I HEART GROMS
Geiselman, Viesins, Glenn, And Richards Clean Up At Messy Lighthouse To Win Billabong Surfing
America Prime Series Presented By Got Milk? By Matt Pruett; Photos by Raven Lundy/ Billabong
“There’s like ten kids in my whole school who surf.”
The sad thing is this grommet — 14-year-old Kill Devil
Hills, NC, surfer and First Flight High School freshman Grant Tyler — isn’t
exaggerating. Oh, there are legions of skimboarders roaming First Flight’s
hallways, outnumbering surfers some ten to one. Thug rat skaters? Plenty of
them, too. But for some reason, the sand-sucking epicenter of East Coast soul
has a hard time selling its own youth on the aqueous wares that lay beyond the
dune line.
And for a recently re-acclimated resident who spent the
better part of the last nine years stationed at the ESM Headquarters in Central Florida, that’s kind of disturbing.
Because what the Sunshine State lacks in wave power, it makes up for in grom
force. Grommets barking in your face. Grommets squeaking in your ear. Grommets
spinning over your head every time you paddle back to the peak. Grommetopia.
So you can imagine my delight when rolling up to the Cape
Hatteras Lighthouse on Sunday morning for the Billabong Surfing America Prime Series
presented by Got Milk? when I saw the best young talent on the East Coast
huddled en masse at the famed Wave Magnet to earn their chance at making a mark
on bigger stages: the U.S.A. Championships, the ISA World Games, the ASP World
Tour… the Olympics?
“The movement of trying to get surfing in the Olympics is
growing,” said Mike Gerard, Executive Director of Surfing America, Inc., the
National Governing Body for Surfing in the United States, “with China and Dubai
now being recognized by the International Surfing Association [ISA]. If we can
all agree that the goal is the Olympics, our business as the governing body is being
done. We’re looking for structure and coordination — not control. Surfing
America is not trying to take over any of these organizations.”
“The East Coast is so huge and so diverse,” continued
Gerard, “and the way the ESA [Eastern Surfing Association] structures their
districts makes a lot of sense. So we designed the Prime Series so that the
surfers need to do two out of three events on the East Coast (four out of six
on the west coast), the whole idea being to raise the qualitative bar for these
kids, who will be looking at four-man heats and ASP judging as they approach
the U.S.A. Championships and beyond. Exposing them to that kind of stuff keeps
their eyes on the prize. We’re trying to do the right thing for all the right
reasons — putting the Prime events in the prime locations and keeping it
topnotch across the bar, from setup to judging to locations.”
While the other two Prime events enjoyed overhead point surf
in Montauk, NY, and warm-water ramps at Sebastian Inlet, FL, Cape Hatteras
Lighthouse left something to be desired on April 24th-25th:
temperamental shoulder-high storm surf, squalls, and southerly gusts up to 30
mph. I’ve always had a knack for arriving at the comp scene just in time for
the ride of the day, and this contest was no different. North Florida helgie
Daniel Glenn had just posted a 9.5 on an ugly righthander as I made my way up
the beach for the Boys Under 16 semifinals. But it was the following Boys Under
18 semifinal that brought out the best in the judges. Such a flurry of
air-reverses were exchanged between Chris Tucker, Keto Burns, Mason Barnes, and
Evan Geiselman, Head Judge Gordon Lawson was prompted to reaffirm what
constitutes “radical” in this hyperbolic age of aerial wizardry.
“The air-reverse is the new chop-hop,” asserted Lawson, “so
seeing a 360 blow-tail pivot on the face without amplitude isn’t gonna cut it
these days. The maneuver needs to be done over the lip, off a section, and in
the air to be scored well.”
“We had a full panel of ASP judges on Saturday morning
addressing the kids, parents, and team managers and explaining what the new ASP
judging criteria means here,” said Surfing America Prime Series Director Greg
Cruse. “Most of these kids have been blowing airs and doing crazy grabs
forever. Now they can be rewarded for that new-school approach in competition.”
Star pupil Evan Geiselman quickly exemplified the heightened
standard in the semifinal mentioned above, pirouetting a single air-reverse
(the real kind, to Lawson and the
rest of the judges’ delight) for a 6.7, and then another with a three-hack
backup for a 9.4. The five 25-minute finals that followed featured many of the
usual suspects who regularly top the charts in ESA, NSSA, and ASP Pro Junior
competition on the Right Coast. Brevard County wahine Nikki Viesins comboed the
field in the Girls Under 18 final with a 16.84 combined total, and nearly did
the same in the Girls Under 16, as well, with a 15.5 heat score. South Carolina
sensation Cam Richards’ 9.43 six-hit decimation of a left earned him the Boys
Under 16 title ahead of a tail-blowing Corey Howell. In a comparatively
low-scoring affair, Daniel Glenn was untouchable after a particularly graceful
8.93 dance, easily winning him the Boys Under 14 title. The premier Guys Under
18 bout, however, wasn’t a runaway like the other four finals. As Southern North
Carolina upstart Nick Rupp’s backhand attack failed to find favor with the
judges, and Rusty teammates Chris Tucker and Keto Burns tried to outdo each
other with their frontside blow-tail obsession, a last-minute left pushed Evan
Geiselman ahead of Burns, 12.27 to 12.17.
“You know why Evan’s so good?” challenged former Florida pro
Jeremy Saukel as the final results were revealed. “It’s because he and all the
guys he surfs with out west, like Kolohe Andino… they’re just such freakin’
groms. They’ll come in from a heat and go right back out in the water to
freesurf. They just love everything about surfing. That’s why Evan is so much
better than any teenager on the East Coast. That’s why he will be on the World
Tour someday.”
And that’s why I couldn’t get any quotes from Evan, or any
of the other kids mentioned in this piece. By the time Cruse had announced his
last ‘thank you’ to the National Parks Service, I turned around, and the kids
were all gone. Every single one of them.
Gone surfing.
FINAL RESULTS OF THE 2010 BILLABONG SURFING AMERICA
PRIME SERIES CAPE HATTERAS PRESENTED BY GOT MILK?
GIRLS UNDER 16
1. Nikki Viesins
2. Katie Gordon
3. Cierra Cunningham
4. Grace Muckenfuss
BOYS UNDER 14
1. Daniel Glenn
2. Tyler Faulkner
3. Sam Deeley
4. Stevie Pittman
BOYS UNDER 16
1. Cam Richards
2. Corey Howell
3. Daniel Glenn
4. Pat Schmidt
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