From the can’t-win-for-losing department… 

Last week, major Australian news outlet The Sydney Morning Herald ran a long piece on Brooke Farris’ elevation to CEO of Rip Curl, smashing fifty-two years of “hypermasculine” history for the company.

Farris was the logical choice for the role, the sharpest tool in that particular shed in Torquay, although the wonderful Neil Ridgway aka Head, the company’s marketing man, was a close-ish second I’d imagine.

Many important passages in the story.

The day Farris was made CEO in August, Wright lost a critical heat at the Corona Open Mexico, meaning she didn’t make the world top five. She had just come back from the beach, crushed and sunburnt, when Farris called. “I was quite upset and emotional,” recalls Wright, who has battled chronic fatigue syndrome since a 2018 bout of influenza. “In a business sense, I didn’t perform. I didn’t make the [Rip Curl WSL Finals], which is their event, their Super Bowl. Most of the time, when you don’t produce for your sponsor, you don’t hear from them, but Brooke was like, ‘You’ve done brilliantly this year – you’re number six in the world. Think of all the challenges you’ve faced.’ She’s someone who actually listens and cares.”

All-embracing, female-friendly marketing is pretty much the antithesis of the alienating surf ads from the early days, such as Billabong’s “Only a surfer knows the feeling” campaign. Surf brand Gotcha also famously ran a series of ads with the slogan, “If you don’t surf, don’t start”. Says Nik Carroll: “It was full-on, like saying, ‘Surfing is for a very special f…ing breed of people, mostly men. Don’t try to walk into this door because it’ll get slammed in your face.’”

For Farris, the challenge will be to preserve the mystique of surfing while making it more accessible, welcoming newcomers and perhaps even creating a fresh surf culture along the way. It’s a tricky balancing act. “You still want to be cool enough to recruit that next generation, but I think by approaching it from a place of inclusivity, people will be attracted to that,” she says. “I’d rather see more people try surfing because … I’ve never met anyone who comes out of the water and says, ‘Oh, I wish I hadn’t gone for a surf.’ You always feel better for it.”

Late in the piece, Rip Curl gets a light kick in the guts for its lack of diversity in its online fit guide, a surprising charge given the company’s diverse use of labor, including the brave North Korean. 

There’s also plenty of surfwear made for women – not out of altruism, but because it makes commercial sense. Rip Curl legend has it that co-founder Brian Singer once vowed never to make female surf gear, but women’s products now account for more than 40 per cent of sales globally. Farris talks about “empathy-led design” and has introduced a new online fit guide featuring a bunch of Rip Curl employees – (at this stage, all white) women of different shapes and sizes – wearing an assortment of bikini tops and bottoms, to help customers figure out which swimsuit will fit them best.

Read story here.

"This is a motor race!"

What a thrilling end to an altogether thrilling season. Oh, I’m not writing about the Triple Crown of Surfing, which has transformed into TikTok competition, no, I’m writing about the just-wrapped F1 world championships which found culmination in Abu Dhabi.

For the less world sporty, England’s Lewis Hamilton, an avid e-foiler, Surf Ranch enthusiast and Kelly Slater’s wonderful friend was battling all season long against The Netherlands’ Max Verstappen who rides for Red Bull which also sponsors Jamie O’Brien and Kai Lenny.

Much exciting with various barbs pitched back and forth between teams but it all came down to Abu Dhabi with Hamilton leading, Verstappen appearing done for, when a crash on lap 52 of 58 brought out the safety car.

The Red Bull team was able to convince race director that lapped cars should be able to overtake the safety car, which slotted Verstappen right behind Hamilton.

Since the Flying Belgian-Dutchman was on new tires, he blew past Hamilton who was left stalled with only seven world championships under his fire suit, still four short of Slater’s all-time surfing mark.

Hamilton’s team threw a giant fit but to no avail and Verstappen stands on top, telling his crew, “It’s insane… can we do this for another 10 or 15 years together?”

Slater’s mark in the crosshairs?

More as the story develops.

Not chill.

The dangers associated with surfing are well-known. Shark attacks, drowning, slaps from furious locals, bashing off reefs etc. but, whenever I paddle out, I rarely, maybe never, consider it “dangerous.” Oh sure, I’m not paddling out to Jaws, and my heart has crawled right into my throat plenty of times, but something going wrong, really wrong, never enters my mind.

Well, an eighteen-year-old young Las Vegas mn, handsome and fit, had always dreamed of surfing and finally got his opportunity on a Thanksgiving family vacation to Hawaii. He ordered up a lesson but told Las Vegas’s NBC affiliate, “Within that first or second wave, I noticed my lower back was starting to feel tense. Soon as I touched the sand, my legs pretty much just gave out.”

He tried stretching it out but when no relief came his family took him to the hospital where it was revealed he had suffered Surfer’s myelopathy, a condition that leaves little to no sensation in the lower half of the body and is so rare that there have been less than 100 documented cases in the past 20 years.

“It wasn’t a traumatic injury. I didn’t fall, I didn’t hit a rock,” he said. “It really just happened on a surfboard, standing up arching my back, and somehow ended up with me being paralyzed.”

Doctors say the condition occurs when a surfer, lying on a board, hyperextends the back while getting up thereby causing non-traumatic injury to the T10 vertebrae.

The young man is home, now, trying to get as much sensation back as he can, pushing through and rehabbing. He said there have been ups and downs, so far, and a long road ahead. A GoFund me has been set up to help with crazy costs.

But, man, Surfer’s myelopathy? What a sneaky, sneaky little jerk.