A poor, young child and a place he will never be allowed to visit.
A poor, young child and a place he will never be allowed to visit.

Acting World Surf League CEO Emily Hofer castigated for brutalist exclusionary policies at “rich people only” Surf Ranch facility!

Rich People and Purpose.

While it is still difficult to imagine, we must all come to grips with the fact that we are, officially, living in a post-ELo world. The former chief executive of the World Surf League, ruthlessly fired one week ago, has left behind broken hearts and raving minds but we are forced to move on. Mandated to dry our eyes and cast our gaze upon the new acting CEOs, the Chief Purpose and People Officer Emily Hofer and Chief Legal Bob Kane with particular attention given to Purpose and People.

Hofer, who grew up in San Jose and Miami, was brought on by the aforementioned Erik Logan told Authority Magazine, “Three years ago, he asked me to lead our work in Purpose at WSL, and at the time, I told him I wasn’t sure I was the right person to lead the work. Afterall, I had no professional experience in ESG work, and in particular, I was not formally trained in Ocean Conservation or Environmental Sciences. He assured me I was the right person for the job and said ‘trust me, you’ll do great.’ After a few months, I realized that not only could I lead the work, but I could make a real difference.”

That “difference,” of course, has been in saving the environment though the building and operating of power/water hungry artificial wave tanks that keep impoverished folks locked out, unable to even peer over a large wooden fence.

As you know, surfing is a greying pastime, particularly in the United States and Australia. Wildly high coastal property values means young middle-class families can no longer afford to live at the beach. In Lemoore, California, though, home to Kelly Slater’s Surf Ranch, a fine home can be bought for $300,000. An apartment rented for $600 a month. There, children all the colors of the rainbow ride bikes in the street, eat rocket pops served from ice-cream trucks and watch luxury SUVs, windows darkened, whiz by on their way to the ultra-excuse manmade wave.

In the warmer months, Surf Ranch can be rented for $70,000 a day.

In cooler months, $50,000.

Zero of those slots are given to the lower-middle class locals. Hard-working migrant farmers, low-income teachers, blackjack dealers.

Hofer declares, “We know that each community has its own unique needs and challenges. At WSL, we partner with grassroots organizations and indigenous, communities to educate us about the unique solutions each community needs to protect and conserve their ecosystems. We believe it’s critical to bring humility and authentic listening to these conversations, and where we can, WSL provides different kinds of support to lift up these solutions.”

That does not include allowing the unwashed to surf.

And while hypocrisy has become sport inside the World Surf League’s gilded walls, the fact that already-burdened salt-of-the-earth folks are used as catchwords to excite millionaires and billionaires is… extreme.

David Lee Scales and I discussed this a few weeks ago on our podcast, in any case. A listener of program called in and said he was one of the lucky few to experience the tub. After his session, he talked with young man working at the facility, asking him if he surfed. The fellow said that he did and learned at Surf Ranch. How many hours of surf did he get per month? Two waves.

Two waves, per month, to the local toiling under the sun so that Diplo can post Instagram videos.

People and Purpose.

Listen here.

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Surf comic Sterling Spencer joins Erik Logan pile-on following WSL CEO’s mysterious disappearance, “I wonder what it feels for him, an entire surf community hates you and all he wanted was to do good!”

"I heard a lot of people complaining, more than I’ve ever heard, just about that one guy…"

The Pensacola surfer and comic Sterling Spencer has added his considerable voice to the attack on Erik “Elo” Logan following the sudden, and still mysterious, disappearance of the WSL’s high-profile CEO.

Logan, who is fifty-two, was disappeared by the WSL mid-event at the Vivo Rio Pro, no reason given, only a curtly worded press release that neither thanked nor exalted their high-profile CEO.

“Today, the World Surf League (WSL) announced that CEO Erik Logan has departed the company, effective immediately. As the WSL begins the process of identifying a new CEO, Emily Hofer, WSL’s Chief People and Purpose Officer, and Bob Kane, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Legal Officer, will jointly lead the company and continue to drive the WSL’s mission to showcase the world’s best surfers on the world’s best waves as the global home of competitive surfing.”

Despite cultivating what may have felt like enduring friendships on tour, at one point world champ Filipe Toledo edged close to BFF status, any allies of Logan have been conspicuously silent. Even the WSL’s preferred media outlets joined the pile-on, their sudden shift pointed out earlier this week by Chas Smith.

The Inertia, which previously praised Logan as “visionary” and “cool guy, someone we should emulate” mocked his departure by likening the fallen to fat Elvis in a cruel headline reading “Erik Logan has left the building.”

Stab, which has attempted to recreate a miniature Wall of Positive Noise around its offerings, recently excoriating subscribers who dared question why the premium surf blog ran gambling ad with an open comment reading: Thanks for the input. Just so you understand, the money isn’t impossible to resist. It literally allows us to keep our staff employed. One month of Betonline promotion = three people’s salaries. So would you rather that we put three people out of work (also meaning we’d be able to create less content for you to enjoy) or put a little betting blurb at the bottom of our comp reports? We appreciate where you’re coming from, but for us it’s a pretty simple equation.

