Morey was real good on the skins and uke, too.

Obituary: Warshaw on supersonic surf inventor Tom Morey, “Tom was a bullshitter who knew he was a bullshitter, with a great sense of humor. Surfing doesn’t have a surplus of those people.”

"Tom looked at surfing and saw it as being infinitely flexible and funny and worthy of our time."

Two days ago, the free-thinking inventor of the boogieboard and one of surfing’s great gifts to the world, Tom Morey, died, aged eighty-six.

Ol Tom wasn’t in the best shape. He was blind and broke, despite the outrageous success of the boogie board, which celebrated its fiftieth anniversary this July.

A little earlier today, I asked surf history custodian Matt Warshaw to fill in the blanks. Who was Tom Morey and why did he matter.

DR: When I told you Morey died yesterday, you wrote back, That’s a big one. Why big?

Warshaw: The boogie made him the Johnny Appleseed in terms of spreading wave-riding happiness, so there’s that. But the thing that stands out just as much, for me anyway, is how Tom looked at surfing and saw it as being infinitely flexible and funny and worthy of our time. Lesser minds, especially in the late ’60s and ’70s, loaded the sport down with 15 varieties of philosophical bullshit and we had to drag that around for years. Tom’s view of surfing was bigger and broader than anybody’s, but he never lost touch with the fact that at the bottom of it all we’re just out there riding waves, and riding waves is fun, and that the serious stuff, the more profound stuff, is really just a byproduct of having a good time. You don’t aim at enlightenment by surfing, in other words. You aim for a good ride, a good pun, a long late-night bullshit design session with other surfers and a half-case of Zinfandel—and if you do that for enough years, enlightenment in one form or another will find you. Tom was smart as hell, creative, a bullshitter who knew he was a bullshitter, with a great sense of humor. Surfing doesn’t have a surplus of those people. We’re no longer producing them as fast as they’re dying off. That’s what I meant by saying that Tom dying is a big one.

In that old profile of Morey by Steve Barilotti you posted on EOS yesterday, he’s described as “perhaps the most revered and reviled man among modern waveriders.” Wild claim and maybe hard to believe, now, but back in 1996, hate for boogieboarding was acute. Did Morey ever talk about that side of it? 

Yeah, he talked about that in the article somewhere. He didn’t deny it. “Red ants and black ants will never get along,” or something like that. I was thinking, while reading Steve’s piece, that bodyboarders are nowhere near as hated as they were in the 1980s and ’90s. When I was at SURFER we did a Mike Stewart profile and I headlined it something like “Mike Stewart: Best Surfer in the World,” not “Best Bodyboarder,” and the hate mail rained down. That would not be the case today. Or rather, there would still be haters, but also plenty of defenders and various list-makers sharing their favorite non-WSL-Top-Five favorites.

Tom regarded his invention as important as the spoon, the printing press, yeah? 

That’s what he said. But that’s what I mean about Tom being a bullshitter. Or a salesman. I don’t know if Tom believed it, but you’d listen to him make the case and he could shift your view, for sure. He had that grinning-mad-professor charisma. Actually, I do think he did believe that about the boogie. Or, at least, that the world will be a better place in direct proportion to how many of us are out there riding waves. He believed that, and I do too.

How did he name the boogie? 

It was going to be called the SNAKE, short for Side, Navel, Arm, Knee, Elbow, which is a terrible and likely product-killing name, so he went back to his music roots and pulled out “Boogie” instead. Here’s another thing. There was a really popular novelty song from that time called Hey Babe, Ya Wanna Boogie?” and I’ll bet a hundred bucks Morey loved it, and loved calling his new craft a “Boogie” because that gave it the double-entendre, just like Simon had with his Thruster. Morey never, ever called it a bodyboard, God bless him. It was a Boogie till the end.

Real talk. Was it the little board or was it out-of-the-box thinking surfers who grabbed a kid’s toy who made bodyboarding? ie, Mike Stewart and co granting Morey a place in design lore by taking the boogie places it wasn’t mean to go. An accidental design breakthrough. 

In that little clip I posted yesterday of Morey riding his boogie in 1972 you can see he’s not just trimming out, he’s turning and pulling high and cutting back. So I don’t think he ever thought of the boogie as just a beginner’s board—although that was certainly part of it too. But Tom himself, visionary and all, no, I don’t he think had any idea Mike and the rest of those first-generation boogie savants were going to take it as far as they did, as fast as they did.

Talk about his genius to bullshit ratio . . . 

I wrote yesterday that said Morey’s genius-to-bullshit ratio was 2:3, but that was supposed to be 3:2. More genius, in other words. Of course, I’m no actuary.

He went blind in his last few years and was broke as hell. What happened, money-wise?

