New York City shutters beaches after shark bites “mystery alien fish” in two!

The Bagel's sweaty summer of discontent continues…

The ´Ol NYC can take a chunk outta ya in many ways.

Every corner reveals some new chic and trixy way to liberate you of everything from self-esteem to the loose change in your sack.

And now you can add the loosing of a femoral artery by way of our old pals Selachimorpha.

The beaches of Hempstead (Lido, Point Look Out, Long Beach –The Quiksilver Pro was run there) are a pretty haven where the suburbs meet the sea. They rest about thirty minutes, or five hours if you take the Cross Bronx Expressway, from Manhattan.

As of today, where the weather hovered around ninety-six degrees, those beaches are closed.

Locals received this message via text today: *Shark Sighting Update* A second shark has been spotted in the water near Town of Hempstead beaches. Lifeguards have red flagged the strip of water as per the NYS protocols. Due to this second sighting, swimming remains prohibited at certain Town of Hempstead beaches: Civic Beach, Lido Beach, Lido West Beach, Town Park, Point Lookout and Town Park at Sands. Lifeguards will continue to monitor the situation and determine when it is once again safe for swimming to resume.

Remember Clash of the Titans ?

The Stygian Witches?

“A TITAN VS. TITIAN!!!!!”

Apparently, being a member of the alien family with a wing span of an NBA point guard is not enough to win a game of tag verses Jaws.

Thresher sharks are common in the waters off Long Island during the summer months as the Gulfstream warms the waters, but their cute little mouths probs can’t incise the hunk of flesh ripped outta this carcass.

Any marine biologists care to take a guess what left this dental impression?


Open for Trading (again): Join BeachGrit’s winner-take-all Survivor League!

A twenty-buck stake to win a gee…

In the middle of last year, and shortly before the hellfires of 2020, we announced a terrifically exciting version of fantasy surfer.

Easy to play, limited numbers, a thousand bucks to the champ.

Its creator, Costa Mesa’s Taylor Lobdell, a recent migrant to the tech industry in San Francisco, was a fan of the WSL tour but not its clunky fantasy surfer league, and its absence of any sort of incentive to play.

So he created what he calls The Surfival League.

Four rules.

1. Pick one surfer each event.

2. Surfer must advance past round of 32.

3. You can’t pick same surfer twice.

4. Winner takes all.

Then came the pandemic, tour cancelled etc.

Anyway, tour is back, maybe, although Pipe is looking shaky (story coming shortly) but next year, maybe we got a tour.

Earlier today, Taylor asked if he might address BeachGrit readers re: The Surfival League’s reopening.

Hello Friends.

Taylor from The Surfival League here.
Remember us? We were a quick blip on the BeachGrit radar right during Chas’s Euro-Covid Tour. We promised a better “Fantasy Surfer Game”. No complicated lineup setting, no weird tiers and budgets. Just pick 1 surfer per contest. Win $1,000. Easy.
Right after the article was published, Elo and The WSL shut down the tour and we vanished in the night.
Well, we are BACK.

Full rules here.

There’s a $20 entry fee and BeachGrit is shelling out $1,000 to the winner. The winner will also get a BeachGrit write up, probably a traction pad, maybe a signed copy of Cocaine and Surfing, etc. We will spoil ya baby!
If you signed up back in March for the 2019 season, your entry will rollover. If you want to refund, email [email protected]. If the tour is cancelled, we will rollover to the next season or refund, your choice.
Want in? 

 


Give it to us!
Give it to us!

Listen: “I am at a complete loss as to why the World Surf League didn’t ram whatever tour it wanted down its surfers’ throats then scream in their faces, ‘Suck on that ultra hard surf candy!'”

The Goggansification of surfing!

David Lee Scales and I sat across from each other in Album surfboard’s upper room this mid-morning and I worked myself into a thick lather. We were at least six feet apart, not the twenty-seven that Barack Obama and Joseph “Bad Grandpa” Biden prefer, but it wasn’t fear of Covid that got me all worked up.

It was preeminent surf journalist Nick Carroll’s integrity-laden analysis of the World Surf League’s announced tour changes.

On Coastalwatch, a surf website for the immunocompromised 75-year-old + set, he detailed the various and sundry shifts and the vast minefield WSL executives had to cross in order to reach some working program.

