Merry Christmas

Congratulations Jeremy Flores.

Great show put on by the Frenchman in 4ft backdoor. It's the first time I can remember a European winning The Pipe Event and its also much needed points for my fantasy surf team. Winning at Pipe is something which you should be able to eat out on for life and comes with the title "Legend".

 Monsieur Flores we salute you.

Castles In The Sky: Review.

Sipping Jetstreams by Taylor Steel was one of the few surf movies that made me look twice and although it has pretension involved, I kept my eyes open for the sequel "Castles In The Sky".

 The opening sequence all the way to the finale, the cinematography, music....Christ I could smell Kretek Indo fags...beautiful. Yes it's sad that they always have to surf something quirky, this time a coracle, as if stuck for ideas. But the starkness of getting tubed in Iceland contrasting with Machado taming El Hueco in Peru, just makes you start fumbling for the passport and cracking out the pin tail.

 What makes these highly expensive style DVD's worth it, is that non surfers devour the imagery too. It feeds something in us, akin to the Baraka series.

 I loved it. It makes me want to try out 180 Degrees South By Chris Malloy. If anyone wants to do a trade for a bit, let me know.

Pipeline Masters is on!

Past Masters including the 4 time Master Andy Irons whose recent death has led to the event being dedicated to him.




The first day's highlights show a Backdoor fest. I fancy John John or Jeremy for an upset or two. Check out all the action here.http://www.triplecrownofsurfing.com/billabongpipemasters/

Snowboarding the Penwith range, continued.

With a fair smattering of snow and the country brought to a stand still only one thing made any sense.

There is no guide currently available on Cornish Snowboarding so all gates had to be inspected. Cattle seemed to be housed, horses wrapped up and left to fend for themselves. These guys didn't seem to mind.

Untitled from Edward Lockyer on Vimeo.

First runs were tentative, lack of practice and gradient meant it became an excercise in picking lines.

Being restricted to fields meant, backing right into corners to make the most of it. The animals must also charge with the same principles because corners are churned up.

Untitled from Edward Lockyer on Vimeo.

Sometimes we got it all wrong and just walked around aimlessly, still the views weren't bad.

Kids got stuck in too.

Says it all.

Some shots from around about.

It's the end of Movember

There can be little disputing that growing a Mo for a whole month is good for annihilating the ego. Buddhists should give it a whirl. I for one am very glad to see this bad boy go!

Cornish winter

Cornish winter has come early and it's harsher than any I remember already. We have this tradition in England that the world comes to end when it snows. Unlike our European brothers, a light dusting here and  all schools close, all shops shut and people start hailing Siberian conditions at minus one. The surfs been flat, so it only seemed appropriate to take to the slopes. Cornish land is pretty poor so we don't seem to have large fields more akin to arable farming, so slopes are short and often have cattle or horses in them, as well as granite. Still great time to get a novice buzzing.

The video is of the great mountain range based in Nancledra, spinalsurfer is contemplating a horse drawn carriage lift system.

 Sadly bodyboarders seemed to be getting involved in the action too.

Making shapes.

We just lost out on bidding for a house. It had a beautiful garage, I was dreaming of getting the sander out and making some shapes. This video inspired me a bit. Then we found out we didn't have a house...who cares about quarter of a million quid on a house, I was far more gutted about the garage though.




How to make a Wallako surfboard? from Ka nardo on Vimeo.

It's a lovely blog well worth having a squiz at.

Scotish surfing.

Where is this wave?

Surfing Brilliant Corners by Sam Bleakley

If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull, is all too often a juxtaposition aimed at people who do things differently, I think. I've been guilty of thinking this. I wasn't sure whether this was going to the case when I saw the book. The shear scale of variety of vocabulary between the front cover and the first page, suggested things were not all as they seemed. Still a local legend who just seems to radiate positivity you've got to check it out right?

