The beautiful unpredictability of ol ma ocean…
If there’s one beautiful thing left in this charred piece of steak we call mother earth, it’s the unpredictability of the ocean.
Even with all the buoys, virtual and real, computer modelling and so on, man still can’t correctly predict what the surf’s going to be like even one day out.
To wit, for the past few days, the Pipe Masters has been readying itself for a six-to-eight-foot west swell.
“Finals Day is looking really likely for tomorrow” has been the mantra although each morning sleepy eyes on the North Shore reveal nothing like the official surf forecaster, Surfline, predicted.
Here’s a few days of tweets.
The #BillabongPipeMasters is OFF for today. Finals Day is looking really likely for tomorrow, Tuesday the 17th. Next call at 7:30am HST. @billabong1973 pic.twitter.com/qGMrWyKTZb
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 16, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters is OFF for today. Finals Day is looking really likely for tomorrow, Tuesday the 17th. Next call at 7:30am HST. @billabong1973 pic.twitter.com/qGMrWyKTZb
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 16, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters are ON HOLD. Next call at 9 am HST for a possible 9:30 am HST start @billabong1973 #VTCS pic.twitter.com/UMrOJdM0RY
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 17, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters are ON HOLD. Next call at 10 am HST for a possible 10:30 am HST start @billabong #VTCS pic.twitter.com/4gr8CIE3LB
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 17, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters is on hold, next call is 11am HST. There’s swell but conditions are not what we thought we’d see this morning. The buoys are big, everything says today is our day but the ocean is fickle! We’d like to run the R16 today, will provide an update at 11 am. pic.twitter.com/QF3B4z4K3g
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 17, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters is OFF for the day. We are monitoring a swell expected to arrive on Thursday, December 19th for a potential finish, however the next call will be made tomorrow morning at 7:30 am HST. @billabong1973 #VTCS pic.twitter.com/d3shGCIrSC
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 17, 2019
The #BillabongPipeMasters is OFF for the day due to lack of swell. Tune in for the next call tomorrow at 7:30 am HST #VTCS @billabong1973 pic.twitter.com/nMfdJ2TFeF
— World Surf League (@wsl) December 18, 2019
Now with two days left in the waiting period, one presumes tomorrow is the day.
But who knows, yes?
The one man I can always count on, and whose eponymous youtube channel always leaves me feeling moderately high, is Jamie O’Brien, who grew up in a rental house at Pipe, won the Pipe Masters in 2004 and who bought his own domicile behind the famous Lopez house, one hundred or so steps from the sand.
Jamie, now thirty-six, was shopping for Christmas presents in Haleiwa when I called.
“Everyone kept asking for my two cents, it doesn’t matter for me, I’m not in it,” says Jamie.
I point out that as a former Mr Pipe Masters and a long-term resident of that stretch of sand and reef, his opinion is worth something.
Jamie laughs and says, “I think it’ll be stressful to be one of those three guys trying to win a world title trying to figure out if it’s going to be the beautiful Pipe they’ve been training for or an air contest.”
For tomorrow, he says it’s going to be “pretty dang good. The swell is 320 degrees which is the almost perfect direction (north-north-west). The wind looks tremendously better than today. I think it’ll be six-plus but the winds might be weird. It’ll start off north-east (good) but then it could be funky. This season has been hard to judge. All the wind models have been wrong this year.”
And the sand that promises a terrific closeout end section?
“Well, the sand was crazy, the north-east swell brought a lot of sand in. The sand’s not all gone but it definitely looks a lot better than the other day.”
I mention that it’s been fifteen years since he won the Pipe Masters.
“Goddammit,” says Jamie, who won the event as a Rip Curl wildcard. He adds that the labyrinth one must navigate to get into the contest is too much for most to bear.
You need to have enough points to qualify for the Volcom Pro, then you have to get through four heats or better to get into the Billabong Pipe Masters trials and then you have to get a first or second to get into the Pipe Masters. It’s a nightmare.”
Is he excited for finals day?
“I’m pumped. It’ll be a good show. Finals day is awesome for multiple reasons. The world title showdown happens and I’m excited for everyone to go home. It’s a win-win.”
