Virginia Beach surfer wins $20,000 from obscure sticker and magnet company for frontside air!

By Derek Rielly

5 years ago

Notes of Kustom Air Strike from a decade ago. Very big airs etc.

Heard of the sticker, magnet, keychain and pin company Life at Sea? Don’t ring no bells? Yeah, me neither.

But.

Over the past year, June 1, 2018 to June 1, 2019, the Santa Cruz-based co, owned by the surfer, artist and environmentalist, Tim Ward, ran a contest that offered twenty-gees for the best air, three for second, two for third. All y’had to do to be in the game was to tag your clip @lifeatseaco and #planetary punt.

It had notes of Kustom’s Air Strike contest a decade ago that gifted Hawaiian Dusty Payne fifty-gees minus the accompanying hoo-ha.

Sidenote: In that instance, I gave the cash to Dusty in a Bondi bar but only before extracting a promise that…if…he won he’d spend ten percent of his earnings on booze and visually strong women. The plan was abandoned when we realised it was Good Friday. Even the best-laid plans etc.

In this case, VB surfer Lucas Rogers won with an outburst in Panama, Australian Reef Heazlewood came second and Maryland’s Brad Flora got third.

The contest was judged by Santa Cruz’s Jazzy “Ratboy” Collins and Flea Virostsko, both of whom are looking relatively well despite age and track records

I just looked at the play count on Planetary Punt and it was at a paltry 329.

I think it deserves a little more, don’t you?

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Ryan Daniell

Watch Italo Ferreira in “This is your new daddy!”

By Derek Rielly

5 years ago

Get your levers yanked!

First thing. I can’t get enough of Italo Ferreira, the twenty-five-year-old Brazilian who has won a remarkable four WCT events in eighteen months and who controls his board like bait on a fishline.

A pivotal shift in surfing, still coming, will be the way we approach a wave on our backhand. Don’t you think it’s crazy that the same turns that won world titles for Barton Lynch and Damien Hardman in the nineteen-eighties still gift Owen Wright and co nine-point rides thirty years later?

Do you think, like me, that new lines have to be drawn at the highest level?

And here’s where Italo fits. His backside turns yank on different levers, his combos gut and rope waves.

In this promotional video from Billabong, we see Italo in the Maldives, I think it is, first, terrified out of his head on the puddle jumper plane to the island they visit, and, later, blasting his horn like an interstate trucker on the pretty three-foot waves.

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Ando, six-eight single, Indo.

Watch: Craig Anderson in “I been a long time leaving but I’m going to be a long time gone!”

By Derek Rielly

5 years ago

A dreamy, slumberous edit by the little master Kai Neville…

The South African Craig Anderson is one of the the most alluring characters in surf; a man who once refused a million-dollar-a-year contract so he could start his own surf and skate clothing label with Dane Reynolds.

“In my opinion, the soul isn’t there (at Quiksilver),” Craig said. “So we want to start something that’s true to us, with products we believe in. To be motivated to do fun, cool shit.”

Craig’s career was kickstarted almost a decade ago by his inclusion in a series of Kai Neville’s surf films which included the 2011 classic Lost Atlas.

His manager John Shimooka told me, “Four years ago he was definitely on minimum wage. Now, he’s a top earner. Once you’re affiliated with Kai… it carries a truckload of weight.”

In this twenty-minute cut, Craig, who is thirty, is photographed surfing in Iceland, South Australia and Indonesia.

A Willie Nelson cover of the old Irving Berlin song Blue Skies (from the Rodgers and Hart musical Betsy) is an inspired choice for the outro.

Filming by Dav Fox, edit by Kai Neville.

THE QUIETER YOU ARE THE MORE YOU CAN HEAR. from craig anderson on Vimeo.

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Koa and his finless Pyzel, eaten alive by the Teahupoo reef.

See: Koa Rothman’s fins blown clean off at Teahupoo!

By Derek Rielly

6 years ago

Ain't no easy rides at Tahiti's favourite photo studio…

The Hawaiian surfer Koa Rothman, brother of Makua, son to Big Daddy Ed, chases big waves for his thrills and for his cash.

Over the course of the last year, Koa and his filmer buddy Jack Germain, have created a vlog that takes the viewer into the world of a big-waver with an impeccable pedigree and who has a stomach like wooden slats.

This episode begins in Tasmania, where Koa competed in the Red Bull event there, and ends with his Pyzel relieved of its fins by the Teahupoo reef.

I watched this wearing a tank top, which was red like my underthings, and eating cream-coated treats from Dunkin’ Donuts. I caught my eyes in the reflection of the computer screen and they were filmy and grey.

This is Livin’ transports me to magical lands.

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Watch: Mason Ho in “My mom said when I was a baby I used to bang my head all day and all night long!”

By Derek Rielly

6 years ago

Mason's most exuberant film yet!

Mason Ho, the thirty-one-year-old surfer from Sunset Beach, Oahu, personifies all that is good and worthy in surfing.

Don’t you think?

When I watch Mason, Satan is temporarily exorcised from my thoughts, although I do want to dress him in a baby-doll nightie from Victoria’s Secret.

Kelly Slater says he’s “truly one if my favourite surfers to watch. You never know what he’s gonna do. He throws style points back to his influences and elders, and throws down maneuvers lots of new school guys can’t pull. And he surfs those weird waves nobody else does, which is probably my favorite thing about him.”

Dane Reynolds calls Mason “the king of stony surfing. The novelty tricks are rad, and he mixes them in with really gnarly tricks, which is even radder. I love that he rides 7’6″s at Pipe. And the whole Jimi Hendrix thing he does, recorded off YouTube with a phone for his web clips, really suits the vibe of his surfing.”

In this five-minute film, which was made by his best friend Rory Pringle, Mason casts his magic like a fishing line. And it’s a spell no man or woman can resist.

Watch cliff-crashing, underwater rock licking, backside tube arm-switches, cannibalised takeoffs and much much, oh so much, more.

Essential.

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Eat beach grit spam!