by The Editors on August 31, 2010
Cardiff California’s “Cardiff Kook” is making world headlines as the Wall Street Journal’s Conor Dougherty reports on the awkward statue and the pranksters who have made ridiculing it an art form.
Recently, Mr. Hardtke topped his wave with a new piece: Just before dawn on July 24, he and a dozen friends carried the 15-foot shark—crafted out of papier-mâché over a wooden frame—a few blocks to the beach, installing it in just 15 minutes. Those were merely the final moments of a two-week project for Mr. Hardtke, who guesses he spent roughly $450 building the shark. . . Police have mostly ignored pranksters like Mr. Hardtke, and local officials have quietly praised the various Kook-inspired works because they bring attention to their tiny beach town. In fact, Mr. Hardtke recently learned the city has been storing his wave sculpture inside at a dusty warehouse that belongs to Paul Ecke Ranch, a grower of poinsettias and other flowers in Encinitas, Calif., the city which surrounds the community of Cardiff.
Another example of how surfers will make use of anything that moves them.
[Link: Wall Street Journal]
by The Editors on August 23, 2010
by The Editors on August 23, 2010
One of the great things about the Billabong Pro Teahupoo is that it runs right through the middle of the West Coast’s work day allowing most of the surf industry to spend a few August days “hard at work” with their browsers open to the Billabong Pro live feed. But not yet. Today was the first day of the waiting period and it’s a lay day and the next couple days look the same, according to event organizers.
“We monitored conditions for a good while this morning and deemed it not contestable,” Richie Porta, ASP International Head Judge, said. “It was very small and just too inconsistent to run. We’re working with everyone, the surfers, the organizers, the forecasters to ensure that the athletes have the best possible conditions.”
Follow the jump for all the ASP details.
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by The Editors on August 20, 2010
Randy Wright isn’t saying much about the closure of the Horizons West Surf Shop last month, according to a story in the Santa Monica Daily Press. But to fans of the Dogtown & Z-Boys story it was a sad day.
The skate and surf shop, owned by surfer Randy Wright, occupied a modest, one-story building at the corner of Main and Bay streets that was designated a city landmark in May of 2007 after neighbors and skateboarding enthusiasts erupted in outrage over plans to tear it down and replace it with a mixed-use development. The retail space was the original home of Zephyr and Jeff Ho Productions, whose founders, Skip Engblom and Jeff Ho, created the Zephyr Skate Team, which became known as The Z-Boys. . . Wright did not return several phone calls seeking comment.
Guess we can’t expect a retailer to live on the past forever.
[Link: Santa Monica Daily Press via LAist]
by The Editors on August 18, 2010
Mark Occhilupo’s former accountant, Noel Holmes, had sued the pro surfer in Brisbane Supreme Court claiming that he gave Occy $50,000 to buy 21,739 friends and family shares of Billabong stock just before it went public in 2000 and now he want’s the nearly $200,000 proceeds back. Occy apparently believed the shares belonged to him, according to a story on ABC.net.au.
But today it all got sorted out in an out-of-court settlement, according to the Courier Mail.
Lawyers for the disputing parties have spent most of today in private discussions. . . An out-of-court settlement was reached and details were not disclosed.
As might not be surprising, Occy is glad it’s over and just wants to get back in the water. “”The first thing when I get back to the coast I’ll be going for a surf for sure and take my shirt off,” Occhilupo said outside court.
Apparently Occy’s suit worked. . .
[Links: ABC.net.au and Courier Mail]
by The Editors on August 17, 2010
Larry Mabile ripping into his version of Simon Anderson’s thruster.
For the past four years Scott Bass (of Down The Line surf talk radio) has been hosting a gathering of the surfboard tribe, “as cliche as that sounds,” he’s quick to add, called the Sacred Craft Consumer Surfboard Expo.
Anyone truly into the art of surfboards already knows about the expo and has probably attended every single one of them. But for those of us who buy our boards off the rack and only think about them when something goes horribly wrong, having the Sacred Craft as the fourth horseman of this fall’s ASR Trade Show apocalypse was the perfect chance for us to see something we’ve so far missed entirely. And we don’t think we were alone
Follow the jump for the rest of the story or Click here for a small photo gallery from the show.
