"No small talk. No fluff. Just pure efficiency."
In a move just announced by the World Surf League, Jeffreys Bay, the South African point famous for almost un-aliving Mick Fanning via Great White, has been dumped for New Zealand’s crown jewel Raglan.
Raglan is one of of the world’s best waves, or so I’m told by my immigrant pals, and is a lefthander on New Zealand’s north island. It isn’t one point but three separate points.
Y’got Indicators, Whale Bay and Manu Bay.
You’ll recall we used Raglan’s Luke Cederman, a screwfoot who proved that surfing and comedy can sometimes be good bedfellows, as the protagonist of our time travel-themed wetsuit film, Once Upon a Time in New Zealand.
“I’m very happy with the addition of a rippable left on tour,” said Yago Dora, the 2025 WSL World Champion. “It’s been a long time asking to have one on the schedule, and we finally got it! I’ve never been to New Zealand, and I’m very happy that I will get the chance to go there for the first time and experience what seems to be a very beautiful part of the world. The place looks amazing so I’m truly excited to go there for the first time and compete at Raglan.”
“Obviously, so psyched to have an event that’s not too far from home,” said Molly Picklum, 2025 WSL World Champion. “We don’t have a rippable left point break on tour, so I absolutely love that I get to bring out the backside attack. New Zealand culture and the way of life there is just a breath of fresh air, which is so appreciated when we are travelling so much. So all in all, I’m excited for that event. I think having NZ on tour brings us a world-class location when it comes to waves and food, which for me is all I ever worry about!”
Raglan resident and former national champ Daniel Kereopa said fist fights weren’t a big problem here and most local surfers were out to inform rather than fight.
“Seventy per cent of the surfers out there don’t really know how to surf that well and they’re actually putting themselves in danger. They surf waves beyond their ability or get themselves into bad positions,” he said.
“The locals are the ones who surf here most often so they understand the dangers, so what it boils down to in the end is water safety.
“No small talk. No fluff. Just pure efficiency,” said one user.
No JBay? Is this really why JJF dropped out?
This gonna be like another Mundaka?
Great to add a performance left, but did you need to kill the best right on tour to do it?
Choice bro!
Sad for Raglan though
Shoulda traded margaret river and kept JB , but the waves have nothing to do with it , its all about cash up front , i can understand the SA goverment not stumping up the cash just have a look at where it could be better spent in the non white community. Plenty of white zaffas made a ton of the back of that comp over the past decades we dont see any of them fronting up the cash to keep JB on the tour ,the big bro and shaun T are minted but have very deep pockets and short arms. Its all just white greed.
You can’t “replace” an iconic tour spot with a VAL spot.
Replace a spinning right with a soft left?
The world has so many good surf spots. Why?
Obviously yes you can dude.
oh no, it’s on the tv news here. that can’t be good.
Criiiikey there mates
How good Raglan is compared to J-Bay has nothing to do with it, nothing at all (though most know that J-Bay is obviously the far superior break).
What its got to do with is the $10,000,000 U.S. that the Kiwi Govt got suckered into paying to an American billionaire to display his dancing monkey’s in the hope of attracting tourists…
You know what newly arrived American refugees say about New Zealand:
Great health care and beer.
Bad Mexican food.
I guess you can’t have everything –
Mexican food is bad in Oz too.
They over complicate it.
Bad restaurant food, but excellent raw product.
Dear Dr. Grit.
I have recently purchased a second-hand suffering board in good condition but inexpensive.
It has a deck traction pad in addition to the standard tailpad.
I am fucking old kook and will not be doing airs or shredding, except in my mind as I lay in bed the night before thinking about the radical maneuvers I will totally try except I rarely can actually get into the waves to begin with and this board is probably several litres too small for my failing corpse anyway.
Do I remove the deck pad or leave it on? Digging the idea of less melted wax in the car.
Yours,
Channelbottom,
Aged 55 1/2
P.S. I know the answer is; “Who GAF what other people think at your age? Go get a multi-coloured wetsuit and fucking own the lineup.”
yes!
rip both the deck and tail pads off. embrace chaos.
Rip it off and stick in the shower at home so you don’t slip and break your hip!
Hahahahaha cheers mate, gave me a good chuckle this morning
To be fair I have a 2nd hand twinny that came with deck grip and I like how it feels.
What’s the great New Zealand food Molly is talking about? Heard the meat pies are good.
BBQ Wētā.
Somehow I pictured it being a lot like England, even the food.
Worse weather and shitter waves than England but better food. Don’t bother visiting, you might end up in a hangi pit or a boil up.
https://youtu.be/B5zzrJjefTs?si=c_kInbaDDCYvqwWf
Watched the Torren Martyn video of him riding his motorcycle through ice and sleet for two weeks to surf blown out waves so yea not planning on a trip anytime soon.
