Man from Futures Fins to Chas Smith: "Get this you clown! Backward fins work!"

Shock reveal: backward fins work; Vissla/BeachGrit release movie, clothing range to celebrate!

Derek Rielly

By

A collaboration to break your heart.

It’s safe to say that the highlight of 2018, from a surf culture point of view, was the Backward Fins Beth imbroglio, when the WSL’s new chief commercial officer, their “purveyor of cool, Beth Greves, appeared on @kookoftheday with her fins put in, yeah, backwards.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BjkLtjVAvRr/?taken-by=kook_of_the_day

We ate and regurgitated that morsel here, here, here, here, here and here and bookended the saga with a billboard near Kelly Slater’s wave pool in Lemoore, and installed just before The Surf Ranch Pro.

Charlie Smith, with billboard.

The New Yorker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning staffer Bill Finnegan adored the stunt, writing in the famous magazine, 

Slater saw it. He is a tireless online poster, with a rare degree of patience. On his Instagram feed, a magnet for cranks of all kinds, he has spent years debating flat-Earthers, laying out innumerable scientific proofs that the planet is round. He’s a well-informed environmentalist; right-wing flamethrowers rain hellfire on him for that, and he often takes the trouble to reply to them individually. When the Backward Fins Beth billboard went viral, Slater showed a tiny bit of pique. On the BeachGrit Instagram feed, he wrote, “Funny. Cheap. Character Revealing.” The BeachGrit crew was ecstatic. They had successfully trolled the king.

Lovely Nick Carroll called BeachGrit “horribly clever.”

Now, and with much egg on our faces etc, it’s been revealed that putting your fins in backward ain’t such a bad thing.

It works.

And, so, with eyes filled with an empathic warmth towards the pioneer of the backward fins movement, we announce a collaboration with Paul Naude’s Vissla, featuring two t-shirts and a pair of surf trunks with the backward fins motif, as well as our cry for help tee.

(Which you can examine below and buy here.)

 

All meaningless, of course, without video proof of the backward fins theory being tested.

Want to see if Pipe shredder Cam Richards and pals can fly with reverse fins?

Watch.

Quick question... who in hell is this "surfing group?"

Breaking: Australian movement to reject British crown gains steam over perceived mistreatment of “Surfing Royals” Harry and Meghan!

Chas Smith

By

Some food for thought.

And I’ll admit to being jealous of Australia and Canada and their infantile suckling on the teat of Britain’s proud monarchy. Oh the history, the pomp, the comfort in being tucked into bed, nightly, knowing a steady hand is at or near the wheel. We Americans are let to bob up and down, swinging from the jowls of one highly unpredictable politician to the next. Our “king” is basically Mike Bloomberg and imagine that.

The horror, the horror.

In any case, Australia’s “republican” movement has gained sudden steam over perceived mistreatment of “Australian-esque” Prince Harry and his beautiful wife Meghan Markle. Their “surf-like” qualities are admired in the land down under but let’s learn more and then, as Americans, give some advice.

Harry and Meghan’s decision comes at a time when Australians are talking very seriously about becoming a republic, although recent polling has provided mixed results. A February 2018 poll by Research Now found 52% supported a republic with 25% unsure and just 22% supporting the monarchy.

A Newspoll in November 2018, just after a royal tour by Harry and Meghan, found only 40% supported a republic with 48% against. This was the first time since 1999 that a poll found more people opposed the change.

In 2019, it was even reportedly proposed that Harry might be made the governor-general of Australia. This move would have potentially boosted royal support but was ultimately dismissed.

A Dynata poll in June 2019 then found that support for a republic among under 25-year-olds had grown to 57%, with 50% of those 25-34 supporting a change.

A large part of the couple’s appeal is that they appear relatable (read: surfy) when compared to the Queen or Prince Charles. It certainly is relatable for a couple in their 30s with a young family to want to move from home and be financially independent. The catch for monarchists is that much of the couple’s popularity comes from their rejecting traditional royal roles.

Now, advice…

DON’T LEAVE THE CROWN! Freedom may look good but one day you wake up sandwiched between Bill and Hillary Clinton, Bill mouth-breathing, Hillary binge watching episodes of Friends while passive-aggressively hate-texting Seema Nanda and think… “Whoa. How’d I end up here?”

More as the story develops.

Lakey Peterson, signed 'cause company owner Paul Naude says she's got the best turns on the Women's tour. Chris Carrie/ZAZ photography

World #3 Lakey Peterson shucks Hurley, signs with Vissla sub-brand Sisstrevolution!

