Big Names of Surf - A Blog by Fausto Intilla (WWW.OLOSCIENCE.COM)

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2010-01-11T13:52:00.000-08:00

Robert Harold "Nat" Young

2007-09-23T07:51:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nat_Young_(surfer)

Robert Harold "Nat" Young (born November 17, 1947) is an Australian surfer and author.
Born in Sydney, New South Wales, Young grew up in the small coastal suburb of Collaroy. In 1964, he was runner-up in the Australian junior championship at Manly, and two years later was named world surfing champion in 1966. He won the title again (then called the Smirnoff World Pro/Am) in 1970. Young won three Australian titles in 1966, 1967 and 1969, and won the Bells Beach Surf Classic a record four times. Since retiring from professional surfing, Young has written several books about surfing and sailboarding in Australia. His son Beau has also seen some success in the sport, winning the World Longboard title in 2000.
In 2000, Young was a victim of 'surf rage' when he was severely bashed on his home break of Angourie after a long-running feud and heated altercation with another local surfer. During his recovery he wrote a book titled Surf Rage, calling for greater tolerance and mutual respect in the surfing community, although Young admitted he had acted aggressively during his career (where he had earned the nickname "The Animal"), and had acted provocatively towards his attacker, who he met and forgave several months after the incident.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Joel Tudor

2007-09-23T07:42:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joel_Tudor

Joel Tudor is a world famous longboard surfer from San Diego, California.
He started out in skateboarding and, while in his early teens, gained both recognition and sponsorship for this. On the water, his apparently effortless skill saw him win his first professional ASP competition at age 14. Unlike the vast majority of his contemporaries who were riding only modern short surfboards, he also rode the out-of-fashion longboard, and it was the longboard that catapulted him to worldwide fame in his mid-teens. His reputation was such that, when he was on a break, other surfers would sometimes leave the water to watch his silky mastery of such skills as nose-riding ("hanging five" and "hanging ten" - riding with the toes of one or both feet hanging over the nose of the board[1]). Admiration of Tudor was a major factor in the longboard revival of the 1990s.
Despite wide recognition as the doyen of modern longboard riders, and regularly competing in the longboard world championships, it took seven attempts before he finally won this event in the Canary Islands in 1998.
Joel now has his own surfboard manufacturing company, as well as selling wetsuits in Japan.
Due to his skill on both longboards and shortboards, on big waves and small, Tudor is widely considered to be one of the best surfers alive, and is also known for being unusually open-minded with regard to the diverse equipment that can be used for wave riding.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Shaun Tomson

2007-09-23T07:37:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaun_Tomson

Shaun Tomson was born on August 21, 1955 in Durban, South Africa. He is considered one of the world's most significant surfers and was the 1977 world champion. He first gained notoriety while surfing at Jeffery's Bay.
He currently lives in Montecito, CA and is active with the The Surfrider Foundation. He is involved with his family clothing venture, Solitude.
Son Mathew died on April 24th, 2006 in Durban, South Africa from an accidental death caused by playing the "choking game."

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Rell Kapolioka'ehukai Sunn

2007-09-23T07:32:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rell_Sunn

Rell Kapolioka'ehukai Sunn (1950 – January 2, 1998 in Mākaha, Hawai'i) was an American world surfing champion. Known as "Queen of Makaha" and "Aunty Rell," she was a pioneer in the world of women's surfing.
Rell Sunn was born in Makaha on Oahu in 1950, the fourth of Elbert and Roen Sunn's five children. Her father Elbert is Chinese, and her mother Roen is Hawaiian-Irish. Her Hawaiian middle name, Ka-polioka'ehukai, means Heart of the Sea.
Sunn started surfing at age 4 at Makaha, and was entering competitive surf meets by the age of 14. At the time, not all surfing competitions has women's divisions, in which case she would enter the contest and compete successfully against her male counterparts.[1]
Sunn was a pioneer in women's competitive surfing and water sports. She became Hawaii's first female lifeguard in 1977. In 1975, Sunn was one of the original members of the first women's professional surfing tour. Faced with what they saw as frustrating inequities between male and female surfers, Sunn, along with other female surfers, founded the Women's Professional Surfing Association in 1979.[2] She also founded the Women's Surfing Hui (organization) in Hawaii. In 1982, she ranked first in the international professional surfing ratings.
In 1982, during a pro surf meet in Huntington Beach, California, Sunn felt a lump in her breast which turned out to be breast cancer. When she was diagnosed in 1983, her prognosis was for one year. Sunn continued to surf everyday after her diagnosis, despite the pain and chemotherapy associated with the disease.
Following her diagnosis, Sunn became a radio disc jockey and surf reporter, a physical therapist at a Waianae care home, and a counselor at a cancer research center[1]. She helped pilot a program for breast cancer awareness at the Wai’anae Cancer Research Center that involved educating local women about the causes and prevention of breast cancer.
During the next 14 years, her cancer went into remission three times, and she underwent a mastectomy and a bone marrow transplant.
Sunn died on January 3, 1998. Over 3,000 people attended her memorial service, where her ashes were scattered in the ocean off Makaha.
Sunn was married three times, most recently to Dave Parmenter in 1995. She has one daughter, Jan (who is married to Tony Kaumana), and two grandchildren, Kamalani and Caiden Kaumana.
In August 1996, Sunn was honored with a granite stone on the Huntington Beach Surfing Walk of Fame.
In 1997, an award-winning documentary about her life titled Heart of the Sea was filmed by filmmakers Charlotte Lagarde and Lisa Denker.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Mike Stewart

2007-09-23T07:27:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Stewart

Mike Stewart (1963 - ) is a nine time World Champion bodyboarder, one of the early pioneers of the bodyboarding sport, a pioneer of big-wave tow-in surfing and also a champion bodysurfer.
He was the former undisputed number one bodyboarder in the world, prior to the establishment of the World Tour. Having ridden bodyboards since the inception of the sport he is one of the most experienced bodyboarders currently in the tour.
He has won the annual Banzai Pipeline line event a record 11 times, from which 8 earned him the world title, and has been crowned the Pipeline Bodysurfing Classic champion a record 10 times. He is the only bodyboarder to have been competing in the Banzai Pipeline event since 1982.
He has received the title Mister Pipeline for being the best wave rider of any kind, the only non stand-up surfer to achieve this title.
He is father to two kids and lives in Oahu with his family.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Mark Richards

2007-09-23T07:22:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Richards_%28surfer%29

Mark Richards (born 7 March 1957), known as MR, is an Australian surfer, four times world champion (1979-1982), and highly respected by his peers.

Richards was born and grew up in Newcastle, son of Ray and Val Richards, both keen beachgoers. They worked at the Wire Rope Works, Ray Richards as an account, but he wanted more than that career could offer and started a business selling second-hand cars, at a time when new cars were too expensive for most people. Together they setup a showroom at the end of Hunter St and lived in an apartment above it.
In the late 1950s Ray saw the new balsa and fibreglass mailbu surfboards, which Greg Noll and other visiting Californians had brought with them in 1956. The new boards were shorter and more manoeuvrable than the solid timber boards used until then. He bought himself one, and when he saw how much it impressed people he made a decision to branch into selling them too, buying from early manufacturers in Sydney. So the business came a combination car yard and surf shop, and in time the cars gave way to the surfboards and it became a dedicated surf shop, one of the first in Australia.
So when Mark was born in 1957 he was always around surfboards, growing up with surf-o-planes and pint-sized longboards. He learnt to surf in gentle waves at Blacksmiths Beach, about 15 minutes south of Newcastle, a beach partly sheltered by the breakwater on the northern side of the entrance to Lake Macquarie. The family also went to Rainbow Bay on Queensland's Gold Coast for holidays, where he surfed Snapper Rocks. He was also very keen on cricket when young.
Richards surfed many junior competitions around Australia, taking time off school to go in some cases. He also made trips to Hawaii for winter on the North Shore as a teenager. The highlight of his junior career was a win at Margaret River in 1973.
In mid 1973 Richards father allowed him to leave school mid-way through fifth form, to pursue surfing. Anyone could leave after fourth form, but that was usually to take up an apprenticeship. To leave for surfing was radical at a time when surfers were regarded as long-haired layabouts. The deal with his father was that if it didn't work out in a year then he had to get a trade.

At the end of 1974 Richards returned to Hawaii for the North Shore winter. This was his fourth trip, and his first taste of really big waves. He got a late entry into a contest at Waimea Bay, and did well enough on the first day of competition to make the semi-finals the next day. That day the surf had jumped and 30 foot cleanup sets were closing out the Bay. Even local big wave riders were saying it was too big to compete. Organiser and 1968 world title holder Fred Hemmings had other ideas; with sunshine, offshore winds and television coverage he threatened to go out himself if nobody else wanted to.
Richards made a decision to go. At 17 years old and without Waimea experience nobody would have thought less of him if he didn't, but he felt to walk away would end his hopes of surfing professionally, and put him back in Newcastle at some unappealling apprenticeship. He went with survival uppermost in his mind, and reckoned his first wave twice as big as anything he'd surfed before. By the end of the heat he was game enough on the monsters to actually bottom turn, yet was glad not to reach the final and have to go back out. In time he came to enjoy big waves, without being regarded as a big-wave specialist.
Image was important for Richards, and in 1975 he had Hawaiian artist Albert Dove design a superman-style badge with "MR" inscribed in it. He used that logo on all his boards and wetsuits for most of his career.
Richards was interested in twin-fin surfboards and in shaping. At the Surfabout in 1976 he saw Reno Abellira on a highly manoeuvrable twin-fin fish and thought something like that would be better than a single-fin for small waves. Back in Hawaii again for the 1976/77 winter, aged 19, he took his father's suggestion to pay for shaping lessons from noted pioneer Dick Brewer. It meant Richards was able to put his thoughts about design into actual foam. He credits Brewer for the style of shaping he came to use.
Brewer made Richards a twin-fin, and Richards took aspects of that and Abellira's fish for his own designs. The result was boards faster and more manoeuvrable than the single-fins of the day.

By 1979 Richards reckoned his career as shaping primarily, and just competing at home in Australia and in Hawaii where he would go for the northern winter anyway.
In Australia that year he had a strong win at the Stubbies, and another strong win in small waves at Bells Beach, but couldn't make a clean sweep at the Surfabout (relocated to Bells that year). The tour went to Niijima in Japan, the first time tour events had been held in Japan. Richards was not focused on title ratings points and might not have gone except he had a Japanese sponsor. In four events there in small waves Richards got a 1st, a 2nd and two 5ths, which put him well in the ratings lead.
Richards didn't go to the two-event South African leg, instead returning to Australia to make boards. Past world title winners hadn't reaped any great financial reward, so he reckoned he was better off putting his shaping first. So going into the last two events in Hawaii his lead had evaporated.
Richards came 4th in the Pipeline Masters, which advanced him against Wayne Bartholomew and Cheyne Horan when they made early exits. Then at the World Cup at Haleiwa fortune smiled on him in good 6-8 foot swell. Bartholomew went out early, and another contender Dane Keoloha made a tactical error of waiting for big sets which didn't come and was out. It came down to the final, which was Peter Townend against Richards. If Townend won then Horan got the world title, and if Richards won then he got it.
In that final the two jostled for the inside position, both stubborn and wasting time out well past the break. His girlfriend (later wife) Jenny Jobson had arrived in Hawaii just in time for the final and thought he was going to be so stubborn that he'd give up the title rather than give up the inside. Finally Richards reckoned he was not in the lead and had to get some waves. He was so nervous he fell on a couple, but in the end did enough to take the win and take the title he hadn't even intended competing for.
The title presentation was in Haleiwa, and consisted only of a Rolex watch and a plaque with a Pan Am logo. But Surfing magazine gave him the honour of a head-shot on the cover instead of their normal action shot, commissioned from rock photographer Norman Seef in Los Angeles.
For 1980 Richards changed his strategy, and set out deliberately to get a second world title, doing the full tour. Although he'd won the ratings in 1979 he wasn't universally thought the best surfer, with Dane Kealoha reckoned the best by many. Richards was also competing against Wayne Bartholomew, Cheyne Horan and Peter Townend. In the end his results were very strong and took the 1980 title by a record number of points, and ended the season as the surfer against whom others were judged.
Richards won in 1981 and 1982 too, with his chief rival being Cheyne Horan.
In 1982 Richards' main sponsor, Lightning Bolt, suddenly dropped him. The reason was a mystery, he'd just won his fourth world title and was at the peak of his popularity, but they declined to renew for another year. The Lightning Bolt Australia division reckoned that treatment shabby and signed him up for several years. It turned out the parent company was in severe financial trouble, and it in fact folded, putting most of its Hawaiian staff out of work.
Right through Richards' career his parents went with him to see him compete, within Australia at least. They preferred sitting in among the crowd, no doubt a little out of place among the teenagers and surfie types, even though they would have been welcome in the VIP areas. Richards and his parents were close and he would celebrate a win by having a meal with them, a marked contrast to surf and party animals of the time.

For 1983 and following years Richards chose not to defend his title, and to travel and compete less, due to back troubles and the pressure of being on top. It turned out he was unable to compete for 1982 anyway, an ankle injury on a big day at home at Dixon Park kept him on dry land for five months.
Richards had suffered back problems throughout his career. His legs were a little shorter and trunk a little longer than usual which meant that he tended to pivot not at the hips but a couple of vertebrae up, straining the ligaments surrounding them. He reckoned a poor diet and lack of stretching or exercise (apart from surfing) hadn't helped either.
His back had developed a reverse curvature, with the lower vertebrae sticking out noticeably. He required regular physiotherapy to keep it mobile, and in later years it worsened to the point of making him something of a weekend surfer, since too much would aggravate it, obviously a very frustrating situation for a surfer.
Today Richards still lives in Newcastle with his wife and three children and runs the Mark Richards Surf Shop in Hunter St, the same shop started by his parents.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Michael Peterson

2007-09-23T07:16:00.000-07:00

Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Peterson_%28surfer%29

Michael Peterson (born 24 September 1952), known as MP, is an Australian surfer. He was among the best Australian surfers in the early to mid 1970s, noted for his deep tube riding skill, especially at Kirra on the Gold Coast. He was Australian champion in 1972 and 1974 and won many other major surfing competitions. Schizophrenia (only eventually diagnosed) and drugs cut short his career and his surfing became the stuff of legend.
Many of the details of Peterson's life remained obscure until Sean Doherty's biography MP: The Life of Michael Peterson was published in 2004 (on which this article is primarily based).

