On Saturday the 21st of Jan Kai Linder and his crew from The Good Life organised an excellent day for all at the beach. The theme was retro surfing and the guys from Vudu Surf provided a whole range of retro boards for the day’s contestants to ride on. The idea was to raise funds for the Llandudno Life Saving Club and from what I experienced this was a raging success.
Llandudno beach was packed to the brim and the who’s who of SA surfing popped in to support. Highlights was Potamus the surfing dog who almost ate one of Vudu’s boards (in fact I hope it wasn’t one of their boards) and of course Jordy Smith (leading SA surfer) , Roosta, Chad du Toit and more.
It was hot on the beach, and not just the sun, babes everywhere made for a happy beachbum…
Shoutout to Jacque Smit and John Wilkinson who kept me company.
Props goes to sponsors Vudu Surf, RVCA, Red Bull, theGoodLife, Hurricane, Backsberg, Indo Sole, Wet Sac, Reef Wetsuits, Mrs Palmers and once again to Kai for making this day possible. The best day to kick off a year full of surfing in Cape Town, ever!
theGoodLife video here:
And without further ado, check out the gallery below (there is a second set of photos, link at bottom!):
Lets start with Jordy and Trav. They put up a good show and it’s Jordy’s first event back after his rib injury. Unfortunately he’s not in contention anymore for the world title this year, but this will allow for some very entertaining surfing for the rest of the year. Travis actually put up a great fight and looked the better of the South Africans going into round 3, only to be beaten by the in form De Sousa in that round.
De Sousa went on to beat Durbidge (no knockout round), Bourez (quarters) and Durbidge again in the semi’s to line up against Kelly Slater for the final. Kelly beat Alves and Taj Burrow to get to the finals. De Sousa displayed some excellent technical riding to take the title, but Kelly’s edging towards his 11th World title. He only has to make the fourth round in the next event (San Francisco Rip Curl Search event) to take the title, but there are still a few contenders with an outside chance. Chances are slim though…
The South African Bodyboarding Champs is on at Big Bay this week. Be sure to pop in and support the guys. I’ll be doing limited covering with pics this week when the swell picks up, hopefully Wednesday the 5th of October 2011.
Watch this space for some fun coverage and comment us if you’re keen to contribute.
Owen Wright fought hard to win his latest title at the Quiksilver Pro New York 2011. He was on a high after his second against Kelly Slater in Tahiti at Teahupo’o and it looks like he’s not planning on coming down from that high any time soon. You see, Owen has gotten his pilot’s license in being an aerial specialist and this event will go down in the books for being a showcase of just that. See the video below for some ridiculous air time.
It’s not just Wright who claimed outrageous aerials, Kelly Slater gave it horns right up to the final heat, but looked out of sorts with the kind of competition that Owen was throwing his way right from the start of the heat. To top it all off Kelly snapped his board on a lip with two minutes to go and didn’t bother paddling out again as the writing was on a long wall, being carved up by Owen Wright right in front of him. He’s not too bummed though, as he earned just as much as the US Open of Surf at Huntington Beach with a nice $100k cheque in his pocket. Owen earned the biggest cheque in surfing history, a whopping $300k for winning the event.
Kelly’s semifinal heat against Taj Burrow was an excellent contest. Both of them were scoring in the 9’s and Kelly wrapped it up with a perfect 10 for a stupendous air (around 2:30 in the vid above). This heat just went to show that it’s never over until that buzzer goes, especially against Kelly. He’s on a strong path towards an 11th world title, scoring 8,000 points for his second place against Owen’s 10,000 points, but Owen is not far behind at all, with Joel and Jordy trailing not far in their wakes. These guys starting looking like choppers with all their front and back side reverse airs. Best move of the contest was Josh Kerr’s body varial (is that what it’s called?) Watch closely below:
The current top 10 ASP World Rankings:
1. Kelly Slater: 34950
2. Owen Wright: 31900
3. Joel Parkinson: 30200
4. Jordy Smith: 27000
5. Adriano de Sousa: 26750
6. Josh Kerr: 25600
7. Taj Burrow: 25250
8. Mick Fanning: 23000
9. Michel Bourez: 20500
10. Jeremy Florez: 19700
This year seems to be wide open and it’s making for some spectacular viewing pleasure. Long Beach, New York really did bring the goods, and there were crowds aplenty. It was great to see such a good turnout, and also how well the surfers were being looked after by the sponsors (Quiksilver’s competitors area was amazing to see and apparently modelled by the guys who does locker rooms for the NFL!)