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by The Editors on August 16, 2010
Surfer Nicholas Edwards, 31, a mine worker and father of two children from Busselton died after being attacked by a shark at 8:15 AM on August 17, 2010 near Gracetown in the Margaret River area of Western Australia, according to a story in Western Australia Today.
Police and the RAC rescue helicopter were dispatched to a beach south of Cowaramup Bay near Gracetown this morning. . . The man was retrieved from the water and rushed to hospital, but police have confirmed he has died from his injuries. They could not say how old he was or confirm his identity. . . The man is believed to have been attacked while surfing on his own, at a beach only accessible by four-wheel-drive vehicles.
According to a story on ABC.net.au a man watching the surf saw Edwards go down.
Rob Alder says he saw Mr Edwards lose his board and not come back up again. . . He rushed down to the beach with his friends and alerted a rescue crew. . . He says they found Mr Edwards washed up on rocks near South Point, lying unconscious with a huge gash to his leg. . . Mr Alder and his friends created a tourniquet using a surfboard leg rope and tried to resuscitate Mr Edwards for 20 minutes until the ambulance arrived. . . Eddie Kilgallon was one of the rescuers who tried, unsuccessfully, to resuscitate the man. . . Mr Kilgallon says Mr Edwards’s injuries were horrific. . . “[The] back half of his leg was totally chomped. It looked like one bite. It looked like a big shark bite,” he said.
The beach reportedly remains closed. Our thoughts are with Edwards family and friends.
[Link: Western Australia Today, ABC.net.au, and The Australian]
by The Editors on August 16, 2010
Saturday August 14, 2010, while watching shaper Larry Mabile shaping away inside a plexiglass box in what we thought was one of strangest parts of the surfboard fetish show Sacred Craft, we realized that Lost’s Matt Biolos was standing right next to us.
“Wouldn’t that be kind of weird to be working in a clear plastic box with all these people watching?” we asked.
“I’m going to be in there tomorrow,” Matt said. Then he explained the contest to us. Shapers were given an hour in a half to copy some one else’s shape. In this contest it was the thruster that Simon Anderson’s surfed to victory at Bell Beach in 1981.
Not only did Matt show up, he showed the rest of the field who was boss by winning the event and a $1,000 check signed by Scott Bass, according to a story on Global Surf News.
“This is a bit of redemption for me, as I am sometimes pegged as a guy who is only known for his marketing expertise, and maybe I don’t get credit for my shaping ability,” said Biolos in front of a large crowd on Sunday at Sacred Craft. “It is real honor to win this event, as Simon Anderson is a true legend.”
A gracious Biolos reportedly offered the prize money to a local charity. Kind of bummed we didn’t get to see it all go down live. Follow the jump for video of the entire contest.
[Link: Global Surf News] [click to continue…]
by The Editors on August 16, 2010
For a while 87-year-old O’Neill brand founder Jack O’Neill was worried that a new seawall being built by the County of Santa Cruz, California would cause the land in front of his Pleasure Point home to erode away even more that it has, according to a story in the San Jose Mercury News. So he was asking for the County to extend their wall past the front of his home.
I was satisfied with my house the way it was,” O’Neill said Wednesday, looking out at the emerging seawall that runs up against his property. “But the wall creates a little hurricane when the sand and sea get washed down, and it eats out what’s at the end.” . . O’Neill’s seawall plans call for expansion of the county’s concrete seawall around his property. The work, which he says will cost him at least $1 million, involves removing the rock and riprap that now offers him protection from the waves and replacing them with a sturdier wall contoured around his home.
Last week, the California Coastal Commission approved O’Neill’s plans for the wall as long as he didn’t develop the property next to him. Looks like Jack will be on the point for a few more years.
[Link: Mercury News]
by The Editors on August 16, 2010
Cardiff California’s “Cardiff Kook” is making world headlines as the Wall Street Journal’s Conor Dougherty reports on the awkward statue and the pranksters who have made ridiculing it an art form.