Peterson's family lived in several places when he was very young before settling at Tweed Heads and Coolangatta on Queensland's Gold Coast. He grew up there with his mother Joan, younger brother Tommy, and younger sisters Dorothy and Denice.
As a boy he was in surf lifesaving and in the Greenmount Surf Life Saving Club won many junior titles for swimming. Being a clubbie was uncool in those days but when he got old enough to be worried by that sort of thing he stayed because it meant a locker and a warm shower at the beach. The price was a half-day a month on surf patrol, dressed in sluggos, watching swimmers. He had no patience for sitting around and he and Tommy would arrange to be on patrol together for company.
Peterson got started surfing first on surf-o-planes, then polystyrene Coolites. Money was very tight for the family, his mother Joan worked long, long hours peeling prawns and all sorts of jobs just to make ends meet, so the boys couldn't own a board (of any kind), only hire or borrow, either from Billy Rak at Greenmount or Johnny Charlton at Kirra who ran tourist hire businesses. The boys ended up working for Rak for two summers, setting up and lugging boards around for tourists etc.
The first boards Peterson owned, in early 1966, were ones broken so badly when washed over the rocks at Greenmount (before the days of leg ropes) that their owners didn't bother collecting what remained. The boys would take them home, make rough repairs and head back out in the water on them. They also found surf club membership had another advantage – weekend surfers from Brisbane would leave their boards at the club during the week, so there was a great choice to sneak out and ride.
In September 1967 around Peterson's 15th birthday the family moved to units in Tweed St, Coolangatta and the boys setup a board shaping bay underneath. They figured it'd be cheaper to make boards than to buy, and got resin and fibreglass offcuts from local factories. For blanks they used cut-down old longboards. A lot of the local kids couldn't afford new boards either, so the little business flourished, expanding to Peterson's friend Pete Townend's garage too.
Unknowingly, the cut-downs they were making and surfing put them right in the middle of the shortboard revolution. 8 foot boards would be cut down to 6'8", or to 6'0 or right down to 5'1, though they soon found that they'd gone too far with 5'1 when they got crunched at big Kirra. The shortest they ever got to was 4'3 for friend Kerry Gill, who actually found that board went well for him.
Peterson's first new board, a proper board to his mind, came in 1968. His mother offered that if he won the Greenmount Surf Lifesaving Club championship then she'd buy him one. With his always competitive drive spurred on by that prize he was a convincing winner, and two weeks later got a 7'11 board from local shaper Ken Gudenswager.

In February 1971 young Alby Falzon was on the Gold Coast filming for Morning of the Earth during one of the best runs of swell ever seen there (12 continuous weeks rarely below head high). He'd earlier run a picture of Peterson in his magazine Tracks with an article about the underground Gold Coast scene, and on a particular day happened to be filming at Kirra while Peterson was taking the place apart.
The result was a 3 minute sequence in the film, and many stills printed in Tracks. The shot of Peterson that stood out became known simply as "the cutback", it had Peterson tall and muscular, long hair flying, doing a big cutback at Kirra. That shot became the cover for the July 1972 issue of Tracks too (after the film was released).
Peterson didn't go to the local premiere of the film (10 January 1972). His mother Joan drove him up to the hall at Miami High (his old school) but he balked at being the centre of attention and they went home again. His nervousness at presentations and gatherings would be repeated many times in the future.
One of Peterson's secrets for surfing barrels at Kirra was the rocker (underside curvature) on his boards. Instead of having the nose start to lift from somewhere close to the end of the board, he moved the apex back near the middle and would ride it with one foot either side. By shifting weight onto the back foot the board would be on the back part and would stall, slowing down to get back deeper in the tube. And by shifting weight forward onto the front part it'd shoot forward. He told Mike Perry who shaped along side him for a time "It's just like cheating, man."

[edit] Early contests
In 1971 Peterson won the Kirra Pro-Am contest, the first Queensland contest to offer any prize money ($150), and following that the Queensland Titles which had its final round at Kirra. That title earned him a start in the Australian Titles held at Bells Beach (incorporated into the Bells Beach Classic). He did poorly there, with his narrow 5'9 board unsuited to the fatter waves.
Back in Coolangatta the police had an unofficial campaign to clean up the beaches, getting rid of marijuana and the undesirable types who didn't suit the family-oriented tourist destination the local chamber of commerce wanted to promote. Surfers were on the top of the list of targets (and on occasions they weren't carrying anything the police were not averse to planting something). Peterson had been a heavy pot smoker for some time and on 24 January 1972 got arrested for possession and supply, but was lucky in court and got a $500 fine instead of 3 months jail.
That bust curbed his habit for a time, but not very long. He found pot relaxed him, one of the few things that could dull a growing whirlwind of thoughts in his head (almost certainly an early symptom of his later diagnosed schizophrenia). In coming years he was well known for having a couple of joints before or after surfing, even before contests. Others might have found pot made them unable to concentrate properly at a contest, but Peterson had no such worries. What he didn't do, incidentally, was get drunk, neither when young nor when older. At a nightclub he might well have had some acid, or be stoned, or whatever, but while everyone around would be drinking he'd just have lemonade.

In 1972 Peterson successfully defended his Queensland Title, narrowly beating friend Pete Townend. (Townend ended up with an unenviable record for second place finishes in his career.) The win put Peterson into the Australian titles again, but he almost didn't get there.
Paul Neilsen was the reigning Australian champion but hadn't made the Queensland titles final and so hadn't qualified as such to defend his Australian title. His club "Windansea" from Surfers Paradise hatched a plan to bring up Peterson's drug conviction (as if any of them had never indulged) at the inter-club meeting and get him ousted, in favour of Neilsen. The meeting descended into chaos and the selections were put to a vote, with the result Billy Grant was sacrificed. Over the years Peterson's schizophrenia would make him imagine all sorts of plots, this was perhaps the only time there really was one.
The Australian titles were held that year at North Narrabeen in Sydney. In the second round Peterson surfed with energy, but also some luck, getting practically the only good waves that came through, and making it to the final. For the final the ocean went completely flat and the organisers had to cancel it, instead declaring Peterson the winner (with Pete Townend second, yet again).
That win then sent Peterson to the 1972 World Titles in San Diego. It was a wild time, with surfers practically taking over the Travelodge hotel there. Peterson made it through his first round heat, then in the second round in 1.5x head high waves at Oceanside he got a full 5 second tube ride, which one judge saw and scored 19 out of 20, but the other two didn't. Only later when they compared scores did they realize the other two hadn't seen him go in, and had only scored what they saw at the end. But it was too late, the scores stood and Peterson was eliminated.
If fate had meant Peterson to get a world title then 1972 would have been the year for it. As it happened though his most dominant year, 1974, fell in between this last 1972 amateur world title and the first professional title in 1976.

The Bells Beach Classic in 1973 offered a $1000 prize, which was very substantial at that time, and was to be run under the new "points per manoeuvre" system which had been trialled at the Hang Ten event in Hawaii a few months earlier. The idea was to eliminate subjectivity from judging, it was to be just a matter of counting moves completed. In the first few rounds in big messy conditions Peterson didn't do well and was outside the top ten on total points.
On the last day he had a bit of luck when the leader Midget Farrelly came down with a bad flu and had to withdraw. Peterson was still well behind but he got a bigger board and started bouncing around making turns like crazy. By the end he thought he hadn't done enough and didn't hang around while the judges did their arithmetic. In fact he'd won and was amazed when told. The presentation was supposed to have been on the beach but it was so cold the organisers moved it to the local pub. Peterson's speech was characteristically short, "I just want to thank everyone", before he disappeared to the back of the room.
The 1973 Australian titles were held at Margaret River in big surf. Peterson was right up with the leaders through the early rounds, but it was fellow Queenslander Richard Harvey who got the win (and Pete Townend second, again).
Back on the Gold Coast Peterson did more board shaping, with Furry Austen enticing him away from Joe Larkin's factory with the offer of more money.

1974 was a big year for Peterson, his most successful in contest results. It started with a second place finish to Rabbit Bartholomew in the Queensland titles though. Peterson had a bit of a feud going with Bartholomew in those years. It started, as these things do, over a trivial enough thing, Peterson hadn't paid Bartholomew back for a cab ride they'd shared in Hawaii in early 1972. But with rivalry in surf competitions, it all escalated to the point where Peterson thought Bartholomew was stalking him or somehow out to get him (which wasn't the case). They patched up their differences in later years, but in 1974 it really burned Peterson to lose the Queensland titles to Bartholomew (for a second year running).
Peterson then won the Kirra Pro-Am, the start of a remarkable run of wins. The next event was the Bells Beach Classic where instead of the come from behind win the previous year he was well in control and won by a big margin. The contest was still under the points per manoeuvre system and he milked it, even slipping in old school longboard moves that were still on the scoring card. This contest was also where he found that showing up from nowhere just minutes before a heat really played with his opponents heads and made his blitz in the water even more effective.
The inaugural 2SM/Coca-Cola Surfabout was held in May 1974. Coke didn't just dip their toe into surf sponsorship, they went into it in a big way, offering a $2400 first prize, which was a new record for an Australian contest. It drew surfers from around Australia and the world, including some like Nat Young who had otherwise become disillusioned with the contest circuit. Pete Townend lead all the way to the final day and it was looking like Townend first and a young Mark Richards second. But Peterson just kept gaining and gaining and it played on Townends nerves. Townend slipped back (to fifth in the end) and Peterson came through the winner.
The Australian titles for 1974 were held at Snapper Rocks and Burleigh Heads. Peterson started slowly then crushed his opponents in tubes at Burleigh. On one tube he disappeared for so long the judges thought he'd fallen, until the crowd went wild when he popped out almost at the beach.
It was also during 1974 that Pete Townend gave Peterson the nickname "MP". Peterson used to call him "PT" all the time, so Townend in turn coined "MP" and used it in newspaper columns he wrote, and it stuck. Peterson didn't much like "MP" in later years, associating it with hype and image, though it's still how he's most often known.

In September 1974 Peterson started his Michael Peterson Surfboards business, with a factory in Currumbin next to the Burford Blanks factory, and a shop at in Musgrave St, Kirra, right opposite the Kirra beach. His name by then was so big it seemed a sure winner. A caption in the Brisbane Courier Mail wondered if he could be "Australia's first millionaire surfer".
He had a rather inflated idea of his own business acumen, but did have the sense not to try to go it alone, he brought in Peter Hallas as a partner. Hallas was a fellow Kirra surfer and had worked alongside Peterson at Hohensee's factory. They had a total of seven staff and would sell boards up and down the coast, often delivered by Peterson himself in his panel van.
Orders for boards soon flooded in, more than they could fill. The boards they supplied were actually more designed for Peterson's level of skill than the average surfer, but the "MP" label certainly made them sell. The problem was that Peterson wasn't very business minded and would too often sell stock out the back door or treat the business like a personal bank when it was going well.
Eventually Hallas despaired and by mutual agreement let himself be bought out by Peterson's mother Joan for just $1000. If run well the business should have been a gold mine, but he thought getting out was the smartest thing to do, and he remained friends with Peterson. Joan took charge better, but couldn't much improve the overall operation. She ended up walking away in 1977 when Peterson brought in a girlfriend who Joan strongly disapproved of, and shortly after that the business folded.

Meanwhile back in 1974/75 at his factory Peterson shaped for himself a 6'6" six-channel triple-flyer pintail which became known as the Moonrocket, or the Fangtail, or the Christmas Tree. His staff laughed when they saw it, wondering how anyone could possibly surf it. The fang-like flyers at the back and finger-deep channels also made it a glasser's nightmare (so Peter Evans, who had that job at the factory, wasn't laughing).
The board was Peterson's secret weapon for the Pa Bendall contest at the start of 1975 at Caloundra on the Sunshine Coast. There was a lot of general weirdness on the beach at that contest, like Keith Paull going around with his head shaved and painted purple and blue. But Peterson's board brought him victory (and a $2000 prize) in knee high slop, continuing his run of success from 1974.
Later the board passed to a young Peter Harris who worked at Peterson's factory, in lieu of wages owed when the business shut down. Harris surfed it until it became hopelessly waterlogged and then gave it to a friend's son on the Sunshine Coast, where, so the story goes, a famous piece of surfing memorabilia finished up as landfill.[1]
In 1995 Tommy Peterson made a replica of the board. It was presented to Kelly Slater when Slater won the peer poll in Australia's Surfing Life magazine that year.

Peterson first tried heroin some time in 1974, and later in 1975 got into it in a big way. The Queensland Police had done such a good job cleaning up the pot on the Gold Coast that they'd created a vacuum, which was filled by a far worse drug, heroin, cheap and very pure. Many local surfers got into it, and, with everyone naive, many died from overdoses. Rabbit Bartholomew has written about that time too, he lost twelve friends to overdoses.
Peterson had a phobia about needles, so he didn't inject, instead he'd chop the heroin up and snort lines. His brother Tommy (who himself wrestled with heroin addiction over the years) thought that was the only thing that saved Michael from an overdose, the fact he couldn't get enough up his nose at one time to be fatal.
All this time Peterson's schizophrenia was gradually getting worse too, he became ever more erratic, hostile to friends, and imagined plots against him. These were classic symptoms in retrospect, but at the time those who knew him just thought it was the drugs, certainly he'd done enough to make anyone act weird. His friends later wished they'd done much more for him at the time.

At the start of 1976 Peterson went to New Zealand for the first event in the new IPS professional world tour. There weren't many big names there, they were in Hawaii for the much more prestigious Duke contest, and Peterson got the win. There was a certain irony in the first event of the new professional era being won by a man who was in so many ways the opposite of budding professionals like Pete Townend (the eventual winner of the series that year).
In 1977 the inaugural Stubbies contest was held at Burleigh Heads. It was organised by Peter Drouyn and he devised the "man on man" heats system fot it (which is used in ASP World Tour contests today). Just two surfers in the water suited Peterson, he could focus all his psyche-out energy on just the one poor bloke in the water with him. He got through to the semi-finals comfortably where he came up against Rabbit Bartholomew.
In front of a huge crowd the two took on 6 foot freight trains. Peterson went deep in the tube and took chances from way out on the point. Bartholomew made high-percentage moves in the pocket. Scoring was based on the whole heat and it split the judges with Peterson getting the win. Just who surfed better that day was a hot topic of debate for many years. The final was then Peterson against a young Mark Richards, MP versus MR. Richards thought he couldn't match Peterson's wave hassling and decided just to take whatever came through while Peterson paddled back out. It was still quite close, with Peterson getting the win and the $5,000 prize.
That turned out to be his last major contest victory. He spent the next few years as something of a nomad, hardly known to anyone, taking erratic surfboard shaping jobs, sometimes dealing, and alternating time on and off drugs. To get himself clean he'd go camping to a favourite spot at the base of Mount Warning with big bags of health food like fruits and nuts and just be by himself. Later in court (below) his solicitor told the court he'd tried about 30 times altogether to get clean. He surfed intermittently during those years, and got into windsurfing as recreation instead, just in a small way, perhaps attracted by its solo nature.

