What is your favorite archetype?

The waiting period for the fourth stop on tour opens today and how thrilled are you that Margaret River is still on tour? How over the moon? It is a perfect place for the world’s best surfers to come ply their trade as it has everything from scenic backdrops, hearty locals, multiple waves ranging from scary good to scarier better and terror below.

Margaret River is as close as the World Surf League has to a blockbuster film, like Avengers: Endgame, and it’s difficult to imagine it getting pulled out of multiplexes but it almost was and just last year.

Who could forget the multiple shark sightings and attacks that led to the cancellation of the event, its moving to Uluwatu and possibly never screening in Western Australia again?

Well, magic was made behind the scenes to keep the show going on until 2021 and this year’s cast is the best ever. Reluctant leading man John John Florence is back and sitting atop the Jeep Yellow Jersey Sand Dune Aerial Leaderboard. “Ingénue” Kanoa Igarashi nipping at his heels. “Bad boy with a heart of gold” Jeremy Flores is in the top ten and “hard-luck heartthrob” Julian Wilson needs a result just to keep from being let go.

And two great stars have been recast in wonderful new roles. Gabriel Medina as the “damsel in distress” and Kelly Slater as the “hardboiled cop.” Let’s turn to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation to listen as they get into character.

The Margaret River Pro, held in the south-west of Western Australia, was abandoned mid competition last year after two non-fatal shark attacks occurred on the same day.

The two recreational surfers had taken to the waves in Gracetown, 15 kilometres north from where the competition was being held, when they were bitten.

It prompted Brazilian’s Gabriel Medina and Italo Ferreira to take to social media with claims they did not feel safe surfing in the area.
Despite his safety concerns last year, Medina has returned to Margaret River.

The reigning world champion said the extra safety measures announced for this year’s competition helped to lure him back.

“Last year was a tough one, everywhere we were surfing, we were seeing sharks,” he said.

“This year, they’ve put in place more security — jet skis, drones and planes.

“I feel much more confident.”

Justin Majeks from Surfing WA, which has helped to organise the competition, said this year a drone would take to the skies to protect surfers.

“It’s a dedicated drone that will essentially fly all competition day, pretty much from first light,” he said.

He said there would also be a fleet of jet skis and trained water patrol staff on duty.

Surfing legend Kelly Slater is on his final year of the pro circuit and said he felt comfortable in the Margaret River water.

“I’ve never really had much of a fear of sharks,” he said.

Oh I just love it. I absolutely just love it and will be on the edge of my seat, munching popcorn and cheering on the bad boy. Always my favorite archetype but what’s yours?

Who are you hoping will steal the show?

#surfranchwedding

Are you a fan of weddings? Cute ringbearing boys and cuter flower girls? Matching bridesmaids’ dresses, matching groomsmen cummerbunds? The blazing 2:00 pm sun shining overhead, mother-in-law tears dripping on new Michael Kors dresses, father-in-laws toesies hurting in new Cole Haan shoes? Korbel Brut raised high while best men and maids of honor regale attendees with lightly embarrassing stories?

I’m going to be honest with you here, like I always am. I don’t like weddings (besides my second and final), especially since they are usually at 2:00 pm thereby gutting the day/weekend and somewhere annoyingly difficult to find, headache inducing, filled with shallow conversation, not fun and generally not funny.

Then again, I was never invited to a wedding at Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch and it’s true. Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch is now open for the wedding business and could you imagine anything more wonderful, more glorious?

If you’re thinking about getting married but haven’t yet please convince your significant other that a Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch wedding is the only way to go. I know from experience the food is good, the staff is impeccable and no beach on earth can conjure this on demand.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bx7uAVYHclW/

If you need more convincing then you love Korbel Brut.

Here’s to the happy couple!

This could change everything!

The perfect hook of the first turn. That midface dance step. The barrel so deep, it looked like it must surely be a close-out. The exit. The lookback as if to say, well yes, I made it. Of course, I made it. And a quick bang of a close-out move to finish it.

Surely, Steph Gilmore’s final wave was one of the best perfect tens I’ve ever seen. There was no need to second-guess it, to hesitate, to ask, but was it really. It certainly was. Emphatically, Gilmore won Keramas and took over the lead in the world rankings. That final wave made the outcome look inevitable, as though it were preordained, but it was only a month ago that Gilmore made an early exit from Duranbah, defeated by Caroline Marks. A lot can change in a month.