The surfing world has morphed into and out of art over the years, its simply too diverse to be defined. Thomas Campbell, the WCT and my average surf share less and less in common it would seem. It's hard to find common ground. One thing that has mesmerized me over the last few years is some of the more Art House photography that has emerged.

We have magnificent brains, but we use a great deal of our brilliance to keep ourselves stuck and ignorant, to keep ourselves from not shining. We are so afraid of our beauty and radiance and brilliance because it scared the adults around us when we were children.
Patricia Sun

 I've not been convinced the art of surf journalism has kept pace. "Blood, sweat and beers" was  as surf article that stuck in my head as being particularly tabloid in nature.... So obviously I purchased Brilliant corners. (click on link to get yours) in search for something new . It's not the cheapest book you'll come upon, but then again for the photographs of the ever brilliant Senor Callahan and the roads less travelled of Monsieur Bleakley it seems appropriate.

  Before the beginning of great brilliance,
there must be chaos.
I Ching

There was a bit of chaos in my mind when I read it unlike I think the author.I find it pretty strange to think like anyone but myself. I like Miles Davis though it gets so frantic I can also hate it, jazz has been known to saunter around my Ipod yet I am no aficionado. What I realised very early on in the book is that Sam Bleakley knows his way around Jazz, bands and its historiography. At times there was one too many snaps of a snare drum when I wanted to live a little more vicariously. But in a unique way I did. That's what dawned on me by the end. I'd actually had a bit of a peep into a buena henti and his relationship with the world which had been heavily laden by jazz enjoyment and surfing splendor. it captured me and it did it sneakily. I didn't realise how much I'd appreciated it till the end, then I felt sad but realised there'd be more from what that came from.

 This book is not the norm, it will not be everyone, but there is poetry and there is earnestness. The divide between  photography and journalism, just got smaller. it may be only  in my head but it was a serendipitous discovery indeed.

 Most interesting surf book I've read since Miki Dora's biography. Give it a whirl.

Haleiwa finished. Parkinson takes care of business.

Selfish derision

I wish I could surf with my friend Leigh,
all ginger haired and knobbly kneed.
He'll ride his single fin and dance up and down
whooping and hollering a complete absence of frown.

Stop....phone Japan, get Usueke and Floyd.
We'll need more wax and wood for the fire.
To warm all our hands, it'll take quite a while.
After friends have travelled so many miles.

Get through to Peru...State of Emegency planned.
We'll need Terry, Gustavo and Dan.
Better bring some local produce along.
It'll pay for the jaunt, Chav'll have a bong.

 And then there's the Kiwis and Aussies; Shuy and Owen,
Their poo stances and loud talk
Gwenvor will throng

Of course it could happen.

Still better have a think and rein it in.
With the whole shooting match they'll be quiet a din.
More importantly as a set rolls through?
What's the chances, will it be for me or you?

The Triple Crown starts here.

The time in Hawaii is



The North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii. Must be the most over publicized piece of  real estate the surfing world knows.

The reasons for that are simple. Surfing began there with the Polynesians, so it was the only surfing world (don't get me started on the Chimu and the Caballitos de Totora) Seecondly with a fetch half the length of the world and its volcanic nature (hence no continental shelf slowing wave power), the reefs of the North shore and quite simply hardcore. There power is allegedly (having never been or desire to) unsurpassed. Thirdly Hawaii is part of the US of A and there isn't a nation on this planet that can blow wind up its arse like it.....North Korea....na'h. All in all as a competitive surfer, you ain't shit till you've gone toe to toe with some North Shore grunt and made a mark in the sand.

 The Triple Crown is held every year in Movember and December and comprises of three seperate competitions. The first is the Haleiwa pro, the second is the Sunset beach Pro and then the final event is the Pipeline masters. There all beautiful beaches and full on waves. The reason I love them is the passion. I can feel a rant coming on...........