On the evening of 9 August 1983 Peterson was on his way to Noosa to go windsurfing the next day and had pulled up at Beenleigh south of Brisbane to sleep. A police car with siren blaring came by and it set him into a panic and he drove off as fast as he could. He hadn't realized the police car was actually going the other way. The policeman saw him and took up a pursuit.
The pursuit turned into something straight out of a Hollywood movie, 20 police cars following, two side-swiped, and pedestrians nearly killed when he mounted the footpath at one point. The chase went on at high speed all the way to Brisbane where a further 15 police cars setup a roadblock on the Story Bridge, at which point Peterson stopped. It made national news and became known in surfing circles simply as "the chase".
He was held in a cell overnight at Beenleigh then taken to Boggo Road Gaol. The police assumed he was on drugs and took his car, The Falcon, apart looking for them. All they found was some vitamin C, part of his health kicks. The car ended up in so many pieces it was sent to the wreckers.
Peterson's luck with the law had come to an end and he was sentenced to a year's jail, and his driver's license permanently revoked. The judge recognised heroin alone couldn't explain Peterson's sorry state and ordered a psychiatric report, but it didn't provide a diagnosis and didn't help him. Peterson started his sentence at Boggo Road, and in fact was there during some of the infamous riots (but stayed in his cell).
His mother Joan lobbied her local state MP, the justice minister and the prisons minister for medical help for Michael, and eventually he was moved to Wacol Prison Hospital on 25 December 1983 for psychiatric treatment. His schizophrenia was, at long long last, diagnosed and he received Mellaril medication. He also took two electroshock treatments in the hope they would help (giving his own consent for that).
At the end of his sentence Peterson returned to the Gold Coast and lived either at care facilities or with his mother. His medication helped considerably but he lived those years almost as a recluse, rarely seeking out former friends. A poor diet and the medication (especially Clozaril) saw his weight balloon, to the point where those who knew him in his lanky muscular prime in the 1970s could scarcely recognise him.
Like most schizophrenics Peterson heard voices, but he was one of the lucky few whose voices are friendly and he could chat away to them, or sort of marshal the troops when trying to keep to a diet.

Through 2002 and 2003 Peterson cooperated with surf writer and Tracks editor Sean Doherty on a biography of his life, bringing light to many aspects life that had only been the stuff of surfing legend.
Peterson had been well enough in recent years to attend a few surf functions, including a contest organised by his old Kirra Surfriders club in 2002 called the MP Classic in his honour. It raised about $10,000 to support various local mental health services like those who looked after him over the years.
He hasn't surfed since some time in the mid 1980s, but told Doherty "I haven't given it away! Who told you that? Is that what's getting around?". His friends have hopes that maybe on a mini-mal somewhere away from prying eyes his spark might be rekindled; many of his peers (Rabbit Bartholomew say) still surf.

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Margo Oberg

2007-09-23T07:08:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margo_Oberg

Margo Oberg is a three-time world surfing champion from the United States. She won her first world title in 1977, then won back-to-back titles in 1980 and 1981.

Margo Godfrey Oberg grew up in La Jolla, California where she quickly made her reputation as not only a talented athlete, but also a gifted surfer. Margo captured her first Women's World title Surfing Champion title at the tender age of 15 and went on to win 6 more crowns throughout her career.
She began the Margo Oberg Surf School in 1977 on the shores of Poipu Beach, Kauai which she still owns and operates.

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Mickey Munoz

2007-09-23T07:04:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Munoz

Mickey Munoz, born in New York City in 1937, is one of the early pioneers of surfing but is perhaps more famous for his work as a surfboard shaper. Munoz has been featured in many popular surfing documentaries such as the 2004 film Riding Giants. He currently resides in Capistrano Beach. California and designs boards for Surftech, a manufacturer of epoxy boards.
Munoz was part of the surfing scene at Malibu and was present on June 27, 1956, the day a young lady showed up and Terry "Tubesteak" Tracy nicknamed her Gidget. Later he was the stunt double for Sandra Dee in the 1959 Gidget movie. He developed a stance while surfing that became known as the "quasimoto".
The correct spelling of his last name is actually Muñoz, but it mostly appears as Munoz. A good example of this appeared in his own blog, where the web address has Munoz, but the graphic on the home page has Muñoz.

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Pauline Menczer

2007-09-23T07:00:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauline_Menczer

Pauline Menczer (born 21 May 1970) is an Australian surfer. She won the 1988 women's amateur world title and the 1993 women's world championship and has been a long-standing competitor on the world championship tour.
Menczer was born and grew up in Sydney. She got her nickname "Naughty Pauls" from doing funny things as a girl, like pushing another girl into a pond. She surfed her first wave at Bronte, New South Wales Australia.She started on a board her older brother Trevor had snapped,so she started on half a surfboard
In 1991 Menczer was narrowly beaten in the world championship by Wendy Botha, but blitzed the field in 1993 becoming the world champion. To date she has been competing for 20 years and won a total of 20 WCT events and 8 WQS events; only Layne Beachley has won more. She also was world Amateur in 1988 and world WQS champion in 2002
Throughout her career Menczer has battled rheumatoid arthritis. She describes it like being stiff and sore every day, as if having run a marathon. At times it had hurt even to move her fingers. A rigorous diet has given her some control over the condition.
Menczer failed to requalify for the 2005 world championship tour, but doesn't plan to retire. Her present sponsors are Stick Girl Surfboards (California) and Ocean Shores Surf Shop. She lives in Byron Bay when not on tour.

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Sofía Mulanovich

2007-09-23T06:56:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofia_Mulanovich

Sofía Mulanovich Aljovín (born June 24, 1983 in Punta Hermosa, Lima, Peru) is a Peruvian surfer of Croatian descent. She is the first Peruvian surfer ever to win an Association of Surfing Professionals World Championship Tour event. She is the first South American to ever win the World Title. In 2004, she won three out of the six World Championship Tour events and finished the season as World Champion. She is sponsored by Roxy.
On July 27th, 2007, Sofia Mulanovich was inducted into the Surfers Hall of Fame during its 10th Anniversary celebrations. She is the first South American to have this honor, having had a major impact on the sport.
Sofia Mulanovich will go down in history as the first South American to win an ASP world title. Think about that for a second. There have been Brazilians on the world tour since it started, and they're all contest-winning machines. If little old you ever got one of them in a heat, you would get so smoked, you wouldn't even know what to do. But until today at Haleiwa, none of them had ever won the big one.
Sofia and Rochelle Ballard had an awesome race for the title. It was obvious from the Gold Coast on that it was a two horse race (sorry about the pun girls), and they conducted it with style and grace, remaining close friends the whole time. I'm sure Rochelle is disappointed about not winning, but she had a great year, and should be satisfied with creating a really worth-following race for the prize.
The 2006 Surfer Poll and Video Awards was a big night for Sofia Mulanovich. Not only did she win Best Female Performance in a Video for her surfing in Sofia: A Documentary, that biopic made during Sofia’s championship year also won Documentary of the Year, beating out even Kelly Slater. And then to top that off, Sofia was voted #1 on the women’s reader poll, showing that even though she was second in the ratings at the end of the 2005 season, she is first in the hearts of surfers everywhere.
Sofia deserved the honor, as did the movie made in her name. Produced by Peter Goetz, Sofia: A Documentary is a first-rate production, detailing her arc from a girl with dreams in a small, coastal town in Peru, to her impossible dream of World Surfing Champion.
To see Sofia: A Documentary is to appreciate how far Sofia has come. She was born in Lima in 1983, to parents who loved the ocean. Peru is a developing country, although, Sofia grew up comfortable. She went to the San Silvestre School in Lima and took to the water almost immediately, learning to swim at three and competing as a girl. In Sofia: A Documentary, the time of Sofia’s youth is shown as a time of severe political upheaval in Peru, a time when the country suffered severe blows to its national pride and heroes were scarce.
Peru has always been a little surf mad, going back to the Peruvian Surf Championships in the 1965, and the country has produced some good surfers over the decades, but never a World Title contender. Sofia’s road to the impossible began with trips to Mancora, a popular beach resort at the north of Peru, where Sofia began riding waves on a Morey Boogie and then moved up to a surfboard at 9. Sofia was trained as a girl by Roberto Meza and then Peruvian pro Magoo de la Rosa began to take an interest when she showed some real talent.
Sofia took her first trip out of Peru as an observer to a surf contest in Guadalupe at the age of 12, but she raised eyebrows there and did it again at 13 when she made the quarterfinals of the US Open. After winning the Pan-American Championship in Brazil, Sofia was signed by Roxy to represent the company on the World Qualifying Series Tour, with hopes toward making the World Championship Tour. All this time, according to the documentary, Sofia doubted herself, that a girl from Peru would have a chance against all these women she had read about and idolized in surf magazines.
Sofia finished 11th in her first year, missing the WCT by one place. She made it the next year, and in her first year on the WCT she finished 7th out of 18. Sofia came up during the Reign of Queen Layne, when she won six World Titles in a row and the only thing that could stop her was a lightning bolt.
Peru is the land of long left points but not barreling left reefs, but in 2004, Sofia caught fire in the two most difficult events on the tour, winning the Roxy Pro Fiji and the Billabong Pro Teahupoo, and crowned that nicely with a win at the Roxy Pro France. As seen in Sofia: A Documentary, Sofia’s World Title came down to a heat at Haleiwa, and when she came from the water with a World Title, Layne was right there cheering for her.
It’s impossible to begrudge a girl who came from so far, against such great odds, to accomplish what Sofia did in such a short time. Watching Sofia: A Documentary, you learn that not only is Sofia a national hero in Peru, she is the national hero in Peru. And watching the documentary is to be amazed at the present level of women’s surfing. Sofia rips. She is very fast, she is smooth and she thwacks it wherever and whenever she can. Sofia lost the 2005 World Title by one missed drop at Honolua Bay, but she was right there cheering when her friend Chelsea Georgeson emerged from the water the Champ. For now and for the next few years, the race for the WCT Women’s Title is now a love pyramid with Beachley, Georgeson and Sofia all going at each other to be on the top. Women’s surfing has never been more exciting, and women like Sofia make you wonder who else is out there, bubbling in some corner of the world, dreaming of taking the world.
The former world champion Sofia Mulanovich (Peru) recorded her first-ever victory at the famed Huntington Beach Pier, capturing the $30,000 Honda Women’s U.S. Open of Surfing Presented by O’Neill. Sofia, who finished second here behind Chelsea Georgeson (ASU) in 2004, opted for the smaller, better-shaped waves and followed up with a 4.83 then ended Jessie Miley-Dyer’s hopes with a stunning 7.50 on the strength of several slashing moves and a connection to the inside. She ended the lengthy ride with a flashy tail-slide. Mulanovich finished with 13.83 points to Miley-Dyer’s 8.67. “It’s amazing to finally win here after seeing Chelsea win the U.S. Open twice. I’m amped right now,” said Mulanovich. “Jessie is such a great surfer. I guess I got the better waves today.”

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Bobby Martinez

2007-09-23T06:53:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Martinez

Bobby Martinez (born May 26, 1982) is a professional surfer from Santa Barbara, California. Though he is relatively new to the surfing world as a pro, his style often draws comparisons to that of legendary surfer Kelly Slater. Martinez began surfing at age 6. When he was old enough he joined the National Scholastic Surfing Association (NSSA) where he would go on to win a record 7 national titles. After several injury prone years he joined the Association of Surfing Professionals in 2005. His first major title as a pro was winning the O'Neill Coldwater Classic in 2005. He joined the World Championship Tour in 2006 finishing the year with #5 ranking which earned him Rookie of the Year honors.

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Rob Machado

2007-09-23T06:48:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rob_Machado

Robert Edward Machado (better known simply as Rob Machado) (b. October 16, 1973 Sydney, Australia) is an American professional surfer from Cardiff-by-the-Sea, a community in Encinitas (San Diego County), California.
Machado attended San Dieguito High School, and is known for his casual, "laid-back" style both in and out of the water. Though he rides a modern tri-fin shortboard, he could still be considered a "soul-surfer" because of his smooth cut-back style that has earned him the nickname "Mr. Smoothy". He is one of the best-known goofy-foot surfers in the world today.

Rob has won many of pro surfing's most prestigious contests, including Hawaii's Pipeline Masters (Triple Crown of Surfing), and the U.S. Open of Surfing, the largest surfing event held on the U.S. mainland. His 2006 win in that competition was only his latest at Huntington Beach, and it came on the heels of his victory at the 2006 Monster Energy Pro (also held at Pipeline) on Oahu's North Shore. Also, Rob was on the "West" team that won the 2006 Summer X Games surfing competition, called "The Game", held each year in Mexico.
He is now retired from the WCT (World Championship Tour), but was among the top contenders until injuries began plaguing him in the past few years. Nevertheless, he's finished in the top three of the world in the year-end rankings twice. Since retiring, he has concentrated on the big wave and barrelled surfing comps that he loves. The surfing magazines and his videos and films keep him in the public eye by showing his great skill.
Rob hosts and participates in an annual event held at his home reef called the Rob Machado Surf Classic and Beach Fair, which is an amateur competition for the locals of all ages, and it includes demo sessions with Rob and other pros, as well as a lunchtime break he takes with kids to give them tips and pointers. The competition crowns a King and Queen of the Reef for the best overall performances in a combination of surf-related events over the weekend.
Currently, Rob is still frequently voted in surf magazine polls as readers' favorites , and has many sponsors, including Hurley, Reef, and Nixon. Machado is a very good friend of and served as an inspiration to quadriplegic surfer Jesse Billauer of the Life Rolls On Foundation.
Just like Kelly Slater, he played "himself" in the 2007 animated picture "Surf's Up".

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Gerry Lopez

2007-09-23T06:45:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerry_Lopez

Gerry Lopez, aka "Mr. Pipeline," (born November 7, 1948, Honolulu, Hawaii) is a world-renowned surfer and occasional film actor. He won the prestigious Pipe Masters competition in 1972 and 1973. In 1982 he co-starred in the film Conan the Barbarian with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Other film appearances include Big Wednesday (1978), North Shore (1987), and Farewell to the King (1989). He has also appeared in numerous surfing documentaries, including 5 Summer Stories (1973), Step Into Liquid (2003), and Riding Giants (2004). Lopez is an ambassador for Patagonia clothing company and has written at least one essay for their catalogs. Today, Lopez lives far from the long lenses of the surfing media, in Bend, Oregon, with his wife Toni and son, Alex. Snowboarding has become a passion for both father and son, and Gerry is now applying his talents as a craftsman to making snowboards. His surfboards also remain in high demand.
Lopez played an important role in the industry of surfboard manufacturing. Whilst on Hawaii, together with other shapers, Lopez started the Lightning Bolt brand of high performance shortboards. This brand was the first brand to sponsor team riders with free boards, partially because the riders didn't have the money to buy them.

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Isabel Letham

2007-09-23T06:41:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabel_Letham

Isabel Letham (1899 - 11 March 1995) was the first Australian to surf. This was at Freshwater Beach, Sydney in 1915, tandem with Duke Kahanamoku.
Kahanamoku had been invited to Australia by the NSW Swimming Association. He hadn't brought a board so Letham's father William Letham helped him make one from sugar pine. At Freshwater Beach Kahanamoku gave a 3 hour demonstration of "hawaiian-style surf shooting" to a crowd of several hundred people. Australians had been bodyboarding on wooden boards, and bodysurfing, but not standing up.
At the end of the session Kahanamoku invited Letham from the crowd for a tandem surfing demonstration. Letham was 15 at the time, but an accomplished swimmer and bodysurfer, and known as something of a tomboy. On the first few waves they paddled for she yelled for him to stop because it felt like going off a cliff. Being a gentleman Kahanamoku did stop, but then ignored her cries, went anyway, and hauled her up. They rode four waves that day and Letham was, as she later said "hooked for life".
Letham went on to become an accomplished surfer, and to teach surfing and swimming.

