"The shiniest jewel of the former Triple Crown relegated to a specialty event."
The Pipe Masters is now, officially, in the books with John John Florence and Moana Jones Wong etching their names alongside Kelly Slater, Andy Irons, Carissa Moore, Michael Ho, et. al. in history. As you are certainly aware, the World Surf League jettisoned the event two years ago, preferring to begin the season at The Banzai and ending at Lower Trestles.
Vans, holding the window and the Pipe Masters name, did not budge leaving the onetime Super Bowl as a specialty event.
Surf fans, it appears, are bitterly divided over its relative worth.
Some found the lack of WSL schlock absolutely delightful. True Pipeline chargers being given the stage, allowed to showcase their unique abilities without having to paddle around Filipe Toledo when the ocean roared to life. Others found the lack of stakes, and names like Gabriel Medina, troublesome. The shiniest jewel of the former Triple Crown relegated to a specialty event.
Me?
Oh, I made my opinion known before the epic-adjacent final day.
And stand behind it even after watching many of those last heats including Jones Wong, Harry Bryant, Ivan Florence’s facial hair raising the bar. The Pipe Masters deserves all of the lesser known chargers, and it is a crime against surfing that the “Home of Surfing” savagely gutted their ranks with its big foot.
But where do you stand?
David Lee Scales and I discussed during our weekly chat, bitterly divided. He loved, though he also loves driving in the carpool lane solo, further jamming already jammed Southern California traffic with a sneer. You can, and should, listen now, ponder, then add your feelings like gilded beads into these annals.
Enjoy.
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Personally I liked the Pipe Masters with this format. Face it, the WSL tour surfers are not the best Pipeline surfers. Sure a couple of them excel at Pipeline but by and large WSL tour surfers get to the big tour by ripping in mediocre waves. They don’t get there by charging on the North Shore.
So the pipe masters is dumb because the WSL guys were not all in it but the WSL is dumb because the champ is a sissy that doesn’t charge pipe. Maybe, just maybe, now I’m no surfoligist but could it be that surf comps are dumb but it is entertaining to watch good surfers surf good waves in real time so if you care too much about the comp you have lost the plot being that art can’t be judged and all that while at the same time if you write the comp off you will miss seeing miracles like Moana setting a bar for women surfing that fast forward the learning curve by 10 years plus?
Or is the lesson here that you can’t judge a book by only reading the last chapter?
Possibly it’s more that the readers and commenters here should know that the grit is about clicks.
Or, D all of the above.
Pipe only became the shiniest jewel in the crown of the triple crown in the late 90s. For years it was effectively a specialty event and the real machos were the ones who dominated Sunset and Waimea (and later Haleiwa because Waimea never broke enough).
Look at the companies that sponsored it; the surf companies stayed away since the 70s and it was sponsored by a Japanese department store, some guy who paints the side of buildings, Xbox, Chiemsee (whatever that is).
It only became huge as Surfing DVDs and the Internet took off, and coincidentally that’s what killed Sunset because it’s so far out to sea that it just doesn’t work as a live spectacle (it did however work for still photos published in mags).
Vans are wise to not cave to the WSL demands; The WSL only want ownership so they have some IP to sell when they flog it off to some other poor schmuck. All the blame here is on the WSL for being greedy assholes.
Did not watch a minute of any heat and do not miss it.
we should rename it the Gripe Masters, so we can all feel welcome!
Well at least Vans has the balls to put it out in the open unlike when the big labels would bribe a fix into their prime events.
I found it quite entertaining the commitment across the entire field was evident , great pipe surfing was on display, fuck the WSL.
https://www.youtube.com/wat…
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As a comp it definitely had some flaws, but on the whole it was pretty enjoyable. At least they had a comp director who wasn’t afraid to send the girls out in pumping, heavy waves, and the girls definitely rose to the occasion. The women’s final was incredible.
The webcast also treated the viewer with some respect, didn’t try to tell us it was pumping when it wasn’t and commentators all spoke their mind freely which was refreshing.
I think the WSL man on man heats need to go, not enough waves get ridden. Having 3 or 4 man heats / overlapping heats is so much more entertaining. Feels like it’s non stop action.
Agree about 4 man heats. I mean maybe you can make the final (and semis?) 2 man heats but the best way hold a comp in optimal waves is have way fewer heats, and 4 man heats does that. It also means there are way more waves being ridden in every heat.
Aren’t all events a branding/media exercise? That’s what I’ve seen from my corner.
My take away was that completely surfer run events come off too lax, unprofessional, and feed into stereotypes too much. It needed a corpo leader like Elo to give it some tension and make it feel like a contest. Without the corpo figure head to hate on the contest just had the wrong chill vibe. It also took til the final for me to finally figure out the format, since none of the commentators felt like it was necessary to talk about.
Pipe “Masters” without Gabby rings hollow and lacking.
He’s only won it once.
is DLS that guy that helps the VAL learn the channel and tell em where to sit in the line up?
great format. loved that every surfer got to surf in variety of conditions instead of the usual morning sickness heats destroying whoever’s unlucky enough to get the draw.
the judging was spot on because it was just a total of every judges number instead of everyone trying to hit the magic number and set the criteria for the day.
Decimal points suck in surfing.
would have been better to have the top wsl in the comp and throw in some additives, but all in all, they proved you can finish an entertaining contest in three days if you have the right contest director and let the commentators speak freely.
Pipe being invitational isn’t anything new is it? Was it an invitational type event the year Bruce won?
Get your sneer on, girl !
That ain’t no way to post!
holiday greetings…fam-time. Surfreport down
I thought the contest was good. Enjoyed format. The commentating from Mike February’s favorite taint licker was horrible. Whats wrong with him. The tongue plunging and wokist speak. Bruh we get it.
hot for teacher
https://youtu.be/xkzeeEU27M…
I’m just happy I saw those waves of moana wong. They were good as.
aqualung(s)