I don’t know. He didn’t talk much about those decisions, at least not on record, or at least not that I’ve read. But I always feel bad when people like that end up having to do a Go Fund Me, which means they have no health insurance, or crap health insurance, which makes me angry at our health care system but also angry at the person for not having health insurance.

Did surfing need Tom Morey? 

Sure. The silver lining of Tom’s death has been this great outpouring of affection, everybody sharing their memories of him. We still love our eccentrics, we still boogie with the oddballs, and I am so grateful for that.


Latinx star of The Ultimate Surfer Alejandro Moreda on WSL CEO’s wild $10,000 gamble against him, the divine joys of cock-fighting and the clever line that won him Puerto Rico’s most beautiful woman!

Fall in love with Ale all over again!

If you watched ABC’s The Ultimate Surfer, and who didn’t, you would have fallen under the spell of the Puerto Rican pocket-rocket Alejandro Moreda.

Although only five-feet five tall in his striped American Apparel socks, he is a salad of perfect genes and, at Surf Ranch,  jackknifed Taylor Knox-esque cutbacks and chewed, bit, sucked, gnawed and stabbed his way almost to victory in the much loved reality show. 

After a succession of foxy high-fashion nymphs in his wild youth, for Ale is now thirty-four, he settled on the Miss Universe contestant Mia Blackman Gomez, a rich, ripe, radiant apricot. 

Conversation in the podcast settles on many things, including WSL CEO Erik “Elo” Logan’s wild $10,000 bet against him on the show, his love of “little cocks” and his daddy’s love of “fighting cocks” and why he can’t make a dime as a pro surfer.

Crazy!


Mikey Wright's brother Owen, pictured.
Mikey Wright's brother Owen, pictured.

World Surf League announces 2022 Championship Tour wildcards, dropping jaws by including exciting one-time prodigies Kolohe Andino, Owen Wright!

It's a whole new world of surf.

Yesterday afternoon, middle-Friday I believe, the World Surf League shocked the actual surf world by dropping the wildcard slate for the 2022 Championship Tour season.

Per the press release:

Today the World Surf League (WSL) Tours and Competition Team announced the WSL wildcards for the 2022 Championship Tour (CT) season: Lakey Peterson (USA), Malia Manuel (HAW), Kolohe Andino (USA), and Owen Wright (AUS).

These athletes will join the qualifiers from the 2021 Championship Tour, as well as the current surfers competing on the 2021 Challenger Series. There are two events remaining in the Challenger Series, the Quiksilver and Roxy Pro France and the Haleiwa Challenger, which will determine the final Challenger Series rankings and the qualifiers to the elite CT.

“We’re excited to welcome these surfers back on the Championship Tour as the 2022 season Wildcards,” said Jessi Miley-Dyer, SVP of Tours and Head of Competition. “Lakey and Kolohe sustained injuries early in the season, with both athletes missing a total of five events in the last season. Malia and Owen both had good results in 2021, and were very close from requalifying for 2022 at the end of the season. All four surfers had proven performances over the recent years and earned a spot among the world’s best.”

Kolohe Andino and Owen Wright are, of course, one-time prodigies. Andino, son of professional surfing father Dino, hails from San Clemente, California.

Wright, whose brother Mikey recently retired from the tour, will join sister Tyler who remains on the women’s side.

Peterson and Manuel will also join Tyler on the women’s side. Both bringing much promise with them.

Unannounced was winner of The Ultimate Surfer Zeke Lau.

Fresh blood everywhere.


Gabriel Medina’s family feud goes nuclear; allegations of wild sex tape from drunken party in Rio; Yasmin Brunet to sue! “Another lie created to attack me would be about a supposed homosexual relationship. As if living a love was something that would offend.”

"I don't agree with machismo. Just as my life also has no room for homophobia."

Earlier this year, Brazil media reported that Gabriel Medina had split, in a professional as well as a private sense, from his mammy Simone and his step-daddy Charlie Serrano.

Charlie you know as the ubiquitous, unsmiling, ever-supportive pillar behind his equally taciturn looking son.

The split was driven, it was said, by Medina’s surprise marriage to thirty-three-year-old actress and Swimsuit Illustrated model Yasmin Brunet, parental sadness over losing their lil man, the ol’ empty nest syndrome.

A few weeks back, mammy and Charlie put the Gabriel Medina Institute which they got in the breakup deal onto the market, seeking two mill or so. As well, Gabriel slashed mammy’s allowance from five to three-and-a-half gees a month.

Now, journalist Leo Dias from Metropóles is reporting that Gabriel has blocked mammy Simone on social media after she allegedly claimed to have a sex tape of a real young Yasmin.

Wasn’t real kind about Yasmin’s mum, either. 

