Mavericks video

You want big? You want stooopid big and freezing cold? Check out these seasick waves from last weekend

Warning, no steady cam For those who haven’t seen this vantage point and aren’t prone to motion sickness here are some clips from the first two heats of the Mavericks contest this last weekend. …

Surf in Scotland?

Interesting 9-min video of surfin’ in Thurso region. Waves look kinda like the NSW south coast… but a bit colder!

A video guide to Thurso, Scotland.

Vid: Slater shoots HB Pier

VIDEO: Daniel Ross Wins Drug Aware Pro at Margaret River

Dan Ross's feet above the sand. Photo: Mario Vassallo

Margaret River, Western Australia — DANIEL Ross (AUS/NSW/Yamba) has won the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) six star prime rated  Drug Aware Pro defeating fellow North Coast NSW Australian surfer Adam Melling in clean 3 to 4 feet (1.25m) surf at Margaret River in Western Australia today.

It was Ross’s biggest career victory and could not have come at a better time for the powerfully built surfer who fell short of requalifying on the ASP World Dream Tour last season and also recently lost his major sponsorship deals!

“ I was so pumped to win this event and I can’t believe how good I feel right now” said an elated Ross after his win.

“I’ve made the semi’s the last two years here and I knew coming here I was a really good chance to win, I’ve trained hard leading into this event and it has really paid off for me in a big way.”

“Without a major sponsor the cash that comes with winning ($US20 000) will make my year of competing that much easier and I wanted to prove to everyone out there right now  that I am worth sponsoring and capable of big results!”

Ross surfed the ASP Dream Tour last year but failed to requalify. Today’s result has him exceptionally well placed for requalification this year.

Dan Ross in action to win. Photo: Steve Robertson

“That’s my aim for sure and now I’m winning I want to get on a roll and string together a lot more excellent results.”

With the lead  see sawing in a  high scoring quality  final, Melling opened with an excellent 8.67 ride and looked to have control when he backed that ride up shortly after  with a strong 6.07 ride.

Ross opened with a 6.77 score, remained patient and found the finals best ride when he scored an outstanding 9.43 at the twenty minute stage of the 30 minute final.

Ross unleashed all his power on this ride combining two massive bottom to top turns sending fans of spray  high off the wave and it was immediately clear to the large crowd on the hills of Margaret River that he had taken the lead with that ride.

While Melling searched for an achievable 7.54 to regain the lead, he fell on a few critical turns late in the final and was forced to settle for second on a score line for each surfers top two scoring rides of 16.20 (out of a possible 20) for Ross and 14.74 to Melling.

Melling’s second place today is the second time he has finished runner up  in an ASP prime 6 star event.

“It’s disappointing not to win but Rossy is a great guy and I’m really stoked for him today” said Melling.

“Having made the finals twice I now really want to win one of these events; my start to the season has been great but there’s still a lot of work ahead to qualify for next year’s Dream Tour – that’s my goal and I have to remain focused because the season has really just started.”

Despite being disappointed at not winning, Melling’s  good early season form see’s him as the number one rated surfer on the ASP World Qualifying Series Ratings ahead of Brett Simpson (USA) , Dion Atkinson (AUS) with  Ross in fourth place.

In what turned out to be a dominating day for the Australian surfers, with all Australian semi finalists, Luke Munro (AUS/Gold Coast) and Dion Atkinson (AUS/SA) placed equal 3^rd both picking up valuable 2625 rating points along with $US2950.

Both Atkinson and Munro have firm goals to qualify for the ASP Dream Tour for next year.

“I’m really happy with my start to the season, 5^th last week  in Tasmania and 3^rd here is a great start to my season” said Atkinson.

“That’s two ‘keepers’ already to the season in my aim to qualify and that is a lot better than most other surfers this early in the season so I’m feeling great”

For most of today’s finalists their next stop on the ASP World Qualifying Series will be South Africa in mid April for the Quiksilver Pro presented by Virgin Mobile in Durban, another six star prime event.

Melanie Redman-Carr winning her fourth Drug Aware Pro title at Margaret River. Photo: Mario Vassallo/Surfing Australia

Veteran Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Dream Tour surfer Melanie Redman-Carr (AUS/WA/Dunsborough/33 years of age) won her fourth Drug Aware Pro at Margaret River defeating rising Hawaiian star Coco Ho (17 years old/North Shore Ohau) in clean 1.25m (3 to 4 feet) surf.

Redman-Carr’s local knowledge and experience at the break saw her select the superior waves in the final which she won comfortably with a combined top two wave final score tally of 12.60 To Ho on 7.67.

“I have really surprised myself winning here today” said Redman-Carr.