Are you saying you don’t understand the way latitude (north to south) affects weather ?
And that you’ve never looked at a globe, or a map ?
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Do you presume the weather in San Diego and northern Oregon are always the same ?
Have you heard of Chas Smith ? (best you ask him about Coos Bay…)
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
(both those yellow lines are 1000 miles, 1600km long, north to south)
Heck, what would you say if I told you that the south of California is warmer than the north of Oregon ?
And that the north of NZ was warmer than the south ?
How’d ya be able to handle that news ?
Do you own a boat?
Chas Smith of BG fame?
I owned a globe as a kid but I guess since NZ is sitting all by itself in a spot underneath everything where I would have to pick up the globe and turn it upside down to look at it, I never thought about how big it is.
Also it is known as the stepping off point to Antarctica and looks very close, so it seems like the whole country would be cold. People don’t depart for the North Pole from Coos Bay.
KS11 only uses flat globes
Take it you’ve never been to inland Oregon in the summer.
Here’s the same 1000mile (1600km) yellow line on…
The north of Scotland to the south of France.
(would JPCurry/ChazMM have been a miserable hill-runner, with a taste for whisky and gambling, if he’d been born 1000 miles south in the sunny south of France, for instance ?)
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Also Boston to Florida
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
And obviously Australia’s east coast from Victoria’s chilly south up to the world famous tropical Great Barrier Reef
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
All the same distance and north to south orientation…
Whats the cost of living like mate?
Cost of a meat pie at the servo?
Cost of living is wild. Pie at the servo probably $8
servo pies* still reasonable, 4-6.
bakery 6-8
cafe 8-11
fancy cafe 10-15
most expensive pie i have purchased was $11.
slow cooked beef with jalepenos and bechamel sauce. In Opunake (on the Surf Highway on the way to Oakura).
* i recently did a solo road trip and treat servo pies like health packs in video games. Pie & a V. breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea.
The $150 minimum that it will cost to fill up the shitty van that the next blow in Torren Martin wannabe just purchased will have them thinking twice and chasing a ghost swell from East to West and North to South at least. Remember, always blow on the pie 🤙🏼
$4 USD
Besides Luke Cederman probably the best thing about the joint haha
They both sound like prepared statements by the WSL for her and Yago to release.
Yea Yago’s statement seemed pretty suss also. I was wondering if New Zealand is some international food destination and I wasn’t aware of it.
I hate to break it to you Derek, but Raglan Roast Tahunanui is located in the Country’s most wave starved locale, on a whole different island
I should really read the articles before I pass them on to him. Your old local was pretty bleak for the Classic. October conditions.
Yeah, the fact that my new local was actually pretty good was a good indicator that it was going to be pretty bleak there. Jai take it out?
Yeah I saw some photos of razor straight lines. Jai turned it up, I gave him a 9.4 on his best one in the final.
In Memorial to speed, power & flow
https://youtu.be/Pb-0nARucg8?si=qUCIXs4cIQxF-kNv
So good fully suck bro , cant wait to see the momgrel mob , head hunters or black power turn up pissed and wreck the bar.
“our people once were warriors”
Once we were coconuts bro
Roflmao
Now, now, now …
Hahahahahar fucken hell
Dropping J Bay for Manu is beyond idiotic, The Weird Seppo League strikes again. Just fuck off ya pack of cunts and leave the tour for people who actually care about surfing
The worlds best surf surfers in the world best waves*
It’s a fucking joke ay. Bells early probably fucked, Margs meh, Snapper is sick but late in the season so probably flat, Manu Bay average El Sleepador fucked, Brazil fucked, Fiji and Chopes both sick, Slowers fucked, Portugal could be good but they don’t go mobile so probs fucked, the slavepool soooooo completely and utterly fucked I didn’t even want to mention it, Pipe sick
Good fucking job Weird Seppo League you pack of complete soft cock, corporate wank stains. Go fuck yourselves
There is already enough surfers in the world in my opinion so that fact that the WSL sucks isn’t a bad thing. Doesn’t change the fact that some of us actually want to see the worlds best surfers go toe to toes in the worlds best waves, and JBay has produced some epic heats.
I havent seen a decent board under the feet of almost any of the pros at JBay for quite a few seasons , the surfing at pro level Jbay has devolved into twtchy tube avoiding shit
backside surfing looked better.
Manu doesn’t replace J bay
If stu sends you, you can pull a Chas and score away from the circus. Lemme know.
May is prime month here- still surfing in boardies.
You obviously didn’t watch last year.
1 or 2 good rides doesnt balance the accounts dude.
