The biggest Billabong XXL ever?
There is no doubt this has been one of the best surf seasons in decades, but in the short history of the Billabong XXL I would have to say this is THE best season for judging big waves. I can’t wait to see some of the finalists!
Every year the Billbong XXL has a panel of surf industry folk, including sickshots, review the final shots and pick the winners. I am stoked for the opportunity and always invite you, the sickshots audience to help me. I will be receiving the ballots soon, so stay tuned and I will ask for your opinions. While I know many of the contestants, I keep it as unbiased as possible and ask you to do the same.
This is one amazing shot of Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker at Mavericks last month and it was shot by Frank Quirarte who always seems to be scoring unbelievable Mavericks images. Congrats guys. Epic moment!
Paddle power is back!
I got a call from a friend of mine today from the North Shore of Oahu. He was standing on a 3-story beach house where he was doing construction. There were a few guys surfing a well known tow-in spot in front of him and he was giving me the play by play. ”One of them just took off he’s higher than I am on this house! Whoa, they are all paddling! There’s no skis!” Whoa is right. How cool is that. Paddle power is coming back into vogue with all this swell around. Seems the old school hellman were just waiting to come out of the wood work. A big gun and your own power. There’s something to be said for the whole waterman process of getting out into the ocean, stroking into a monster and making it back in on your own.
I received this press release from the Billabong XXL today (see below). It describes what is being claimed as one of the biggest paddle-in waves ever at Waimea. Unfortunately it doesn’t look like anyone got another angle than this side view. I sure hope one turns up because a front view of this would really put it in perspective. Anyway, It is a monster and worth big congrats to Shane and Mark for an impressive display of bravado!
The photo here is of Kohl Christensen earlier that day (front view). Kohl is one of the paddle guys. He can usually be found in the gnarliest places when the surf is big. I’ve seen him as a little spec on the horizon out at Himilayas as I drove by Lanis on many a large swell. Sometimes he is by himself. I was stoked to see him in the Eddie. Now that I think about it, it was probably Kohl that was out paddling that tow-in spot my buddy was telling me about. Cool.
NEWPORT BEACH, CA — (January 8, 2010) — The promise of the El Nino winter appears to have delivered for big wave surfers, as many long-standing records are ready to fall in this year’s Billabong XXL Global Big Wave Awards presented by Monster Energy. And more than ever before, the Monster Paddle category (just for surfers who catch their waves without any jet ski assistance) has taken center stage as the elite of the sport refocus on this elemental man-against-the-sea tradition. Visual evidence of these landmark performances can be viewed at the event website at www.BillabongXXL.com.
While huge swells have blasted nearly every coastline of the planet in recent months, it has been the Hawaiian Islands which have had the most mind-bending proof of the power of the current El Nino weather phenomenon. December 7-8, 2009 saw one of the biggest swells in modern history batter the northern shores of the entire Hawaiian Chain, followed by another extraordinary day of outer reef waves on Christmas. From these historic moments of oceanic grandeur have come images which show several top big wave surfers paddling into what may well be the biggest waves ever caught by human power in the long history of the sport.
Among these superlative rides is a massive dark wall caught by Shane Dorian and Mark Healey which closed out the legendary Waimea Bay on Oahu on December 7. Also up for consideration is another mammoth peak at Waimea ridden by Chile’s Ramon Navarro which earned the South American hero a perfect score in the Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau event on December 8. And more recently, grainy, documentary photos have arrived depicting Garrett McNamara paddling into a distant peak at Outer Log Cabins, a rarely-seen outer reef far off the North Shore shoreline, previously only the domain of tow-in surfers with jet-powered watercraft.
All are likely to figure prominently as finalists for the Monster Paddle Award to be given out at the tenth annual Billabong XXL Big Wave Awards to be held in California in late April. A panel of big wave surfing and photography experts will analyze the available images and by interpreting the known sizes of the surfers and their surfboards, calculate reliable height estimates for the face of each wave. One will emerge as the Monster Paddle winner and will receive $15,000 out of the total event purse of $130,000.
The current world record for a paddle-in wave belongs to Taylor Knox of San Diego, California who rode a wave measured at 52 feet at Todos Santos Island off of Ensenada, Mexico during the last major El Nino episode in 1998. Many experts are expecting an update to the Guinness Book of World Records once this winter’s measurements are complete.