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Keala Kennelly

2007-09-23T06:36:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keala_Kennelly

Keala Kennelly (born August 13, 1978 [1]) is a professional surfer, who was featured playing herself in the movie Blue Crush, also featuring Rochelle Ballard, who was Kate Bosworth's stunt double.[2] She was also in the movie Step Into Liquid.
She set a record in 2005, at Teahupoo, riding the biggest tow in wave, by a woman.[3]
Keala grew up on Kauai, is also known for DJ abilities. In 2007, she took a break from the World Championship Tour (WCT), to co-star in the now canceled HBO series, John from Cincinnati, and to free surf.

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Duke Kahanamoku

2007-09-23T06:31:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_Kahanamoku

Duke Paoa Kahinu Mokoe Hulikohola Kahanamoku (August 24, 1890 – January 22, 1968), is generally regarded as the person who popularized the modern sport of surfing. He was also an Olympic champion in swimming.

The name "Duke" is not a title, but a given name. He was named after his father, Halapu Kahanamoku, who was christened "Duke" by Bernice Pauahi Bishop in honor of Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, who was visiting Hawaii at the time of the elder man's birth in 1869. The younger "Duke," as eldest son, inherited the name.
Growing up on the outskirts of Waikiki (near the present site of the Hilton Hawaiian Village), Kahanamoku spent his youth as a bronzed beach boy. It was at Waikiki Beach where he developed his surfing and swimming skills.
In his youth, Kahanamoku preferred an old-school (traditional) surf board, which he called his "papa nui", constructed after the fashion of ancient Hawaiian "olo" boards. Made from the wood of a koa tree, it was sixteen feet (4.8 m) long and weighed 114 pounds (52 kg). The board was without a skeg, which had yet to be invented. In his later career, he would often use smaller boards, but always preferred those made of wood.
On August 11, 1911, in an amateur swim meet, Kahanamoku was timed at 55.4 seconds in the 100 yard (91 m) freestyle, beating the existing world record by 4.6 seconds, in the salt water of Honolulu Harbor. He also broke the record in the 220 yd (201 m) and equaled it in the 50 yd (46 m), but the Amateur Athletic Union, in disbelief, would not recognize these feats until many years later.

Kahanamoku easily qualified for the U.S. Olympic swimming team in 1912, breaking the record for the 200 meter freestyle in his trial heat for the 4×200 relay. He went on to win a gold medal in the 100 meter freestyle in the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, and a silver with the relay team. During the 1920 Olympics in Antwerp, he won gold medals both in the 100 meters, bettering fellow Hawaiian Pua Kealoha, and in the relay. He finished the 100 meters with a silver medal during the 1924 Olympics in Paris, the gold going to Johnny Weissmuller and the bronze to Duke's brother, Samuel Kahanamoku.
Between Olympic competitions, and after retiring from the Olympics, Kahanamoku traveled to different places in the world, particularly Australia and the United States, to give swimming exhibitions. It was during this period that he popularized the sport of surfing, previously known only in Hawaii, by incorporating surfing exhibitions into these visits as well. His surfing exhibition at Sydney's Freshwater Beach on December 23, 1914 is widely regarded as the most significant day in the development of surfing in Australia. He also made surfing popular in mainland America first in Santa Cruz, California. This is where surfing first started in California. The board Kahanamoku used is retained by the Freshwater Surf Club and can be viewed if the caretaker is approached respectfully. There is a statue of Kahanamoku on the headland at Freshwater. Duke was also known as the Father of Surfing.
During his time living in Southern California, Kahanamoku also performed in Hollywood as an extra and a character actor in several films. In this way, he made connections with people who could further publicity for the sport of surfing. Kahanamoku was also involved with the Los Angeles Athletic Club, acting as lifeguard and competing on both swimming and water polo teams.
While living in Newport Beach, California on June 14, 1925, Kahanamoku rescued eight men from a fishing vessel that capsized in heavy surf while attempting to enter the city's harbor. Twenty-nine fishermen went into the water and seventeen perished. Using his surfboard, he was able to make quick trips back and forth to shore to increase the number of sailors rescued. Two other surfers saved four more fishermen. Newport's police chief at the time called Duke's efforts "the most superhuman surfboard rescue act the world has ever seen." Thus was born the tradition of lifeguards having rescue surfboards at the ready.
In 1800s, a lots of Europeans arrived in Hawaii. Some Europeans didn't like the sport and try to eliminate it. In 1920, Duke Kahanamoku helped bring the sport back by founding a surfing club.
In 1940, he married the love of his life, Nadine Alexander. She accompanied him when he traveled all over the world.
During the 1950s and 1960s, the identity of the surfer began to change. Surfers developed their own language. You could spot surfers by their suntans and the casual clothes they wore. Before long, surf music and movies helped bring surfing style to young people all over the United States.
Duke Kahanamoku was the first person to be inducted into both the Swimming Hall of Fame and the Surfing Hall of Fame. The Duke Kahanamoku Invitational Surfing Championships are named in his honor. He is a member of the US Olympic Hall of Fame. He served as sheriff of Honolulu, Hawaii from 1932 to 1961, serving 13 consecutive terms.
Hawaii music promoter Kimo Wilder McVay capitalized on Duke's popularity by naming his Waikiki showroom Duke Kahanamoku's, and giving Duke a piece of the financial action in exchange for the use of his name. Duke's was a major Waikiki showroom in the 1960s and is best remembered as the home of Don Ho & The Aliis from 1964 through 1969.
Duke's name is currently being used by another business establishment, Duke's Canoe Club & Barefoot Bar, a beachfront bar and restaurant in the Outrigger Waikiki On The Beach Hotel. The decor includes many poster-size photos of Duke -- with his brothers in Waikiki, and on his travels in other parts of the world.
A monument at Waikiki beach in Honolulu also honors his memory. It shows Duke Kahanamoku standing in front of his surfboard with his arms outstretched. Many honor him by placing leis on his statue.

Kahanamoku died of a heart attack on January 22, 1968 at the age of 77. For his burial at sea, a long motorcade of mourners, accompanied by a 30-man police escort, moved solemnly across town to Waikiki Beach. Reverend Abraham Akaka, the pastor of Kawaiahao Church performed the service. A group of beach boys began singing Hawaiian songs, including "Aloha Oe." The Duke’s ashes were then scattered into the ocean he loved so dearly.

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Bruce Irons

2007-09-23T06:29:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Irons_%28surfer%29

Bruce Irons (born November 16, 1979) is a regularfoot professional surfer from Hanalei, Kauai and younger brother of three-time world champion Andy Irons. Best known for his radical aerial maneuvers and fearless tuberiding abilities, he claims he will surf any wave on the planet.
Born in Lihue, Kauai, he was raised on the North Shore where he began surfing at age seven. After a successful amateur career with several wins in the United States Surfing Championships, he went pro shortly after graduating high school. After placing second place in 1998 and third in 2000, he defeated eight-time world champion Kelly Slater to win the 2001 Pipe Masters event. on October 3rd, 2004 after qualifying for the WCT tour, he again defeated the seven-time champion in the semifinals at the ASP Quiksilver Pro France event, only to lose to his older brother in the final. Later, on December 15th, 2004, he won the " Quiksilver In Memory of Eddie Aikau" event in waves that exceeded forty feet (12m) at O'ahu's Waimea Bay. Soon after, he dazzled crowds by making the final and placing fourth in the Pipe Masters, barely re-qualifying for the 2005 tour.
Bruce is sponsored for life by the skate, surf, and snowboard clothing line, Volcom. Bruce also rides for wetsuit sponsor Body Glove International.

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Andy Irons

2007-09-23T06:24:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Irons

Andy Irons (born 24 July 1978) is a professional surfer. Irons, a Hawaiian, was reared on the dangerous and shallow reefs of the North Shore in Kauai, and has 3 world titles (2002, 2003, 2004).
An inspiration to many young groms, he and his family host the Annual Irons Brothers Pinetrees Classic, a contest for youngsters, to give back to the community that has given them so much. The governor of Hawaii deemed February 13 forever 'Andy Irons day'.
The 2004 movie 'Blue Horizon' (directed by Jack McCoy), paralleled his life on the WCT tour with that of free surfer, David Rastovich. The film also touched on his long-time rivalry with 8 time world champion Kelly Slater. There has been some debate over whether or not the film was an accurate and fair portrayal of Irons surfer lifestyle.
In 2006 he won his 4th Triple Crown Championship title, and is now tied for second place with Derek Ho on the all-time list. Irons will begin the 2007 Championship Tour in 2nd place trying to win another world title against the likes of Kelly Slater, Mick Fanning, Joel Parkinson, Taj Burrow, Cory Lopez and the Hobgood Brothers.
His brother, Bruce Irons, is a fellow competitor on the World championship tour (WCT).

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Fred Hemmings

2007-09-23T06:19:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hemmings

Fred Hemmings (b. January 9, 1946) is an American surfer, politician, and author. He is a 1965 graduate of Punahou School. As 1968 world surfing champion, Hemmings is considered one of the most successful surfers of all time. After a career of professional surfing in the 1960s and 1970s, Hemmings won a Republican seat in the Hawaii State Legislature. He has served in both the Hawaii State Senate and Hawaii House of Representatives.
In 1991, Hemmings was inducted into the International Surfing Hall of Fame, and in 1998 the Hawaii State Sports Hall of Fame.

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Joyce Hoffman

2007-09-23T06:15:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joyce_Hoffman_%28surfer%29

Joyce Hoffman is prominent surfer, considered a woman's pioneer in the sport of surfing. She is often regarded as the first female international surfing star and was one the first inductees of the International Surfing Hall of Fame.

Born in Dana Point, California, Hoffman started competing at an early age. She went on to win numerous honors including the US Surfing Championship for Women from 1965-67 and the Makaha International Open in 1964 and 1966. In 1968, she became the first female to surf the Banzai Pipeline in Hawaii. Hoffman was also the top vote getter for Surfing Magazine International Hall of Fame Awards in 1966 and 1967. In 1969, the Los Angeles Times named her Woman of the Year, the only surfer to ever hold this distinction.

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Damien Hobgood

2007-09-23T06:08:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damien_Hobgood

Damien Hobgood (born July 6, 1979) is a professional surfer from Satellite Beach, Florida. He is known for having the highest grand final score in the history of pro surfing by scoring 19.9 Out of 20 at The Quiksilver Pro Fiji in 2004.

Hobgood is the twin brother of C.J. Hobgood who is also a professional surfer. Hobgood is a member of the World Championship Tour (WTC). Among his notable accomplishments was defeating world champion Andy Irons for the Quiksilver Pro Fiji in 2004. He suffered a shoulder injury in 2005 but rebounded by winning The Globe WCT Fiji in 2006. Hobgood is part of the Surfrider Pro Team which is sponsored by the Surfrider Foundation.

Hobgood is married to Charlotte Hobgood and have a daughter Savanna Grace born on July 29, 2006 in San Diego, California.

Fausto Intilla

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Laird Hamilton

2007-09-23T05:19:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laird_Hamilton

Laird Hamilton (born Laird John Zerfas on March 2, 1964 in San Francisco) is an American big-wave surfer and former male model.

Laird was born in San Francisco on March 2, 1964, in an experimental bathysphere designed to ease the mother's labor. Laird and his mother, Joann Zyirek Zerfas, moved to Hawaii when he was still an infant, after the departure of his Greek birth father, L.G. Zerfas, before his first birthday. Laird hunted pigs and worked in taro patches as a boy. Even as a child Laird showed an unquenchable thirst for adrenaline; footage has been released of him jumping off a sixty foot cliff into deep water at just 7 years old. While a young boy, Laird met legendary 1960's surfer Bill Hamilton on Pupukea beach of the North Shore of Oahu; saying "I want you to be my daddy, so you have to meet my mommy," Laird introduced Bill to his mother. Bill Hamilton went on to marry Joann, and become Laird's adopted father, eventually moving the family to a remote valley on the island of Kauai. JoAnn and Bill divorced after ten years of marriage, having given Laird a younger half-brother (and surfer), Lyon. JoAnn died of a brain aneurysm in 1997.
Laird thus grew up in the 1960s and 1970s with one of the greatest surfing locations in the world on the north coast of Oahu as a playground with a legendary surfer as a father and coach to mold him into the art of conquering big wave surf.
At school, Hamilton had a difficult time in classes dominated by darker native Hawaiians, where he was often the only Caucasian person in the class. At the age of sixteen Hamilton quit the eleventh grade at Kapaa High School to pursue a modeling career and work in construction (with a little help, he can build a house from scratch). At the age of seventeen Laird was discovered on a beach in Kauai by a photographer from Italian Men's Vogue magazine L'Uomo Vogue which subsequently saw him land a modeling contract and later a 1983 photo shoot with the actress Brooke Shields.

1980's
By the age of twenty, Laird had already become an accomplished surfer and could have easily left modeling to pursue the well-worn path from clothing endorsements to dominance on the prized World Championship Tour. However, competitive surfing and contests never appealed to Laird, who had watched his father Bill suffer thoroughly in organized championships. Bill Hamilton regarded surfing more as a work of art rather than based chiefly on performance. As a young Laird once quoted "Contests are less about the one big wave," he says, "than about your performances. Surfing is about your body of work. It's about art. I would snap if I was letting someone other than the audience determine my fate. How does a musician judge his thing? By how many people love his music?" In the 1987 movie North Shore, Laird played the antagonistic role of "Lance Burkhart."
Despite further success in modeling during the 1980s, Hamilton, with his professional surfing upbringing, had always intended to venture into a life of surfing. But, Laird's rejection of, and disposition toward, the contest circuit meant that he had to devise an alternate route to fame and international recognition.