I won’t talk too much about this, except say that this is one of the biggest days ever captured at Teahupo’o in Tahiti and as luck would have it right smack bang in the middle of an ASP event with all the cameras rolling. Check out this insane footage! 27 August 2011 will be remembered for a long time…
Plus check out this insane footage from the Phantom Cam in the earlier rounds of Billabong Pro Teahupo’o 2011. Check Adriano de Souza’s wipeout at 2:15, it just shows you with how much speed these guys are racing down the line!
And then as you’ve all probably heard by now, Jordy and Travis surfed against each other only for Jordy to be injured (rib injury from either his board or the reef – he doesn’t know), the heat to be stopped and then restarted with Jordy winning. BUT the call was made for a re-surf of the heat, because it wasn’t supposed to be standard protocol for a heat to be stopped if someone’s injured and Travis took the rematch, putting him through to the quarter finals.
We can’t really complain, a Saffa’s going through, but I damn well hope that we don’t get another Saffa duo match up for the rest of the year as this was two in a row (first in JBay earlier this year).
We wish Jordy a speedy recovery, as he has to be up and surfing at the Quicksilver event in New York by the 5th of September!
A BIG shout out also has to go to Jeremy Flores who scored a perfect 20 (two 10 point rides) in one heat. Some amazing surfing going down at the moment.
[UPDATE]
Congratulations to Kelly Slater (USA) for taking the win over Owen Wright (AUS) in a close fought battle. Kelly put one over Owen on a wave by wave showdown and some excellent tube riding was displayed by both contenders. A big WELL DONE goes to Travis Logie (South Africa) for making the semi finals and making us fellow Saffa’s proud.
This still has to be one of the best intros to a surf movie that I have ever seen.
And in other news, I saw the Lost Atlas premier the other night here in South Africa. It had really amazing footage (the most creative cinematography I have seen to date in a surf movie thanks to Kai Neville), but apart from a disguised pop shove-it and a few rodeo flips that was as progressive as it could go (maybe I missed the climax?). PS who’s the little blond chap? He rips!
Now excuse my ignorance and don’t make a mistake, Lost Atlas is thoroughly enjoyable and got a bunch of surfers who attended the premier applause at the end. I particularly liked the scenery of the different countries and surf spots (which was captured honestly and realistically) and Jordy’s ‘stinky breath’ scene.
Surfing is pretty much taking over skate and snowboarding moves. It’s the only natural progression I guess. Now, who out there do you think is the most progressive surfers and give us some video evidence of their moves, would love to see that…
It probably comes down to pulling off these extreme moves in competition, but I love me a free surf…
The guys from West Coast Boardriders did an excellent job in hosting a fun day for family and friends and there was some impressive surfing going on.
Conditions were a bit blustery at Big Bay (about 25 minutes from Cape Town), but it held for most of the day. The opportunity to take good pictures was hampered by the fact that I don’t have enough zooming power and there were no close elevation to get above the waves well enough so some are not entirely focussed.
My annual pilgrimage to the Billabong Pro in Jeffrey’s Bay did not disappoint. After all it was a trip with extreme epicness patched together by a lot of nothingness in between. Stretching a surf trip over 10 days doesn’t do one’s bank balance good, especially with so much entertainment on offer and seemingly the only final destination on a lay day to be the factory shops. I think this town was laid out exactly with this in mind, with the end of the road (Da Gama) being my credit card on the sales counter, literally. At least I scored a new suit at a decent price.
Today the swell maxed out between 10-15ft and strong winds and rips made conditions difficult for the competitors. Jordy Smith glided through a few monster barrels to take the win in his round today and has moved on to the quarter finals. The rest of the day was ‘loser rounds’ to see if anyone could make their way back into the fold of first prize competition. The Brazilians are still proving themselves as a strong force to be dealt with. More on that at Kai’s Blog.
Even Shaun Tomson reckoned that he’d much rather prefer the comfort of the commentating box than getting those bombs on the head. The surfers had jet-ski assistance to get to the line-up as it was near impossible to paddle out alone. That fits perfectly with my beachbum style (any takers?).
Day 4’s highlights
{update} – Jordy subsequently got knocked out in the quarters. The waves were a bit inconsistent, but check below for further highlights.
Day 5’s highlights
Final Day’s highlights
Results
Congratulations to Pat Guduaskus (from San Clemente, California, USA) for winning the Mr Price Pro event. He beat John John Florence (HAW) in the final and Jordy Smith came in third. Hopefully Jordy can build on the result and peak at the Billabong Pro and make us Saffa’s proud!