Now, Sterling Spencer, who is thirty-seven and the son of Gulf Coast legend Yancy Spencer III, and who hit worldwide fame in 2010 when he posted a dubbed video of a kid trying to get Jeremy Flores’ autograph at J-Bay, with Flores strangling Spencer at the Surfer Poll awards the same year in revenge, has added his voice to the harangue.

After pointing out Logan’s non-surfing bona fides with several brutal archived clips, Spencer delivers his coup de grâce.

“Everyone hated the guy… I heard a lot of people complaining, more than I’ve ever heard, just about that one guy, everyone hated him, poor guy. I wonder what it feels like for him, literally, an entire surf community hates you and all he wanted to do was good.”

There is a slight upside, as Spencer points out.

“I think he’s rich so he can be depressed in a nice house.”

 

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Dave Prodan (left) closes eyes to stop tears under withering attack from Conner Coffin (right).

The case against “ultimate apple-polisher” Dave Prodan for vacated World Surf League CEO job

Dave has sat idly by while the WSL turned into the "bullshit wannabe tennis tour" that Bobby foresaw.

Recently, Surfer and Stab recommended that Dave Prodan, current Chief Marketing Officer, be groomed as successor to the ELo throne. While his pedigree and involvement may be what Dirk and others view as logical and prudent, he is absolutely the wrong man for the job.

To begin, Dave has sat idly by while the WSL turned into the “bullshit wannabe tennis tour” that Bobby foresaw. Along each step of the way, Dave was fully responsible for the hype and positioning of the company in this pivot.

On several occasions, and most notably with Connor Coffin on his podcast “The Lineup”, Dave sought to gaslight competitors and surfing’s stalwarts into drinking the WSL Kool-Aid. Dave asked Connor how great the mid-year cut is and Connor replied essentially “Yeah, it was so cool to lose my job in waist-high Winki so you could manufacture drama”. Dave listened to the surfer rep mouth breathing and slack-jawed that the surfer dared to speak ill of the league.

Reason number two is simple, Dave is the manufacturer of the wall of positive noise.

Everything from Tea-hu-po-oh-oh and greenwashing from the WSL starts with the man in charge of marketing. It can be reasonably argued that Prodan is simply doing the bidding of owners, but the failure to make any ding in the wall of positivity is a brand decision, plain and simple.

Dave oversaw the gutting of the core, brand alignments, announcer washing, and likely had some influence over decisions such as failing to allow “Hamilton” to adorn the backs of male competitors on women’s day. It is well established that Dave feels the WSL and the associated content are fair game for a soap box to preach his politics and virtue signal, and elevation to CEO would merely silence more surfers and perpetuate the moronic wave of perpetual positivity.

Dave is also a turncoat.

He is very impassioned when he discusses his days at the Rip Curl surf center in my beloved San Clemente and seeks to delineate himself as a core surfer, denouncing the privilege of his monolithic and frankly unimpressive career. From a mere marketing and branding position Dave has failed to elevate the bleeding brand and has taken something everyone once’s loved and has turned it into something so forgettable my league mates and I have failed to set Fantasy teams for two consecutive contests.

He loves to position himself as a passionate surfer who cares about the sport, but in reality, it appears from the outside that Dave is a mere corporate shill who will do or say anything to continue a globe-trotting life of privilege, happy to rub elbows with competitors and talk surf on a podcast he has turned into the Dave Prodan show.

We as surfers want change, not a continuation of numbers conflation, not gaslighting us in an attempt to agree with what they’re doing, not perpetual saccharine and nauseatingly sweet conversations, not an over bloated tour of the world’s best surfers in the world’s worst waves.

We want to see amazing surf, amazing surfers, in contests that can be watched in a day, with a message we resonate with.

Dave won’t deliver. Full stop.

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Upper-middle-aged man (insert) experiencing prepubescent glee. Photo: North Shore
Upper-middle-aged man (insert) experiencing prepubescent glee. Photo: North Shore

Surfing’s 45-to-49 year old cis white male demographic explodes in fit of prepubescent glee as actor famous for playing Rick Kane snapped ripping on Oahu’s fabled North Shore!

"It's him! It's really him!"

With the landmark study revealing the average participation age, in surfing, to be 45-to-49 years young now officially part of the canon, wave sliders near and far are celebrating things they love publicly and without shame. Totems of this surfing life that were once hidden so the “youth” wouldn’t see and point mocking fingers. The musical stylings of Pennywise, for example, or the 1987 film North Shore.

Oh, any and every middle-to-upper-middle age cis white male has seen the classic multiple times. First on VHS, later on DVD, lastly streaming. It tells the story of Rick Kane, an Arizona surf standout who wins a contest in a pool, a drawing kit, a belt buckle and enough airfare for a trip to Oahu’s fabled North Shore. Once there he is treated to a heavy wake-up call via the powerful waves, sharp reef and serious local justice. He falls for Sam George’s ex-wife, is taken under the wing of a Pyzel-like surfboard shaper and eventually beats Laird Hamilton by discovering his soul.

