Despair and frustration from the (diminishing)
legion of hard-core surf fans who have stuck with the broadcast
from the basin…
Part of the feelings of despair and frustration from the
(diminishing) legion of hard-core surf fans who have stuck with the
broadcast from the basin has been the slow dawning reality
that things have gone backwards from last year.
It was impossible to complete a statistical analysis comparing
this year from last because instead of a “cut” day we got a
half-dangling, half-sucked cock at a wedding (as my friend would
say) day which left only half the surfers having finished their
bonus runs. Nevertheless, prelim analysis suggested average scores
are down about a point-and-a-half from last year.
There are outliers, Gabe Medina obvs, and almost the entire
women’s side of the draw who rendered the normal gender disparity
almost mute in the mechanical copulation of the basin.
Why?
Debate raged with some blaming the technology and some blaming
the surfers. I think a complex-ish interplay of factors has created
almost the perfect storm for producing and rewarding safety surfing
and conservatism. The lack of practise waves is huge. Kelly Slater
made the astute observation that Medina and Italo had an almost
snowboardery (sic) look to their surfing.
Snowboard half-pipe is the obvious parallel to make with the
basin. Except instead of unlimited opportunity to practice and
perfect high-risk runs surfers here get two waves a day, a farcical
amount of practice time. Kelly himself admitted that with only two
waves available surfers were hardly likely to risk them by going
big.
Practice safe = surf safe.
Another factor is simple calculus.
Despite their reputation for being intellectual pygmies pro
surfers have been rational actors in the tub. With the double-cut
format, a pair of sixes was a fair bet to get to the bonus round.
Judges relentlessly awarded mediocre surfing with mediocre scores
but pros held solid and in the reckoning their math was correct.
Those who went big early and fell, like M-Boz, got shovelled out
the backdoor with a thirty-third jammed sideways where the sun
don’t shine.
That is a technology and a format problem.
The third factor was a lingering resentment from last year held
particularly by Jordy Smith and Kolohe Andino, who felt judges did
not reward progressive surfing. Jordy was staunch in his commitment
to offering up solid safety surfing and got duly rewarded.
Kolohe choked.
Made it to the bonus round, cruised a left and fell.
Came to his final right and boiled over. Loosed the fins on a
section, got caught behind and in a moment of pure frustration went
even bigger on the next section. The wave, as it does, peeled off
without him.
He dodged the presser with Rosie but Strider caught up with him
in the Jeep as it whisked him off the premises.
“How you feelin’ buddy?”
Silence.
“I’m stoked,” he offered in a voice as deadpan as Death
Valley.
In one of the more beautiful unscripted broadcast moments of the
day the camera panned to Snips looking grave and Dino Andino
tapping furiously on the wooden edge of the fence as a
diminutive figure scurried behind in the background.
Sophie!
The vibe was, let’s be kind and allow for the flattening effect
of video, low.
In the tent, a different reality prevails.
Could Soph detect the tragedy unfolding around her?
We’ll never know because the modern CEO maintains the veil,
until death, or the ghostwritten memoir, whichever comes first.
Filipe Toledo did not safety surf, proving that the changes to
the wave from CT two to three, or the reverse were no impediment to
high-risk, hi-fi surfing.
The left is his weakness. He fell early on his first try, then
spiked a right with various potent concoctions including a
rapid-fire reverse and a club sandwich which clicked so smoothly it
made the crowd gasp. He made a wave on the next left attempt and
then threw away his final right before shepherding his young
daughter away from the water’s edge.
Precision is key said Kelly in the booth, perhaps unaware how
ironically the machine both demanded and robbed surfers of the
ability to achieve it.
Brisa Hennsesy took a more philosophical angle, declaring that
the mise en scene was beautiful and her method was to pretend she
was in the ocean and this was part of her fate in being born as a
surfer.
That romanticism attracted me. Her surfing, not so much.
It was left to Courtney Conlogue to come up with the perfect
blend of the philosophical, the artistic and the athletic on
afternoon bonus runs. Her exaggerated soul-outs into the tube
section, producing flamboyant late entries seemed perfectly formed
homage to Terry Fitzgerald in Morning
of the Earth. Even allowing for an under-score
those waves rocketed her up the leaderboard.
Was the day going to go on forever?
In late afternoon light and an atmosphere tinged with
melancholy, like the end of a child’s birthday party, as the last
guest prepares to leave and the child looking at his Dad asks,
“Does night really have to fall on my birthday” the last bonus runs
of the day were held. The commentary team were tight-lipped on the
schedule, the website obstinate in its refusal to yield
information.
Maybe it was going to go on forever.
Wade Carmichael crushed his left and improved the right.
Owen Wright mastered the low-risk, high-speed quasi-progressive
surfing the basin demanded, first on the left with tail wafts and
whips and a dramatic late-hit-to-freefall-tube-ride and then on the
right, burrowing in on the outside tube section before unleashing a
flurry of tight snaps.
For a man who had done no surfing for the day it was an
impressive feat. Matched by few.
On a brown leather couch the man who had been thanked as a God
by Deivid Silva a few minutes ago (“Thanks to God for the
opportunity to ride more waves here”), the GOAT, Morpheus according to Ronnie
Blakey, more Mephistophelean to me, watched
his creation whirring on it’s tracks, the final perfect wave
silhouetted in the scotopic light.
Men’s Freshwater Pro pres. by Outerknown Leaderboard Top
8
Gabriel Medina (BRA) 17.77
Filipe Toledo (BRA) 16.07
Owen Wright (AUS) 15.97
Jordy Smith (ZAF) 15.90
Griffin Colapinto (USA) 15.50
Italo Ferreira (BRA) 14.97
Wade Carmichael (AUS) 14.90
Willian Cardoso (BRA) 14.70
Women’s Freshwater Pro pres. by Outerknown Leaderboard
Top 4
Johanne Defay (FRA) 17.50
Carissa Moore (HAW) 16.23
Caroline Marks (USA) 16.10
Courtney Conlogue (USA) 15.83