 Those people who are called professional surfers are quickly sorted into two sections, show ponies and thorough breds. The waves are thick, heavy lipped heaving machines and instead of the guys getting out there 6'0 beachie board, the 8footers come out and some testosterone is brought back. I love it. The lines the artists etch on these huge moving canvasses, the soul bared for the audience to marvel at...well it's poetic.

 Anyway watch it Haleiwa has started it's waiting period and a huge swell approaches.

 Mahalo

PS There will be all sorts of other competitions going on at the same time, keep your eyes peeled.

Fins

A few years ago I lost my much loved garage. Times move on and unless I parted company I would haven't have sampled the delights of South American surf etc.....but I surely miss that garage. The control of an area untouched by my partner and kids, a place where experiments arose out of plumes of smoke. A place where I sprayed my first surfboard and had enough left to get a bit "out there" on the walls. A place where saw dust and fibreglass fumes could mingle freely, far away from frowning eyes.


I can make fins, wooden, keel fins. Never a simpler or more satisfying surfing endeavour. Find the template you like, get some 9mm marine ply, cut out the shape with a jigsaw and then get the mask on and the random orbital out for some freestyling.

Three things led to failure on the last attempt. Firstly, the ply was poor quality and splintered. It would be so great to get some oak and teak ply or something which really adds strength and colour....it isn't easy to get hold of in the piddly quantities I want or can store.

Secondly, I lost concentration at a crucial time. After finishing off the first fin. I clamped up the second one and without thinking, sanded from the base not the tip, in 10 seconds the damage was done. I blame the third can of cider myself.

Lastly with no garage, there is nowhere to store excess wood, there is nowhere to leave things and come back to at a more auspicious time and the whole experience is just off key.

So we are house hunting at present and I'm gunna try and hang tough on the garage front.

Kelly Slater 10 times World Champ.

 So Kelly Slater 10 times World Champon hey....well I can think of no sport so dominated. It struck me as being somewhat creepy that the only guy to really put a rupture in his works was no other than Andy Irons who died the same week just aged 32.

 I'm going to say that judges are soft on the guy but...that doesn't go anywhere near far enough to discredit a man who surely holds the gratifying title of "Most successful competitives sportsman on earth"....please if you know some fat clay pigeon shooter whose being shooting better than anyone, don't bother me alright. He is.

 Good on ya!

Problems in Peru for the ISA games.

 

The article below was brought to my attention by Inkawaves Terry but was written by Swellnet

 

 Shall Fight Them on the Beaches: Riot in Peru

 

