Rio Waida (left) not at the beach. Photo: Instagram

Worry grows in Indonesia after nation’s most successful surfer discovers joys of alpine living

By Chas Smith

5 months ago

"Switzerland is the number 1 place I've ever seen..."

The ink on the freshly released ’25 World Surf League Championship Tour schedule is not yet dry and yet a proud surfing nation already finds itself very worried. Yes, Indonesia, which has long been a must-visit location for surfers, has produced its most successful one ever in Rio Waida. The universally adored spark plug is adept in all conditions, brave, and ended the ’24 season ranked 9th in the world.

Hopes and dreams of a possible title dancing in Batavian heads.

Except, as mentioned, worry is currently the pervading emotion for Waida, you see, has left the palm-fringed shores and is currently bathed in alpenglow.

The Olympics’ own organ published a feature, overnight, detailing how five-ringed surfers were spending their off time. Medina went to Bali, Billy Stairmand to the Maldives. Waida? He traveled to Switzerland and appeared to fall in love.

“The nature here in Switzerland is on another level, felt like I’m in the heaven and felt like I’m in the dream,” the twice-over Olympian wrote on Instagram. “It’s so beautiful, the most beautiful place I ever seen. I mean it’s hard to compare with ocean and beach but this place might be my number 1 place that I visited. The reason I came here is because I wanted to do something that I love to do, which is hiking, see the nature, see the beauty of this world, and be at somewhere there’s nobody and listen to the sound of the nature. And inhale beautiful fresh air and exhale all the bad stuff.”

Number 1 place ever seen?

A snowboarding future just over the Matterhornian peak?

David Lee Scales and I did not discuss Waida’s love of Switzerland, during our weekly chat, but did discuss the revamped tour and what it means. I think you’ll find it extremely informative.

Enjoy.

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“What ensues is an adventure turned survival story of epic and bloody proportions on a tropical island which once seemed to be paradise but is actually closer to hell.”

Kevin Costner set to recreate 1995 bomb Waterworld after inking deal for surf-horror film set in Bali

By Derek Rielly

6 months ago

“This is one of the best scripts I have seen in my career. Kevin is a legendary actor who brings so much depth and charisma…”

Almost thirty years after briefly sinking his career with the 1995 stinker Waterworld where he played a mutated human with gill-like structures and webbed feet, capable of surviving in the post-apocalyptic, water-covered Earth, Kevin Costner will have another swing at an oceanic epic next year with a surf horror film set in Bali.

Called Headhunters, the film will combine the “kinetic energy of surf culture with the suspense of horror.”

The almost seventy-year-old Kevin Costner, whom you last saw as the murderous patriarch John Dutton in the television series Yellowstone, plays Lazer, “a washed-up American ex-pat with a mysterious past who finds himself living in Bali, Indonesia. Lazer recruits a group of surfers led by Bima, a local photographer, on a journey to an uncharted island to pioneer a ‘perfect wave.’ To their surprise, the island is home to an ancient tribe of headhunters guarding the land at all costs.

“What ensues is an adventure turned survival story of epic and bloody proportions on a tropical island which once seemed to be paradise but is actually closer to hell.”

Kevin Costner has joined up with Scott Steindorff and his Stone Village Films to bring the Headhunters to life.

“For decades, my friend Kevin Costner and I have been searching for the right project to collaborate on,” Steindorff said. “This is one of the best scripts I have seen in my career. Kevin is a legendary actor who brings so much depth and charisma to his roles, and has written an iconic horror script with Steve.”

Sounds like it has a shot at the worst movie ever made, don’t it?

Or does that crown forever belong on the head of the 2016 remake of Ghostbusters?

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Kelly Slater’s least favorite wave replaced by his new Abu Dhabi surf tank on just-released WSL Championship Tour schedule

By Chas Smith

6 months ago

The most fossil fuel hungry tour ever!

The fabled second jewel of surfing’s Triple Crown has been erased from the World Surf League Championship Tour for the upcoming 2025 season. Sunset Beach, there on Oahu’s North Shore, no more. It is being replaced by Kelly Slater’s sparkling Abu Dhabi surf tank leading surf thinkers to wonder if, perhaps, the greatest competitive surfer of all time wanted to stab his least favorite wave in the heart as he is forced into retirement.

Slater’s disdain for Sunset very public over the years.

The tour will begin at Pipeline before burning excessive jet fuel to fly all the way to the United Arab Emirates. From there, it will fly halfway around the world, again, to Portugal followed by more jet fuel to El Salvador, even more to Bells, where it will finally conserve energy by plunking down for Snapper and Margaret. After the cut, Lowers, Saquarema, J-Bay, Teahupo’o will close out the regular calendar, with Finals Day being hosted at Cloudbreak.

In other words:

Stop No. 1 – Banzai Pipeline, Hawaii, USA: January 27 – February 8
Stop No. 2 – Surf Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi, UAE: February 14 – 16
Stop No. 3 – Peniche, Portugal: March 15 – 25
Stop No. 4 – Punta Roca, El Salvador: April 2 – 12
Stop No. 5 – Bells Beach, Victoria, Australia: April 18 – 28
Stop No. 6 – Snapper Rocks, Queensland, Australia: May 3 – 13
Stop No. 7 – Margaret River, Western Australia, Australia: May 17 – 27*
Stop No. 8 – Lower Trestles, San Clemente, Calif., USA: June 9 – 17
Stop No. 9 – Saquarema, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: June 21 – 29
Stop No. 10 – Jeffreys Bay, South Africa: July 11 – 20
Stop No. 11 – Teahupo’o, Tahiti, French Polynesia: August 7 – 16**
Stop No. 12 – WSL Finals – Cloudbreak, Fiji: August 27 – September 4

Or for the semi-illiterate:

Certainly the most gas-gobbling tour ever.

