With winter just around the corner and the big wave season about to start, the time has come for a wake up call: this year, once again, no European will win a XXL Big Wave award! You think I’m being too harsh? Well as I see it, it’s just the plain truth.
No matter how hard we keep trying year after year, cold winter after cold winter… it’s all to no avail: the big wave award always ends up going somewhere else. As a European surfer, the realization that we are never going to win was not enough; I wanted to know why not only we haven’t won, but we never will. And here are the only four reasons why they will never give us the awards, no matter how big and gnarlier than everybody else’s our waves are:
1) Sorry, but what’s your name again??
Picture it, the typical host at the award-giving ceremony, up there in Anaheim, just about to announce the winner of the Biggest Ride of the Year. He smiles at the audience, opens the envelope, reads the name on the paper and then slowly glazes his eyes over as he tries to figure out just how the Hell he’s going to pronounce… Ibon Amatriain.
Try it, it’s a little challenging, isn’t it? And yet, with a little bit of practice it shouldn’t be that hard. Read my lips: Eebon Amatree-ine. Ok, maybe it is that hard. And it could be even worse: Hugues Oyarzabal, Indar Unanue, Axier Muniain or… Ok, I think I made my point.
So maybe, and only maybe, in order to avoid hiring a multilingual host for the night… or the extra cost of simultaneous interpretation for the guests and other nominees, it is much better to give the awards to more familiar names. Such as the ones we read –month in, month out- in the surf tabloids. Names we know so well that they feel like family: Long, Parsons, Baker, Dorian, Gerlach, Knox... Good ol’ names that any North American can pronounce safely without feeling lost in translation at his own party.
2) And where in Hell are you saying you caught that wave?!?
I honestly believe there’s more chance of a European surfer winning an XXL award for surfing an American wave than for surfing a European one. In the US, European waves are the stuff jokes are made of. They are the center of endless discussions regarding whether they are good enough for a WCT or not, never mind for an XXL award. They rank just above Brazilian waves (minus the babes but with mellower crowds), and the Japanese ones (sushi is good, but endure a cold flat winter spell in Japan and you’ll know what I mean). Some Hawaiian badass even went so far as to say that one of Europe’s biggest waves –no matter how big- was safe enough for his little kid to go and play with (I have to agree with him: better his kid than me to face a 50 foot Belharra monster). And those tides: since when can a wave only be surfable for –like- three hours per day? It shouldn’t even be called a surf spot at all, it should be called a… hoax.
And by the way… where exactly are those waves? Most of the time they are found at the bottom of endless, spooky cliffs, or rather far out at sea… Even the average European surfer hardly sees them going off due to their remote location. On the other hand everyone knows that Mavericks sits off Half Moon Bay, not far from Santa Cruz, and has a great vantage point from up the hill by the aerial. And that Ghost Trees is plainly visible from one of California’s most famous golf courses. And that you can check Waimea from the road on your way to the most expensive supermarket in the world. But… Belharra? Aileens? Playa Gris? Isla Pancha? Jardim do Mar? Obscure names for obscure places that hardly anyone has seen but for a couple of times in the media every ten years. No chance of winning anything there, pal.
3) Is that water or mud?
Now, now… there is something our photographers need to work on: color and light. A photo of a wave from dark Mordor will never win an award in the sunny Shire. And if the XXL Judges have to spend the whole allocated 10 minutes just trying to figure out where the black suited surfer is on the wave’s face because everything looks brown, bleak and gloomy… well, that makes our chances of winning even slimmer. Now, bringing a few spotlights on the cliffs’ face and throwing some liters… -excuse me- gallons of turquoise paint in the line-up, that’s not cheating; that’s cosmetic surgery, dude. And have you checked just how close Anaheim is to Hollywood?
4) Have I seen you somewhere before?
And that might just be our biggest problem: European big wave riders are mainly an unknown bunch outside their own neighborhoods. No current or even former pro WCT surfers; no free surfers with paychecks in the mail at the end of the month; no Amex stars. They all have jobs; the lucky ones have jobs within the industry, which allows them to leave their desks when conditions are right. The rest are just a bunch of survivors with no jobs, no paid trips to the Mentawais and –thus- no exposure in the media apart from the local European mags after the winter season. It is very hard to win the judges’ favor competing with guys who have been in the media almost since before the media was born. It’s like Rick Kane wanting to get a set wave on his first day ever at Pipe: it’s not about the skills, but rather about being well known enough so the locals let you have one.
So what can be done?
There’s always the possibility of an Irish surfer nailing the award on behalf of all of us. You see (1) most Irish names are normal-sounding by American standards (since lots of north Americans have Irish origins); (2) thanks to John F. Kennedy and John Wayne all of America loves Ireland; and (3) although the Irish are full members of the EU -and even gave up the punt to embrace the €-, most Americans ignore this fact and think of them as half-euros (just like the British), so they won’t feel like they are giving us an award.
But that is a long shot. On a more realistic way, the only chance Europe has to win an XXL award is to go the Australian route and set up our own XXL awards.
No matter how hard we keep trying year after year, cold winter after cold winter… it’s all to no avail: the big wave award always ends up going somewhere else. As a European surfer, the realization that we are never going to win was not enough; I wanted to know why not only we haven’t won, but we never will. And here are the only four reasons why they will never give us the awards, no matter how big and gnarlier than everybody else’s our waves are:
1) Sorry, but what’s your name again??