1990's
An early attempt at media recognition was his quest to be the first surfer to complete a 360 loop while strapped to his board. The attempt was chronicled in the ski film Groove - Requiem in the key of Ski by Greg Stump (1990). Thus he embarked on famously, in the early 1990s with Maui's legendary 'Strapped' crew, a group of eight or so friends that included fellow all-star Rush Randle which aimed to push the restrictions and boundaries of contemporary surfing beyond people's wildest imaginations. The Strapped crew amazed spectators by tackling bigger wave surf and featuring stunts such as launching 30-foot jumps on sailboards, then mating the boards to paragliders to experiment with some of the earliest kiteboards. The video "Strapped" chronicles their feats.
In late 1992, Hamilton with some of his companions, such as Darrick Doerner and Buzzy Kerbox, started using inflatable boats to tow one another into waves which were too big to catch under paddle power alone. The technique, which would later be modified to use jet skis, was a revolutionary innovation. Tow-in surfing, as it soon became known, pushed the confinements and possibilities of big wave surfing to a whole new level. Although met with mixed reactions from the surfing community, some of whom felt that it was cheating and polluting, Laird explained that tow-in surfing was the only way to catch the monstrous sized waves such as those that can be seen at Jaws (Peahi) off the coast of Maui and the coastline of Tahiti. Using tow-in surfing methods, Hamilton quickly learned not just how to survive 70-foot waves but to carve arcs across walls of water that could literally sink ships. This put a high level of drama back into a sport long preoccupied with small-wave hopping tricks that had become a cliché in competitive surfing.
Soon, Hamilton was receiving the recognition he had long craved. In 1994 he appeared on both ESPN (with his first wife, Brazilian bodyboarder Maria Hamilton) and the cover of the magazine which gained him attention from a number of sporting agencies who recognized his potential, landing an exclusive sponsorship from the French beachwear company 'Oxbow' surf later that year which he still endorses, modelling their clothes and featuring in their adverts.
However, in 1995, Laird's life took an unexpected detour. He left his wife and baby daughter and moved in with professional volleyball player and model Gabrielle Reece in Los Angeles whom he met following an interview by her on American television. He went on to marry Reece in November 1997.
Hamilton's climb to fame was greatly helped by Gabrielle Reece's expertise in the media machine who "knew all about being in a sport where you had to create something out of nothing," as she says. She soon set Hamilton up with her own talent manager, Jane Kachmer, who recommended that he needed some professional organization and publicity to achieve his potential. In short order, Hamilton's career began looking a lot more like Reece's. In 1996, People magazine named him one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World, and he replaced Reece as correspondent for the syndicated cable series 'The Extremists'.
By the late 1990s, Laird, whilst gaining more attention, had become a truly all-round waterman, gifted in a number of other watersports such as windsurfing, waterskiing and developing his kitesurfing abilities as a pioneer of the sport. In 1996 Laird and Manu Bertin were instrumental in demonstrating and popularising kitesurfing off the Hawaiian coast of Maui.
Demonstrating his superb ability in the water, in 1999 Laird sailed his windsurfer between the Hawaiian islands of Oahu and Kauai, some fifty miles away, an endeavour he completed in just five or six hours. He later sailed his windsurfer back again. Hamilton has also been credited with inventing the foilboard, which he has also developed in, an innovative surfboard which incorporates hydrofoil technology allowing a higher degree of precision and effectiveness of aerial techniques within the water. Most recently, he has become the most public practitioner and proponent of stand-up paddle surfing, an ancient Hawaiian technique that requires an enormous longboard and a long-handled paddle, as well as considerable skill, strength and agility. Some "purist" surfers have blasted him for this, but Hamilton has called it a return to an old, traditional Hawaiian way of surfing, some say practiced by King Kamehameha and his queen Ka'ahumanu almost three hundred years ago.

2000 - present
However, it was Hamilton's death-defying drop into Tahiti's Teahupo'o break on the morning of August 17, 2000 which became the benchmark in his career and his life, and cemented his reputation as the greatest big wave surfer of all time. A wipeout in Teahupo'o, a particularly hazardous shallow-water reefbreak in southeast Tahiti, means almost certain death. At Teahupo'o, Laird dropped into what is widely considered to be the most dangerous wave ever ridden. His ride there is known by surfers worldwide simply as 'The Wave', and a shot of him riding The Wave made the cover of Surfer magazine, accompanied by the caption: "oh my god...". Afterwards even Laird admitted that even he was pushing himself to the "max, max, max, max". Hamilton is now widely regarded as the best of the best at big wave surfing, regularly surfing swells of 35 feet (11 m) tall, and moving at speeds in excess of 30 miles an hour (50 km/h) and successfully riding other waves of up to 70 feet high (22 m), at up to 50 mph (80 km/h).
He has often been credited for being able to conquer such enormous 'big wave' surf because of his exceptional physical conditioning and stature. At 6'3" (1.90m) and 220 pounds (102kg) he is able to take on larger waves which many smaller surfers could not physically handle.

Laird's first marriage was to Brazilian bodyboarder/clothes designer Maria Souza, with whom he has a daughter, Izabela, born in 1995. He is at present married to model/pro athlete Gabrielle Reece, with whom he has a second daughter, Reece Viola, born in 2003, and another child on the way, due in January 2008.

Laird appeared in the 2004 documentary Riding Giants about surfing and the opening sequence of the 2002 James Bond movie Die Another Day, as Pierce Brosnan's big-wave surfing double. He also appears in Waterworld, as Kevin Costner's stunt double in numerous water scenes. During the making of "Waterworld", Laird, who had been commuting to the set via jet-ski, was lost at sea when his jet-ski ran out of fuel between Maui and the Big Island. He drifted for many hours before being spotted by a Coast Guard plane and rescued; when the abandoned jet-ski washed up on shore on the island of Lanai, he went over to fetch it and drove it back home again.
In 2007, Hamilton, along with his wife Gabrielle Reece, appeared in the ABC reality television series Fast Cars and Superstars: The Gillette Young Guns Celebrity Race, featuring a dozen celebrities in a stock car racing competition. In the first round of competition, Hamilton matched up against tennis star Serena Williams and former NFL quarterback John Elway. Laird was eliminated in episode 5.
He has appeared in the television show Iconoclasts with Eddie Vedder from the popular American rock band Pearl Jam
Footage of Laird is used on the video for "Dayvan Cowboy" from Boards of Canada.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Bethany Hamilton

2007-09-23T05:14:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethany_Hamilton

Bethany Meilani Hamilton (born February 8, 1990) is an American surfer. She is known for surviving a shark attack in which she lost her left arm, and for overcoming the serious and debilitating injury to return to surfing.

Hamilton was born in North Shore, Kauai. Both of her parents were keen surfers who moved to Hawaii from the continental United States for the surfing opportunities. Hamilton was taught how to surf by her parents when she was 4 years old. Her surfing abilities progressed very quickly and, while still in grade school, she won first place in the "push and ride" division of a Quicksilver surfing contest. She entered her first major competition at the age of 8, the "Rell Sun" contest on the island of Oahu at Makaha beach, competing in the girls seven to nine shortboard, and seven to nine longboard, taking first place in both. Her senior career as a surfer started when she won the 1999 Haleiwa Menehune Championships 23rd annual contest, in February, 2000. In this competition, she placed 1st in the "11-under girls", 1st in the "15-under girls," and 2nd in the "12-under boys" division at the Volcom Puffer Fish contest. She picked up a sponsor, Rip Curl, which aided her with her plans of becoming a professional surfer. Hamilton is also a devout Christian who uses her shark attack experience in her personal ministry.

On October 31, 2003, Hamilton went for a morning surf along Tunnels Beach, Kauai with friends Alana, Byron and Holt Blanchard. Around 7:10 a.m., she was lying on her surfboard with her left arm dangling in the water, when a 14ft tiger shark attacked her,[1] ripping her left arm off just below the shoulder. Her friends helped her paddle back to shore, and fashioned a tourniquet out of a surfboard leash around what was left of her arm before rushing her to Wilcox Memorial Hospital.
Despite the trauma of the incident, Hamilton was determined to return to surfing. Just ten weeks after the incident, she returned to her board and went surfing again. She adopted a custom-made board that was longer and slightly thicker which made it easier to paddle. She has observed that she has to kick a lot harder to make up for the loss of her left arm. After teaching herself to surf with one arm, she has again begun surfing competitively.
In July of 2004 Hamilton won the ESPY Award for Best Comeback Athlete of the Year.[2] She was presented with a special courage award at the 2004 Teen Choice Awards. Hamilton still aspires to become a professional surfer.
Since the attack, Hamilton has appeared on 20/20, Good Morning America, Inside Edition, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, The Tonight Show, as well as in People and Time. In 2004, MTV Books published Hamilton's book, Soul Surfer: A True Story of Faith, Family, and Fighting to Get Back on the Board (ISBN 0-7434-9922-0), which describes her ordeal.

The 2007 short subject documentary film, Heart of a Soul Surfer was directed by Becky Baumgartner and is currently appearing in film festivals around the world. Described as a "faith-based documentary", the film portrays the true, coming of age story of Bethany Hamilton. Addressing Hamilton's courage in the aftermath of the loss of her arm in a tiger shark attack, the film follows Hamilton's quest for spiritual meaning and purpose.

Fausto Intilla

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Jeffrey "Jeff" Hakman

2007-09-23T05:07:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Hakman

Jeff Hakman is an ex-world surfing champion and multi millionaire founder of clothing giant Quiksilver , who lost it all to a heroin addiction - twice.
Jeff started surfing in 1956 at age eight in Palos Verdes (California) and at the age of ten moved to Hawaii with his parents. He surfed Waimea Bay at fourteen years old and at seventeen won the prestigious surfing title, The Duke Kahanamoku Classic. From twenty one to twenty seven he won the most major surfing titles on the planet including the first Pipeline Masters, 1976 Bells Beach and was 1974 and 1975 unofficial World Champion.
In 1976 Jeff founded Quiksilver America with Bob McKnigh and in 1984 founded Quiksilver Europe with Harry Hodge, Brigitte Darrigrand and John Winship.
Today Jeff Hakman is travelling continuously, living in France half the year and Hawaii the other half. He is the Marketing Director for NaPali SA (Quiksilver) in France and still enjoys surfing big waves.

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Sunny Garcia

2007-09-23T05:03:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunny_Garcia

Sunny Garcia (b January 14, 1970) is a famous American surfer from Maile, Oahu. He was the 2000 world surfing champion and several computer games use his name.
Sunny discovered his talent for surfing at the young age of seven when his friends literally threw him into the ocean. Within a few minutes he was already riding waves to the shore.
At the age of five, Sunny was suspended from kindergarten for brawling. He quit high school after being wrongly accused of harassing someone's sister. The older brother of the sister walked into his photography class and beat him viciously. He spent the next week in the hospital. It was the first time Sunny had ever lost anything and he vowed to never let it happen again. It is said that because of this vow, his competitive drive is fueled by anger.
Sunny starred in The WB reality show, North Shore: Boarding House along with 7 other surfers.
In October of 2006, Sunny was sentenced to serve time in federal prison for failing to pay taxes on unreported overseas winnings from 1996 to 2001. Over $471,000 in prize money went unclaimed - resulting to a three month sentance on tax evasion charges. He will begin his term January 12 of 2007. "I spent my money foolishly and didn't handle my affairs," he said outside the San Diego federal courtroom where he was sentenced.

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Nick Gabaldon

2007-09-23T04:59:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Gabaldon

Nicolas Rolando Gabaldon (1927-1951) was an early surfer who is credited by surfing experts with being California's first documented surfer of African-American and Hispanic descent. Despite being an amateur rather than a professional competitive surfer, many surfers of color consider him as a role model and an integral part of the history of surfing.
Nick was born February 23, 1927 in Los Angeles, California. Very little is known of his childhood. He lived most of his life in Santa Monica, California and was one of 50 black students at Santa Monica High School during the 1940s. Nick taught himself how to surf at a 200 foot roped off stretch of demarcated beach which was part of Santa Monica State Beach. This area of beachfront was informally referred to by names such as "Ink Well Beach", "Negro Beach", and other more derogatory names . After the closure of Bruce's Beach during the 1930's and due to de facto segregation, that portion of beachfront near Pico Street was the only beach in Southern California that racial minorities were freely allowed to use without harassment or violence. This area remains popular with African Amercan Angelenos to the present day.
After serving in the Navy during World War II, Nick enrolled in Santa Monica College, where he divided his time between pursuing his studies, surfing and working as a lifeguard. Around 1949, Nick began surfing in Malibu, California at Surfrider Beach where he was accepted without question by several surf pioneers. His friends and surf contemporaries included Mickey Munoz, Ricky Grigg, Matt Kivlin, Buzzy Trent, Robert Wilson Simmons aka "Bob Simmons" and Les Williams. Since he did not own a vehicle, Nick would either get there by hitchhiking on the Pacific Coast Highway, or he would use his surfboard to paddle the 12 miles to Malibu by way of Santa Monica Bay. He did this each day for several years.
On June 6, 1951, Nick died when he crashed into the Malibu Pier while attempting a surfing move known as a "pier ride" or "shooting the pier". At that time, there was a south swell that came on, creating some of the biggest waves known in that area. Nick's surfboard was found immediately, but it would be 3 to 4 days before his body was found washed up on Las Flores Beach, further west of the Pier. Most of his Malibu-based surfing peers had attended his rosary and funeral. He is buried in Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery in Santa Monica, California. Six days prior to his death, Nick had submitted a poem for submission to the Santa Monica College literary magazine. It was entitled "Lost Lives" where he describes the sea as "capricious", "vindictive" and where men "do battle but still die." Some see the poem as being somewhat prophetic in light of how he died.
There is also a brief reference to Nick's death in the 1957 novel, "Gidget" by Frederick Kohner. He is not mentioned by name, but in the story, the protagonist, Frances Lawrence, refers to her parents being opposed to her surfing because of what happened to that "colored boy" who crashed into the pier.
On September 7, 2007, officials for the City of Santa Monica announced plans to commemorate the stretch of Santa Monica State Beach called the Ink Well, and to post a plaque to honor Nick Gabaldon's contribution to the sport of surf.

George Greenough

2007-09-23T04:56:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Greenough

George Greenough is a surfer from Santa Barbara, California who now resides in Byron Bay in N.S.W Australia. He is known for creating the modern surfboard fin. He changed the design from a useless keel to a more powerful fin. His equipment was different from the longboard design of the day. George rode short kneeboards under 5'5" and rode surf mattresses regularly. He is credited as being the best mat rider ever. George still surfs air mattresses.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s George released his films "The Innermost Limits of Pure Fun" and "Crystal Voyager".

Fausto Intilla

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Donavon Frankenreiter

2007-09-23T04:52:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donavon_Frankenreiter

Donavon Frankenreiter, born December 10, 1972, in Downey, California, is an American musician and surfer. He is a long-time friend of Jack Johnson and his debut self-titled album was released in 2004 on Johnson's Brushfire Records through Universal Music and made the Australian ARIA Top-40 charts in April 2004.

He commenced surfing as a teenager at San Clemente, California, and was signed to a sponsorship deal with Billabong allowing him to travel the world surfing. During his travels, he rented a room in North Shore, Oahu, Hawaii, from Jack Johnson's parents and the surfer-musicians developed a strong friendship.
Donavon is also well known for his appearances in the Drive Thru series of surf videos.
In 1990 Frankenreiter started playing in Peanut Butter and Jam at the age of 18. In 1996 he began to seriously pursue a musical career when he formed the band Sunchild. In Sunchild, Frankenreiter was the lead guitar player but did not sing. The band had a 70s rock sound similar in style to The Black Crowes. They released their first CD, Barefoot & Live, on Surfdog Records in 1997. Produced by Gary Hoey, the live album featured covers of The Allman Brothers Band, The Marshall Tucker Band, The Rolling Stones, and Van Morrison, as well as several originals. California Honey followed in 2000 on their own Sunchild Records. This studio album is now out-of-print and is very hard to find. Sunchild disbanded in 2001 and Frankenreiter went on to pursue a solo career. Sunchild is rarely mentioned in interviews or press-releases which leads many people to believe that Donavon only started his professional music career more recently.
In 2002 Frankenreiter signed with Brushfire Records.
His self-titled solo album, Donavon Frankenreiter, was recorded with co-producers Jack Johnson and Mario Caldato Jr. Johnson appears on the the album, as do G. Love and Eels member Koool G. Murder. The album was released in April 2004 in Australia due to his high profile in that country from his support gigs for Jack Johnson and from Frankenreiter’s own surfing career. He toured Australia in April 2004, helping the album reach the top forty of the ARIA albums chart. Gary Jules was his support act on this tour. The album was released in the United States one month later, on 11 May 2004.
In 2006 Frankenreiter left Brushfire Records and signed with Lost Highway Records, home of such notable artists as Elvis Costello, Ryan Adams and Willie Nelson. His follow-up album, Move by Yourself, was released on June 6, 2006. Later that year Donavon recorded a song called "Lovely Day" along with Koool G., which was featured in the opening sequence of the 2006 film Snakes on a Plane, and also appears on that movie's soundtrack.
Donavon's first live DVD, "Donavon Frankenreiter: The Abbey Road Sessions" was filmed and recorded at a special concert performed at Abbey Road studios in London, England in November of 2005, and subsequently released in early '06.