Cape Town surfer Brendon Gibbens is one of the contenders for the new award "best use of social media" at the upcoming South African Surfing Awards presented by Zigzag surfing magazine. Gibbens was nominated for his blog http://brendongibbens.tumblr.com/ blog and his Innersection video clip. The SA Surfing Awards will take place on 9 July at Suncoast Casino and Entertainment World in Durban. Photog: Alan van Gysen
The countdown to the 1970’s themed South African Surfing Awards presented by Zigzag has begun. The event, which takes place on 9 July at Suncoast, will see the honouring of our Surfing South Africa Pro Surf Tour (PST) and ASP Africa champions and several sought after individual accolades such as SA Surfer of the Year.
One of the most anticipated aspects to the evening is the inductions of South Africa’s golden oldies to the “Legends” and “Hall of Fame” Honours boards. The legends are those who have advanced South African surfing through the contribution to the industry, administration or some other pioneering aspect of our sport, while the Hall of Fame contenders are those who earned their stripes out in the water or through competitive surfing.
The lists read like a who’s who of South African surfing. Max Wetteland, Shaun Tomson, Jonathan Paarman, Gavin Rudolph, Mike Larmont, Tony van den Heuwel, Spider Murphy, Errol Hickman, Mike Ginsberg, Peers Pittard, Graham Hynes, Baron Stander, Peter Burness, Ernie Tomson and John Whitmore are some of the names that those outside of surfing may recognise.
The “Surfer of the Year” award has been dominated by Jordy Smith (Durban) over the last few years. Smith is undoubtedly South Africa’s most successful surfer on the international stage since Wendy Botha won the women’s world title in 1987. Grant Baker has been the only surfer able to break Smith’s stranglehold on this accolade when he took the award after dominating the Red Bull Big Wave Africa and Billabong XXL in 2008.
This year the Surfer of the Year will be split into Men’s and Women’s categories. Smith will be a front runner for the Men’s award once again, having finished runner up to the world title crown last year, the highest Men’s year end ranking by a South African for almost quarter a century. The Women’s award will be a closer fought affair, with Rosy Hodge and Nikita Robb (both East London) enjoying top step international experiences, while exciting young surfers Sarah Baum (Amanzimtoti) and Bianca Buitendag (George) have dominated local contests and ISA events.
Three new exciting awards introduced this year are “best use of social media”, “team performance of the year” and “moment of the year”.
Zigzag, Paarl Media KZN and Carling Black label are once again proud supporters of the South African Surfing Awards. Only a few of the 250 tickets remain. Tickets sold out long before the ticket booth closed last year, so those wishing to attend the event are advised to log on to www.computicket.com to book.
We’re really looking forward to seeing you all at the Billabong Pro Jeffrey’s Bay 2011 from the 14th until the 24th of July 2011. It’s going to be a cracker of an event and we’ll be loading some coverage and pictures ‘off the beaten track’ of the event.
The swells at the moment look a bit small, even though it seems Magic Seaweed is predicting something for Thursday through the weekend, so it might happen.
Windguru is predicting something similar, but it doesn’t look like all time firing Supers. Luckily the waiting period is 10 days, so we’ll keep our ears to the ground and bring you updates.
If you’re a photog have some images you’d like to share during the event with a link, send us a shout out.
Saffa surfers did it! Team South Africa rakes in the medals at the ISA World Masters surfing championship in Santa Catalina in Panama last weekend.
South Africa netted three gold, a silver and two bronze medals. Team South Africa’s hopes of scoring a third consecutive gold in the team event was dashed by a mere 260 points when Australia beat us 10456 to 10196.
So much going on on the surf scene at the moment, so here’s a quick round-up of events:
– According to the latest update from Panama, all of our surfers are still alive in the competition at the Panama ISA World Masters Surfing Championship! This means that South Africa is tied for first place with Brazil and Australia. The winners will be determined tomorrow, 4 September 2010. Good luck, guys and gal!
– In the mean time, back in home surf, the Billabong Junior Series has gotten underway in Herold’s Bay, near George, after organisers made the decision to relocate the event from Victoria Bay in search of better waves. The move paid off and now South Africa’s top junior surfers, including the likes of Dylan Lightfoot, Sarah Baum, Bianca Buitendag, Tarryn Chudleigh, Alice McGregor, SA Open champion Chantelle Rautenbach, Kirsty Delport, Benji Brand, Steven Sawyer, Mikey Venter, Jarred Veldhuis and Slade Prestwich are all vying for the title and one of three spots in the inaugural ASP World Junior Tour to take place in Bali at the end of October.