Dorian and Healey are veterans of decades of big wave hunting and both concur that their shared ride at Waimea was easily the biggest either had ever caught. “I’d been waiting 15 years for that wave,” said Dorian, of Kona, on the Big Island. “That wave, we could see it from when it was like two or three minutes away from breaking, we could see the wave coming in, everybody’s screaming on the beach and yelling and stuff… When the wave finally came in, it was SO big. The thing was a MONSTER. We both put our heads down and started paddling and somehow we both caught it.
“I was going no matter what,” Dorian added. “And I know Mark felt the same way. It was just fun. A party wave — a wave of that size, and it was for sure the biggest wave I’ve ever paddled into, and to do it with my real good friend, it was very….memorable.”
Mark Healey has lived down the road from Waimea all his life and has been one of its most dedicated practitioners. But he’d never seen waves like this.
“That was the biggest day I’ve ever had at Waimea,” said Healey. “And that wave in particular was definitely by far bigger than anything I’ve ever caught out there, for sure.”
The wave was so large it closed out all the way across the Bay, not allowing the surfers the opportunity to kick out over the top of the wave as usual, and forcing them to straighten out and take the endless tons of whitewater on their heads. But for Healey, a renowned freediver with the ability to hold his breath for over five minutes, it was a fun experience. The longtime friends surfaced unharmed right next to each other, hooting with excitement.
“We were pretty stoked,” said Healey. ”Big waves are different, there’s a lot of brotherhood involved, stuff like that. I’d rather have had Shane catch that wave than ride it alone. It was cool to share a wave like that with a friend, and someone I look up to.”
McNamara, another North Shore stalwart, likes his own chances in the Monster Paddle derby. A past winner of the XXL Paddle crown in 2007 for a huge wave at Northern California’s Maverick’s, “GMac” reckons his Outer Logs Christmas present was several notches larger. “I don’t know how big it was,” McNamara said. “But I do know it felt at least ten feet bigger than anything I’ve ever paddled into. The Mavs wave a few years back was small compared to it….”
Remarkably, there may be much, much more to come. This week the National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center issued an alert confirming that the current El Nino episode had intensified in the last 30 days from “moderate” to “strong,” adding that the condition would exert a “significant influence on the global weather and climate in the coming months.” And for surfers in the North Pacific basin, that means more enormous waves. According to Surfline.com, major new swell events are lining up in the coming days, impacting the Hawaiian Islands around Monday and the West Coast around Wednesday of next week.
Kelly at Backdoor Pipeline, Oahu
While the Triple crown’s second event is being won by Joel Parkinson over at Sunset Beach, I decided to take a smaller lens and shoot some wider shots at Pipeline. It’s nice to be able to walk around more freely (not that I don’t move around with my big lens- shame so many surf photographers plant themselves like they do). I got this image of Kelly about to paddle out at backdoor. You think he likes what he sees? With a huge crowd and shifty conditions, Kelly went out and got two good waves in less than 10 minutes. The guy is still amazing, and while the hype will be all about Mick and Joel’s title race don’t be surprised to see Kelly take another Pipe Masters crown.
…This just in, here’s the latest from Pat Caldwell:
HIGH SURF WARNING FOR NORTH AND WEST FACING SHORES
HIGH SURF ADVISORY FOR EAST FACING SHORES
Surf along north facing shores will be 15 to 25 feet with 30 foot sets on outer reefs today. The surf will build to 30 to 40 feet with occasional sets to 50 feet on outer reefs Monday.
Outlook through Saturday Dec 12: slowly dropping northwest swell is still keeping north facing shores in very large heavy surf this morning. Another much larger northwest swell arrives abruptly overnight pushing surf heights to extremely dangerous levels. Surf will exceed warning levels well into the second half of the coming week. Adjacent west and east facing shores will see very large surf wrapping into the area as well this week. South shores will see fading southern hemisphere swell today into Monday. Some areas may experience inconsistent waves in unusual places this week due to the large northwest swell also wrapping into south shores.
And Surfline:
Truth is I have never read a forecast like that! Pretty exciting indeed!