Before we go further, I will go ahead and confess: This story is late. In internet time, it’s several years past due. Blame Yemen. If Chas sent you his book manuscript about Yemen, what would you do? You would drop everything and read it.

So really, this is all the fault of Chas. And Yemen.

Someone was going to have to surf in the crumbling onshore conditions on Friday (local time), if the contest was going to finish on time. Women’s quarterfinals drew the unlucky short straw. I came home from a surf in shitty, cold, wind-fucked conditions, hoping to see dreamy Keramas. It was… not that dreamy, really.

The judges enjoyed Brisa Hennessey’s surfing more than I did. She felt consistently overscored to me. She had speed and variety, but also some dodgy rails and awkward, off balance moments. Yes, the waves had weird wind bump. Sure. But when they threw her an eight for that final wave, where she barely held on for the close-out, it seemed a point or two on the side of generous. It was an 8.37 and won her the heat in the final minute.

Carissa Moore’s top-scoring wave involved — and involved is the correct word here — a beauty frontside reverse, followed by three tidy turns and a fairly standard close-out move. No bobbles, no warbles, and a big turn straight off the start. The judges gave it a 8.6. The spread between Moore’s 8.6 and Hennessey’s 8.37 left me guessing. Moore’s score looked right. Hennessey, well, let’s just say, I wasn’t convinced.

The heat between Courtney Conlogue and Steph Gilmore promised fireworks. With Marks out early, either Conlogue or Gilmore could take over the ratings lead. It started slow before Conlogue threw down a seven, and until the dying minutes, it seemed as though Conlogue had it.

Not so fast.

On her final wave, Gilmore strung together three characteristically stylish turns. Then she slid out on the closeout move. Gilmore has said that she thinks the judges sometimes throw her a little extra for her style and flow. I’m not sure that’s entirely a bad thing, though I suspect Conlogue would not agree. They threw Gilmore a 7.23, weighting the three completed turns more heavily than the failed closeout move. It won her the heat, and I’ll confess I had to watch that final wave a few times before I agreed she deserved the score.

The highlight of the semis for me was Sally Fitzgibbons’s cheeky barrel. Fitzgibbons came out firing in this heat — as with Conlogue and Gilmore, Fitzgibbons also had the top spot in the rankings in sight. She succeeded in keeping Hennessey in check and advanced on the strength of a 6.90 and an 8.70. Between them, they rode 14 waves. Let’s just say, there was a lot going on.

The second semifinal could not have been more different. Gilmore played it safe and did enough to defeat Nikki Van Dijk, who tried valiantly to throw big turns, but consistently misjudged her timing. As perfect waves rolled through the lineup, Gilmore’s conservatism frustrated. Come on, Steph, please? Please take a set? But in truth, why should she, when she had Van Dijk comfortably under control.

Gilmore’s decision to play it chill may also have served — whether intentionally or not — as a bluff directed at Fitzgibbons. Why not allow Fitzgibbons, hot off a high-scoring heat against Hennessey, to believe Gilmore just wasn’t that on? It’s the kind of strategy Slater might pull — and Gilmore isn’t really known for tactics. Without intending to, though, Gilmore may have set up Fitzgibbons to hit the water overconfident.

Whatever the tactics, Fitzgibbons trailed Gilmore from the start. Steph’s first wave was a tidy 6.83 — and turned out to be a keeper. She consistently kept the pressure on Fitzgibbons, who couldn’t muster more than a 5.50. Even without the ten, Gilmore had the heat won.

But the ten is what we’ll remember, long after anything else. It won’t be the onshore slog, or how long it took to get to finals day. It’ll be that ten. The wave gleamed green jewels. Overhead, perfectly clean. Who even saw that barrel coming, I certainly didn’t. In those conditions, when the waves are insanely good, Gilmore’s unstoppable.

Gilmore is world number one again — but the title race is far from over. Six women crowd the top of the rankings: Gilmore, Marks, Conlogue, Moore, Fitzgibbons, and Malia Manuel. A win from any one of them at Margaret River could change everything.