Fausto Intilla
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Skip Frye

2007-09-23T04:48:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skip_Frye

Skip Frye (b.Harry Richard Frye September 7, 1941 in San Diego, California) is a surfer, board shaper, and environmental activist.

Skip attended Mission Bay High School and began his professional surfing career in 1958. His first board was a balsa board shaped by legend Mike Diffenderfer. Skip rode professionally for G&S surfboards, and eventually created his own model for them in 1967. Skip captured national titles and represented the United States team internationally in 1966. Frye has appeared on many magazine covers including Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue (1969, with model Jamee Becker), The Surfer's Journal, Surfing, and Surfer Magazine. Skip is known for his gliding, fluid style as well as some of the most in demand surfboards in the world. Though he is perhaps, best recognized by his iconic logo, a set of wings commonly referred to as "Frye Wings". Iconic images of him surfing with his dog, silhouetted against a setting sun, and paddling alone into "The Ranch" have appeared in books and magazines; and have been printed on clothing and surfboards. Skip is also known for his innovation with foiled surfboard fins. After a surfing trip to Australia in 1969, he developed his trademark board shapes, the Egg, Fish and specialized longboard shapes. He has also developed a moderate temperature surf-wax ("Man Wax"), ideal for his native San Diego waters. Skip still surfs daily and shapes in the San Diego area. His attention to detail and careful hand-shaping practices have created high demand and long wait-lists. His boards have slowly become much sought after collector's pieces often passed down through generations.

Frye married his first wife, Marcia Metcalf in 1963. Together they raised their three children (Lauren, Donald, and Braden), before divorcing in the late 1970's. Following his divorce, Frye experienced a period of personal struggle but submerged himself in his sport. While visiting France in 1990 he experienced a life-changing event which led to a renewed sense of faith; and a profound personal change. Upon his return to the US, Frye married his long-time girlfriend (Donna Sarvis); He became a devout Christian, and along with his wife (Donna [Sarvis] Frye, a California politician who narrowly lost the San Diego mayoral election in 2005), a public supporter of various environmental and clean-water acts. Skip currently attends Coastlands Church in Pacific Beach.

Fausto Intilla

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Mark Foo

2007-09-23T02:00:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Foo

Mark Foo (born Mark Sheldon Foo on February 5, 1958 – December 23, 1994) was a professional surfer. Born in Singapore to a Chinese photojournalist for the U.S. Information Agency he relocated to Hawaii at age 4. Foo spent his early childhood surfing the South Shore of O'ahu. His family moved several times during his adolescence, but Foo ultimately returned to Hawaii just before finishing high school. He continued surfing throughout his teen years and in 1977 he joined a professional surfing tour, the IPS World Tour. In the early 1980s, Foo quit the IPS World Tour, stopped competing, and began surfing Waimea Bay, a famous big wave surfing spot on the North Shore of O'ahu. Foo's passion for surfing big waves led him to surf larger and larger swells.

On December 23, 1994, Mark Foo died in a surfing accident at Mavericks, a big wave break off the coast of Northern California. During take-off on an 18 foot wave, Foo experienced a seemingly innocuous wipeout which resulted in his drowning. Foo's death shook the big wave surfing community, as one of its pioneers had died. On December 30th, over 700 people arrived at Waimea Bay in Hawaii for Mark's funeral. Approximately 150 surfers paddled into the Bay and formed a large circle. One of the participants, who was carrying a container with Foo's ashes, paddled into the center of the circle and placed the ashes into the ocean.

Foo helped elevate the popularity of the sport, with his talent, courage, and enthusiasm, and was certainly recognized as one of the greatest big-wave surfers to ever ride the waves. Mark was a favorite subject of photographers, and he had his own cable television surfing program. "If you want to ride the ultimate wave, you have to be willing to pay the ultimate price" was Foo's philosophy, which he certainly lived until the day of his final ride.

The epic battle between Foo and Ken Bradshaw in the 1980s is chronicled in Stealing the Wave by Andy Martin (Bloomsbury Publishing).

Fausto Intilla

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Michael Eppelstun (Eppo)

2007-09-23T01:55:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://www.worldsurfers.com/profiles/eppo/profile.htm

In 1993 an unknown kid from Port Macquarie, New South Wales pulled off the first double roll ever seen in competition and clinched the Bodyboarding World Title at Pipeline, Hawaii. This was perhaps the biggest win ever in bodyboarding because to win at Pipe that year, ‘Eppo’ had to also defeat the previously unbeaten 8 times World Champion Mike Stewart at his home break! Eppo broke Stewart’s dream run and took the title thus becoming Australia’s first and, so far, only World Champion bodyboarder.

Since then Eppo has consistently competed on the World Tour, always ending the year in the top ten or better. His Reader’s Poll and Peer Poll ratings are unequalled by anyone except for Mike Stewart and Eppo has really earned his worldwide fame by charging hard.

It’s a big task for a young guy with a lovely wife (Krista) and two energetic kids (Bree and Taya) but Eppo is nothing if not up to such challenges. In fact, he’s a handful himself. Known for his larrikin antics on the road, Eppo has driven many a photographer and travelling companion to tears with his merciless teasing and his beloved little tricks! Luckily his heart of gold and his honest smile seem to keep him out of hot water most of the time.
The most well known of Eppo’s abilities is his creative surfing. Very few surfers can say they have invented a new manoeuvre but Eppo has invented and perfected several.

The Double Roll (he’s not done with that one yet!), the Back Flip and the ARS (Air Roll Spin) are all a part of his traffic stopping repertoire. And it’s insane to see him pulling them off in big, slamming waves like Pipeline. Massive, big airs have also been an Eppo trademark for years, sometimes taking their toll on his back but luckily, with a history in gymnastics and plenty of training, he’s still at the top of his form, in good nick and charging.

Fausto Intilla

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Shane Dorian

2007-09-23T01:42:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shane_Dorian

Patrick Shane Dorian (born July 19, 1972), or "Shane", is an American surfer from Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. He spent 11 years touring on the World Championship Tour surfing.
Dorian was born to Patrick, a former Hollywood actor and stunt double for Elvis Presley, and Susan, who competed in female bodybuilding events. When Shane was three, his parents opened a restaurant called "Dorian's" on the beach. Being a child, Dorian was too young to wait tables, and long hours at the restaurant resulted in him turning to the ocean for amusement.
He started out on a bodyboard alongside friend, and future bodyborder champion, Mike Stewart. Dorian received his first surfboard, from his dad, on his fifth birthday. He soon abandoned the bodyboard to focus on surfing.
Surfing and surfing education became a priority for Dorian. Dorian's mother, who had divorced Patrick when Shane was 12, worked out a system where Shane would spend the second and third quarters of the school year on the North Shore of Oahu (the peak winter season) and the first and fourth quarters back home on the Big Island.
In 1987, Shane Dorian had his first major success a the Gotcha Pro competition at Sandy Beach. He was able to beat some big names, made it through four rounds, and received some media exposure. More importantly, he became friends with a couple of the up-and-coming surfers on Oahu, Brock Little and Todd Chesser who played a role in the development of his surfing.
Dorian joined the ASP World Tour in 1993 where he hovered outside of the top 10 for a number of years before cracking the barrier with a fourth-place world finish in 2000. He's also won a number of events in his career, including the Rip Curl Pro in 1999 and the 2000 Billabong Pro at Mundaka. In 2004, Dorian retired from the WTC tour, but not from a being a professional; choosing to focus on becoming a better surfer.
He has been a long-time member of the Billabong team, his main sponsor.
In the documentary "Solid: The Two Days That Teahupoo Blew Minds," fellow surfers gave him a standing ovation for his wave conquering rides.

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Miki Dora

2007-09-23T01:38:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miki_Dora

Mickey Chapin Dora, Miklos S. Dora III, Miki Dora, MSD III. The names are many, and so are the facets of the man they call "Da Cat." Mickey Dora is surfing's Black Knight, the consummate antihero of the Malibu era.
Born in Budapest, Hungary to Miklos and Ramona Dora (who soon divorced), his stepfather, the great surfer Gard Chapin, introduced the boy to the ways of the ocean and a life at the beach. Dora was a worthy student and an excellent test pilot for the surfboard Chapin bought him. "Chapin was one of the few guys who instantly recognized that my pintails would work," surfboard innovator Joe Quigg recalls. "I got ridiculed and (Bob) Simmons laughed at them, but Chapin got one, and he bought one for Mickey, and that was his first surfboard."
Young Dora was a touch iconoclastic from the get-go. His early plan to fire-bomb the shack at San Onofre would have been offensive even to his independently minded stepdad had he carried it out. Stories of Dora's youth abound; stories on his Malibu years and beyond are legend. But Da Cat's outrageous scams, ruses and poses mask a man of extreme sensitivity and brilliance -- in and out of the water.
With the advent of foam surfboards and the more maneuver-oriented surfing styles of the late '50s, Dora's subtle mastery of wave positioning and the nuances of board control set him apart from the pack at Malibu, and his appearances there became the fodder of legend. His deft mannerisms on and off the beach and calculatedly eccentric comings and goings epitomized the Jack Kerouac/James Dean cult of cool. Who knew what lurked behind those Ray Ban sunglasses?
After Gidget created a cinematic genre, Dora became a sometime stunt double for several of the early '60s Hollywood beach flicks beginning with 1964's Muscle Beach Party. He was also worked in Bikini Beach (1964), How to Stuff a Wild Bikini (1965), Beach Blanket Bingo (1965) and Ski Party (1965). He was featured as himself in Bill Delaney's Surfers: The Movie (1990).
In his halcyon days, Dora circulated mysteriously, sometimes penetrated the L.A. scene and lived an increasingly covert existence. Occasional interviews with the nascent surf media were veiled, cryptic and showed a penetrating and surreal wit. Above all, he was clearly oppressed by the accelerating loss of the idyllic world of his youth.
As his beloved Malibu increasingly swarmed with interlopers, Dora's go-outs became more like slalom runs as he wove intricate paths through scores of kooks, pushing and shoving his way along the zippering hollows. When accused of being ruthless, Dora told Surfer, "It's a lie. I'm vicious. We're all pushing and shoving, jockeying for position, and if I get the wave first -- if I'm in the best position -- then I feel I deserve it."
In the '60s, Dora grew to loathe contests and the "fascistic" control they exercised over surfers, the beaches and the waves. He called contest judges senile surf freaks and rejected the authority of the sport's self-appointed leaders. At the 1967 Malibu Invitational Surf Classic, competing for the last time, Da Cat took off on a wave, trimmed beautifully across its blue-green face and, passing in front of the judges, bent over, dropped his black shorts and exposed his naked ass to the gathered dignitaries and spectators.
Eventually Dora's disgust with contemporary California forced a decisive career move and lifestyle shift, and he escaped into a self-imposed (and strategic) exile, abandoning his fabled haunts to the Valley usurpers and Hollywood geeks. He has lived in France, traveled extensively in South Africa, Australia and the South Pacific and Indian oceans. He returned to the United States in the '80s to serve jail time for grand larceny (credit card fraud) and perhaps other criminal pursuits.
Since then, Dora, still with no permanent residence, has remained a surf tribe icon over the years. He has been invited (and sometimes attended) legends events, and lives much of the year in France, where he is often seen at Quiksilver functions, giving him a sense of community in the international surfing establishment. Like many of the aging stars, Dora has benefited from the nostalgia of the so-called longboard renaissance, and a new edition of his famous Greg Noll Da Cat surfboard (which sold thousands as the first limited-edition signature model in the mid-'60s) has been a great success.
"We made 250 of them, and we've got eight left," Noll reveals. "We started out at $1,000, which some people thought was outrageous, but then they went to $2,000, and the last 15 or 20 are going for $3,000 each." Clearly the Dora image and name (each Da Cat model is signed by both Noll and Dora) has cachet.
Recently a slew of Dora's possessions (presumably sold to lighten his load and raise some cash) was offered for sale via the Internet. The lot included Miki's 1967 Duke Kahanamoku Invitation
He died in 2002 and will forever be remembered as one of the most legendary surfers in history.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Ross Clarke-Jones

2007-09-23T01:27:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Clarke-Jones

Ross Clarke-Jones is a well-known big wave surfer. He originally came from the Central Coast, of New South Wales, Australia where he enjoyed surfing Terrigal Haven, a point break that produces rare waves lasting for up to 300 metres on a big swell.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Tom Carroll

2007-09-23T01:21:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Carroll

Thomas Victor (Tom) Carroll (born 29 November 1961 in Newport, New South Wales) is a former Australian surfer. He won the Australian Junior Title in 1978, the Pro Juniors in 1977 and 1980, the 1983 and 1984 ASP World Title, and the 1987 Pipe Masters. He was the first surfing millionaire after signing a contract with Quiksilver in 1989.
A portrait of him by artist Jan Williamson was hung in the Archibald Prize in 2000.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Tom Curren

2007-09-23T01:16:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Curren

Tom Curren (born July 3, 1964, in Santa Barbara, California) is an American surfer. Born to father Pat (big-wave legend and shaper) and mother Jeanine. His brother Joe is also a professional surfer and popular photographer he also has a sister. He was world champion three times - 1985, 1986, 1990. He achieved near-mythical status both for his competitive drive and for his smooth, powerful surfing style. He made a high-profile decision to retire from competitive surfing in the mid-1990s. He led the surfing revolution in the early '80s and inspired many of the surfers today, showing them how to surf a wave. Curren is without a doubt, one the most memorable surfers with one of the best styles the surfing world has ever seen.

Life
Tom Curren currently resides in Panama and still surfs in contests on the ASP World Qualifying Series (WQS.) He is also often invited to surf in World Championship Tour (WCT) trials or contests. He has competed in the Annual Switchfoot Bro-Am Surf Contest for 3 years in a row, surfing on the Switchfoot team.
In his five year rise to World Surfing Champion, Tom Curren led the way in cutting edge, perfectly tuned performance. Despite his youth, Curren was acknowledged as one of surfing's true geniuses and a soulful original. He single handedly challenged the surfing community in almost every area of surfing's culture and altered the mindset of hundreds of thousands of surfers around the world.