-For those of us who aren’t quite as skilled on the board, here’s your chance to conquer the biggest waves in some of the world’s top surf spots – including South Africa’s very own J-Bay – simply by using your fingers when you play a new game called Billabong Surf Trip. The arcade-simulation surfing game, which was developed by Billabong and Biodroid, a Portuguese game developer, can be played on the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. Featuring some of the best professional surfers in the world, such as Andy Irons, Taj Burrows, Joel Parkinson and Tiago Pires, players will be able to experience super-realistic waves from Billabong Surf Trip destinations such as Mundaka in Spain, Pipeline in Hawaii and many others.
The surf-art style graphics create super-realistic visuals, and the game has many highlights that create a whole world inside the surfing culture. Future platforms will include Sony PSP, Wii Ware, Xbox 360
The 2010 South African Masters Surfing Team has departed for Panama, where they will be competing in the 2010 ISA World Masters Championships.
The tournament, touted to be the greatest event in Masters surfing, is scheduled to get underway on August 27 in Santa Catalina, on the north Pacific coast of Panama. Competitors from all over the world will get a chance to prove once again that age ain’t nothing but a number, and that you don’t need to hang up the board and retire just because you’ve spent 35 years or more on earth.
The “old” toppies (and one chick) who will be representing South Africa at the Masters are:
Wayne Monk (Border), Andrew Banks (Southern KwaZulu-Natal), and their non-travelling reserve Gary van Wieringen (Southern KwaZulu-Natal), who will surf their stuff among the Over 35 (Masters) competitors.
The Over 40 (Grandmasters) representatives are Andre Malherbe (Border) and Robert Moore Boyle (Central KwaZulu-Natal), with Gareth Sepp (Border) as the non-travelling reserve.
David Malherbe (Border), Marc Wright (Central KwaZulu-Natal) and non-travelling reserve Mike Brent (Border) are the Over 45 (Kahunas).
If you’re over 50, watch out for South Africa’s Grandkahuna, Chris Knutsen (Central KwaZulu-Natal).
And the rest of the world’s women over 35 will have to know their stuff to compete against Heather “Fergie” Clark (Southern KwaZulu-Natal). This girl has been on such a roll since recovering from a terrible car accident last year. We couldn’t be prouder of her!
Coach Antoni Brodowicz echoes our opinion that this is a great team: “The masters team is the most successful surfing team to ever leave our shores,” he told theBOMBsurf.
With an impressive three out of the eight going to Panama defending their current individual world championship titles, we agree that this is definitely a team to be reckoned with.
South African surfers continue riding high after yet another local yokel took a major title yesterday.
When East Londoner Greg “The Foot” Emslie emerged as the winner of the O’Neill Cold Water Classic South Africa in Cape Town yesterday, he became the first South African to do so in home surf in the entire history of the event.
With Emslie beating Australian Dion Atkinson at Kommetjie’s Long Beach, it means that the recent South African surfing winning streak continues.
“Jordy (Smith) won the other two local events and now I’ve won the third,” Emslie said after the event. “I was thinking to myself, ‘I beat Jordy in this event, now I can’t let the guy down and lose the final’. We’ve got to keep all the trophies at home, so I’m stoked I managed to do that.”
It was close though. As the Mercury reports, Emslie’s victory over Atkinson came down to a final wave in the dying minutes of the contest.
Jordy Smith managed to become the first South African to win an ASP World Tour event since Shaun Tomson back in the ‘80s when he was crowned the Billabong Pro J-Bay 2010 champion at Jeffreys Bay on Sunday.
By accomplishing this amazing feat, during which he defeated Australia’s Adam Melling in the last round, the 22-year old also managed to secure the top spot on the ASP World Title Race Rankings, knocking the legendary Kelly Slater from his perch as the world’s number one surfer.
“This is the best day of my life,” Jordy said from the podium. “The crowd on the beach has been supporting me the last few days and hearing the cheers and the vuvuzelas just get me fired up to perform. It feels like they’re pushing me along. I couldn’t have done it without them.
“I knew the swell was dying and I had to take advantage of every wave that came through.” Referring to Adam Melling, he said: “[He] is such a dangerous surfer. He’s been in form all day and I knew that if he got the waves, he would get the scores. I went out there knowing I had to open up strong.”