Per Carroll:

The surfers are the power in the room. They’re also the most vulnerable. THEY need pro surfing. But Dirk Ziff had specifically instructed Pat O’Connell and his team not to point the money gun at them. Rather than coerce, Ziff wanted the surfers to see the opportunity for change, in a moment when big change was not only possible, but necessary. The world itself is changing; no pro sport can afford to sit on its hands, least of all our dicey little darling.

As Pat laid out the options before the talent, he found them split on a range of issues. One option — favoured by Kelly Slater, by the way — was a continuous Cut throughout the season, a whittling at every event, so each CT featured fewer surfers than the one before it. Another involved dropping any non-elimination rounds — lose a heat, any heat, you were done. Neither of these got a lot of backing.

Instead, the process turned into a slow nursing of opinions and details, giving something here, asking for something there. The Cut was set two seasons down the track, instead of straight up. The non-elimination rounds were left intact. Both spared the concerns of the pros, who didn’t like the idea of travelling halfway around the world for one heat, or getting slung off tour after five such heats.

But wait.

Why are the surfers the power in the room again? Aside from wave quality, locations and days that should be contested, who cares what they think? I understand that Peterson Crisanto may be sad to fly halfway around the world, lose his Round 1 heat and get bumped from the event then get bumped from the entire tour after three such performances but the viewer isn’t sad.

So long, Crisanto. Better luck next time.

It boggles my mind that Santa Monica is using kid gloves with the one asset it should be man-handling. Shoving whatever version of the tour is workable down their throats and telling them to suck on it.

Whether or not they enjoy it is entirely immaterial.

What’s the surfer option? A rebel tour? Going to work for Hurley? Starting a sunglass brand?

The World Surf League, in any form it takes, is all they have.

Co-Waterperson of the Year Dirk Ziff and CEO Erik Logan should have showed real hardbitten leadership, instead of trying to be bros with the pros, and dished up an offering tailored for the viewer. A cutthroat competition that dropped Round 1 heat losers into an alligator pit where they had to fight other Round 1 heat losers for their very lives.

Or something.

The Goggansification of surfing is what we’re left with and it won’t work and it has never worked. Being bros with the pros will garner a loose shaka, a “Hey, brah…” a “siiiiiiick…” but not a functioning professional tour in the time of global pandemic.

Ziff wanted the surfers to see the opportunity for change.”

Awesome. That’s not what surfers are good at especially when getting paid a decent wage under the current model. Ziff, ELo and the rest should stop trying to give back rubs and step up to a very winnable challenge.

This was professional surfing’s greatest opportunity and it was blown.

Want more froth?

I also get firmly behind Kanye West.

Listen here!

P.S. When the august Nick Carroll is googled, this is how it comes up.

Tom Carroll’s brother? I’m offended on behalf of surf journalists everywhere.


Close Shave: Hurricane Douglas barely misses direct hit on Hawaiian islands, skirting just north of Kauai!

"We hope we dodged a bullet."

A rare hurricane heading directly for Hawaii shifted slightly to the north and spared the iconic island chain of much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Hurricane Douglas had been tracking to land somewhere between Oahu and Kauai with National Weather Service meteorologists calling the storm a potentially deadly performer “bringing a triple threat of hazards, including, but not limited to, damaging winds, flooding rainfall and dangerously high surf.”

But have you ever known anyone who practiced musical theater? In that field a “triple threat” is someone who can sing, dance and act. Very devastating, leading to much destruction in the form of Cats, Rent and Into the Woods to name but three.

Some rain fell in Kauai and some rivers got choked out. Gentle rain fell in Oahu while blustery wind slapped palms. One small tree was false cracked on Maui and dropped onto a road.

Hawaii’s Governor David Ige told the press, “We hope that we dodged a bullet. We were fortunate in that we did not have major flooding or major dislocations.”

I had a major dislocation, once, at Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch in Lemoore, California. It was uncomfortable and lightly embarrassing though not as uncomfortable nor lightly embarrassing as Nick Carroll getting snaked by Vaughn Blakey and Sean Doherty on the final wave of the day.

Did you know that when you Google “Australian surf journalist” it comes up like this?

I hope Tim Baker doesn’t feel too comfortable with his Wikipedia and walled off “top of the pile” positioning. That’s our Longtom right below him and, unlike Hurricane Douglas, he will not shy away from a direct hit.

You’ve been warned Tim Baker. Best to start filling sandbags and laying them below your “featured snippet.”


Surfing’s lunge for middle America: A persuasive case for the WSL Tour showdown in Lake Michigan!