The Fish Revolution
After his 'time out', Tom Curren re-appeared at an ASP Surfing Competition in France in 1993, armed with a 1970's 5'5" Twin Fin he'd reportedly bought second hand in a New Jersey Surf Shop. He entered and proceeded to convincingly beat Matt Hoy, who was ranked 8th in the world at the time. Curren's improvised fusion of speed and turns, kick started a new age of retro as all surfers looked to add a similar board to their quivers. Tom showed the world how to use the fish board and how to use it modernly.
Curren has played a variety of instruments since fifteen. His drumming, bass, guitar, singing and composition took a form that reflected his unique personality. Famously reclusive, his musical gift was only recognised - although highly regarded - among a small enclave of musical celebrities.
Curren broke track in late 1993 by committing to a 27-stop national American tour, in which his band 'Skipping Urchins' drove to every hardcore surfing outpost. The tour was a stunning validation of his artistry & endurance.
His musical depth grew through the mid '90's as he collaborated and jammed with premier talent. Curren also relocated from France back to Southern California. It was during a visit to Sydney in '98 that he exposed himself as a prodigious musician. One evening, unannounced, he walked in off the street to EMI Studios. Curren laid down six live tracks with just guitar and voice.
The music of Curren features raw and honest performances. The folk influence, bluesy, gritty feel with a minimalist approach may have been seen as contradictory to what some believe as the 'surfing music market.' However, the recording success of his long time friend Jack Johnson, is testament to the fact that the 'surfing music market' is a past tense definition, and that the market is receptive to a wide variety of styles.
Curren's music goes beyond the immediate 'surf market'. He explores musical styles and combinations of sounds that reflect his unique take on music, and a glimpse into the Curren persona.
Composing and recording is now routine, as is rehearsing his band for performances at major surfing events (whether he's competing or not), as well as mainstream venues.
The expansion of Curren's horizons into music seems a natural path to him. In many ways, the culture and lifestyle of surfing and music, are one and the same.
"Curren's reputation as one of the world's greatest surfers in history is supported by his accomplishments as a competitor. But most surfers would define Curren as an artist, then as a world champion..." from Matt Warshaw 'Surf Riders'.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Jeff Clark

2007-09-23T01:10:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Clark

Jeff Clark (born March 26, 1957 Redwood City) is one of the most noteworthy and respected big wave surfers, famous for surfing Mavericks alone for 15 years before it was widely discovered by the big-wave surfing community.
Clark is the only active ambidextrous big wave surfer in the world, and one of the few in history. A natural goofyfooter, Jeff spent ten years learning to ride regularfoot. This allowed him to ride frontside (facing the wave) when he started taking on the more-dangerous right-breaking waves at Maverick's.
Labeled one of the "world's best big-wave riders" by Surfer magazine in 1994, Clark, along with Maverick's and the Half Moon Bay surf scene has been featured in such films as Riding Giants.
The annual Mavericks surf contest is now co-managed by Evolve Sports (a San Francisco-based sports marketing group) and Jeff Clark after surf clothing manufacturer Quiksilver withdrew its sponsorship of the event.
Clark also runs the Mavericks Surf Shop in the Princeton Harbor neighborhood of Half Moon Bay, not far from the famous break; he sells his own custom-made surfboards at his shop.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Taj Burrow

2007-09-23T01:05:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taj_Burrow

Taj Burrow is a well-know Australian surfer, born June 2, 1978 in Western Australia at Yallingup to Vance and Nancy Burrow. He has been romantically linked to Australian surf model Cheyenne Tozzi, however in July 2007 it was reported that he was traded in for American oil heir, Brandon Davis. He began surfing at the age of seven in 1985 and discovered he was regular footed. He began to become better and win contests several years later, becoming recognized as a grom. He went professional in 1998, and has since been recognized as one of the best surfers in the world of all time, even entering into the Australian Surfing Hall of Fame.
He has written a book (Taj Burrows book of Hot surfing) and has produced and partaken in his own surf videos such as Taj Burrow's Fair Bits. He is said to be one of the most advanced surfers that has not won a world title. It has been rumored that Taj and Andy Irons are working on being able to do a backflip aerial. In a recent interview in spring 2006, Taj said his top goal was not to win a world title but to further himself and the surfing world. Taj's favourite surfers are New Zealanders Butch And Wangle who he looks to for inspiration.
In 2007, Burrow won the Rip Curl pro at bells beach. He backed up this win with a stellar performance at the Billabong Pro in Jeffrey's Bay, South Africa where he claimed the title over 8 times ASP mens world champion, Kelly Slater. This win boosting him to second on the ASP Men's Tour ratings.
Vijay Khurana has since superseded Taj as the recognised leader in the professional surf curcuit in teaching underprivileged children how to surf. Taj and Vijay, though, remain good friends.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Ken Bradshaw

2007-09-23T00:55:00.001-07:00

Source:

http://www.kenbradshaw.com/bradshaw

By: Allyne Bradshaw

Born and raised in Houston, Texas, Ken started surfing at the age of 13 on Surfside Beach, Texas in 1965. After many youthful experiences in and out of school, Ken had to choose between academics, school sports or surfing. To his parents disapproval surfing won Ken's heart. For the next year, Ken threw himself into surfing 100%. Searching for better waves, he moved to California in 1969 and finished high school in Encinitas. By 1972 he was ready to master the big waves of Hawaii and decided to move to Sunset Beach. His first clothing sponsor was Sundek from 1979 to 1986. Then Quiksilver sponsored Ken from 1986-1992.

He surfed and worked in surf shops in Encinitas, San Diego, and at the La Costa Hotel Country Club and spa until he had the finances to move to Hawaii where he could ride larger waves. Once in Hawaii, 1972, he continued in the Resort Industry in Waikiki, but this time as a Maitre'd at one of the prestigious Colony Surf Motel restaurants on Diamond Head. Through this time period he continued to pursue the largest waves his ability allowed at that stage of his surfing. While under the tutorage of his first Hawaiian mentor, George Downing, whose guidance, knowledge, philosophy and wisdom, not only in surfboard designs and shapes, but more important, what it meant to be a Hawaiian Waterman and Surfer. Ken first met George Downing while participating in the World Contest in 1972.

Ken's ability and technique continued to increase after a few years of growth and understanding of the famous Hawaiian North Shore surf, and with additional mentoring and friendships with Barry Kanaiaupuni and Eddie Aikua, two historical Hawaiian watermen surfers. After a couple years of experience as a heavy equipment operator (Backhoe), and learning to build his own surfboards, he was ready to go into business for himself. Ken's first surfboard shaping job was with Lightning Bolt Surfboards and Surf Shop in 1976. Ken started his own business, Bradshaw-Hawaii, a manufacturer of custom surfboards in 1978. Bradshaw-Hawaii, Inc. is now celebrating It's Twentieth Anniversary. Ken's business interests have grown substantially in the last two years.

Ken mastered big wave surfing on Oahu's North Shore, not only Sunset, but also Waimea. Through the late 1970's and early 1980's, he gained nicknames like Ken Kong, The Shaw of Sunset, and Planet Crusher. His rise to media coverage was all but meteoric; his first big win in professional surfing was the ABC Wide World of Sports, Duke Kahanamoku Surfing Classic in December 1982. During this time he was sponsored first by Sundek clothing 1979-1986, then Quiksilver clothing 1986-1992, both of which used him extensively for advertisements and personal appearances on all three coastal areas in the USA and also in Japan and Australia. His promotional tours have taken him to every surfing community in every state along every coast in the USA. (WA, OR, CA, TX, LA, MS, AL, FL, GA, SC, NC, VA, DE, MO, NJ, NY, CT, RI, MA, NH, ME)

Since that time he has surfed at every well-known surfing spot around the world, which includes Europe, Indonesia, Japan, Australia, Puerto Rico, Peru, Mexico, and South Africa. He has worked hard to refine his knowledge of big-wave surfing, surfboard design, shaping boards for himself and others to become an even better surfboard manufacturer.

He won the Duke Kahanamoku Surfing Classic in December 1982. This was the last time ABC Wide World of Sports covered the famous "Duke" surfing contests.

Between 1990 and 1992, Ken built his home on Sunset Beach, Oahu, Hawaii so he could keep an eye on his favorite surfing break from his bedroom. He continues to live there today.

Ken has worked with the movie industry as well. He has worked with John Millius on "Farewell to the King" doing ocean stunts; and with Randall Klissor in "North Shore" performing surfing stunts, and acting as advisor to Gregory Harrison. Ken has become a lifelong friend with Gregory Harrison and John Millius.

He has worked with the Miller Brewing Company introducing two products to the surfing world. First, Lite Ice and then Red Dog beers to sponsor the prestigious Triple Crown of Surfing events in Hawaii, 1993-1997.

Ken has also sponsored and mentored several young and upcoming professional surfers such as Anthony Petruso, Ty McMillin, Hamish Campbell, Love Hodel, Noah Johnson and earlier the Ho brothers as well as the years of Mark Liddell and Buttons Kaluhiokalani. His proudest coaching accomplishment to date is Layne Beachley, the current 1998-2000 ASP-WCT Women's World Champion. Besides managing and coaching Layne's career, he shapes all her surfboards, which she rides exclusively. Other professional surfers riding Ken's boards are Sunny Garcia and John Shomooku who are members of the ASP-WCT (Association of Surfing Professionals, and World Championship Tour).

Ken's devotion to big-wave surfing took a turn in 1986 when he was determined to paddle out and ride the larger waves which were about 1 to 2 miles offshore . This happened again in 1993. Realizing he needed the help of something like a boat, Jet Ski, Wave Runner or a personal watercraft (PWC) to get him into these monsters, he was one of the first few to master the tow-in-surfing. Today tow-in-surfing has become a sport of its own...the only way to ride waves above 40 feet successfully.

Today Ken is a Co-Director of the World Tow Surfing Association. He works with the Coast Guard, Hawaiian Life Guard Association, Honolulu City, County Life Guards, The State of HawaiiⳠDepartment of Land and Natural Resources and Boating Division to help set guide lines, rules and regulations for this new fast developing sport in Hawaii.

Ken has been on major TV shows such as Dateline NBC, 8/2/98 and 7/95 "The Ultimate Wave"; 20/20; ETV, 3/98; ABC's Out There, "K2 Challenge" ABC Wide World of Sports many times; BBC's "Walking on Water" and National Geographic "To Catch a Wave"; Outdoor life, 1/10/96; KABC Channel 7 News Special "El Nino" 2/5/98; Beach Beat NBC; H3O Surf News; Board Stories, Fox; and an IMAX release called "Extreme" on 12/98.
Numerous articles referring to Ken as the Legendary Big Wave Rider have been written in major magazines, such as Surfing, Surfer, Surfers Journal, Smithsonian, Outside Magazine, Rolling Stones, Vanity Fair, The Village Voice, and Penthouse, to name a few.

His dedication to good health, nutritious foods and exercise is of utmost importance to him in his drive to be the best. His conditioning is Olympic in nature; he does not drink, smoke, or take any drugs. Ken's courage and devotion to his sport is exceptional. He trains constantly by swimming long distances and free diving through lava tubes and caves, rock running, and all to help his confidence level for even greater comfort in giant surf. In the springtime, Ken spends a lot of time enjoying snowboarding. As the extreme surf slows down, the extreme snowboarding begins? then the call is steep and deep.

On January 28, 1998, Ken rode the biggest wave ever ridden in history on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii at an outer reef known as Outside Log Cabins. This wave was considered to be in excess of 85 feet. That same day he also rode another 20 waves between 40 and 65 feet to make this the largest day ever ridden. Ken's dream has always been the same, to be one of the best big wave riders, and possibly the best big wave surfer in the history of the world. It looks like his dream may have come true.

Ken's business interests have grown substantially in the last two years. He has spent considerable time working with one of the industryⳠmost experienced manufacturers of quality surfboards, Tony Channin of Precision Fiberglass. Together they have formulated a concise and intricate business plan and have begun the first phase of introducing KOA HAWAII. It begins with a surfboard CNC machine, engineered by them to be the first in-house CNC shaping machine. Second, the consolidation of two highly renowned and experienced surfboard manufacturers into one more-powerful entity. Third, marketing driven by the all time best wave rider in history.

Fausto Intilla

www.oloscience.com

Lynne Boyer

2007-09-23T00:49:00.000-07:00

Source:

http://www.lynneboyer.com/bio.html

Lynne Boyer was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and moved to Hawaii as a young child. Although her talent in art showed early in life through her skillful sketches and drawings, Boyer's aptitude in sports lead her into the world of professional surfing, earning her two consecutive World Championship Titles in 1978 and 1979.
However, her interest in drawing and painting has never ceased. Through continuous practice, as well as the help of a few university courses and workshops from other established artists, Boyer became a successful painter. Her preferred medium is oil on canvas. She works both outdoors on location (en plein-air) and in her studio.
For Lynne, painting is both fun and challenging. As a long-time islander, her mastery of realism radiates through her work and captures the "mana" (spirit / mood) of her subject, expressing the beauty, serenity, and power of our beautiful Hawaiian landscapes and seascapes. Boyer's paintings seldom fail to bring an emotional response from the viewer. Her passionate love of nature reflects in her vibrant use of color, values, brush work and compostional ability that render her paintings full of life.
As an established painter, Lynne Boyer has a growing list of clients from Hawaii, the mainland U.S.A and throughout the world. Her original paintings and reproductions of selected works are showing at various galleries throughout the Hawaiian Islands.

Fausto Intilla
www.oloscience.com

Wendy Botha

2007-09-09T09:09:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wendy Botha (August 22, 1965- ) is a four-time world surfing champion. She won her first title as a South African citizen in 1987, then she became an Australian citizen and won three more titles in 1989, 1991, and 1992). She also posed nude for Australian Playboy for the September issue of 1992.

Layne Beachley

2007-09-09T09:02:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Layne Beachley born May 24, 1972) is a professional surfer from Manly in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. She is regarded as the best female professional surfer in history, having won the World Championship seven times.

Biography:

Born Tania Maris Gardner to a 17-year-old unwed Scottish mother then living in Surry Hills, Sydney, Layne spent six weeks in an incubator as a premature baby, before being adopted by Neil and Valerie Beachley from Manly.
When Layne was six years old, her adoptive mother, Valerie, died from a post-operative brain haemorrhage, and Layne was raised with the help of a family friend. Perhaps as a way to deal with her loss, Layne started surfing amidst a crowd of predominantly young male surfers.
Layne made a remarkable rise through the ranks in the masculine world of surfing: at the young age of 16 she became professional, and by the age of 20 she already ranked sixth in the world. Then in 1993 and 1996 she suffered from two episodes of chronic fatigue, which threatened to end her surfing career altogether. But she recovered, having dealt with her personal issues, such as her adoptive mother dying and has achieved her goal in life which is being a famous surfer and became the Women's ASP World Champion in 1998. She won the title again in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2006, securing her place as the most successful female professional surfer ever.
In 2004 Layne was given a wildcard entry into the Energy Australia Open held at Newcastle, one of the rare occasions a woman has competed in a men's surfing event.[1] She was drawn with Andy Irons in the first round and at the press conference the day before he wasn't particularly welcoming, believing the women have their tour and the men have theirs. But if it was supposed to be a showdown between top male and top female surfer, then someone forgot to tell the other two men in the first round heat, Bede Durbidge and Bernardo Pigmeau. They surfed better, Andy and Layne both hardly got a wave and were both eliminated.

