“The must-see show of the summer” or “Ultimate Cringe Machine.”

The American Broadcasting Company has released a provocative teaser ahead of the ten pm, August 23, premiere of the jewel in its summer programming crown, The Ultimate Surfer. 

The network promises “Dramatic rivalries. Intense challenges. Summer romances?” and the teaser delivers ten-fold on the promise, human-with-phallus Mason Barnes, from Wilmington, North Carolina and rated #1126 on the WQS, apparently mating with birthing person Malia Ward, the twenty-three-year-old daughter of Chris Ward. 

“There might be a little fire in the eyes of Malia and Mason,” says Koa Smith. 

The series, which was filmed entirely at the WSL’s Surf Ranch in Lemoore, California, is rumoured to be dominated by Zeke Lau, a powerfully built Hawaiian of six feet and two inches with full round breasts sculpted by God and which rivet the eyes. 

His reward will be wildcards to Snapper, Margaret River and Surf Ranch on the 21-22 Tour. 

Lau qualified for the WCT in 2017 and competed for three seasons before missing the cut for the 2020 season. 

It ain’t surprising Zeke wins; put any WCT surfer against qualifier-level shredders and the difference is marked. 

The other cast members, Kai Barger, Austin Clouse, Mason Barnes, Luke Davis, Alejandro Moreda and Koa Smith are a mix of beauty and some talent, although none, I think, at CT level, unlike Zeke. 

Zeke’s high point on the tour was in 2018 when he highlighted the world champion John John Florence’s tender underside, an unwillingness to engage in paddle battles etc. 

Response on Instagram has been mixed, commenters falling into two camps.

The first, emoji riddled and “How can I watch The Ultimate Surfer in (insert country).

The second is led by noted Australian surfers, including Harry Bryant, “What is this fucking rubbish?”, Skeggs guitarist and talented surf filmmaker Toby Cregan “Ultimate Cringe Machine” and fuck-the-WSL’s Noa Deane who writes simply, “RIP.”

"(We) will always put human life and human safety first with the shark control program."

The Queensland government was just “hours” away from announcing the removal of shark nets on its beaches, it’s been revealed, replacing ‘em with birds in the sky during the annual winter whale migration when three hundred or so of the leviathans swim up the coast for the tropical waters of North Queensland.

And where there’s whales, Whites are gonna trail.

Despite criticism the nets were a little blunt in their application, taking out whales (tend to get tangled up on the return journey in August), dolphins and turtles etc, until last September there hadn’t been a fatal attack on Queensland’s netted beaches since their introduction sixty years earlier.

Do they work? Yeah, they do.

And, yet, before the September fatality, the Queensland shark control program’s scientific working group had recommended a scaling back of the nets, using aerial surveillance and drumlines here and there. Maybe they’d figured it was an act of God, not man, that had kept sharks and surfers away from each other.

Then Nick Slater was killed at Greenmount and all bets were off, as they say.

The Queensland government don’t fuck around.

They know the electorate well.

Now, data from June reveals thirty-five sharks, including nineteen tigers and two Great Whites, were caught in the nets, including a ten-footer at Coolangatta, right in the middle of the fabled Superbank.

A few theories were kicking around after the Greenmount hit, the most common being the build up of sand had positioned surfers right on the deep-water drop off, in the path of whales and Great Whites.

“(We) will always put human life and human safety first with the shark control program,” Fisheries Minister Mark Furner told the Courier-Mail. “The Government has no plan to remove shark control nets or drumlines from state controlled waters.”

A very different mindset to Byron Bay, an hour or so south, where the Great White, along with the leashless log, both killers, are venerated.

"Should have called it The Fresno or The Bakersfield…"

If you were wandering around Santa Cruz last week, you might have seen filmmaker Stacy Peralta on the streets.

Peralta, a former pro skater who co-wrote and directed Dogtown and Z-B0ys, is directing a commercial for Hyundai’s new compact truck, the Santa Cruz. The vehicle is in production now and will be rolling off the line by fall.

The truck features a 2.5 litre four, two- or all-wheel drive, and a four-foot truck bed.

Aptly named?

Peralta is stoked on the moniker. He told the Santa Cruz weekly Good Times, “Santa Cruz is one of those extremely unique California beach towns. It’s extremely rare because this city has everything the great cities have. It has a gigantic cultural mix in a tiny area.”

And,

“Something else that blows my mind is how much presence there is in this town for Black Lives Matter. I’m blown away.”

And,

“A bitchin’ record store is always the sign of a great place. Because a store like this cannot exist in a town that doesn’t understand it. These kinds of places are what gives towns color.”

“There’s a really deep bed of culture here. There’s a heavy performance ethic here. If you’re a skateboarder, a surfer, a mountain biker, or a hiker, or a musician or an artist, everyone is competing with each other to be great. Which makes [Santa Cruz] great.”

What a dance ol’ Stacy taps out.

While Santa Cruz ain’t Nineveh, it ain’t what Peralta describes, either.

And notice how he curiously stops short of connecting the dots between the name and its use for the daily surfer.

Is it out-of-bounds to question Peralta and how this particular build represents Santa Cruz, that great coastal city? Can we question the lack of power, four-wheel drive and a truck bed too small to hold the shortest of shortboards?

Let’s do.

Not since the Mexican release of Chevrolet’s Nova – translated as “It does not go” – has a vehicle been so poorly named.

Hyundai labels the Santa Cruz a “sports adventure vehicle.”

Locals Ken “Skindog” Collins and Jason “Ratboy” Collins label it something else.

“Super stupid. Total bullshit. Should have called it The Fresno or The Bakersfield,” Ken says.

“I think they should have named it the Silicon Valley! Most definitely not a surf truck!” Ratboy says. “It looks like a new Subaru Brat.”

Peralta has to know that the truck isn’t really functional for surfing, right?

“He is just doing his best to help sell a piece of shit. His [BLM] comments are true without a doubt, but it’s just another selling technique to reach The Woke,” says Ken.

Ratboy adds that “Santa Cruz used to have culture and a cool vibe but it’s just an overcrowded watered-down version of what it was. I think its lame to take a cool city and try and exploit it for a crappy car sale. Hyundai is trying hard to be cool but it’s still a Hyundai.”

Ken agrees. “The surf culture has been totally assassinated by Kooks, so this should sell really well.”

He reflects briefly and says, “I ended up getting a Sprinter van. So who the hell am I to have an opinion about cars?”

Question #1: What would a car named after your town, your break look like?

Question #2: What would be a more fitting name for Hyundai’s new “sports adventure vehicle?”