Waimea Bay (warm up?)
At any other time this would be really good Waimea Bay, but with all the hype of the next swell, it seems everyone is overlooking today’s good surf. I say this was a great day- sunny, light variable winds and some incredible surfing!
Above are 21 unforgettable moments from the session.
Here are ALL THE WAIMEA PHOTOS.
Here’s a quick video of a Waimea set wave.
Billabong XXL update
Well the Big Wave hype is upon us with this winter expected to be El Nino big and powerful. I hope so. I received this update today from Billabong with a link to an insane video of Mid Season highlights mostly from down under. It’s our turn now. Let’s see if this big Pacific can do some damage! YEA, Bring it! ha!
Billabong XXL – my picks
So I sat down this beautiful Easter weekend and watched the videos/photos of the Billabong XXL. Although we didn’t get many XXL entries on this side of the planet (except for Mavericks), there were some whoppers to be had elsewhere- namely Tasmania and South Africa. So here are my picks with a brief explanation:
Ride of the Year: Ryan Hipwood – Tasmania
I was asked by Billabong to rank these 1-5. Ryan Hipwood wins this category hands down for me. He is a Tasmaniac! This freaking wave is the poster child for Ride of the Year. You got your late drop…your thick lip…your huge barrel…and then…then…dude jumps the speed bump and launches an air and lands! Are you kidding. Sick!- and I don’t say that much on SickShots. Never mind he is barely hanging on for life the whole time. He may even be a one hit wonder. Who knows? Who cares? Props to you Mr. Hipwood (cool ass name too) I have never even heard of you and that was incredible!
Rounding out this award was #2 Greg Long’s insane wave at Dungeons, #3 More Tasmania from James Holmer Cross #4 Brian Conley in Mexico who gets an A+ for presentation for taking a camera on board for the ride and finally, #5 Garrett McNamara for a very impressive Teahupoo layback tube. I could see good arguments (which some of you had) for all of these. I took your suggestions and considered them before choosing the above (as well as what follows).
Biggest XXL WAVE award – Mark Matthews
It will always be hard for me to vote for that big wave face in Belharra, France. It just doesn’t seem to have the same consequences that some of the other outer reefs have. Notice I was careful not to call it soft or criticize the riders, but truthfully, it is a wave for XXL wannabes. A practice field for the Junior Varsity perhaps. You get it. So I didn’t consider any of those entries.
What was left were the two entries from Cow Bommie and Twiggy’s entry from Tafelberg Reff in SA. It is too bad for Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker that the footage is shakier than a bigfoot sighting video. I mean I think the dude won. But wait, the frickin video gets tossed out of screen at the biggest moment! Bummer. I can’t tell…Did he win? Maybe? I will give the video man his props because he shot that while riding on the back of a ski whilst being chased down by the beast (which I can tell you from experience it is not easy)!
So that leaves the Cow Bommie footage. Mark Matthews wins. Not by much, but he gets my vote. The wave looks just a little bit bigger and scarier and steeper. Enough said.
Monster Paddle: Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker
This is not a make up call! He really wins this one. I think. You already know Axi gets shafted for riding Belharra. Although I want to vote for James Taylor who may just sing a song on stage when he collects his 15G’s, I have trouble selecting him to win riding a closeout. Seems that one should be in the wipeout category.
So that leaves us with the Mavericks rides. With a broken femur on the mend Nathan Fletcher is the sentimental favorite (and that may make the difference). I want to vote for the guy because he is the real deal charger. But sorry to say Derek and Twiggy got slightly larger waves. It is a tough call between the two, but Twiggy wins and gets my vote.
Monster Tube: Mark Healey
Of all these entries, Kerby Browns wave is the most interesting and I think the ‘helicopter’ looking angle may hurt his chances (although I love the view). Ryan Hipwood’s wave has already been discussed and as great as it is should not be in this category. I want to see a deep tube and exit (why is Brian Conley’s wave not in here)! Dylan Longbottom is dealing with more of a Monster than a Monster ‘Tube’, so I nixed him.
