“That was heavy,” says Nathan Florence.

A couple of days back, Teahupoo was big, skis and boats everywhere, drivers’ faces wet with spray and sweat as they manoeuvred photographers into position to shoot the wave’s extravagant barrel in a game of potentially fatal choreography.

Pretty rare for a boat to go over, or lose a passenger, especially in the hands of the experienced drivers who work the two-lever steering wheels, forever treading an ultra-fine line between deep water and the slightest incline of reef that’ll drag ‘em back into the hole.

In the incident below, Ted Grambeau, possibly the best, definitely the sweetest, surf photographer ever to draw breath, and Chris Bryan, the high-def video gun for hire, for whom the phone tolls every time a studio wants the finest in surf-cinematic vision, are tossed from their vessel, along with their lunch baguette, only seconds after recording an epic ride.

 

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The Tahitian driver is catlike in a scenario that would have most leaving wet web stains on the front of their red bunny pyjamas.

Also sunglass help, please.

I am currently sitting in Munich’s functional flughafen, in transit, and needing to purchase sunglasses. The very fine pair I had became lost over the weekend’s ballet rehearsal leaving my eyes squinty and tired but I don’t want Maui Jim and and I don’t want Police so I am going to have to search, quickly, and impulse sunglass buys are always regretted later.

Speaking of, I wonder if the World Surf League is, now, regretting their decision to cut the waiting period along with the field after Margaret River? The story developing around the exciting return of G-Land is becoming, more and more, WSL incompetence. Oh, the League cannot nor should not be blamed for the surf quality but they can and should be blamed for both timing of the event and winnowing the window.

Derek Rielly just wrote, “With waves that will be lucky to crest a man’s eyebrows predicted for the next week, and an eight-hour cycle of the event being “on hold”, come back in three hours etc, surf fans are becoming a little frustrated.”

Fans of professional surfing lashing out etc. I am certain a bunker mentality is taking hold, within WSL brass, maybe taking hold in an adjacent room to Tyler Wright’s Covid quarantine quarters. Everyone, haters, grumpy locals, derelicts always wanting more etc. and the League may be right within that bunker but the distinct hatred growing for its core audience doesn’t bode wonderfully.

Sunglasses.

Ray-Bans?

Prada?

Ugh.

Smart.

Memorial weekend is the official start of summer in the United States what with BBQs and its fireworks displays and its U.S. Open of Surfing and its good old timey riotous fun but this summer dire warnings are being given to those who would like to swim or learn to surf. Oh no it has nothing to do with rip-roaring inflation but rather a troubling lifeguard shortage affecting sea to shining sea.

Per reporting from CNN:

Dwindling interest in lifeguarding is not a new problem, according to some experts, but was exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, when many pools and training sessions were shuttered and many of the young applicants who would normally apply are now choosing retail or restaurant jobs that offer higher pay. Having unmanned pools can be dangerous or even deadly, Fisher said.

But leaders in the field say this moment also offers an important opportunity to reshape the narrative around the job: how it’s perceived by the public, who can do it, how much it pays and why it is so important.

“We’ve got to keep up pay rates, we’ve got to keep up motivating these lifesavers and making sure that everybody understands that at the end of the day, there is no better job than being a sort of lifesaver,” Tom Gill, vice president of the United States Lifesaving Association, a nonprofit representing beach lifeguards and open water rescuers.

And let’s hope our brave guards get their pay raises but let’s also not stress the safety net, as it were. Vulnerable adult learners and Wavestorms should likely stay on the sand for the foreseeable future. Spike ball, I hear, is very fun and I’ve played a fair deal of smash ball, which I can whole-heartedly recommend. Great for the entire family.

Enjoy!