Last Friday the International Surfing Association (ISA) wound up its week long competition in Punta Hermosa, Peru. The ISA Games are a teams event where surfers compete for their country rather than compete as individuals. The surfers collect points for placing and the nation with the most points becomes the ISA champion.
Last week it was the host nation, Peru, that collected enough points to call themselves ISA champions. It was a proud moment for the host nation but unfortunately the moment was tarnished by a serious riot following the mens semi-final.
Australia had two competitors in the semi, Mick Campbell and Drew Courtney, and if both got through to the final Australia would've accrued enough points to be crowned champion. Peru had one surfer in the semi and not long after the heat began it was clear he was operating under orders to take Drew Courtney out of the competition. The Peruvian didn't catch a wave the entire heat, instead focussing on blocking Courtney from riding waves.
Toward the end of the heat Courtney caught a wave and the Peruvian had an interference called against him. According to Courtney "a bit of push and shove happened and a few words were said out in the water".
When he got to the waters edge the fervently patriotic crowd thought the Peruvian surfer had been slighted and they confronted Courtney. Another Australian competitor, who watched the incident from the roof of a nearby house, said a 100-strong crowd of locals surrounded the Australian. With no security to quell the situation it quickly became violent.
The first thing to hit Courtney was a bottle. He was then punched in the head a number of times by individuals who fled back into the crowd. When rocks started to be thrown Courtney had to use his board as protection.
The Australian team physio rushed to the surfers aide and he was also hit by a large rock in the shoulder. Team coach, 1988 world champion Barton Lynch, stepped in and tried to calm the crowd but had to retreat when they turned on him too.
By now the crowd had grown to 500 and Courtney made his escape by running along the rocky shoreline and through a hole in the scaffolding of the competitors area. The local police force arrived with sirens on yet no officers got out of the car. ISA security, clearly outnumbered, also did nothing.
The Australiam team house was situated just ten metres from the competitors scaffolding but to get there would've meant Courtney leaving the safety of the competitors area and running the gauntlet of the angry mob. He stayed in the competitors area. Much of the anger was then directed at the Australian house and for fifteen minutes the crowd surged with more violence likely.
Tensions began to ease however, and surfers from the Peruvian team made their way into the Australian house offering apologies for their countrymen's behaviour. The Peruvian surfer that blocked Courtney in the semi-final was succesful in keeping him out of the final so Peru were crowned ISA champions.
According to sources the victory was hollow for the Peruvian surfers. Although that wouldn't have been obvious from reading the absurdly one-sided press release written once competition was completed. That press release, clearly written by someone involved in the Peruvian team, made no mention of the violent infraction although it did include this quote by ISA founder, Fernando Aguerre, "Today we present to the nations of the world a vision, a unified hope of surfing for a better world".
The ISA Games offer gestures of international unity such as the 'sharing of the sands'. As an organisation it has much to offer, yet the riot - the way it was handled, and the way it has been covered up - leaves a serious black mark against them.
Of great concern, especially for the Australian team, is that the ISA junior world championships are due to be held in Punta Hermosa, Peru, early in 2011. Following the riot coaches from France, Tahiti, Great Britain and South Africa expressed their concern about sending their junior national team to Peru.
In response to the riot, Surfing Australia CEO, Andrew Stark, said he is "insisting that the ISA provide a safe and secure events for our teams to attend". Stark also said that they "will only send the Australian Junior team to Peru next year if we can guarantee that the necessary security measures are in place and we can be assured that the team will be safe".
As for Fernando Aguerre, he has made it his life's work to get surfing into the Olympics and the ISA is his vehicle for doing so. Friday's deplorable behaviour may prove to be a setback to his goal, yet how he responds will be a good gauge as to whether he is capable of achieving it

Passing of a Surfing Legend: Andy Irons

Kurungabaa

I couldn't help but love a blog I stumbled on today, it's http://kurungabaa.net/ and here are some of the entries I found I enjoyed.

Monsterboards from Matthew McGregor-Mento on Vimeo.

Greg Webber Fatburner and stuff.

There are two boards I've always wished to own. The first is a 6ft 10 inch Channel Island Black Beauty and the second is a Greg Webber Fat Burner. These boards could be ridden well by big boys. At 6ft 4 in and 16 stone, I'm not your average shortboarder for sure. For the last few years I've been riding fishes and have nothing but praise for Steve Lis and his fellow kneeboarders who designed them through the 1960's. You know, whilst on the topic you have to mention a few of the many great fish pioneers such as Skip Frye, Rich Pavel and Dick Van Straalen. And to be honest if Tom Curren hadn't hopped off that boat in Indo in 1994 when the swell was making and jumped on a fish, the world might have forgotten about the fish and .....my beloved surfing might be dying with matchstick boards and that terrible music.



The music is terrible as is the footage but half way through this section the fish was reborn and with it bigger guys began to see an alternative to longboarding or missing waves.


 The fish rebirth naturally led to quad fins, no finer example here than the Pavel Speed Diallers. The speed and unique characteristics of the set up, brought back larger tails.....more good news for the big guys. The whole Clarke Foam debacle made alternative more buoyant materials accessible too. You can see where the big guys are getting some love from here by now.......