That leaves Garrett at Chopes and Mark Healy at Yeti Oregon. No one will be with me on this one…Sorry Garrett, your wave is worthy and you may just win, but Mark Healy’s act is just a little more daring. Think about Mark Healy’s photo for a moment. It has got to be freezing cold and the wave looks so dangerous and they call it ‘Yeti’ that’s f’kin scary. You can’t even see what is really going on, but you know he is just shacked off his head in that cold water version of chopes, while the rest of the pacific impacts the reef. Incredible. I like it. Props to you Mark. You get my vote.
Wipeout Award: Dean Bowen
They gave this vote to you – the ’surfing public’- to decide. If you don’t agree with my take then go to Billabong XXL and vote for yourself!
Greg Long and Twiggy get buried under mountains of white water rubble and don’t even get my consideration for this award. Shame that. My Chilean friend Ramon Navarro skips down the face before total disaster and doesn’t get my vote. Sucks man. Ross Clark Jones (a.k.a the wrestler) has been putting in his time and gets the whole ocean dropped on his asss and gets passed by for this award. Hard life. Congrats Dean Bowen. The video guy that framed the rocks in the foreground of your wipeout won you this one. Split the prize money with him and go celebrate. Cheers.
Mens Performance: Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker
Sorry boys Twiggy wins. Easy.
Women’s Performance: Maya Gabiera
This one is difficult. I know all these girls. They are all chargers. Mercedes was on every swell that broke at the Bay. Jamilah is my sentimental favorite because she is a Mom and how many Moms go out at Mavericks?
Maya did a Tow-in Session in November on a flukey day on Oahu’s North Shore and ended up catching a bomb that was featured all over the place by Red Bull. That wave sealed it for her. I would have liked to see more swell to give these ladies the chance to get more entries, but Maya gets my vote and she deserves it- again.
WAS I RIGHT?
You will have to check back on April 18, 2009 to see if I was right. Don’t like my picks? Give me your comments and make your predictions. It is easy to make the call after the awards ceremony. Don’t be a lightweight. Give me your take rookie!
I will review my picks in a future post…stay tuned.
Waimea Bay shots
Here are the shots from Waimea Bay on Tuesday, December 2, 2008. Sorry for the delay, but my internet connection has been crawling lately. Must be that all the swell has everyone refreshing the buoy report constantly! I know I am. I shot from noon to dark and the gallery gets better and better as the sets started rolling in later in the afternoon.
A few of my shots from that day were on Surfline including a sequence of Shane Dorian that was pretty insane. A guy walked up to me right after and asked if it was Kelly because the surfer was a). Bald, and b). Skilled. I said “Nah, the dude is sponsored by Billabong’. I also heard someone in the Volcom house (yes, that was my secret location for the ‘angle’- pretty easy) behind me say, “who the hell was that?” I figured it out when Shane caught his next wave. He had a pretty good day.
The shot above is one that didn’t make the cut, but I really like it because it shows the power of a medium/ large swell around here. The caption I put on it was, “Honey, the gazebo is all wet again…” That’s Sharks Cove getting battered. Sure hope those tourists pay attention to the signs especially on a day like we just had when it will be flat for like 20 minutes and then have a macker come in like that.
Finally, I just read this on my friend Jamie’s site from Clark Abbey. Clark is a long time Waimea charger and all around good guy. He is out there every swell and has all the respect in the world from me. Here is his message..Please return the guy’s board. I am sure it has heaps of memories and some pretty serious sentimental value.
Waimea Bay
Does this Waimea charger make his air drop? You will have to wait and see when the galleries load. This might take awhile because there are 1,200 photos! Ridiculous? Yes. Way too many photos, but I just couldn’t help myself. Waimea was good. Not great or epic, but just really good (BTW, I think people use ‘epic’ way too much, if it is always epic then, what, do I have to say ‘Really Epic’ or exclaim ‘nah bro, you don’t understand it was REALLY EPIC’- I’m not good at that stuff). Waimea was good and I took a lot of shots. If you were out between noon and dark I have a shot of you. Dig it.
I started the day at Pipe just waiting for the swell to build- and it did. There were some huge outside reef sets at Pipe, but it was a bit out of control in the late morning with the occasional perfect tube. Shane Dorian got the best one I have seen in awhile and I got a great sequence of it.
