Aaron Leiber has had a lot going on lately. He graduated from college, traveled around the world twice, and more recently has been holed up in his room in Seal Beach, California spending 16 hours a day editing his new film The Pursuit.
The film (which will be available on Blu-Ray HD disks in October) features: Brett Simpson, Jordy Smith, Ricky Basnett, Pat Gudaskas, Dusty Payne, Dede SuryanaTravis Mellem, Nathanial Curran, Torrey Meister, and many more in locations from Australia to Nicaragua.
If the trailer is any indication, this film is going to blow minds. It drops September 2 at the Laguna Theater. Click the link for all the details.
At the AST Dew Tour Right Guard Open (how’s that for sponsorship) he had the following to say about Allison got the whole “selling out” thing wrong:
They said something in the ESPN interview that I was comfortable with selling out which is completely not what I said. It is not selling out. I haven’t sold out. People say what they want to say, but in my eyes I have taken my skateboard career and gone on a different path. It might not be the same path as some of these core skateboarders that think that their path is the right way. There is no right path in skateboarding. I want to do something different. I love this. I love the fans. My life is crazy as it is and this fits right in the puzzle piece.”
Okay, okay, Ryan. You’re not selling out. You’re just getting paid.
Okay, not really, but the 20-year-old star of Disney’sHigh School Musical apparently likes to carry a Sector 9Bambino around. Billabong must be so happy.
Garret Lisi, that frighteningly smart, unemployed surfer/snowboarder physicist who got so much play in January 2008 for maybe having solved the ultimate physics problem with his “Theory of Everything” was profiled in this week’s issue of The New Yorker.
Click the link to read the abstract, or buy the magazine for the whole story. It’s the one with cartoon of Barack Obama on the cover dressed as a Muslim.
The stories surrounding the Taiwanese fishing vessel Ho Tsai Fa No.18 (which looks not unlike the pirate ship from The Life Aquatic) are getting stranger and stranger as the days roll on, according to WAtoday.com.
Police have described the vessel as a crime scene, confirming its captain may have been murdered. Taiwanese investigators have arrived in Bali to carry out their own inquiry. . . . A flotilla of small fishing boats failed to refloat the 35-metre fishing vessel yesterday and Thursday. It is believed surfing companies [Rip Curl?] and the boat’s owner paid cash to local officials to hire a powerful tugboat, but it never appeared.
Click the link for the rest of this continuing story.
Apparently, Salt Lake City based action sports photographer Rob Mathis has been doing a little more than sitting around playing online poker. He has a new book out titled Slide featuring a collection of his photography. Knowing him, and his work, we’d say this one is a keeper.
Taking a bigger step into high fashion Hurley International has signed up “Leonardo DiCaprio’s main squeeze” Bar Refaeli for a new campaign.
She will appear for the brand’s spring 2009 runway show as part of Los Angeles Fashion Week in October. Refaeli, 23, might even lend a hand in designing some of Hurley’s collections. “Anyone can hire a model,” said Lyndsey Roach, Hurley’s vice president of marketing for the young contemporary division. “We wanted to do something different. She lives this lifestyle.”
Yep, we’re thinking Refaeli’s assets ought to move some units for the H.
Forbes Magazine just did a story on supermodels who were also business moguls and in there with the Klums, Banks, and Mosses was Erin Wasson who has “signed a lucrative deal with skating and surfing apparel company RVCA for an eponymous line of beach-inspired women’s apparel to be sold in stores in 2009.”
Hamilton this year joined the board of directors of San Diego-based H2O Audio, which makes products that waterproof digital audio players, such as iPod . . . . He’s done motivational speeches for companies and is releasing a fitness manual, Force of Nature: Laird Hamilton’s Handbook for Peak Living, in November. He also buys, develops and sells real estate in Hawaii and is developing property on Maui and Kauai. . . . And it appears he could already be headed for a business wipeout. In spring, Laird launched a clothing line called Wonderwall sold at retailer Steve & Barry’s, where most clothes sell for about $10. The retailer, though, filed for bankruptcy protection last week, and its future is murky.
Click the link for the rest of the surfer-as-businessman story.
Billabong International Ltd, has been on the road lately trying to “raise debt in the US traditional private placement market,” according to a story on Australia’s Business Spectator.
The company has completed a series of roadshows in the United States, hosted by Bank of America, Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Westpac Institutional Bank. . . . The company has been pursuing an aggressive expansion in the US and Europe. . . . The US private placement market is a popular source of funds for Australian companies looking for long-dated debt.
