'On the BeachGrit Instagram feed, Kelly Slater wrote, “Funny. Cheap. Character Revealing.” '
urf Fans Reeling:
It was BeachGrit’s belle epoch, 2017 through 2019: Elo Logan was the new frontman of the freshly named World Surf League and its new COO was the wildly overqualified Beth Greve, listed on Adweek’s Top 50 for 2014 for her success as “purveyor of cool” in the teen space.
Ms Greve, you’ll remember, soon earned the epithet Backward Fins Beth, photographed and filmed in Bali carrying and preparing to surf a beginner’s longboard-style surfboard with its fins installed completely backwards.
As BeachGrit readers swiftly pointed out at the time, putting fins in backwards is a classic beginner or “kook” mistake — the fins are designed to point toward the tail for proper tracking and maneuverability, so reversed ones make the board handle strangely or not at all effectively.
We ate and regurgitated that morsel here, here, here, here, here and here and bookended the saga with a billboard near Kelly Slater’s wave pool in Lemoore, and installed just before The Surf Ranch Pro.
Backward Fins Beth and The New Yorker
The moment was covered in a long feature in The New Yorker by Pulitzer winner William Finnegan, where it was cited as an example of perceived “kook” culture at the WSL.
As if to confirm everyone’s suspicions, Beth Greve, the W.S.L.’s chief commercial officer, was photographed in Bali lugging a beginner’s board across the beach with the fins put in backward. Backward Fins Beth became famous in surf world—more than half a million views on @kook_of_the_day. And then BeachGrit, an Australian Web site that delights in trolling the W.S.L., blew up the image to billboard size and installed it on a freeway in Lemoore, just in time for the Surf Ranch Pro. The billboard shot zoomed around the surfing Internet.
Slater saw it. He is a tireless online poster, with a rare degree of patience. On his Instagram feed, a magnet for cranks of all kinds, he has spent years debating flat-Earthers, laying out innumerable scientific proofs that the planet is round. He’s a well-informed environmentalist; right-wing flamethrowers rain hellfire on him for that, and he often takes the trouble to reply to them individually. When the Backward Fins Beth billboard went viral, Slater showed a tiny bit of pique. On the BeachGrit Instagram feed, he wrote, “Funny. Cheap. Character Revealing.” The BeachGrit crew was ecstatic. They had successfully trolled the king.
Lovely Nick Carroll called BeachGrit “horribly clever.”
Sadly, and with our faces as red as turkey cocks, it was subsequently revealed that putting your fins in backward ain’t such a bad thing.
It works.
Well, now, seven years later, Backward Fins Beth and BeachGrit are united again, this time via a mutual love of the relatively obscure post-punk outfit Nancy and the Jam Fancys, a band from the surf town of Moruya on the NSW South Coast.
The album Swan Songs was my top album of 2025 according to Spotify Wrapped, time listened etc, 466 minutes, posted it on the BeachGrit account as a story to which the band replied, “Apparently Backward Fins Beth listens to us too.”
Wild and a slightly late Christmas present, yes?
Do you remember those days and all that fun we had?
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My many years-old Vissla/BG collab, BFB t-shirt remains in the rotation to this day. Still waiting for someone to point out the mistake with the image on the back all these years later.
I still rock my BFB tshirt w joy.
Ken oath
was that the same year Gay Morgan and Mini Mikey C. were hoisted in a cherry picker to get a glimpse of the fabled tub?
Some suggested the appearance of a pompous, old skool typist was a sign the WSL’s schedule caused the BG principles to crash. A tragedy propped the site up for a bit so why not milk politics and it worked to the tune of comment sections over 20 comments long. Resuscitation, if you will.
The idea well had run dry, so off the bench comes the entitlement and the condescension of the dead, no dying print medias last breath. Like stepping on a dead seagulls chest and hearing one last sqwuak, Montague spoke his last breath at an audience.
Really, with a name like Montague, what would one expect? Sure the gratuitous and 15 years late, feel good memories for a Public Service Announcement that was too inconvenient for Money to allow, Monty.reach for credibility. Just attach yourself to dim memories of Andy and put yourself in his inner circle, the rubes will eat it up and forget you rimmed Bibbi.
Suddenly, anchovies and swamp palaces gained traction, the tiny ship BG had found a rising tide.
“Why not a reunion tour?” One principle exclaimed, now free of exhaustive holiday play choreography and makeup
“Let’s just run our greatest hits again until the WSL dissapoints in April?” An unkempt jewish and gay curious business partner replied instinctively
“ Remember when we trolled the surf ranch, how bout we repost that?”
“ Genius, so much easier than a surfboard review or stuff that would require effort”
“ Fucking Currie dropped the ball claiming life got in the way instead of watching every QS heat from Saquerema and Long Tom is long gone and thriving in the humorless zone, even mentioning Rory is beyond desperation when we can just run the same stories again adding a new tweet or IG post remotely related”
“Adjacent, yes Charles, embrace adjacent”
…pure genius Professor Hippy
Very very good!