“She was really crazy at a party at her condo in Rio. Drunk, in the parking lot, doing this to a guy and then throwing up,” Simone allegedly wrote to her son.

Simone’s alleged message stream to her world champ son, Gabriel.

Dias reports Yasmin and Luiza are going to sue Simone for defamation.

On Thursday, Yasmin posted a rebuttal on Instagram. 

Out of respect for my fans and Gabriel, I want to express myself about some news that came out this week. One of them says that there is an intimate video of me in possession of a family member of my husband. This information is not valid. There is no such material. And it never existed. However, I need to emphasise that, even if it did, it is regrettable to want to diminish a woman’s sexuality, to be owners of our bodies and desires.

I would have nothing to be ashamed of and no woman would either. I don’t agree with machismo. Just as my life also has no room for homophobia. Another lie created to attack me would be about a supposed homosexual relationship. As if living a love was something that would offend… And that kind of attitude saddens me these days. I value respect for women and for all those who live their loves.

And I’m just going public, because Gabriel and I are tired of this spectaculation of our lives. And also to put an end to these speculations and creations, which are a pitiful attempt to try to attack my honour. 

With or without video, with or without a same-sex relationship, I, all women and all LGBTQIA+ deserve respect.


Richie Vas, properly poised. Photo: Rod Owen (owenphoto.com.au)
Richie Vas, properly poised. Photo: Rod Owen (owenphoto.com.au)

Surf Journalist recognizes need for baseline general fitness as he prepares to train for greatest trilogy fight of the decade!

Explosion at Surf Expo.

Last week found me purposing in my very heart to strive for greatness, once again. To be a good example to children everywhere, David Lee Scale’s included, and challenge my erstwhile nemesis to the greatest trilogy in fight history even better than Fury versus Wilder.

Noble and savage.

Except, the last time I properly fought was a lifetime ago and in a suburban Sydney still brave and free. My opponent was the notable slab weaver, mixed martial artist, Maroubra Boy Richie “Vas” Vaculik who had inexplicably agreed to the match. I trained some Brazilian Jiujitsu in the morning, took a short kickboxing lesson in the afternoon, met him in the ring as night strangled light.

The thing I remembered most was exhaustion. Pure physical exhaustion after mere seconds of bouncing around the ring getting my kidneys kicked, temples lightly socked.

Sweat pouring, sweat blinding me, gasping for breath. Eventually, near the end of round one, I threw a punch, dislodged my shoulder from its socket and mercifully disgusted Richie and his trainer into grimacing and refusing to continue.

Whew.

Fighting is tiring.

Lesson learned, and remembered, I knew I would have to achieve some semblance of fitness before the next Explosion at Surf Expo.

Now, previously, I had been the sort to declare “surfing is my workout” except outfitted with the latest and greatest in fitness tracking technology, the WHOOP 4.0, I realized that surfing not, in fact, a workout or at least not the way I surf.

Average session (Album twin fin) on one of Cardiff-by-the-Sea’s handful of reefs (Pipe’s, Turtles) did not register as an “activity.”

WHOOP knows all, knows when heartrate soars, know when body is strained, knows when it is not. If the sleek black strap senses any sort of exertion it quickly logs, later asking via the easy-to-navigate cellular smartphone application what sort of activity it was. Sometimes it guesses, always correctly.

Three things are constantly being calculated: Strain, Recovery and Sleep. Strain, as Derek Rielly elucidated, is measured on a scale of 0 to 21. A day spent in David Lee Scale’s Adidas would register somewhere in the medium to upper 4s. A day spent perched on a Corinthian leather stool, under zinc countertop, dissecting world’s greatest surfer Kelly Slater’s motives, drinking Grey Goose and sodas would register somewhere in the low to medium 5s.

Surfing, or at least the way I surf, would register in the medium 7s and, again, not an “activity.”

I took two things from this valuable information. I need to surf harder and kick above 10 every day, if I hoped to steal the heavyweight crown as a super middleweight.

Kick above 15 probably.

Let me tell you, kicking above 10 is no easy thing. WHOOP is a cruel, heartless trainer, which is what makes it oh so good. The amount of sweat pouring, grimacing, matters not. Laps can be run, exhaustion felt, WHOOP comes back with a shrug. It cares not for disposition.

Here, for instance, is a day that I ran around the park doing intermittent pushups and planking very sweaty.

Here is a day that I ran three miles to the train station to pick up an abandoned car doing intermittent pushups along the way.

My legs didn’t work right after the train station jaunt and I knew I needed to get stronger, fitter, faster. I knew that my piecemeal approach, as clearly evidenced by WHOOP, would not cut it.

I needed my Cousin Danny, locked up for a second stretch after robbing southern California banks at a record clip, getting out, heisting some art and jewels then re-pivoting to banks before getting locked up again.

I needed prison fit.