"Half of the year is basically uninhabitable. If you bring it, we will watch."

Hey Elo,

I just want start with saying I love what you’ve done with the 2021 year.

I’m with you, Pipe has already had its due. Let somewhere else have the spotlight.

And Hossegor? Snoozefesttttttt.

If I wanted culture and pumping beachbreak barrels, I’d move there.

I know you haven’t decided on the final yet, so I wanted to come out and say that Michigan is interested.

Yes, I know it’s not the obvious choice, but let’s make some waves, shall we?

And I know you miss Oprah. Chicago is right down the road. Don’t you want to show her what you’ve accomplished?

The Great Lakes may not be the obvious choice, but as a fellow Mid-Westerner, I hope you’ll hear me out.

1. Synergy
I actually don’t even know what this means, but I’ve got you hot and bothered now huh?

2. Danger
I know Pipe is the most dangerous wave in the world, Turpel and Pottz mention it every time Pipe even tangentially comes up. But you know what’s really dangerous? Hypothermia. I want my champion to have to brave the elements. You could even tweak into a Survivor-type challenge. Let’s be honest, were not concerned with the best surfer in the world anymore. That went out the window when Kelly built his own event. We want entertainment. I want to see a surfer lose a toe, now that’s a champion. Plus, a little more synergy for ya. You can turn it into a reality show. Somewhere between Deadliest Catch and Ice Road Truckers. I know WSL Studios needs some more content.

3. The Best Surfer Will Win
Anyone can make an eight-foot Pipe wave look good. Even the wipeouts look good. You really want to know who the best surfer in the water is? Put him in a 6/5 with lobster gloves and tell him he’s surfing one foot at five seconds slop. Now that’s a real champion.

4. The Jeep Leaderboard Actually Works Here
You don’t drive a Prius ‘round here. Michiganders drive cars made in the US of A baby. And you know that really kooky commercial where Filipe “surfs the air?” That will kill here. Plus, added bonus, you don’t have to change the voiceover, Michiganders will never realize how kooky it is.

5. There’s No Sharks Here
We all know we’re in the midst of a shark-emic. Just scroll through BeachGrit on any given day. We are under attack. Now, I don’t know the WSL’s financials, but based on quality of your product, I’m guessing there pretty piss-poor. My guess is you just can’t handle any liability right now. And your other options, namely Lowers, reek of radioactive water and baby Whites. Sure, we have our fair share of hepatitis, but by the time the “athletes” figure it out you’ll be in the clear.

6. Freshwater is the New Salt Water
Freshwater is in. The Surfer’s Journal just did a feature on river surfing. Pro surfers are leaving San Clemente and Hawaii to surf two-foot waves in Waco. Tosh Tudor, the son of the most prominent salty purist around, has been dropping Waco clips, albeit on a mid-length (I can’t pass up an opportunity to piss off Joel). Waco.Have you ever been to Waco? Me neither.Yes, I’ll give you credit Elo. You played a role in bringing in the freshwater era when you told Kelly he could have his own wave. But Lemoore just feels, stale. Waco is Twitter and Lemoore is Facebook. That’s as clear as I can put it.

Now, I don’t want to completely blame you. But the clip of your seated tube really didn’t help. Everyone knows that as soon as the old people start to like something, the young people bail. Your viral elation evaporated any “cool” that Lemoore had left.

7. Mid-Westerners Are Clamoring for Surfing
Okay, maybe not. But hear me out. You want to expand surfing? You’ve been doing it all wrong. Bring it to them. Those coastal cities already have surfing. If anything they’re pissed their break is closed during the best days of the year. They don’t appreciate what they have.

Quick fact for you. Detroit and Milwaukee, two Great Lake cities, have less people combined than San Diego, but San Diego has one major sports team to their seven. Those pesky city elites are plenty busy with their yoga and acai bowls. They’re too busy to watch sports. Mid-Westerners, on the other hand, have an abundance of time. Half of the year is basically uninhabitable. If you bring it, we will watch.

8. The Pabst Blue Ribbon Pro
It speaks for itself. Possibly the best event name of all time. You already have Jeep, now let’s double down with the most mid-western beer ever.

This is how you advertise to middle America. It just screams ‘Merica.

P.S. I can’t wait for the Ultimate Surfer. I can’t think of anything more entertaining than watching perennial QS’ers stuff themselves into a chest high barrel for 40 seconds. And if the surfing gets old, the drama will be riveting. Lemoore is notorious for its night life.