The Olympics, mere days away, has officially begun to suck the general public’s attention like a big black hole. Headlines from Tokyo now dominate news from around the world. The latest on athlete village behavior, profiles of exciting potential future stars and, of course, surfing.
Our grand Olympic debut has storylines then storylines then storylines. One of the more thrilling is who will emerge as next Shaun White.
As you know, the relatively unknown snowboarder became a household name after winning Olympic gold in 2006 and went on to much fame, fortune. Dating rock n’ rollers, creating a line of boys’ clothing for Target, later getting slammed with sexual harassment allegations etc.
Which surfer, though, has the potential to be regular famous, not just surf famous? Early frontrunners, Japan’s Kanoa Igarashi and the U.S.’s Kolohe Andino, have been trading heavy media blows. Yesterday, Igarashi delivered a humanizing interview to Outside magazine.
Today, Andino delivered a winning metaphor in describing surfing to a generally confused public telling The New York Times, “It’s so weird, competitive surfing. You could be the best surfer, the most talked-about surfer, whatever, and you go out there and you just need a score and you cannot find a wave. It’s like Tom Brady needs to go down the field for the winning score and he can’t find the ball.”
I laughed when I read it, laughed again when I just typed it and have to believe Andino has pulled ahead. Wheaties box soon etc.
The Times piece highlights how Andino has a clear advantage over Florence et. al. since he grew up surfing relatively poor surf in San Clemente. Not noted was how the World Surf League has decided to declare its champion in a one-day surf-off at San Clemente’s Lower Trestles and how Andino described the the move as “ludicrous” and “corny.”
But back to Tom Brady not finding the ball… truly funny.
Winning, even.
No kidding! I was really into this guy, such a sweetheart but definitely a sporadic pumper in bed and I cut him loose. Yowza!!!
A round about way of saying that competitive surfing isn’t a sport!
Maybe it was second hand cocaine.
If you dingbats can handle a snark-free, sincere, non-whiney, un-sideline-sitting tribute, how about a three cheers for Fernando Aguerre who is on the verge of his Fitzcarraldian/Quixotic quest to get surfing in the Olympics.
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This stunning interview with Fernando was in SURFER a thousand centuries ago – in the Lisa Andersen cover of SURFER for fook’s sake!!! – and now here he is, three days away from the dream come true.
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Congrats Fernando. A shocking amount of work finally paying off, and now – 25 years later – it looks like a Typhoon GoodKarma is headed your way.
Yay.
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Next up is Fernando teaming up with his bro Obama to bring Major League Baseball to Cuba. Build a thoroughly modern stadium in Havana and populate it with all Cubans, or the best of the Caribbean Islands – call the team the Caribbean Islanders.
Americans would flock into Cuba to watch baseball, and the merchandising and TV rights in Latin America would pay for the lot.
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How about no cheers!
Kolohe is a fucking spoiled brat who would rather lose to prove his point about not getting waves while Italo is catching a wave a minute, literally. Fuck that twat.
Watching the US girls get beaten by Sweden in soccer. Weird with and empty stadium.
I reckon you could scrawl that on Elo’s shiny choppers with one of Ozzie Wright’s poscas and get him to stand on the water’s edge with that dumb grin for the whole contest. Be of some fucking use to the Wozl
“Born and raised in San Clemente, Calif., the son of a professional surfer from the 1980s and early ’90s, Andino has always been a short amble away from the steady break at T Street and the sporadic pumpers at Upper and Lower Trestles.”
Oh NYT, please stop writing about surfing. Sporadic pumpers!
Soggy cardboard post copulation. Ewwwww
The great irony here is that those pro surfer cunts catch a squillion waves every free surf and burn and drop in and snake and generally, willingly ignore every piece of conventional surf etiquette that’s ever existed. All for their “training and preparation.”
Then they get in a contest heat and magically transform into bobbing fucking teabags for 30 minutes, seemingly unable to find waves for love nor money. It ain’t hard you dumb cunts. Catch waves and ride ‘em. Non-stop. Be like Italo. He’s world champ.
I just deleted your Koa unboxing comment… pushed the idea to Chas to text Elo about it.
I was being facetious…
It’s a terrible idea and wrong on so many levels, I think they’ll love the idea.
Haha good. If Chas can pitch it as a beautiful moment to share with the fans, ELo may just bite!
Gabriel Medina wins everything…
He should have hired your wife because it looks like the only thing he got out of all this is a Chipotle Kolohe Bowl.
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Missed opportunity to get his Dad a line of Dino Buddies https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Short arms?
Was his bowl deliberately designed to look like a cunt, or is that a happy accident?
Come on. The Kale-ohe Andino. You’re fired, fucker.
Daddy Dino had the big chorizo salad by all accounts
Does Kolohe toss the salad?
Conversely it’s a horrible metaphor in the eyes of the non-surfer, who will raise the question “if the surfer can’t find the wave why don’t they run the contest in one of those wave pools?”
“It’s, it’s like Kelly Slater being crowned 12 time World Champ – it ain’t gonna happen coz of age.”
I thought it wasn’t going to happen because of Brazilians.