I like
Batman
I like
Crass
Robin's got
a new bus pass
Holy piss
holy crappers
Jill Kuniff
holy snappers! –Beastie Boys
Remember years before the
Beastie Boys achieved hip-hop infamy, when they were just another (very bad)
punk rock band? No? Well, that’s understandable. It’s easy to forget those
dubious beginnings when unheralded success renders one’s lame days obsolete.
For instance, most pundits
dissect Kelly Slater’s early professional ascension into two distinct showings: Kelly Slater In Black And White and
the Pipe high-five with Rob Machado en route to Title #3. They tend to
conveniently forget Kelly’s sophomore year, 1993, when he frequently head-butted
boards, cursed loudly, and struggled all the way to a final #6 ranking,
placated with a single victory at the Marui Pro in Chiba, Japan.
“Eventually he pulled his
finger out and started to go berserk again,” said Barton Lynch in Surfer Magazine’s “The New ASP Top 44”
review (June 1994). “All world champions suffer the year after a world title.
It’s much easier to win it than to keep it.”
Obviously, as Barton said,
Kelly soon got it together and creamed three subsequent generations of surfing
savants like smoked Gouda. He’s got nine ASP World Championship titles now,
five of them consecutive. His précis of achievements will not likely be
eclipsed in our lifetime. Oddly enough, the enigmatic 38-year-old has admitted
to going after his tenth crown this season after mimicking his ’93 rating with
another sixth in 2009. “I never found myself
in the right mind frame to deal with the pressure of a tenth title for more
than a few heats last year,” he told ASP press officials. “I just made a lot of
mind decisions and not surfing from the gut and real feelings. I’m comfortable
with nine, but yeah, ten has a certain allure to it.”
So is it all that big a deal that Kelly lost fair and
square to Saffa superman Jordy Smith, 16.10-13.17, in Round Four of the
Quiksilver Pro Gold Coast presented by Land Rover? No, not really. He looked
more a part of the barrel at Snapper Rocks than the foamball itself in his Round
Three thrashing of Patrick Gudauskas, 15.37-7.56. And shameless antics like
that bullshit carving 360 and tube/lip clinic he ran on unconventional
equipment in Round One for the highest heat total of the
day, 17.77, and highest single-wave score of the day, 9.27, has
the whole bloody tour rethinking their quivers. Which can be dangerous for
people who aren’t Kelly Slater.
In other words, he’s got everyone right where he wants
them.
“I love designing and experimenting,” he said. “I love
using the artistic brain and challenging myself and the way things are
accepted. There is no shortage of things to do, only time and focus to do them.
Last year was a radical change for my boards and surprising to a lot of people.
I'm sure some of those changes are here to stay on my equipment.”
Meanwhile, CJ Hobgood had a
hell of a time with the Aussies — going down to feisty goofyfoots Adrian
Buchan and Travis Logie in Round One, getting back in the game after beating
Blake Ainsworth, 14.93-12.76 (despite breaking his board), in Round Two, and
then losing with noticeable frustration to Dan Ross in Round Three.
Twin brother Damien fared
only slightly better, escaping his Round One heat with Jeremy Flores and Matt
Wilkinson before topping Luke Stedman in Round Three, 14.73-13.40, and then falling
to good buddy Bobby Martinez in Round Four, 16.06-12.43.
The fact that both twins, as
well as Kelly, are surfing better than they ever have — faster, looser,
more powerful, and more creative — is not much comfort to their East
Coast fans. Our culture is old, but our sport is young, and we don’t yet have
the quantifiable statistics in order to measure these athletes’ viability this
early. But like the event judges, we do like what we see. That’s enough for now.
And come Hawaii, the Gold Coast should be a distant memory — just another
throwaway for this mega-talented trio.
As far as World Tour
representation, we’re seeing the slimmest East Coast turnout since 1995. But
the good news is the three guys we do have fighting our fight are all World
Championship material. Any detail leading up to that is just that: a detail.
A mediocre lyric to an
otherwise great song.
For full results, photos, and videos from the Quiksilver Pro
Gold Coast, visit www.ASPWorldTour.com
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