Surfing for the win.

It was reported earlier in the week that the world’s greatest race car diver, Lewis Hamilton, was disqualified from the seeding rounds of the Sao Paulo Grand Prix after his Mercedes land rocket had failed to meet standards.

Hamilton, who hails from Best Britain, was forced to start the race in dead last because his drag reduction system was illegal, the stewards of the race declaring, “Hamilton’s car could not fulfill the requirement of a maximum 85 millimeter measurement.”

Much hand-wringing etc. except not by Sir Lewis who went out and won the dang race anyhow.

Per the just-released BBC report:

It was a gripping conclusion to a weekend of bitterness and rancour between the two teams contesting the championship, and controversy both on and off the track.

The 101st victory of Hamilton’s career sent a powerful message of intent and is a potentially critical moment in the championship.

Had Verstappen held Hamilton off, he would have been able to finish second behind the Mercedes driver at the three remaining races in Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi and still win the title.

Now, the title race is wide open and the two head to the Middle East with everything to play for.

Max Verstappen, flying Dutchman, also touched Hamilton’s car and received a hefty fine and the Middle East will be exciting, as it always is, though pundits were left to wonder how the diminutive Englishman could be so cool under fire.

Some, here, posited that it is due his surf obsession.

For I was, recently, at Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch there in the cow folds of Lemoore, California, enjoying a bounty of waves when I heard “someone special is coming.”

“Who?” I asked as a true surf journalist.

“Lewis Hamilton,” was the answer and whoa. I very much looked forward to watching him hand drag the roof of that miniature barrel.

The 7x F1 winner is a noted enthusiast of Surf Ranch, spending much time there, and you can see his fast twitch muscle skills here.

Alas, it was not to be. Apparently he could not secure a private jet out of Los Angeles and had to miss his session but when I heard he had been disqualified from Brazilian seeding rounds, I wondered if it was surf’s fault. Head not in game etc. Too much water logging.

When he won, I wondered if it was surf’s perfection. His knowing, in his depths, that all he needs are some tasty waves and a cool buzz.

No Dutchman, however flying, could transcend that amount of chill.

Surfing for the win.

Spicoli approved.

"Sand, Sun, Sea and Sex with Strangers."

Spain’s Canary Islands, floating west of sunny North Africa is on every surfer-worth-her-salt’s “places to go and poke around” list. Razor sharp volcanic reefs, feisty locals, nooks and crannies to explore and maybe get lucky within. The chain also just so happens to be on many sexually-adventurous-tourist-worth-his-chaps, hosting a very large Gay Pride festival etc. but a damning new report has fingered this casual public sex, not surfing, with destroying the environment.

According to CNN, a new paper in the Journal of Environmental Management — “Sand, Sun, Sea and Sex with Strangers, the ‘five S’s. Characterizing ‘cruising’ activity and its environmental impacts on a protected coastal dunefield” — looks for the first time at the environmental impact on the coastal reserve being used as a cruising area.

Researchers inventoried 298 “sex spots” on the beach, over a total area of over two square miles, mainly among “bushy and dense vegetation” and nebkhas — dunes that wad up around vegetation. They studied them during May 2018, a period which included the local Gay Pride festival.

The tourists’ sex, and “cruiser trampling,” impacts “directly” not only on the nebkhas, but also on eight native plant species, three of which are endemic, they found.

As a result of the tourists’ activities, there has been a “complete abandonment” of environmental education in the reserve, according to the study. The reserve was originally created with education as a “primary activity.”
What’s more, Gran Canaria giant lizards — a popular sight in the Canary islands — have “died after eating condoms left behind by pleasure seekers,” wrote Patrick Hesp, one of the report’s authors, in an article for The Conversation.

Hosting up to 14 million visitors a year, Gran Canaria is a gay-friendly tourist destination, with visitors from the US, UK and Germany among the main markets, and while the authors are quick to emphasize that there is “no intention to criticize some of the LGBTI community,” and stressed that it was not just LGBTQ visitors having sex in the dunes, they note that “cruising is openly practiced” on Maspalomas.

At the end, the authors of the paper did not want to call for an end to public sex but noted, “One couple having sex on the beach is one thing; but having hundreds converge on the same area every day damages the dunes as much as off-road driving does.”

Surfing, mercifully, spared any wrath.