d swing in with a headache from
all the hassling.
I ain’t sure whether its that genetic thing of having to fight
for everything they’ve got and, who knows, a katyusha might land on
their heads any second so y’might as well grab every wave that
comes, or that they’re at that same point on the surf culture
evolution table Brazilians were ten years ago, Australians
thirty.
Another question: why do we mention the nationality in the first
place?
Because of that preconceived notion?
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Four minutes to go Wilko diced a little right,
threw down a nifty little whipped reverse and kicked out with a
minor claim. Fanning was unconvinced he got the score, I wrote
down, “Nope”. Judges finally highballed him and he sneaks through.
You could watch that heat on the analyser all day long and get a
different result each viewing. Wilko didn't seem too fazed. Maybe
the post retirement prospect of hanging with Mick and Mason on the
Search has kicked in. WSL
Day 2, MEO Rip Curl Portugal Pro: “While
tech billionaires elbow each other out of the way to throw 55k a
day at the Ranch for stoked kooks to dodge the tube there is no
stomach for socialized Pro Surfing in the Americas!”
So we're back, deeper than ever in the land of
socialized medicine and decriminalised drug use. Portugal.
Ten years at Peniche. A decade at Supertubos.
Despite the mostly crap surf it won’t cross Sophies desk marked
Not to Renew. Rip Curl, the only remaining surf industry
sponsor and power bloc and the main resistance to ZoSea’s 2012
hostile takeover, discovered the only successful, sustainable pro
surfing business model in existence, namely the Bells model, and
transferred it seamlessly to Portugal.
The model rests on two key factors: a willing government ready
to stump up cold hard cash to underwrite the event and a major
population centre nearby with a chunk of fans who’ll populate the
bleachers. S’why Bells and Portugal remain fully sponnoed up on
nexts years schedule and Fiji is not. It’s why the USA with it’s
potential mid-west millions of fans cheer Kanye and have no clue
about Kelly.
Basic business logic would suggest a return to a more
US-friendly time zone prior to Pipe. But while tech billionaires
elbow each other out of the way to throw 55k a day at the Ranch for
stoked kooks to dodge the tube there is no stomach for socialized
Pro Surfing in the Americas. Not my opinions, just a restating of
the facts as reflected in the Tour schedule past, present and near
future.
Basic business logic would suggest a return to a more
US-friendly time zone prior to Pipe. Puerto Rico always struck me
as a perfect place to run a CT as a penultimate event. Warm water,
consistent surf, easy access to US fans and eyeballs. But while
tech billionaires elbow each other out of the way to throw 55k a
day at the Ranch for stoked kooks to dodge the tube there is no
stomach for socialized Pro Surfing in the Americas. Not my
opinions, just a restating of the facts as reflected in the Tour
schedule past, present and near future.
So we’re back, deeper than ever in the land of socialized
medicine and decriminalised drug use.
Portugal.
European fickleness swamped the site this morning and Asst.
Comish Trav “the angry inch” Logie put the event on hold, then
again before finally running six heats in slow but shreddable rippy
head-high surf. The mental key to success, according to three-time
World Champion Mick Fanning, who mercifully stood in between Kaipo
and Mel for a second night in a row was “being OK with being
uncomfortable”. As a severely sleep-deprived surf writer about to
hurtle up the highway there was solace to be found in his
advice.
The day started with injury drama. 2015 World Champion Adriano
De Souza inexplicably buckled over in pain negotiating the
shorebreak. He gestured for help, face twisted in a grimace of pain
before a shoed man in long trousers helped him to the beach. Knee
strapped up he returned to the water, surfed a wave with no
apparent ill effects before buckling over in pain a second time as
he rode a left. Popped a ligament. That gave Joan Duru a walk
through and set a tone for the day of backmarkers staring down CT
extinction finally getting an even break.
I thought an-in form Seabass would maul Wilko in junky
beachbreak with air sections. That is how the heat progressed. Last
stanza of the heat and Wilko needed a 5.43. A score that is
everything and nothing. A position Wilko has been in all year long
and been shanked. Four minutes to go Wilko diced a little right,
threw down a nifty little whipped reverse and kicked out with a
minor claim. Fanning was unconvinced he got the score, I wrote
down, “Nope”.
Judges finally highballed him and he sneaks through. You could
watch that heat on the analyser all day long and get a different
result each viewing. Wilko didn’t seem too fazed. Maybe the post
retirement prospect of hanging with Mick and Mason on the Search
has kicked in.
Close to seven thousand people on Facebook live, more than the
J-Bay Final, more than any heat in France, watched Jeremy Flores
dispatch M-Feb back to the QS. It took the Quiksilver ads shown in
France for me to finally appreciate the M-Feb style.
But in current incarnation he’s wounded gazelle on the savannah
for any competent CT surfer. It’s incomprehensible to me why he
didn’t back himself up on the QS like Kanoa and Colapinto.
MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal Remaining Round 2 (H7-12)
Results:
Heat 7: Joan Duru (FRA) 12.83 def. Adriano de Souza (BRA) 4.50
Heat 8: Matt Wilkinson (AUS) 11.33 def. Sebastian Zietz (HAW)
10.83
Heat 9: Jeremy Flores (FRA) 12.50 def. Michael February (ZAF)
9.84
Heat 10: Patrick Gudauskas (USA) 11.10 def. Griffin Colapinto (USA)
10.66
Heat 11: Ezekiel Lau (HAW) 13.26 def. Connor O’Leary (AUS) 8.36
Heat 12: Frederico Morais (PRT) 11.44 def. Yago Dora (BRA) 9.16
MEO Rip Curl Pro Portugal Round 3 Matchups:
Heat 1: Italo Ferreira (BRA) vs. Jesse Mendes (BRA)
Heat 2: Kolohe Andino (USA) vs. Ezekiel Lau (HAW)
Heat 3: Jordy Smith (ZAF) vs. Matt Wilkinson (AUS)
Heat 4: Conner Coffin (USA) vs. Frederico Morais (PRT)
Heat 5: Michel Bourez (PYF) vs. Michael Rodrigues (BRA)
Heat 6: Gabriel Medina (BRA) vs. Ryan Callinan (AUS)
Heat 7: Filipe Toledo (BRA) vs. Joan Duru (FRA)
Heat 8: Kanoa Igarashi (JPN) vs. Jeremy Flores (FRA)
Heat 9: Wade Carmichael (AUS) vs. Tomas Hermes (BRA)
Heat 10: Owen Wright (AUS) vs. Patrick Gudauskas (USA)
Heat 11: Willian Cardoso (BRA) vs. Adrian Buchan (AUS)
Heat 12: Julian Wilson (AUS) vs. Ian Gouveia (BRA)