Nor Hymala’s Peak, K8, Everest, or Mariana’s Trench can hyde him from Medina’s mob web lynchers association in that case!
The problem clearly is the women’s event on Maui. If it was a parallel event we knew exactly who to blame for taking up valuable heat time. Now we’re left confused about who or what is at fault. Mother Nature, Surfline, the WSL. Who knows. What a clusterfuck!
If this was the olden days, within a generation or so, he would be proclaimed as a saint, with many miracles attributed to him, and profit therein arising from the sale of his memory and a cottage industry of holy relics.
I’m predicting an older semi-surfer looking guy with wavy hair and sunglasses telling us whatsup with the conditions-tomorrow…
What makes me laugh is the WSL pretend that they are a professional organisation with “Athletes” and then you get the guys on their official webcast looking like they just crawled out of bed. They aren’t even wearing any kind of branded uniform. At least they could buy them some polo shirts and embroider the logo on the breast pocket or something.
Why wouldn’t they have a young intelligent woman in front the camera delivering the updates professionally?
It’s marketing 101 and totally suits there fan base.
I find it unbelievable , given the equality call, that they refuse to use woman as anything more than props in the wsl productions.
Get rid of all the old men Ziff!
It’s a youth sport…..get youth in front the camera ASAP
is the “intelligent”part necessary?
I just want to wake up in the morning and hear Renato Schwarzenegger telling me it’s go time.
Show’s over boys. Everybody just move along. Nothing more to see here. Pack up the show and go home for the holidays. You’ve shot your wad. It was good while it lasted. We’ve got a big Kona storm brewing. Make sure you pack out all your trash. If your chick is hot, well then you can leave her but the rest of you tourist kooks just beat it back where you came from. Aloha !
Tip top !
Multi up ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Wow, aloha spirit at it’s best….
Wow you’re a douche huh? My girl wouldnt fuck with a beach peasant such as yourself. Fuck Hawaii. Played out as shit and full of beach goons.
wow, you took that pretty personal. a little close to home?
Somebodies girl had fun in Hawaii…..
He’s definitely got some wounds festering from a trip to Hawaii
https://assets.bigcartel.co…
Exactly my sediment to all non-native “Californians”.
Sediment? Try sentiment
No…sediment.
Make me hang on the morning call once, I’m the fool …
That’s how this works, right?
https://youtu.be/eKgPY1adc0A
Who says there’s no money in surfing?
One comp win and he’s buyin a pipe house.
He’s fuken good too.
Perfect level of cuntiness
House courtesy of Red Bull, Who is JOB ?
A fantastic body of work that no-one will give one fuck about in about 1 years time.
I love it.
I watch an episode every morning to get myself psyched for a day of cutting fuking sick!!
You are a filthy troll.
But, I appreciate the attempt.
Pfffttt. Seeding round…
If the Title race is decided in sloppy Pipe I’ll personaly take the top 16 and start my own rebel tour.
16 with no non elimination rounds reduces the show to two days…. sustainable.
Exactly. The Short form comp all the way.
* personally
Signed: son of Marcus
Hahahahahar
Fuck, I’m a tool.
The Seedening claims another contest scalp via it’s demonic time wasting virtue.
Exactly… watching Richard Christ lose again in decent waves was great said no one ever
you will need to wait another 9 years or have access to a pretty handy lawyer.
Legitimacy is all a sport can ask for, then let the magic happen. Too often, magic conditions exist in a waiting period inconvenient to completing so many rounds. The process is cumbersome, inefficient, anything but agile and vulnerable to disappointment.
This world title contest deserves to be held in conditions like last Wednesday. We just watched an illegitimate Big Wave final heat, it’s fresh in our minds. All the organic momentum for Pipe has been bled out with each and every delay. Add in trials heats?
Interest is generated by momentum.
Hopefully, it’s pumping tomorrow and this is all moot, but it wasn’t at Dbah.
I’ll go into bat for the hype machine: I think they really, really nailed it with the Bells Beach 50 year storm hype train, which totally delivered in terms of drama, character expression, chaos and mastery.
if, if, if, the Pipe Masters hype had come off, it would have been, I predict, a record breaking, red panty day for the WSL.
they got skunked. Who among us etc etc
Poor old Renato though, is there a more hang dog expression in world sport than his mournful “on hold” face.
