Kelly Slater, happy sheik, even happier kid and, inset, world's best little wave champ Filipe Toledo.

Kelly Slater’s Abu-Dhabi wave pool featuring “world’s longest barrel” opens for business!

By Derek Rielly

4 months ago

“The biggest and most advanced artificial wave facility in the world.”

It’s been almost one year since the world’s greatest athlete and, rapidly, one its most opportunistic businessmen, Kelly Slater, delivered a brace of surfing champions to his eponymous wave pool in the Persian Gulf, the capital city of the United Arab Emirates.

The small-wave wizard Filipe Toledo, no lover of Teahupoo it’s true but the greatest ever in waves that ascend to the waist but not beyond, showed his “adult” and “barbaric turns” at the tank.

The procession of stars included WSL in-water commentator Strider Wasilewski, noted for “attack dog tits”, three-time world champion Gabriel Medina, eight-time world champion Stephanie Gilmore, Caroline Marks, Jeremy Flores, “Human Viagra” Raimana Van Bastolaer, iconic filmmaker Taylor Steele, along with Kelly Slater’s former personal assistant Stephen “Belly” Bell.

“There was room for error on the wave yet it still had power and a heavy barrel,” wrote Strider Wasilewski.

And, now, after much ado, the joint is going to open to the public in around six weeks with bookings opening in September.

In a press release, Modon Properties claimed,

“Surf Abu Dhabi will be the biggest and most advanced artificial wave facility in the world. Designed in partnership with Kelly Slater Wave Co., the landmark destination will offer a high-performance surfing experience, featuring the world’s longest ride, biggest barrel, and largest man-made wave pool.”

And, in a post on the SurfAbuDhabi Instagram account:

WE’RE ON! Can’t wait to see you all in October. Thank you for staying curious and sharing the love for Surf Abu Dhabi, it’s all happening!

And before you flood our DMs – bookings for October sessions will be live on our website in September.

No mention of price etc, although if similar to Slater’s Lemoore facility expect 50k a day for the whole pool, minimum or 20-ish for a morning or night session.

Travellers may want to temper their passions while in the UAE, howevs. UAE got the death penalty of apostasy, you’re gonna get a knock on the door on your hotel if you swear on WhatsApp ($68k fine and prison) and blasphemy will get you five years in the pen.

A small price to pay for the waves of your life etc.

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Ross Williams after belting his head at Haleiwa nine years ago and, inset, using a Sonal helmet as treatment.

Surfers rally behind John John Florence coach Ross Williams after troubling medical history revealed

By Derek Rielly

4 months ago

“It’s easy to underestimate a head injury. There’s lots of serious side effects that can sneak up on you."

If you saw Ross Williams waiting for a bus you’d never guess he used to be one of the best surfers in the world.

Almost sixty-one, a lazy hairline that holds a haircut like a dust-mop, a chubby figure that changes weight according to his mood.

But put him behind a microphone, at the helm of a prized athlete or in the water and he glows.

Now, in a troubling post to Instagram, Ross Williams has revealed he’s suffered multiple head injuries while surfing.

“Over the last five or six years I’ve had a couple of pretty serious concussion,” writes Williams, who is pictured wearing a take-home helmet called a Sonal, which is made by a Newport-based company called Wave Neuro.

“Two of them were at my favourite surf spot, Haleiwa. (Shout out to my boy Kawika for pulling me out of the water. I was out by myself. The waves were 10 to 12 feet, pretty maxed out Haleiwa. Good thing he was there as I was unconscious for a couple of seconds.)

Editor’s note: The one-time Momentum star needed eleven staples and plastic surgery after he, “dove head first after a wave into the ‘toilet bowl’ straight into the reef. I cracked my head open and nearly ripped a piece of my nose off.”

Ross Williams and head injury — Ross Williams, a sufferer of multiple head injuries, has his brain waves examined by a Sonal by Newport Beach company Wave Neuro.

“It’s easy to underestimate a head injury. There’s lots of serious side effects that can sneak up on you. The good people at @waveneuro have been so helpful to me and my family. My daughter @sebbie_williams also had a severe concussion (much more serious than mine!). With their help we’ve had great therapy and guidance.”

The former sparring partner of Kelly Slater, and now semi-retired father of three, is no stranger to injury. Four years ago, while rehabbing a tweaked knee, he clipped his riding partner’s wheel at forty clicks an hour, hit the bitumen and got…degloved.

The gruesome injury, which is called a Morel-Lavallée lesion, is an “abrupt separation of skin and subcutaneous tissues from underlying fascia.”

Skin ripped off limb to reveal underlying mechanics, like the little leg of a butchered dog.

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Kale Brock, inset, walks through abandoned "zombie" resort in the Maldives.

Aussie surf coach Kale Brock discovers “unnerving” resort in Maldives, “Remnants of abundant life totally stopped in its tracks!”

By Derek Rielly

4 months ago

"You could fully shoot a zombie movie here"

The Australian surf coach Kale Brock is well-known for his excellent technique and travel videos on YouTube, a rare talent who avoids the usual tendency to overdramatise his encounters.