Adam said: “The ocean didn’t cooperate with me in the Final so that’s a shame but I couldn’t be happier. We had amazing waves and to get the best result of my career is huge. I came into Jeffreys with a long road ahead if I were to make the mid-year cut-off, and now that I’m 19th, I feel like I have a bit of a buffer heading into Tahiti. I worked really hard to get here and I want to stay here.”
The next stop on the 2010 ASP World Tour is the Billabong Pro Tahiti from August 23 through September 3, 2010.
Billabong Pro Jeffreys Bay Final Results:
1 – Jordy Smith (ZAF) 17.93
2 – Adam Melling (AUS) 10.00
Billabong Pro Jeffreys Bay Semi-final Results:
SF 1: Jordy Smith (ZAF) 14.83 def. Bede Durbidge (AUS) 14.40
SF 2: Adam Melling (AUS) 14.00 def. Taj Burrow (AUS) 10.67
Billabong Pro Jeffreys Bay Quarter-final Results:
QF 1: Jordy Smith (ZAF) 16.43 def. Adriano de Souza (BRA) 9.20
QF 2: Bede Durbidge (AUS) 12.17 def. Sean Holmes (ZAF) 11.83
QF 3: Taj Burrow (AUS) 11.00 def. Dane Reynolds (USA) 3.66
QF 4: Adam Melling (AUS) 16.43 def. Damien Hobgood (USA) 5.67
Current ASP World Title Race Top 5 (after South Africa):
1. Jordy Smith (ZAF) 28500 pts
2. Taj Burrow (AUS) 24750 pts
3. Kelly Slater (USA) 23500 pts
4. Dane Reynolds (USA) 20000 pts
5. Adriano de Souza (BRA) 19500 pts
6. Mick Fanning (AUS) 19250 pts
7. Bede Durbidge (AUS) 18750 pts
8. Bobby Martinez (USA) 16500 pts
9. Jadson Andre (BRA) 16000 pts
10. Joel Parkinson (AUS) 14750 pts
The world’s top pro surfers, including nine time world champ and current number one ranked Kelly Slater (USA) and number three ranked local Jordy Smith, are convened in Jeffrey’s Bay where they are participating in what is probably the most prestigious surfing event in South Africa: the Billabong Pro.
The 25th Billabong Pro kicked off in pristine conditions in this Mecca of South African surfing yesterday, Thursday 15 July 2010. Smith, Slater, 2007 Billabong Pro winner and Aussie Taj Burrow and and reigning ASP World Champ Mick Fanning, also from Australia, all proceeded to qualify for the third round yesterday.
Fanning, who was the top scorer of the day, posting rides of 8.83 and 7.87 (out of 10) to amass a total of 16.70 (out of 20), said it was important to take every heat seriously this year. “There are so many threats and even the rookies can do damage. I feel like I’ve been surfing well all year and I’m just focusing on every heat, and hopefully that takes me to a solid result.”
The Billabong Pro will continue until 25 July 2010. For more information, visit the event’s official website.
Wow, but Jordy Smith really is riding a huge wave of success at the moment and that wave doesn’t appear set to come crashing down on the rocks any time soon.
If he doesn’t let up, this entire blog runs the risk of becoming all about him – but we won’t mind all that much. Just last week, we told you how the 22-year old South African professional surfer, who is ranked number two in the world after legendary Kelly Slater, is nominated for Men’s Health Magazine’s “Best Men of 2010” awards and how he is using his name and fame to get involved in environmental issues.
On Sunday night, Jordy received the highest honour at the 2010 South African Surfing Awards when he was crowned South Africa’s Surfer of the Year. As Sports24 reports, the rapturous applause this announcement was greeted with solidifies “his growing reputation as one of the world’s most exciting surfers, as well as South Africa’s reputation as one of the leaders in world surfing.”
Another of the night’s honorees was Cape Town’s big wave rider Chris Bertish, who received the ‘Pushing the Boundaries’ title.
Three more surfers were inducted into the Surfing Hall of Fame. They are Peers Pittard, Christine Petrucci (1942-2009) and Hugh Roe. The late Christine’s children were there to accept the award on her behalf.
The Surf Photographer of the Year award was given to Durban’s Greg Ewing, whose prolific and skillfully executed body of work has established him as one of the country’s leading surfing photographers.
Umhlanga’s Beyrick de Vries received The Blowing Up Performer Award, given to the country’s most exciting up and coming junior surfer under the age of 20.
Cecil Solomon from Cape Town received the Agent of Change award for “spreading the stoke of surfing among all communities and at all levels” – which is a fitting description for the man who founded South Africa’s first non-racial surf club.
