Billabong Pro Teahupoo The Outsider: Les Eye Du Jour Tigre

In: Billabong Pro Teahupoo Press Release 8 Comments Sat 20th Aug '11

Tags: billabong pro teahupoo , tahiti , The Outsider

"There's a verdant, insular Tahiti in the hearts of every man" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick.

Verdant Tahiti and it's fringing reefs and thundering tubes stands not just as a potent touchstone for the conflicting forces operating within Pro Surfing in this year of shifting sands, but as a symbol of more general human realities.

Sorry to get heavy but this is heavy.

Just like being caught inside at Teahupoo, the collision between the unstoppable force and the immovable object cannot be wished away. As the human population expands and the connection between Homo sapien and the natural world becomes ever diminished by the allure of technology deep questions need to be asked. Like: How the hell are an extra seven billion humans going to live on this planet? And what kind of life could they live without destroying this blue watery ball?

Tahiti, equidistant from the great land masses of America and Eurasia, may yet supply some answers.

Tahiti means beauty, grace, some kind of equilibrium with nature based on the irrevocable cast and permanency of natural laws. It's culture spawned the great Polynesian migrations which peopled the Pacific and gave birth to surfing. It's waves provide the slowly expanding benchmark of what is considered humanly possible to be ridden.

It could be a beacon and surfing as a sport should be holding it up to the world: this is what our sport represents; this is what our sport gives back to human culture; these are the values we hold as tried and tested and found to be good and true.

Instead we find the opposite occurring: Pro Surfing is turning away from Tahiti, in spirit and in deed, to the great urban conglomerations of the West. In an article detailing the death of the Dream Tour surfing writer Matt Warshaw indicated that the pros were bored with Tahiti - that they preferred the stimulation of the city. I found the idea of spoiled pros unable to appreciate the finest of the Pacific offensive. I vow to find these Tahiti-haters, sports fans, and exterminate them. Pig after pig, cow after cow. Without mercy. Andy would approve. The future belongs to Tahiti and the Indo-Pacific, not the great decaying cities of the West.

Pro Surfing must understand this simple reality if it is to survive the economic turmoil ahead.

The people of Tahiti are suffering from the economic stagnation of the West. Tourism is down, unemployment is high. My charming host Ginette explained it to me in her faltering English, "There is no work for the people". She shrugged and put her palms to the sky.

In that context nothing could be deemed more self-indulgent than to be sprinting down to the end of the road in a froth to get the first go-out at Chopes. The normal human concerns seem to become the trifles of a race of madmen. Nothing feels as good as the first silky embrace of crystal clear Tahitian ocean. Indo sometimes feels cloyingly hot while cold water makes the body shrink. Tahitian ocean feels like the first drops of rain on parched earth. It's a blessing.

You think you can imagine how it feels to be paddling into the line-up at Teahupoo. But you can't. You just damn well can't. It's a feeling that words can't describe. I saw a goofy-foot thread a super round and deep tube which glowed an iridescent blue as the sun poked out from behind a squall in the mountains. A perfect rainbow framed the mountains and the wind swung ever so gently offshore, bringing the smell of smoke and the too-sweet scent of decaying tropical fruit into the line-up.

For about an hour the surf became mesmerisingly perfect. The kind of perfect that unless you saw it with your own eyes you wouldn't think possible.

Your correspondent was called into a gem by CJ Hobgood. The kind of round blue stand-up shack you'd never forget. Favouritism and bias are a curse in journalism but you'll never hear a bad word come from this poison pen aimed at Clifton James Hobgood. I wish you all the best Clifton. Later I saw him thread a wave from so deep, a wave that opened up on the shallowest part of the reef and went almost square. I saw CJ's lips peel back leaving bare fangs exposed and he roared like a beast as he pumped inside the barrel, riding the foam ball the whole way.

Freddie P came out on a shift change and a weird thing happened. An Hawaiian guy who had threaded some deep tubes on his backhand suddenly addressed Freddie in a small clot of mostly Pro Surfers sitting on the take-off spot. He started to sing, in a high girly voice, "Freddie, Freddie, he's our man, if he can't do it no-one can. Go Bald Freddie!"

He repeated the rhyme, this time with a piece of seaweed draped over his head like a wig. 'Whoa, heavy', I thought.

A long silence ensued. Bald and balding men dropped their heads ever so slightly and looked uneasily side to side. CJ Hobgood rapidly pushed forewords a clump of hair over his forehead as if to say, "All good here boys. Nothing to see. Perfect coverage".

Freddie smiled sheepishly and then said, "Fuck you bro, at least I haven't got a helmet head like you". No-one laughed.

I can tell you that after that public assault on their manhood a bald or balding man did not ride another set wave that afternoon.

Of course that bald hoodoo was broken this morning by surfing's most famous chrome dome, who proceeded to thread the deepest tube of the morning. It's fitting that the first webcast freesurf happened at Tahiti. We'll be seeing more of that action, sports fans, as the Pro Surfing hierarchy cottons on to what we want to see. Tahiti has much to teach.

There was a press conference down at the point. I asked Josh Kerr if he was feeling underrated and under the radar after seeing him take off as late and deep as anyone.

"Well the boys all know I like it heavy."

"Yeah, but the fans have you pegged as the air guy."

"Well I guess it's good to be known for something."

"C'mon," I persevered, "you must be feeling confident after J-Bay?"

"Well I'm taking it one heat at a time."

I groaned, "Christ Josh, that's the worst cliche in surfing. Everyone says that. You're on fire aren't you? Just admit it."

He turned and grinned.

"Thought so," I said.

I spotted Hearii Williams talking to Bruce Irons, but by the time I made my way over he'd disappeared. 'Don't go looking for him' I was warned. He hangs with the wildboys out the back. Hearii is my darkhorse pick. I believe only a Tahitian channeling the mana of his homebreak can defeat Slater. And more than any contest in recent memory the victor here will require spiritual assistance as much as physical skill.

I wanted to ask Hearii how he was feeling coming up against Slater after the ten-time champ narrowly defeated him last year, in part by doing everything humanly possible to throw the young Tahitian off his game. Hearii was fuming afterwards. His pride was wounded and that will fuel his performances in the same way Andy used to channel those feelings.

The spirit of Andy was strong here this afternoon. The surf started to pump while the ceremony went on for him. Big blue spitting tubes were plainly visible as the people of Teahupoo poured out their hearts in honour of his memory. More than anywhere it was Teahupoo with which Andy was synonymous. It was the wave where he found the most fitting expression of his artistry and match for his tormented soul. They say he sent the contest these swells and you'd be a cold hearted sonuvabitch to think otherwise.

Tomorrow looks like it will be epic. The swell is rising. Seeya in the channel.