Billabong Pro Jeffreys Bay Social Anxiety

In: Billabong Pro Jeffreys Bay by Steve Shearer 30 Comments Fri 22nd Jul '11

Tags: jeffreys bay , kelly slater , dane reynolds , lost interest , asp , contest surfing , The Outsider

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"My way of joking is to tell the truth. That's the funniest joke of all." - Muhammed Ali.

Comes in many forms. Dane has expressed a fondness for the affliction - which I confess I share with him - particularly when it comes to the vexed question of surf journalists. The incredible dumbness of surf journalists, their cowardice and inability to join the dots any further than the immediate self-interest of their superiors is a subject I thought I'd exhausted a long time ago...but let's hit it one more time, just for the sheer fun of it.

I have described them as lickspittles and moral pygmies, with the imagination of shopkeepers and the viciousness of slumlords. And that was in a good mood. Phonies and hodads, as Owl Chapman described them to me one glorious sunny afternoon at Sunset Beach. Generally speaking I'd rather drink a gallon of warm urine squeezed from an incontinent camel pad by a leprotic Bedouin than be subjected to the writings of surf journalists.

Kelly Slater in our recent conversation said that for the sport to progress "it needs to be open to a certain level of scrutiny". Is it too much of a stretch to include some kind of independent, incisive journalism in that scrutiny? Bizarrely, the level of coverage from J-Bay is almost non-existent. Like, sub-zero. It's as if this crucial, marquee World Tour event doesn't exist except for the official product put out by the event sponsors. And yes, the webcast is an improvement. Even Occy and Louie have managed to improve their vocab and put out a verbal product which vaguely resembles the English language.

Good God, there's nothing like a fully-fledged hypocritical rant to get the morning off to a flying start, eh? I blame the painkillers wearing off after an unseasonal rockfishing accident yesterday morning. Reflecting on Cloudbreak and a two wave hold down I went into a self-induced shallow-water blackout as I had the rod loaded up for a cast. A catastrophic loss of lure control ensued and a razor sharp Gamakatsu treble hook ended up lodged through the gristly part of my ear. They may have lost their World Tour events but the Japanese sure know how to make a sharp hook.

Enough of this fiendish digression, we have business to attend to. The second round has been completed in pretty, head-high peelers and we need to cast a judicial eye over it, before we get to the pointy end of this contest. But first let's take a look at Dane's new film Lost Interest.

It's sick. That's it?

It's fully, fully sick and Dane's full-power railwork and spontaneity make many people mourn for his missing presence on the World Tour this year. The fillum creates a psychological and aesthetic vacuum at J-Bay where we could imagine this surfing going down. It also owes a lot to French New Wave cinema with its use of jump cuts and strange and brutal audio transitions. The surfing is what Greenough would term 'a blow against the Empire'.

Sports fans, does the following interview recorded onto videotape last year in Tahiti shed any light on the Messiah's emotional state? You be the judge:

"How hard is it to be a sponsored professional surfer and run an independent program?"

"Easier than for most people. F'rinstance with making a film...I'm not making a film to make money because I make money off of doing these events and surfing and whatever. So, I'm not relying on an income off this surf film. I don't have to worry about pleasing people or sales. That makes it a lot easier to make something unique that's not gunna run the middle line just to get sales up, y'know."

"Does it ever feel like your leading a bizarre double life as a Professional Surfer and an independent artiste, for want of a better word?"

"(laughs) Um...I wouldn't consider myself an artiste. I think it's pretty cohesive really. I don't have to work a 9 to 5 job and I get to come to all these awesome places and have these neat experiences. From that you learn and grow and end up where you're at. Surfing and competing and travelling has left me where I'm at."

"Should Pro Surfing have more of an artistic element; should it be beautiful?"

"Um...well...that's tricky. A lot of it is about sales and production and that kind of stuff, which can steal away from that side. It can be whatever you really wanna make it, y'know? We're in the ocean which is a beautiful thing to begin with."

"In Australia and California especially there's a deep cynicism about Pro Surfing; do you think those people feel like it steals something away from the surfing experience?"

"Um, I feel like a lot of people act like that for sure. I feel like a lot of 'em are...I don't wanna say jealous, but we get to make a living off of what we love doing and there is a certain sell-outness to that. But I think a lot of people probably wish they were doing it too. If they had the talent too they wouldn't be so cynical about it. I sound like I'm being rude but I find that in a lot of people who are anti what I do."

"So it's just a matter of what side of the fence you are sitting on?"

"Some people probably have a real deep reason for having a distaste for Professional Surfing, and definitely a lot of stuff is distasteful about Pro Surfing, but not everything, you know?"

"Maybe it's just a historical legacy related to the way surfing started in California and Australia as a sort of counter-culture pursuit?"

"Oh, totally. It started, like a lot of things, like rock and roll, as a real thing then it turns into a trademark for selling things".

"Thanks."

"Yep."

There ya have it. A conflicted artist? A confused Messiah? The lack of spin from Dane is refreshing that's for sure.

But back to last night and the rest of Round 2. The Spartan was the undisputed highlight of the night and was underscored in his win against Monteiro. A projection floater is not a scoring manoeuvre at J-Bay, or shouldn't be. That's according to Slater himself, who proclaimed Curren's lines as the template for perfect J-Bay surfing. That involves commitment to the carving corner with no loss of flow into the next turn. Mastered by few, even at this level.

Fanning revealed a new relaxed approach, which has seen him drop the military style training and clinical heat approaches that have characterised his title runs. We predicted a new love affair with the public as the Chas/Jew imbroglio faded into distant memory and that is coming to pass. Now that Chas has been exterminated with extreme prejudice from the Pro Surfing landscape the public is seeing a softer, gentler Fanning. Until he faces Slater that is.

I'm loving Heitor Alves' run in this contest. A Brazilian goofy-foot power surfer who only speaks Portuguese in the post-heat interviews and resembles some kind of RoboCop has got to be good for the sport. The Outsider wishes you well Heitor.

Wilko turned the fruit dial into the red zone with a leopard skin wetty proving that Pro Surfing really is ready to go to San Francisco with flowers in its hair. These are the best of times...

Peace be with you sports fans.

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