“The younger emerging girls here have been ripping and I was sure I’d be eliminated in the opening quarter final today when I faced Carissa Moore (Haw); she has been the form surfer all week and I thought she’d win the event”

“The waves were really fun out there today and I’m sure my local knowledge helped out a lot” added Redman-Carr.

Redman-Carr opened with a 5.83 ride and was never seriously challenged by Ho who had difficulty finding the right waves to deliver any high scores at all.

Redman – Carr  sealed the final with 3 minutes remaining when she used her priority on a clean righthand breaking wave, scoring the finals top scoring ride of a 6.77.

That left Ho chasing a very difficult 8.10 and with no waves in the final few minutes the 2009 Drug Aware title was Redman-Carr’s.

Redman- Carr’s experience includes finishing second on the ASP World Tour on two occasions, the last time in 2006 and she officially retired from full time  professional surfing this year following the birth of her daughter Willow last year.

Being a local girl with an affinity to the surf here at Margaret River she accepted a wildcard into this event and went on to win $US 4000 in prize money.

Drug Aware Pro Margaret River is the biggest ASP World Qualifying Series Six Star Prime Rated event in the world. Prize money totalling $US145 000 and essential prime rated points on the ASP World Qualifying Series ensures an outstanding field of the world’s best surfers. A field of more than 250 surfers representing countries such as New Zealand, Tahiti, Hawaii, USA, Peru, Brazil, South Africa, France, Spain, England, Portugal, Reunion Island, Canary Islands, Japan and Israel will be competing with some of Australia’s best surfers across the week long event

Video: the Dolphin stampede

Who doesn’t love watching dolphins… a lot of dolphins!

From the YouTube description: This video was shot in the Sea of Cortez between Isla la Guardia and Bajia de los Angeles. While fishing we ran through a pod of several hundred dolphins. This is part of what we saw.

Gerry Lopez & Jock Sutherland talkin’ Pipe

Came across this very interesting video of Gerry Lopez and Jock Sutherland talking about the history and their experiences of Pipeline. It’s part one of six and in this episode they give us brief bios before Gerry talks about trying to surf Pipe the first time in 1962 – and meeting Jock, who already had it wired. Although we see the two champions bantering on a dimly lit stage (they’re actually at the Patagonia surf shop in Cardiff, California) , their chat is liberally illustrated with great stills pictures from Jeff Divine and Surfer magazine.

Discovery credit goes to dailysurfvideo.com which looks like a site to add to the bookmarks!

More about Mr Lopez in my post entitled Where’s Gerry

The Mootrix

MAN vs. COW See the video.  Someone once told me I had a better chance of being attacked by a cow than a shark. Seems appropriate today given the shark attacks in Sydney.  Those aren’t funny. This video is hilarious.

Weird waves: The Silver Dragon

pic by A.J. Neste from Surfline.com: Rusty Long pulling into a barrel in the Qiantang river bore.

In September of 2008, Greg and Rusty Long and Mark Healey joined writer Mike Cianciulli and photographer A.J. Neste from Gerard Sports Marketing on a mission to surf the Qiantang River bore in China Apparently the bore is known to locals as The Silver Dragon and is the focus of a riverside festival.

The river water looks pretty ordinary, but the wave itself doesn’t look too bad. Here’s an excerpt from the blog post on surfline:

Greg Long and Healey zigzagged and carved through our familiar zone. But once they shot Bridge #6 together, the river bent and the wind turned offshore. Rippable sections popped up all over the place. We were forced to forge ahead, much to the dismay of the Communist Government officials, because there was no way for the guide boat to punch through the eight-foot wall of whitewater. And this was our precise excuse for forging past our boundary during the final day.

read the rest of the post on Surfline

(We’re indebted to RealSurfer Kev R. for pointing us to this extraordinary adventure blog on the big US surf site, Surfline.com. )

I did a little search on Google, and turned up some video of the boys’ adventure. And just for comparison, I also grabbed one of the famous Brazillian tidal bore, the Pororoca.

Compare this to the Pororoca in Brazil…

Have a laugh: Hitler’s shaper

I’d say every surfer on the planet will have seen this mashup within the next 24 hours…

Mr Hitler isn’t happy about his surf trip, guess why…(click to follow link)
……
Actually, there have been numerous other mashups on this clip. Here’s one provoked by, of all things, Nikon’s new D3x pro camera.

and finally, here’s the wonderful Mr. Hilter sketch from the Monty Python boys, circa 1970

Ghost Trees

Just Stupid Dept.

From Wetsand.com

One of the biggest swells of the winter hits Pescadero Point, Central California – December 4th, 2007. Filmed by Bruno Lemos and edited by Matt Shuster.