"Machado is chill, no surprise, fun to see him draw lines. Tudor is a bully…"
How many times have you surfed around the best shredders in the world? Maybe you were at Snapper or Pipe or Lowers, maybe at some distant Indonesian reef.
To experience that thrill when a top-tier pro, a Slater or a Fanning, makes eye contact with the peasants, when he shows he doesn’t have a distant relationship with them, smiling jovially and showing all his white and strong teeth, is the sorta thing that’ll stay with a man for life.
Here are my favourites.
Saw Kolohe out at T-Street when we were both groms. Heard him scream “I RIP!” as he demolished a shoulder-high wave. It doesn’t surprise me he’s grown up to be kind of strange. I was coincidentally seated at a table with his sister at the Coach House for a Donovan Frankenreiter concert. She was really nice.
Donovan used to also put on the Cosmic Creek and bring a bunch of retro boards for people to surf. He would surf with all of us kids which was pretty cool.
I knew Pat O’Connell growing up and watched him rip my local from the shoulder when I was young. He’s as lovely as everyone says he is.
Saw CJ Hobgood out at Lowers, but everyone was hassling each other so much there I just thought oh, cool then went back to battling in the gladiator pit.
Out of the Water:
I saw A.I. in talks to renew his deal with the then-president of Billabong at my local. Some kid screamed “OH MY GOD IT’S ANDY IRONS! GUYS IT’S ANDY IRONS!” and someone else screamed “NO WAY! DID YOU SUCK HIS DICK??” Pretty gratifying to see Andy laugh at that.
Ran into Mick at Oktober Fest in Munich which was wild. He was shitfaced, but pretty mellow when I dapped him up.
Rob Machado came to our high school and hosted an assembly when he came to install his eco-friendly water fountains. That was ruined because a jackass decided it would be funny to sneak a Klan hood into the auditorium and put it on while Rob was speaking. Horrible look for our school. I’m still ashamed and will not be mentioning that story or where I’m from if our paths ever cross again.
Surfed with Jordy, josh Kerr, Rob machado, Occy and Slater who were all really nice in the water, would let us kooks get waves even calling us into them. Did 2 hours alone with Jordy at canguu and he was such a good cat, he was no2 in wsl at the time but he just seemed like a guy who liked to surf but did it super well.
Surfed with a young Medina the year of his pro junior win in NZ he was a bit of an arrogant dickhead as you’d expect from a young fulla on top of the world! He calmed down once he was reminded in a calm but firm state there’s only one road in and out of here and you have to drive past these 10guys houses.
In my experience the qs level pros are the worst regardless of where they are from just want every scrap of everything for video or just entitlement. The upper level pros usually a lot more chill tho a mate who lived in Fiji isn’t a fan of several of the Brazilians even a couple I thought seemed mellow after a few sessions with them at cloud break
Machado is chill, no surprise, fun to see him draw lines
Tudor is a bully
Growing up on Oahu, I ran into many pros on the North Shore. One of the most memorable was when I surfed a small (6’) day at Pipe with Kelly Slater. This was circa 1989-90 when he was the young phenom before his world titles.
He was out with his local tour guide and fellow QS teammate Perry Dane. PD was one of the OG enforcers back in the day, pre Wolf pack.
Halfway through the session, some unfortunate person dropped in on Kelly. Kelly paddles back out with the roaster about 20 yards behind him. PD starts paddling towards the roaster with this ‘I going kill this faka’ look on his face and as he paddles past Kelly, he asks Kelly “Dat faka dropped in on you?” without taking his eyes off his prey. Everybody knew what was coming. But Kelly quickly replied to PD, “no no, I told him to go.” He was a class act.
Jamie O’Brien burned me at spot on Oahus South shore that breaks along a very sketchy lava rock wall. I was already up and riding deeper, pretty much within arms length from the wall on the takeoff. He was further inside and sitting on the shoulder but he chipped into it on his big ass soft top and faded straight into my line. It forced me to go straight pretty much directly into the sketchist part of the spot. I got fully washed, came real fuckin close to getting dragged along the rocks underwater and dinged the fuck out of my board. Dude straight up just said “I didn’t see you brah” when I was like “dude WTF was that about?” and that was it. Dudes a prick.
To add to this story, him and his crew hung out of the cliffs filming their SuPeR eXtReME lifestyle content making it seem like jumping off these cliffs into the water was a totally normal and safe thing to do. A 15 year old girl drowned and was resuscitated on top of a surfboard in the lineup less than 30 minutes after him and his crew left. Seriously fuck that guy.
Bought a used efoil. Turned out to be Stacy Peralta selling it. Met up with him to complete the purchase and he was the absolute most genuine, humble, kind and warm human. When I let on that I knew that he was a legend, he offered to sign my board and graciously smiled as the kook in me asked to take a picture with him. Stacy even cut me off some pieces of jade and aeonium plants from his garden–he’s got quite the green thumb and has some wonderful specimens.
He still texts to check in from time to time just to make sure I’m out there still ripping. Like just randomly texts to say hi. Just such a genuine dude. Stacy, if you’re out there, you freaking ROCK and I appreciate everything you’ve done for me and for sport in general.
Alex Knost yields priority like a person should. Most surfers used to hate on this guy for riding a long board and being an indie kid, but when I was surfing almost every day in my 20s he was the only pro I surfed around who didn’t try to pull rank or be a dick even when he was filming. I never exchanged words beyond hello but he’s infinitely cool bc he wasn’t an asshole in the water. Never liked his music though.
Back in the fall of 2020 I was staying in Uluwatu for several weeks, two of them at Ulu Surf Villas. In the span I was staying at Ulu Villas, Slater & Lewis Hamilton were there, Machodo later in the trip as well.
Dawn patrol was my favourite when surfing Bombies. It seemed most locals didn’t like going out early and you can see the afternoon crew paddling in from the cave. Was always a sign to grab a good one in and hit a late breakfast. I would often see Lewis & Slater out as well I think Lewis like the small crowd. Anyways, I didn’t fan out, simply told them it was awesome seeing the two out here and left it at that. Shared some waves, I’d eavesdrop on Kelly shooting Lewis advice. Got a few sick ones over that whole stay which got a few yeww’s from the boys.
I don’t know if it was the lack of verbal fandom or what, but I couldn’t say anything better about sharing the water with those guys. No elitism, profession levels on snaking or anything negative about the session. If anything it made the sessions some of the most relaxing times in the water given it was still a sizeable swell. There was something so cool about being in the water with people that could be anywhere else on the world. But they chose this surf spot, and so did you. So really, it just made me appreciate that trip even more. Because I doubt the majority of surfers will ever experience waves outside their local.
Mid tier pros on the other hand, regardless of where you are or they are from. Absolutely miserable, you get the feeling they surf everywhere as if they’re being watched by talent scouts on the beach.
And, you, reader? What have been your experiences, good, bad and beautiful?