What do you mean about the 50yr storm?
So far it’s an annual BBQ
His face tells the story in the screengrabs.. Each day, a little more deflated. Hope it is good tomorrow though. Fingers crossed the shit wind stays away and it’s a tube fest.
I tune in to the WSL broadcast for the same reason I paid to watch Mayweather fights… Glorious failure. I didn’t get my money’s worth with Mayweather but I get it every contest with the WSL…. gratuit!
I used to stress about the day where the set waves were sold to the highest bidder before then sun even rose. But no longer!
Wasn’t really asking you to write this, but wow, you are quick.
What the fuck is up with Pat’s hair? Is he always “just out of bed” or does he wear a yellow beanie and takes it off for the posts? Dude should just shave the dome and call Cote a twin. They look good together.
ll just say one thing … I wouldn’t want to be in Caio’s skin if he advances to the quarterfinals …
I’d like to be in Caio’s skin for many reasons.
It’s true, it’s true, my bad!
That’s “the only reason”, Negs!!!
I wonder if she’d notice.
I was talking about having lovely olive skin and being sponsored by some obscure Brazilian telecommunication company!
Well guys think from another perspective…
If he’ll win the heat… maybe a future widow so… then an open field!!!
You think he has an exit strategy, if he somehow wins this heat?
I think Medina’s mob web association will come hammering him down and all his 50th next generations…
Did Pat O call it off the other morning so he could get his hair bleached ? What the fucks up with his frosted tips halfway through the morning
The pursuit of beauty never sleeps.
Indeed the modern woman’s idea of beauty is the punched in the mouth look.
We are so complicated.
The fella’ needs to be moved out of the good paddock though….
If so, Pat O must be an insomniac of epic proportions.
Stress
responsibility
he looks terrible
I’ll go into bat for the Wozzle here. Sometimes it’s ok to make a call and get it wrong, and the constant public haranguing only results in the corpos tightening their grip on the joint. Now they’ll be less transparent than they already are and not say anything at all because it’s not worth it ‘from a risk perspective.’
They shoulda fucken ran it but
they should just not hype it so hard. today was better they had the more circumspect ‘we’re hoping to run it tomorrow’ not ‘IT’S GOING TO BE THE BEST CONDITIONS EVER I CAN’T WAIT TO DRIVE MY PLASTIC FREE JEEP DOWN TO GET BEACHSIDE WITH MY HEROES’
You are right.
What about the “Every heat is history” tag they’ve been using? OMG so excited for reals!
Am curious: What is the dashboard made from?
I made a call once and it turned out to be the wrong number.
I apologised and hung up, then dialled a slightly different number which turned out to be the one I was wishing to connect to.
Thank you for reading my story. I hope it was helpful and inspiring to anyone in a similar situation, who may have made a bad call.
Good call!
Crank call!
I texted a cunt bastard to fuck off and he texted back lol. Then I said “you think this is funny? Fuck you motherfucker, dont fuck with me!”.
Then they texted back “I think you have the wrong number. Sorry you’re having a bad day, good luck”.
Then I checked the number and yes, it was the wring number.
Whether they get it right or not tomorrow is one thing, but the fans have been complaining for ages about that extra day of non elimination heats. That is before we get into this nonsense of wasting two days of competition on the trials. Incredible that we may end up with the championship being decided in crappy conditions just to facilitate two Wildcards, positions which could just be decided from the volcom competition.
I don’t want wildcards at all, let them qualify like everyone else. But if you have to do it, using the Vpro as the qualifier is a great idea.
100%. Pipe Pro winner and second gets straight in as WCs.
No trials event.
No non elimination rounds.
Should’ve nailed it last week
You’re right, you’re right. They’re a pack of mongrel bastards
Ah, I miss Hawaii.
I’d give my left tit for a plate lunch right about now.
Never understood the macaroni.
It all makes sense in the cacophony of taste / texture sensations.
Cacophony is such a fun word!
Methinks I swallowed a thesaurus when I was but a babe in arms.
for sure. i was stationed at Wheeler Air Field, 20 minutes to north shore and 45 to Sandy’s, there’s always a wave somewhere on Oahu, but the traffic these days, auwe!
Maybe if you were a Coffey sister.