Wonder if JJF’s recent trips to NZ are just a coincidence.
He’s not surfing Manu
Bells sucks anyway how is Winki during the window?
Margs sucks no matter what. Used to say that until they added Manu
South swell Snapper? Salvador sucks. As just a tour stop, Lowers works. Portugal? I dunno, there’s gotta be another set up.
JBay balanced Chopes and Cloudie. Not really, but at least somewhat plausible.
So if you’re going to add Manu, why not choose instead Ulu’s? Kandui? Lakey?
Why doesn’t the CT tour visit formula one race tracks?
Yeah for sure, any of those Indo lefts over Manu bay, all day long. But we all know its about those sweet first world country tourism board dollars.
because there’s no sponsors who see any value in the Ct/WSL……$3m USD to hold it then….all the marketing etc…..so the Governments are hit up for $’s
Bells/State Govt
Margs/State Govt
Snapper/State Govt
Raglan/Govt
El Salvador/Govt
Brazil / Govt
Tahiti/Govt
Fiji/Govt
Dubai/Govt
Peniche/Govt
so really since the demise of the surf industry , no real public traction in getting big #’s of viewers….there’s no real return on investment…surfing is a commercial dud!
who would have thought! I like my surf tour on the webcast but not the new surf people in the water so which ever way it goes from here is a win-win for me.
Nailed it
100% correctamundo , all the WSL does is provide a marketing vehical for goverment tourisim bodies and as i have been banging on for years the out come for the general local surfers is everything they cherrish gets exploited.
Fuck competitive surfing fuck surfing organisations in general and fuck the WSL its about time surfers turned their backs on this bullshit.
Very good.
Xox
People who care about surfing? like the ones that just go surfing and aint to bothered about contests?
too
So, Change.org petition to give the local wildcard to Negs?
Coming in hot after a 3rd in the O45’s in the weekend. Surely only a good shaper, some of those new fancy Mick Fanning fins and a week in the gym would level me up.
Not going to be on the panel?
I was 5th place in the over 55s thus weekend.
Mind you, there were only 5 guys in the division….
The annals of history will not remember that there was only 5!
let’s hope there’s swell
Given how much car park area they take over for WSL events it’s going to be a nightmare for anyone wanting to watch. Maybe they will need to bus them in from town.
Let’s hope we get to see some classic rock jump fails. That is the only thing I will be looking forward to.
yeah, not sure where they will put everything.
luckily i can get there round the front of the maunga and maybe park up away from the mayhem. they did buses for the music festival, so you might be on the money there.
time for an oldie but a goody.
#FUCK WSL
Paint and roller Lennox style.
Still visible in the carpark.
Contest is at Manu supposedly. Pretty fucked unless it’s big. Move it to Mangamaunu so we can watch Negs fanboy it on the cobbles.
dropping names
Sonofa
big manu is worse than medium…. just pushes out to sea like the cove
Finally, someone or something is going take take take off the kiwis.
About time.
You mean like the Aussie owned banks who’ve been raping nz for fucken years, right ?
No, I mean all the fucking kiwis on the dole over here in wa, all the kiwis taking mining jobs over here and all the fucking kiwis telling us how much better nz is than australia.
Why dont new Zealanders get head jobs in new zealand?
Cause all the cock suckers are in Oz.
I sympathise matey. But what can you do ? It’s the same here but with different nationalities … higher pay in Aus, cheaper living – fuckall reasonable paying jobs here and high cost of living.
My daughter’s been in Brisbane for over a year and a half. She ain’t coming back. Can’t blame her. I told her to start thinking about getting Aus citizenship.
Thanks for the sympathy matey
Less moaning and more working is why Kiwis are taking your jobs and women.
Bullshit, kiwis are silver tongue sly cunts. And lazy fkers also.
And how the hellare they taking our women when 70 percent of them are fanta pants??
I’d be checking the Missus’s phone if I was you… My old apprentice loves his Ocker cougars.
Redhead apprentice? Geez he musta copped some shit.
Nah, the other one… Young Maori fella, Koura.
Scaffolder?
How many kiwis is she banging?!?
Not a chance, a kiwi took her job, she’s more likely to lure one in then go all Lorena Bobbitt.
less moaning- bruz!
No one can whinge like a cuzzy bro.
careful you may be arrested for being anti immigration and talking about it
waaaa waaaa , cry me a river, theres lots of kiwis working in WA because ya lazy arse ozzies are to precious. Its acually very hard for kiwis to get on the dole in OZ. you talk a lot of shit.
Fuck off its well know the cuzzy bros will work for less and make the gain on the exchange rate , its been going on before you learnt to scrible the abc.
Yeah I guess your partly right