Coincidence?

The World Surf League’s media-shy CEO declared, “We’ve built this schedule to include more events and feature a variety of breaks. We’ve brought back some of the Tour’s most desirable locations, while aligning dates with favorable swell windows, to open up more opportunity for quality surf. We’ll see a great mix of locations from heavy-water barrels, to high-performance waves, and pristine point breaks. It’ll be an exciting showcase of the world’s best surfing featuring the incredible CT talent. We can’t wait to kick off in January 2025. See you at Pipe.”

Thoughts?

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Surfers (pictured) defying good sense. Photo: NBC News

News reporter perplexed and dismayed as surfers defy good sense to shred Milton ahead of hurricane’s landfall

By Chas Smith

6 months ago

"Here we have another former Cat 5 that's going to be a Cat 3 at landfall, and the storm surge is baked in."

The potentially very devastating Hurricane Milton made landfall overnight as a Category 3 storm on Florida’s central west coast. Siesta Key, its first point of contact, reported sustained winds of 120 mph, though it shrunk to a Category 1 as it moved east across the state. Power is out for much of the region and those living in the Tampa area have been ordered to shelter in place as “extremely dangerous conditions” are percolating outside.

Jeff Masters, a scientist who formerly worked with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s hurricane hunters, warned CBS News, “Some of the biggest catastrophes in hurricane history were from weakening storms. Katrina was weakening as it was approaching the shore and it caused $190 billion in damage. It was a Cat 3 at landfall and it was formerly a Cat 5. Well, here we have another former Cat 5 that’s going to be a Cat 3 at landfall, and the storm surge is baked in.”

Wild tornados whipped the area before Milton reached the shore further terrifying beleaguered Floridians but none of that stopped two intrepid surfers from paddling out near Naples, right in the storm’s path. A reporter, who happened to be posted on the very same beach, approached the rippers and perplexedly asked what they were on about. They responded that it was typical for them to sample tasty waves before hurricane landfalls. The reporter wrinkled her brow and wondered if they were worried about lightning strikes and aforementioned twisters. They declared they were not. She then wanted to catch them in a “gotcha moment,” asking if they were going to defy orders to leave. They responded that they would defy lifeguard orders but not those of the police.

The reporter shook her head in abject confusion.

Surfers, man. What weirdos.

Watch the exchange here.

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In this video from Jewish-Hawaiian vlogger Koa Rothman Bruce makes a surprise and much appreciated cameo, enjoying step-offs at an Indonesian slab. He only gets a handful of waves but the pleasure of seeing the familiar curved back and White Dudes for Kamala bent front wrist is indescribable.

Mercurial surf god Bruce Irons makes surprise cameo alongside Koa Rothman in epic Indonesian surf

By Derek Rielly

6 months ago

"That was the first barrel I got in a year!"

Six months ago, the Kauai-born surfer Bruce Irons, the best surfer in the world in 2005 if you asked anybody who was there, made a rare public appearance from a psychedelic assisted rehab joint in Cancun, Mexico, called Beond where he delivered a profoundly sad confessional.

“My name is Bruce Irons. I’m a 44 year old professional surfer. My brother was world champion He’s the baddest motherfucker that ever lived and I’m doing this for him and all my other fallen brothers and fucking friends who died,” said Bruce in part.

He was a little heavier and jowlier, his hair longer and darker than when he owned surf media in the early 2000’s, but that deep-seated cool, his mama Danielle once described Bruce as a stealth bomber, was firmly in place.

I remember picking Bruce up from the airport in Tenerife many years ago, a few months before his big bro died as it happened, and being terrifically impressed by the thickness of his arms and the way his hair remained upright despite no apparent powders, wax or gel.

Later that night he described the fight he had with his brother after his Eddie win in 2004.

“That was a typical fucking fight. Him saying some stupid things he shouldn’t be saying to certain people and I was not happy with it. This was in the daytime. And, I was screaming shit at him. Everything you could think of to get him to come out of the house to fucking attack me. And, I said the perfect things and he came flying out and fucking tried to karate kick me. He kinda got me and then we started swinging… some guys grabbing me… and then he got me a couple of times and gave me a black eye and a bloody lip. I think I barely got him. But, fuck, that was a good reason I won the Eddie because I had so much rage in-fucking-side of me. And, I don’t want to use the word hate, but I was very, very upset with him. He was in the heat before me and it was the pulse of the contest and he was… it was 25 feet… and he was getting big waves, probably the biggest waves of his life and I was just… screaming… paddling out, looking at the sky yelling… YOU CANNOT!… because he has won everything. I was, like, he’s not going to win THE FUCKING EDDIE AIKAU! I fucking wanted it really badly. Winning the Eddie Aikau, that contest, I think it picks a person. There’s so much energy in that thing. The winner is already set in stone. It might’ve been for someone else that year, but I wanted it so bad I took that energy, I got those waves, the biggest waves of my life, and, you know… I won. And, a big part of it was how I was feeling. The depth of feeling inside me. Everything was in fucking fifth gear.”

Classic Bruce, although anything Bruce does falls under the banner classic.

Or wild.

Or uh-oh.

“That was the first barrel I got in a year!” says Bruce, who collects his fill at the four minute and thirty seconds mark of the video, adding. “It’s just the beginning.”

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Eat beach grit spam!