Powerful.

And while surf fans have long been aware of Turtle, played by John Philbin, regularly popping up on the scene, Rick Kane’s Matt Adler has been harder to glimpse.

You can understand, then, the explosion of prepubescent glee when Adler was recently snapped on what was identified as the North Shore holding an expertly waxed mid-length and looking resolute.

Examining the photos further reveals he is nowhere near the North Shore, likely California, which lightly diminishes the joy.

In any case, the Daily Mail discusses Adler’s career in depth. How he rode from Michael J. Fox vehicle Teen Wolf into his North Shore role then alongside teen heartthrobs Corey Haim and Corey Feldman in Dream a Little Dream. His career later stalled but, apparently, he is friends with George Clooney and also much-loved by 45-to-49 year old male surfers the world over.

Beautiful nostalgia.

Speaking of, what do you image former World Surf League CEO Erik Logan is up to these days?

Home eating tubs of ice cream or is he preparing a crack legal team to challenge his ultra-harsh dismissal? He has stopped “liking” photos of Chief of Sport Jessi Miley-Dyer.

Smoke or fire?

More as the story develops.

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UFC featherweight god Max Holloway joins surf star girlfriend Alessa Quizon at wave pool in Texas, “Surfing is crazier than fighting!”

"WTF Max Holloway can surf???"

If you’re into watching human beings beat hell out of each other in a 750 square foot cage, you’ll know, and possibly adore, the preternaturally gifted Hawaiian striker Max Holloway, the self-described “best boxer in the UFC.”

Holloway, who is thirty-one and a former featherweight champ (these days he’s the #2 contender), is the husband of Hawaiian surf star Alessa Quizon (once the gal of Caio Ibelli) and grew up on Oahu’s west side, famous for Sunny Garcia, Johnny Boy Gomes, Makaha and so on.

So he’s been around surfing, even if boxing is his game.

As he told Rogan,

“I know all the big-wave surfers, Makua Rothman, and they always tell me, Zeke Lou, Kana Asing, hey, fighting is so crazy, I tell them, guy surfing is crazy, they’re like, no fighting is crazy! Guy, I’m fighting with a human being and I can kinda control what they do at certain times and what I do. When you’re surfing, you’re fighting mother nature my guy! If you fall off and if mother nature wants to throw you three times you’re going to get thrown three times!

As for safety equipment, says Holloway, “You got a puff-up vest? What if it doesn’t pop?”

In a recent Instagram post by Perfect Swell, the company behind the Waco pool, we see Holloway and Quizon riding back-to-back waves at the lauded Texas tank, Holloway competent enough while Quizon, as expected, concusses the wave with her endless beautiful strokes.

Fans were thrilled by the event, “WTF Max Holloway can surf???” but less so by the Reels format that cropped out most of the wave, “Worst camera work I’ve ever seen. 3 people surfing and he managed to miss all of them.”

Holloway’s wave pool adventure comes on the heels of another Hawaiian MMA superstar BJ Penn who nearly became surfing’s first pool fatality three years back when he was sucked outta the tank and into the engine room.

“Last year when I got sucked into a wave pool engine room and thought I was going to die… I kept thinking “don’t die for your kids” I was surfing for a about an hour and the line started getting longer to catch the wave. I was sitting next to the owner of the wave pool by the “wall” where the waves come from. The first wave it shoots out is a dud to get everyone ready for the next wave. The dud wave came back and because I was so close to the wall the wave swallowed me and pushed me and my surfboard underneath a huge cement wall. I remember feeling like I was getting sucked in a pipe and at that moment I got scared. It ended up pushing me into a big dark cement room that fills up with water to push the next wave for the wave pool. It felt like I was in the movie SAW or Final destination. The room would fill up with water to the top and I would hold my breath and then it would push the water out to make the wave and it was really rough inside there. Everything I bumped up against in the room that hurt me got infected. I got a bad sinus infection and a couple facial fractures from getting knocked around the cement walls and from the fractures the dirty water got in my face and infected my whole sinus. I was on antibiotics for three weeks for my face. While I was in the wave pool engine room I knew that one of my friends outside from big island is a legendary surfer and I knew he would come in there to rescue me so I stayed calm. A lot of other people might have panicked and maybe gave up but I just stayed strong for my kids. Anyway to make a long story short I survived that mother fucker 😛😛😛 !! The name of the people and water park have been left out. I not the kine guy shows up to your house to play and gets hurt and tries to sue you so all love ❤️ to everyone who helped me get there and helped me survive 🤙 Maybe I was the first guy in history to get sucked into a wave pool engine room while it is in operation but no matter what happens in life and no matter how scary it is if I can offer you any advice I would just say to “stay calm”. If I didn’t fight tough cunts my whole life I might have panicked, but it was just another day in the office.”

 

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