 However , a solid PU construction thruster for men packing a bit more explosion in their suits has never truly been under my feet, that is of course until the Webber Fatburner! I've heard all the patter going, "Simon Anderson is a big guy his boards are for your gang".....blah blah, well the proof is in the pudding and his XFC model sits in my room, a bit like all warships after the dreadnought superseded all that went before it, eclipsed by light years. Greg Webber himself is quoted as saying "its the best model I've ever shaped". And as you can now tell I'm a devotee.

Every surfer who owns one adores it, I had to have one and yet....the 450 pound price tag has kept me as a distant admirer, until .....shameless plug coming.......Down The Line...gave me a staggering 150 pounds off......minus a near miss divorce.......I've never looked back. The distribution of foam, rocker and ...just everything has enabled me to generate speed and knock it off with solid turns, access the top part of the wave far more easily and allowed me to draw lines I simply couldn't before. Where it differs from my lovely quad is that middle fin and tail shape allows pivot and turning arc in a different way, there is a place for both in this cavernous heart. What is most noticeable apart from its voluptuous nature are the appreciable set of double concaves running through it, reminding me off a more moderate Brett Warner I lived and swore by in Bali.

 Surely the quiver can take no more?!?!? I haven't got a Black Beauty though...still in the world of Cornish beach breaks it's hard to envisage its function.

'ear it!

I'm going deaf. I'm sure I don't hear as well as I used to. As a teacher as well as a surfer I'm not entirely sure I mind either really. I've never liked noise much and I adore peace and quiet so may be I shouldn't worry too much. I don't but......

 The other day my girlfriend came back with some ear candles from the local Chinese herbalist, set fire to them and stuck them in her ears...I was intrigued. I had visions of salt and seaweed oozing from my ear and perfect harmony with my surroundings restored. I decided to have a go.

 The herbalist who spoke little English and was short and kind of quirky, quickly talked me into a "package" and before I could say "Ni Hao" I was lying in a private cubicle with a Chinese octogenarian at the helm. The candle was burnt and stuck in my left ear and apart from the odd sensation of having a mini Olympic torch stuck in you ear with a disconcertingly large flame, things went pretty smoothly.

 It was the right ear when things started to go wrong........... the hole was simply a lot smaller and the torch struggled to make its way down to any depth in my ear canal. Not only that it was all bony and pretty sensitive.....I started to have a vague recollection of what was up.....

 About 4 years ago I had been to a doctor about something to do with me ears and he'd got his kaleidoscope out and informed me I had "surfers ear" and had lost about 40 % of my right ear canal as the bony growth had taken hold. I'd long since forgotten his words but I do seem to remember him telling me that cold water is the culprit and ear plugs and twat caps the solution.

 It seems that cold water surfers are 6 times more likely to suffer from it and warm and dry is the only way forward. It can lead to lack of immunity to infection and obviously loss of hearing......so for this little surfer the blu tac is coming out and the twat cap. The most drastic cases involve drugs and saws and ear canals....no thanks.

For more information on surfer's ear click hear.

The Stretch

 don't think I posted anything from the Life guarding this summer.....so a few shots. Hayle river mouth is famous to young families from the north who to be fair will brave the waters even when its over caste and raining. However no matter whether rain or sun they don't like to get anything above the knee wet, Four frustrated lifeguards make the most of the situation. Top Left is Craig, paddle boarder and clubby. Next up the Hoff. Followed by Phil the fish Newman, the man is faster than an otter in the water and finally Jack the lad. On my first day on the job, as my long term girl strolled up to HQ, after 6 hours of no action Jack stated "look at her she's gagging for cock"...things continued in a similar vein.

Jack was a keen surfer who had issues about being undergunned.

Phil the boss was a greyhound of a man, just under 400 metre freestyle qualification t seemed like. I'd definitely want him to save me.....

Chin ups with the First Aid kit on where a favourite as was the rock running.

A glorious way to spend the summer.

The Go Pro

I think  it's fair to say I haven't quite got the hang of it yet and with trialing about 6 boards at present there may be a slight time delay on getting it nailed.

Autumnal Penwith