Of middle height and with a lightly portly body, Brock, who turns thirty-three in one week, has amassed an impressive almost quarter-of-a-million subscribers on his channel.

He is a man of formidable force, a dreamer who thinks, a thinker who dreams.

Now, Brock has stunned his fans with a walk-through of a hastily abandoned resort in the Maldives, at one point exposing the grim skeleton of what were going to be five-thousand-dollar-a-night over-the-water bungalows.

“Apparently it’s a major politician in the Maldives who owns this island and construction got underway 12 years ago,” Brock says. “They were building for two years then for ‘political reasons’. We don’t really know, ostensibly maybe they ran out of money. They’ve literally abandoned the project… There’s bathtubs in unopened but deteriorating boxes. There’s literally piles of toilets stood up over one another and ultimately there’s incredible potential for an incredible place here.”

Brock swings by a couple of abandoned cars.

“You could fully shoot a zombie movie here… I feel like we’re in Jurassic Park, after they’ve abandoned it.

“Imagine the dinners you could have had,” he “says. “Imagine the surf you could have had 1km that way.”

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Kauli Vaast on the Seine living Filipe Toledo's dream. Photo: Twitter

Newly minted Olympic gold medalist Kauli Vaast delights Paris by surfing down Seine!

By Chas Smith

4 months ago

"Surfing in the Seine is great, it's mega, but doing it with the Eiffel Tower behind you is even more special."

My time is Paris is coming to a close and I have thoroughly enjoyed this month. The City of Light has been electric, throughout, the local population having retreated before the 2024 Olympics began fearing gridlock and general nastiness. Instead, it has been an earthly paradise. Restaurants easy to get into, foie gras flowing like white wine. As the surfing component of the Games got underway some ten-ish days ago, I felt sad that our heroes and heroines were forced to be some 10,000 miles away eating poisson cru in the middle of the Pacific.

Well, things have been rectified at least for bronze medalist Gabriel Medina, who came and dined in proper bistros while getting lightly trolled and gold medalist Kauli Vaast, who made Filipe Toledo’s dreams come true by surfing a man-generated, under knee high wave on the famous river Seine.

The two-time Brazilian champ made news, earlier, when he opined that future Olympic surfing events should be contested in pools, saying, “Every four years, I think the athlete needs to be prepared for this unique moment that is the Olympics and be sure that they will deliver their best!”

The handsome Frenchman, anyhow, had to work for every once of forward momentum but seems to enjoy his time, declaring, “Surfing in the Seine is great, it’s mega, but doing it with the Eiffel Tower behind you is even more special.”

As you know, Paris made a great effort to clean the Seine ahead of the Games and used the famous waters as venue for long distance swimming though three Germans fell ill after their event, one penning, “Vomited 9 times yesterday + diarrhea. Water quality in the Seine is approved.”

Classic German aggression and yet to be seen if the French quickly abandon the river allowing for occupation.

Back to Vaast, though, does his Olympic gold eclipse both Filipe Toledo championships?

Disqus.

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Tatiana Weston-Webb, far left, sanguine about result despite fury from Brazilian surf fans. | Photo: ISA/Pablo Franco

Citizenship of Brazilian Olympian Tatiana Weston-Webb questioned after shock response to cheating claims

By Derek Rielly

4 months ago

"I'm not going to dwell on the negative part, I prefer to focus on the positive part.”

As South America prepares to be ripped apart following an attempt by Peru to have Brazil’s Gabriel Medina stripped of his bronze medal, focus has turned to quasi-Brazilian Tatiana Weston-Webb following her response to claims she was cheated of Olympic gold.

If you’ll recall, Tatiana Weston-Webb, who was raised on Kauai by an English daddy and Brazilian mama, missed out on the gold medal, which was subsequently claimed by the American Caroline Marks, after Weston-Webb fell 0.18 points short of the score needed to win on her last wave.

Brazilian surf fans online also pointed out what they perceived as a generous 7.50 for a Caroline Marks tube ride, numbers that could only be attributed to racism or fixing.

Now, in an interview just released, Weston-Webb has shocked fans and even had doubt cast upon the validity of her Brazilian citizenship, with her very un-South American response to the cheating claims.

“At the time I thought they (judges) might or might not give (the score that would be worth the gold). I really didn’t know. But, I managed to watch a bit of the heat afterwards and I really liked my last wave,” she said.

“I thought it was worth the score. But what can I do now? Am I going to be sad? No. I’m going to be happy because I managed to achieve a huge dream of mine. I’m not going to dwell on the negative part, I prefer to focus on the positive part.”

No such worries for Filipe Toledo, of course, who made worldwide headlines with his claim that Gabriel Medina was robbed of gold by virtue of the event running in the ocean.

Toledo implied an Olympic champion would only be valid if it was contested in a wave pool.

“If I lost in the wave pool, I would at least lose surfing and giving my best, which wasn’t the case with Gabriel, who in my opinion didn’t even lose, he just didn’t have a chance!” said Toledo.

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Eat beach grit spam!