Gave ’em a good listen today. Remind me of:
1. TSOL
2. Danzig
3. Morrissey
Here’s a question for you and the other fellas mate, are Dez and Chaz struggling to create surf content cuz the vast majority of surfers these days are just boring as fuck? Been giving this a little thought today and I reckon comparing the tour of say 20 years ago to todays version is pretty telling
Golden age of the tour for me was between around 2000 to around 2015. The list of surfers off the top of my head in that time included and in no particular order, Taj, Joel, Mick, Andy, Bruce, Old Baldy, Taylor Knox, Dane, Bobby, Jezza Flores, Freddie P, the Hog, Julian, Owen, Wilco, ADS, Jordy and on and on. Not only were they great surfers they were men who would speak their minds and appealed to us all as surfers cuz they appeared just like us, with all the weaknesses but they just happened to surf fucking sick. The tour was being run by the original fucking core lord Bugs, who was loved and respected by the entire surfing world, including the surfers and it genuinely felt like it was a tour run by surfers for surfers.
Now we come on to the sterile, bland, woke, all-inclusive, cheesy, seppo run vacuum of fun that the tour has turned into today. We have a two time world champ who refuses to go left on heavier ones if its over three feet, we have a Californian title contender who appears to have an IQ lower than my dog telling us pre heat he is trying to be a daffodil or a sand dune, we have chicks having meetings to decide solid Margs is too much for them and getting the day called off so the fellas end up on finals day with virtually no waves despite a for once epic window and not only do we now have events in pools we have an event in a fucking slavepool in the Middle East that seeds the surfers into the final event at Pipe hahahaha. I could go on for hours but will end it there to save yous all the pain.
Anyways would love to hear what was the magic era of the tour from anyone who wants to have a yarn about surfing and apologies I ain’t from some fancy arty, farty family and am just a typical Strayan cunt who loves surfing and especially getting coned yeeeeeeeeeeeeew
Imagine if there was a BG in the 80s/90s? Or even in the Irons era?…
Depends on your criteria mate. 70s-90s was probs the wildest times coz nothing was recorded. 2000s-2015 or so the standard of surfing aas so high coz of all the guys you mentioned, and we could see into their world, personalities, and psyche coz social media hadn’t really taken hold yet.
Now? It’s all so bland coz of social media. On the one hand, we’re just so saturated with content that nothing seems that interesting or mind-blowing. On the other hand, surfers are so mindful of curating an image and choosing words carefully that we just see corpo robots.
Can you imagine if Mick made his “Jew” comment to Chas today? He’d be dropped by sponsors, suspended from tour, made to grovel around the world with apologies, hung, drawn and quartered by all sorts of baying mobs across the interweb. And Chas’d become a celebrity millionaire victim doing sob story interviews!
For the record, I think Felipe would’ve won his second world title by event points regardless of the surf off…not his fault the schedule was what it was…
In other news, lady that got killed by a shark in Monterey a week ago washed up on the beach thirty miles north in Davenport and she was wearing a shark banz ankle device.
Will Bethany Hamilton still be selling these scam devices on her IG page?
Great game C4
Yea, Purdy is starting to look more like a franchise quarterback. Good game, now have to beat Seahawks next week.
Hook and ladder was a bad call with time running out. Should have taken three shots at the end zone and left San Jose crying
And days late, we post story!
Daily mail wrote a story today about her wearing shark banz ankle device.
“Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory”
– Dr. Seuss
“Spotify is generally better if your goal is eclectic digging in punk, post‑punk, prog, and new wave — thanks to more playlists, social curation, and easier discovery of niche and underground music”
Too many niche bands, B-sides and Krautrock to mention not availably on Spotify. Shy away.
If you long for the past to much you’ll end up on a leashless longboard Derek
And name your kid “Tosh” to boot.
Imagine if it is after Peter Tosh.
Stoner logic.
Xox
I figured Joel just couldnt spell Josh when he was filling out the birth certificate?
Yike!
My Spotify wrapped sucked this year. An album I play regularly while working took up most of the top 20 songs. Which makes sense but is stil stupid. I don’t know why I ever swapped from iTunes, if anyone else does
No idea about your wrap beef but I do dig Spots! Have 21 playlists…all start with skinnyFAT. My flagship…skinnyFATLive. All live encore’s & original band members…follow🎶
Each time I start my car my phone seemingly randomly plays the first song on one particular playlist. So guess what my most listened to song was. At least it got my most listened to podcasts correct.
“Lovely Nick Carrol”. Well, you crossed a line right there.
Thats what sarge said.
Yeah but what does Monty think?
Coming in two hours or so….
The fins were actually correct, its was the board that was backwards.
(Disclaimer: This is a personal opinion piece reflecting my subjective thoughts and reactions to recent events and posts. All critical statements about individuals or their words are expressions of my honest opinion, based on the specific quoted message and the extraordinary sensitivity of the subject matter. Nothing in this comment is intended as a statement of fact beyond the direct quote attributed, and I do not suggest any malice or ill intent on the part of anyone mentioned.)
I am wanting to know about John Semen Cunts opinion!
Xox
Judging by this comment over on Swellnet sales of The Book are not going as planned
Calhoun has been good value, entertainment wise.
But does he get the sales?
Seems the black cat market has taken a sharp downturn, and the BOOK is now ranked #94 in the surfing genre on Amazon as we go to air and is in serious danger of dropping out of the top 100.
Just ask Fred pawle