Picture it, the typical host at the award-giving ceremony, up there in Anaheim, just about to announce the winner of the Biggest Ride of the Year. He smiles at the audience, opens the envelope, reads the name on the paper and then slowly glazes his eyes over as he tries to figure out just how the Hell he’s going to pronounce… Ibon Amatriain.
Try it, it’s a little challenging, isn’t it? And yet, with a little bit of practice it shouldn’t be that hard. Read my lips: Eebon Amatree-ine. Ok, maybe it is that hard. And it could be even worse: Hugues Oyarzabal, Indar Unanue, Axier Muniain or… Ok, I think I made my point.
So maybe, and only maybe, in order to avoid hiring a multilingual host for the night… or the extra cost of simultaneous interpretation for the guests and other nominees, it is much better to give the awards to more familiar names. Such as the ones we read –month in, month out- in the surf tabloids. Names we know so well that they feel like family: Long, Parsons, Baker, Dorian, Gerlach, Knox... Good ol’ names that any North American can pronounce safely without feeling lost in translation at his own party.
2) And where in Hell are you saying you caught that wave?!?
I honestly believe there’s more chance of a European surfer winning an XXL award for surfing an American wave than for surfing a European one. In the US, European waves are the stuff jokes are made of. They are the center of endless discussions regarding whether they are good enough for a WCT or not, never mind for an XXL award. They rank just above Brazilian waves (minus the babes but with mellower crowds), and the Japanese ones (sushi is good, but endure a cold flat winter spell in Japan and you’ll know what I mean). Some Hawaiian badass even went so far as to say that one of Europe’s biggest waves –no matter how big- was safe enough for his little kid to go and play with (I have to agree with him: better his kid than me to face a 50 foot Belharra monster). And those tides: since when can a wave only be surfable for –like- three hours per day? It shouldn’t even be called a surf spot at all, it should be called a… hoax.
And by the way… where exactly are those waves? Most of the time they are found at the bottom of endless, spooky cliffs, or rather far out at sea… Even the average European surfer hardly sees them going off due to their remote location. On the other hand everyone knows that Mavericks sits off Half Moon Bay, not far from Santa Cruz, and has a great vantage point from up the hill by the aerial. And that Ghost Trees is plainly visible from one of California’s most famous golf courses. And that you can check Waimea from the road on your way to the most expensive supermarket in the world. But… Belharra? Aileens? Playa Gris? Isla Pancha? Jardim do Mar? Obscure names for obscure places that hardly anyone has seen but for a couple of times in the media every ten years. No chance of winning anything there, pal.
3) Is that water or mud?
Now, now… there is something our photographers need to work on: color and light. A photo of a wave from dark Mordor will never win an award in the sunny Shire. And if the XXL Judges have to spend the whole allocated 10 minutes just trying to figure out where the black suited surfer is on the wave’s face because everything looks brown, bleak and gloomy… well, that makes our chances of winning even slimmer. Now, bringing a few spotlights on the cliffs’ face and throwing some liters… -excuse me- gallons of turquoise paint in the line-up, that’s not cheating; that’s cosmetic surgery, dude. And have you checked just how close Anaheim is to Hollywood?
4) Have I seen you somewhere before?
And that might just be our biggest problem: European big wave riders are mainly an unknown bunch outside their own neighborhoods. No current or even former pro WCT surfers; no free surfers with paychecks in the mail at the end of the month; no Amex stars. They all have jobs; the lucky ones have jobs within the industry, which allows them to leave their desks when conditions are right. The rest are just a bunch of survivors with no jobs, no paid trips to the Mentawais and –thus- no exposure in the media apart from the local European mags after the winter season. It is very hard to win the judges’ favor competing with guys who have been in the media almost since before the media was born. It’s like Rick Kane wanting to get a set wave on his first day ever at Pipe: it’s not about the skills, but rather about being well known enough so the locals let you have one.
So what can be done?
There’s always the possibility of an Irish surfer nailing the award on behalf of all of us. You see (1) most Irish names are normal-sounding by American standards (since lots of north Americans have Irish origins); (2) thanks to John F. Kennedy and John Wayne all of America loves Ireland; and (3) although the Irish are full members of the EU -and even gave up the punt to embrace the €-, most Americans ignore this fact and think of them as half-euros (just like the British), so they won’t feel like they are giving us an award.
But that is a long shot. On a more realistic way, the only chance Europe has to win an XXL award is to go the Australian route and set up our own XXL awards.
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This text -in this very Lewis Samuelesque tone- was submitted to Surfline as they were interested in some European content. Apparently they didn't like it. Their loss and this blog's readers win.
5 comments:
Brilliant post. Funny, insightful and to the point. Keep up the good work (and yep, you're right - the future, if there is one, is almost certainly Irish).
Alex Wade
Thanks Alex. Coming from you it is a huge morale booster!
Are Irish, French, Basque or British... i'm perfectly ok with it as long as it's an European surfer. It's about time!!!
Niegà
don't forget that the winner of the Billabong XXL awards actually has to ride for Billabong
If your big wave surfers make no money at surfing, truly don't ever expect to win any contests, and yet continue to ride big waves...
Well then, I have more respect for them than I do for our "Professional" surfers over here.
Reading the description to this video, I found myself ironically laughing. Spot on you are.
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