Derek Rielly

By

As Hurley team gets demolished, little companies line up to catch many bargains…

In the second-biggest thing to happen to Vissla this year, the other revealed tomoz, the company has signed world number three and almost-Olympian Lakey Peterson to its one-year-old Sisstrevolution brand. 

“I’ve always thought that she does the best turns on the Women’s WCT,” says Paul Naude, the South African-born founder of Vissla and its various brands, a man who has also owned a surfboard company, surf mags, surf brands, been a surf photographer, took over Billabong when Bob Hurley split in 1998 and tried to buy Billabong when it tanked but was rebuffed and from there came Vissla.

Phew.

As was reported in December, Hurley, under new owners Bluestar Alliance, would demolish, at the earliest opportunity and with a curious intensity, the greatest surf team ever assembled, John John, Kolohe, Julian, Filipe, Carissa, Lakey etc.

Ain’t nobody was getting out of that slaughterhouse alive.

Now, Lakey, who is twenty-five and a tour veteran of eight seasons, which includes a runner-up finish in 2018 and a third last year, has found a found a new menu to eat from.

Re: this year’s tour, Lakey says, “I’m not here to get second place.” 

Wanna reminisce a little?

Let’s go back to 2017 when Filipe tried to coach Lakey into a 540 down in Mex, Lakey’s highlight movie from her Hurley years.

Coming Tomorrow: A BeachGrit surprise so unexpected you’ll forget about impeachments, Megxits and mankind’s collapse into vicious tribal warfare!

Chas Smith

By

It's anti-depressive!

It was the great American philosopher Rodney King who asked the question, “Can’t we all get along?” The answer then, in 1993 while Los Angels burned, was a resounding “No…” which has only become louder, more resounding, as the decades spin on. The United States’ two major political parties, Democrats and Republicans, don’t speak anymore. Democrat family members refuse to invite Republican family members over for dinner.

Israel and Palestine.

The British are getting out of Europe and the Royals are getting out of the British Royal Family.

John Lennon and The Beatles.

Surfers who drive many cars and fly many planes hate Norwegians who make their oil.

Shark livers.

And is the world officially over? Has mankind reached its breaking point where brother will kill brother will kill sister will kill brother until only the blind remain?

Have you lost hope?

Believe in BeachGrit for one more dark night and tomorrow it shall be restored.

"Have you tried the champagne setting yet? It's to die!"
"Have you tried the champagne setting yet? It's to die!"

Let them Surf Lakes: Posh Sydney neighborhood set to receive world’s first exclusive, luxury, members’ only wave tank!

Chas Smith

By

Come see how the other half plan to live!

It’s funny to think, isn’t it, that the world’s first jaw-dropping manmade wave generating facility is still exclusive and private. The fact that Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch is in “the world’s least desirable hamlet™” has not deterred its World Surf League owners from keeping the “rehabilitated” Lemoore water ski pond a “luxury experience.”

People, and businesses, apparently pay top-ish dollar to drive, or fly, to Lemoore and surf surrounded by cow stink and abject poverty and surf amongst it.

Well, Surf Ranch’s days may be numbered as a posh northwest Sydney enclave, known for designer penile surgery, is set to build a properly exclusive, luxury, members’ wave tank where you will not be invited nor tolerated.

Shall we learn about? It’d be seen as “low class” and “nationalistic” to not.

An exclusive inland wave park has been proposed for an unusual location on the outskirts of north west Sydney.

The Wisemans Ferry Retreat and Golf Club on the Hawkesbury River submitted an application to the Hills Shire Council on January 23 to construct a 13,735 square metre wave pool complete with a beach and lounge area on their existing site.

The pool will use more than 30,000 cubic metres of water filtered from the Hawkesbury while utilising wave-generating technology from American company Surf Loch Wave Systems.

But not everyone will be able to enjoy the attraction, because the wave park will be exclusive to retreat guests.

A spokesperson from The Wisemans Ferry Retreat and Golf Club told Daily Mail Australia they had been ‘told not to discuss’ the proposal, which was reportedly made by the new owners of the resort.

Which leaves us to speculate freely and wildly. Which Australian surf star will be the “face of the brand?” I think it would do this new pool will to acquire Julian Wilson’s board real estate and also have him act as chief pool boy. Imagine the swoon of the wealthy heiresses. It’d be enough to power the plow.

What?

Nick Carroll you say?

Don’t be daft. Nick is a dyed-in-the-wool communist. He doesn’t go for this sort of classism.

More as the story develops.

Photo: Steve Sherman/@tsherms
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