I chatted up fellow photographer Vince Cavataio who I always see around when the waves are good. Dude, was taking photos of the North Shore before most of the guys shooting Pipe today were even born. I could see a lot of people looking at the guy and thinking he is some tourist with this little camera and writing him off, but you gotta check out his website for some of his incredible wave shots or just perve some of the beautiful models he shoots. Unreal.
At 11:30 I crusied by Sunset and saw a few sets wash through and decided to make my way to my favorite wave- Waimea. Sunset would have been great late in the day, I am sure of it, but I really like Waimea. You may even find me there later in the week. I hear it is going to be EPIC!
The Creature
Surf photographers that shoot in the water have lots of these photos. It’s when you are packing your water housing and you want to check that everything is firing (nothing worse than having problems once you are in the water!). So we click a few and get these odd images. Instead of deleting today’s version I thought I would share it because I look so crusty!
So I’m in the back of the rental which is an Electric Blue Dodge wagon (I told my wife,”Hey honey, could you find something low key?” “Sure,” she said as she walked away leaving me with stack of luggage and baby. 20 minutes later she comes racing around the corner of the Thrifty lot with this car and a big smile. ”Could you turn that off’?” I asked. ”What?” she inquired. “The friggin’ color- you’re blinding me!) So believe me when I tell you it is really loud blue. Anyway, I am parked in front of the Wall at Off-the-Wall and I am screwing in wingnuts on my SPL waterhousing rushing to get down to the beach and have a swim. I drank too much coffee and I gotta pee really bad which isn’t helping and I can’t get these damn wingnuts on fast enough. But really, I just want to swim. I’m stoked. I haven’t done enough of it this year. It has either been too huge or just not the right conditions.
Today was playful. Fun. I shot a few wave shots with the talented North Shore based photographer Jim Russi and we chatted in between sets. Jim is a cool guy and his work is super versatile- Land, water, portrait. Good stuff. I swam between Off-The-Wall and Backdoor and got a few little shots I’ll post later.
Meanwhile, I am kind of up late trying to see what tomorrow’s wave’s will be like. I keep checking the buoy for the answer…I always seem to be one buoy report short. I want to see it do something crazy with like a 20 second interval. Then I will know for sure that we’ll have some big surf tomorrow morning. Pat Caldwell called for a ‘Surf Warning’ for sunrise which is better than an ‘Advisory’ if you are into XXL. That’s good news. I’ll be up early looking around. See you there.
Secret Spot? Nope.
What? Where is this wave? Is this some secret island peeler? Yep. Sure is…about 40 years ago! That my readers is Pipe taken with a 50mm lens from the beach. It looks like some perfect fun point/beach surf, but it is the real deal. Pipe on a big west. Growing by the hour…The swell came up fast in the afternoon as predicted and as I drive home from Pipe I noticed a few sets at Waimea. Hmmm. I hope to shoot the Bay tomorrow, but the wind is predicted to be bad, so we will have to wait and see. I will post some of the epic waves from this session soon, which includes a sequence of Aamion Goodwin getting taken out by a ‘drop in’ and later being helped out by the lifeguards with an injured knee. It doesn’t look good for the Hurley charger and he seemed to be in some pain. Let’s hope for his speedy recovery as he provides some incredible entertainment for those spectators on the beach whether from Texas or the Volcom house. Everyone loves a charger…Get well soon.
Waimea Bay Classic Day
In my last post I talked about possibly bringing back some ‘old’ classic sessions and I decided to start with this one- Waimea Bay, February 2006. This is a huge gallery with over 900 photos of one of the best days I have seen at Waimea in a long time. There were closeout sets and some great performances. It is worth a look and especially appropriate as the North Shore season is sneaking up on us. This photo is of my friend Cole. Dude just charges. I have seen him take some serious beatings out there and make some incredible drops. He is definitely one of my favorite ‘unknown’ big wave riders on the North Shore. Check out the boil just in front of him on this wave. That is one massive wall.
This session was the one where Jamie Sterling caught one of the largest Waimea waves of his career that I shot from the cliff and the photo was used in his XXL bid for ‘best performace’. He deservedly won the award in 2006 and continues to be one of the world’s best big wave hellman and one heck of a nice guy.
Let’s hope we get some Waimea Bay action this year and maybe even an ‘Eddie’ – that would be epic!
