Point break, beach break, slab oh my.
Competitive surfing has long been a staid affair. One venue, heats, scores et voilà. A winner. It is all fine enough but surf fans have long wondered if more might exist. Something maybe even polyamorous. Well, Natural Selection has picked up on the vibe and is set to deliver a wild competitive ménage à trois.
Some of the best and/or most interesting surfers in the world, including Milla Brown, Noa Beschen, Hughie Vaughn, Soli Bailey, Kirra Pinkerton are currently in South Africa to face-off in the second ever NST Surf competition. Last year, our heroes and heroines were flown to the Marshall Islands wherein they made battle over a never-before-contested-upon wave.
This year, and as mentioned, the competition will unfold over ten days and a variety of spots including a racing point, a gurgling slab and a thumping beach break. The surfers, including Balaram Stack, Eden Walla, Mikey Wright and Sanoa Dempfie-Olin will have to flash fearlessness and flair, in equal measure, in order to hoist the trophy at the end.
Natural Selection, the brain child of Travis Rice and Circe Wallace, got its start as a thrilling snowboard event before expanding, in recent years, to include mountain biking and surfing. Tying them all together is the ethos that nature must have equal billing.
The aforementioned Balaram Stack declared, “Seeing the NST snow events, then the first surf event, NST has looked like a dream competition to be a part of. Incorporating aspects of freesurfing with competitiveness will make for a mental event, where we can focus on the waves and the land and hopefully have less stress about competing in small waves.”
The show premieres Friday, September 25 on Red Bull TV and the Red Bull Surfing YouTube channel.
It’s business time.