62 years of domination undone.
Australians are waking up this morning blaming both each other, the government and the global home of surfing after the wrong kind of history was just made at Bells Beach. The iconic competition has run a record 63 times, wrapping its latest iteration, yesterday, with Brazil’s Miggy Pupo defeating countryman Yago Dora in the final frame.
Migs took down California’s Griffin Colapinto in the semifinals and Hawaii’s Barron Mamiya in the quarters along his way. Dora, for his part, mowed through the flashy Brazilian Gabriel Medina and Miggy’s brother Samwise along his.
And there, in hard cold black and white is what Australians are trying to accept.
For the first time in history, one of their own mans failed to make it to the final day.
62 years of Southern Crosses flown high. 62 years of Oi Oi Oi. 62 years of Waltzing Matilda done.
A crushing blow.
As mentioned, some who call the Lucky Country home are blaming their neighbors for failing to produce good enough surfing stock. Others blaming the government for not nationalizing surf training. Still others blaming the World Surf League, itself, for facilitating a national embarrassment.
There are no easy answers as to what went wrong, nor any way to fix. A 62 year streak shattered forevermore.
The highest ranked Australian, as the tour hops the country to Western Australia, is George Pittah at 9. The nearest him, Ethan Ewing at 18.
Depression.
David Lee Scales, anyhow, told me that fact about the historic lack of Australians. He tried to use ChatGPT to comb years’ worth of results, but it told him that Mick Fanning, Joel Parkinson and Simon Anderson were not Australian so he kicked it to the curb.
You can listen to the full conversation here.