Rochelle Ballard

2007-09-09T08:56:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Rochelle Ballard is a professional surfer who appeared in several movies, most notably Step Into Liquid, and Blue Crush.
According to imdb.com Rochelle Ballard was born on February 13, 1971 in Montebello, CA.
She surfs for Team O'Neill on the surfing World Championship Tour.
She also co-founded International Women's Surfing (IWS).

Robert August

2007-09-09T08:51:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Robert August (born 1945) is an American surfer and surfboard shaper. He is most famous as one of the subjects of Bruce Brown's 1966 surf documentary The Endless Summer, along with his friend Mike Hynson. The film follows the two around the world pursuing their hobby during the California offseason, meeting other surfers and discussing surf culture.
August picked up surfing in the 1950s, when the sport's popularity had just begun to grow. His enthusiasm and his involvement in The Endless Summer influenced the growth of the sport over the following decades. He currently works as a board shaper for Surftech, a company that manufactures lightweight epoxy surfboards. He continues to travel the world promoting surfing, and in 1994, he was involved in the filming of The Endless Summer II, in which surfers Pat O'Connell and Robert "Wingnut" Weaver retrace the places visited by August and Hynson thirty years earlier.

Greg Noll

2007-09-09T08:38:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Greg Noll (born at San Diego, California on February 11, 1937) also known as "Da Bull" is a pioneer of big wave surfing.
Noll became famous after surfing Waimea Bay in 25-30 ft surf when it had previously been thought impossible. It was at Makaha, in December 1969, that he rode what many at the time believed to be the largest wave ever surfed. He and other surfers such as Pat Curren were viewed as the most daring surfers of their generation.
Noll is readily identified in film footage while surfing by his now iconic black and white horizontally striped boardshorts.
The surfing exploits of Noll and other big wave legends were chronicled in the documentary Riding Giants. Noll (with Laird Hamilton and Jeff Clark) also provides his highly entertaining and significant perspective on Hawaii big wave surfing that is indexed as a colorful commentary track found in the Riding Giants DVD special features.
Noll is also one of the greatest longboard shapers to ever live and his boards are some of the most sought after and expensive in the world.
Today Noll lives in Hiouchi, California with his wife and shapes re-creations of some of the historic boards from the sport of surfing. Some of these are: Olos and Alaias, a replica of a Duke Kahanamoku board, Malibu Chips, Guns, Da Cats, Pacific System Homes and others.

Fausto Intilla - www.oloscience.com

Simon Anderson

2007-09-09T08:34:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Simon Anderson (born 7 July 1954) is an Australian surfer and surfboard shaper, noted for creating the Thruster design of three equal-sized fins on a surfboard, a design now used on practically every shortboard made.
Anderson grew up in Collaroy, Sydney, the second oldest of four brothers. All four were surfers and strong swimmers, and competed in Surf Life Saving competitions. Anderson's surfing skill stood out from his brothers, and in 1972 he was a surprise winner of the junior division at the Bells Beach Classic Easter competition. In that year he also started shaping, with Shane Stedman and Fitzgerald in the Sydney suburb (and surf-factory hotbed) of Brookvale near his home.
Anderson's surfing style was powerful and graceful, reflecting his size (over six feet tall, the same as his brothers). His laid-back attitude to life seemed to limit his success in competition though. In 1975 he started his own surfboard factory, Energy Surfboards, in Brookvale.
In 1977 he had a burst of competitive success, winning first the Bells Beach Classic competition, then the Coke Surfabout in Sydney. Those wins, on single-fin boards, put him into the top 10 on the world championship tour and gave him a chance of taking that title, until the twin-fin intervened. Mark Richards had created a twin-fin design which greatly helped sharp turns on steep waves, by always having one fin deep in the wave. Within months surfers on this design were winning all competitions, but it was badly unsuited to Anderson's size and style.
Over time he experimented with various board and fin setups, and in October 1980 arrived at a three-fin system with approximately equal sized fins, one centred at the back and one on each rail about 11 inches forward and angled slightly inwards, a design which Anderson called the Thruster.
This wasn't the first time three fins had been used on a board, Anderson was aware of the Tri-fin by Bob McTavish from 1971 [1] and the Bonzer from 1974 [2], both of which were like a single fin with two small outer fins. But the Thruster was the first with equal size fins. The idea was to have the manoeuvrability of a twin-fin, but the stability and drive of a single-fin, in particular enough stability to prevent the tail drift found on twin-fins in big waves.
He took that first Thruster to Hawaii for that 1980/81 winter on the North Shore, then on to California where he signed on to be sponsored by Gary McNabb at Nectar. McNabb wanted an Australian surfer because they were making a big splash in the world of surfing at the time.
The Thruster was met with scepticism initially, thought perhaps merely a gimmick, or only for Anderson's particular size and style. Back in Sydney in early 1981 Anderson made two more Thrusters at his own factory and using those he won the double of the Bells Beach Classic and the Coke Surfabout in Sydney, for a second time, then later the Pipeline Masters in Hawaii.
Those victories silenced the critics and brought the thruster to everyone's attention. For the rest of 1981 competitions still had single-fins and twin-fins in use, but from 1984 onwards every world champion has used a thruster. Today practically every shortboard made uses the design, and some longboards do too (mainly smaller ones).
Anderson began to sell his new design with Energy Surfboards and it is thought that Philip Briggs from Nsw Australia was the first to buy the design. All the thruster boards are now worth about $2500 as they are very rare
Anderson never sought to patent or trademark his design, so despite it becoming ubiquitous he never directly profited. He labelled boards from his factory as "The Original 3 Fin Thruster. Concept and Design by Simon Anderson."[3] but that was all. He said in later years that he "couldn't be bothered" exploiting the concept commercially. Though Nick Carroll remarks that perhaps his natural generosity meant it was simply not in his nature to deny it to others.
A small kind of homage to his gift to the world of surfing holds that every surfer with a thruster should give Anderson $1 as thanks.[4] Derek Hynd did that circa 1993, $55 for the boards he owned. Lost Surfboards USA did it for every board they sold in 2003, which was about $5000.[5]
Today Anderson lives with his wife and two sons in Newport Beach, Sydney, a few suburbs north of where he grew up.

Lisa Andersen

2007-09-09T08:30:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lisa Andersen (born March 8, 1969 in Ormond Beach, Florida) is a four-time world surfing champion from the United States. She won four titles in a row from 1994 to 1997.
She won the US amateur surfing title in 1987 and turned professional the following year. From 1994 to 1997 she won successive women's world titles before injury forced her to stop competing. She returned to the sport in 2000. She has two children, Erica and Mason.

Edward Ryan Makua Hanai Aikau

2007-09-09T08:19:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Edward Ryan Makua Hanai Aikau (May 4, 1946 – March 17, 1978) was a well-known Hawaiian lifeguard and surfer. As the first lifeguard at Waimea Bay on the island of Oahu, he saved many lives and became famous for surfing the big Hawaiian surf, winning several awards including the 1977 Duke Kahanamoku Invitational Surfing Championship.

Life:

Born on the island of Maui, Aikau was the third child of Solomon and Henrietta Aikau. Aikau first learned how to surf Kahului Harbor on its shorebreak. He moved to Oʻahu with his family in 1959, and at the age of 16 left school and started working at the Dole pineapple cannery; The paycheck allowed Aikau to to buy his first surfboard. In 1968, he became the first lifeguard hired by the City & County of Honolulu to work on the North Shore. The City & County of Honolulu gave Aikau the task of covering all of the beaches between Sunset and Haleiwa. Not one life was lost while he served as lifeguard of Waimea Bay, as he braved surf that often reached 20 feet high or more.

Death:

In 1978, the Polynesian Voyaging Society was seeking volunteers for a 30-day, 2500 mile journey to follow the ancient route of the Polynesian migration between the Hawaiian and Tahitian island chains. At 31 years of age, Aikau joined the voyage as a crew member. The Hokule'a left the Hawaiian islands on March 16, 1978. The double-hulled voyaging canoe developed a leak in one of the hulls and later capsized about twelve miles south of the island of Molokai. In an attempt to get help, Aikau paddled toward Lanai on his surfboard.[1] Although the rest of the crew was later rescued by the U.S. Coast Guard, Aikau was never seen again. The ensuing search for Aikau was the largest air-sea search in Hawaii history.[2] The last person lifeguard Eddie Aikau rescued at Waimea Bay was a young TV producer named John Orland, who had just wrapped up production on a TV pilot called the "Hawaiian Experience," starring Bob Crane from "Hogan's Heroes." It was on February 28, 1978, a little over two weeks before Eddie Aikau was lost at sea.

Memorial surfing invitational:

In Aikau's honor, the surfwear company Quiksilver sponsors the Quiksilver Big Wave Invitational in Memory of Eddie Aikau at Waimea Bay. The idea of the Quiksilver Big Wave Invitational was created by Bruce Raymond and Bob McKnight. Since its inception in 1984, the tournament has only been held seven times, due to a precondition that open-ocean swells reach a minimum of 20 feet (this translates to a wave face height of over 30 feet).[3] The most recent tournament was in December 2004, when waves in the bay reached 30 to 50 feet high. The contest only invites 24 big-wave riders to participate in two rounds of competition. This event, also hold true to big-wave riding because it does not allow the use of jet skis to tow in surfers into the waves. Surfers must paddle themselves into the waves, using their own arm-power to get themselves over the waves.

Popular culture:

In the 1980's, bumper stickers and T-shirts with the phrase "Eddie Would Go" spread around the Hawaiian Islands to the rest of the world. According to maritime historian Mac Simpson, "Aikau was a legend on the North Shore, pulling people out of waves that no one else would dare to. That's where the saying came from -- Eddie would go, when no else would or could. Only Eddie dared."
Another variation of the aforementioned popular phrase is "Eddie wouldn't tow." This phrase is in reference to the method of big wave surfing in which one surfer must accelerate another surfer (the former on a jet ski, the latter towed on a surfboard) to the speed of a large, fast wave. It is also partially in response to the controversy over the "unnaturalness" of tow-in surfing; many surfers feel that being towed in to a wave, as opposed to paddling, is against the spirit of the sport.

Media:

Books
Coleman, Stuart. (2002). Eddie Would Go: The story of Eddie Aikau, Hawaiian Hero. MindRaising Press. ISBN 0-9706213-7-X

Film
Goes, Sergio. Eddie Would Go: The Story of Eddie Aikau, Hawaiian Hero

Megan Abubo

2007-09-09T08:10:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Megan Abubo (born January 28, 1978) is a professional female surfer from Hawaii.

Biography:

Born in Connecticut and raised in Hawaii, Megan Abubo showcases a style honed on powerful reef-breaks and deepwater ocean waves.
Growing up in Hawaii, Megan quickly became one of the "beach boys" and worked her way to a spot on the World Championship Tour ranks in 1998. She has been on the WCT ever since and in 2000 she was runner up for the world title. She has had many victories both in and out of the water. In October 2004 Megan won the WCT Rip Curl Malibu Pro and shot from 14th to 9th in the ratings. In 2002, she won the WCT Figueira Pro in Portugal, and in 2001 she won the WCT Roxy Pro in Fiji. Throughout her career she has had 5 other WCT victories.
Megan joined a handful of the best women surfers in the world on the first all-female boat trip with Transworld Surf to Indonesia in 2004.

Breast Cancer Activist:

Today her work includes being spokesperson on behalf of Roxy for Keep A Breast - an art initiative that raises money for breast cancer research by auctioning art-decorated breast casts of famous female athletes and artists. Megan has developed a passion for breast cancer awareness since her sister, a 2-time breast cancer survivor, was first diagnosed at age 27. Megan headed up a Keep A Breast fundraiser in Hawaii of 2004 at the Roxy Pro.

Professional Surfing:

Megan has 6 Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) World Championship Tour victories to her credit, the 2001 World Champion runner-up title and a no. 4 finish in 2005.

Motion Pictures and Media:

Megan has appeared as herself and as a stunt double in the motion picture Blue Crush as well as several action sports TV shows and surf videos, such as 7 Girls, Roxy Surf Now, and Shimmer. She has also appeared in magazines including Rolling Stone, Fitness and surf publications.

Kelly Slater

2007-09-09T07:51:00.000-07:00

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kelly Slater (b. Robert Kelly Slater February 11, 1972, Cocoa Beach, Florida) is the most successful professional surfer in the history of the sport.
Slater is an eight time world champion, and competed in the X-Games in 2003 and 2004. In May 2005 in the final of the Billabong Tahiti Pro contest at Teahupoo, Slater became the first to score two perfect rides for a total 20 out of 20 ASP two-wave scoring system (the corresponding honour under the previous three-wave system belongs to Shane Beschen from 1996). In 2006 Slater tied Tom Curren for most career tour victories, 33, at the Rip Curl Pro at Bells Beach.

Biography :

Syrian-descended Kelly was born "Robert Kelly Slater" on February 11, 1972 in Cocoa Beach, Florida.
A videogame by Treyarch and Activision named Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer was released September 17, 2002[2] (he also appeared as a playable character in Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 prior to this, complete with a surfboard). In 2003 he released an autobiography called, "Pipe Dreams: A Surfer's Journey.", which was written by Jason Borte.
In 1999 he appeared alongside Garbage singer Shirley Manson in the promotional video for the Garbage single "You Look So Fine". He played a man washed up on a sea shore, rescued by Manson.
Slater has been romantically linked in the past to Pamela Anderson, and (in 2005) to Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bündchen and more recently Cameron Diaz, after her split from Justin Timberlake. His favorite waves are Pipe in Hawaii and Kirra in Australia He also says he loves the wave Dee Why Point.[3] Slater is passionate about preserving oceans globally and protecting temperate reefs in California through his relationship with Reef Check. He is also involved with poverty reduction organization such as The Borgen Project.
In his spare time he plays guitar, and during the 90's he formed a band called The Surfers which released an album of surf music, Songs From the Pipe. He performed a song with musician friend Ben Harper during Harper's concert in Santa Barbara, California on August 15, 2006. He also performed "Rockin' in The free World" with grunge band Pearl Jam on the July 7, 2006 in San Diego. Slater is good friends with lead singer Eddie Vedder. He also enjoys playing golf, at which he has become very accomplished
Slater has had a long time rivalry with top surfer Andy Irons since he lost the world title to Andy in 2003, but has been running for the title against his friend Rob Machado and others.
Is good friends with recently retired Australian Rugby League player, Andrew Johns.[4]
Slater was chosen as part of the 32-team ESPN Sportscenter tournament Who's Now, which is a bracket-style elimination games where fans and judges decide which athlete is more "now", having on-field and off-field presence. Slater was the 8th seed and was paired with 1st seed LeBron James, who beat him by 70%.
Has a daughter named Taylor, to which Jack Johnson wrote his song "Taylor". He played "himself" in the 2007 animated picture "Surf's Up".

Career:

Stats
Career victories:36
WCT victories: 33
World titles: 8
Slater is currently sharing the first place for most WCT victories with Tom Curren (both have 33 WCT victories).

History
2006
The Sixth Element movie
Quiksilver Pro (Gold Coast, Australia)
Rip Curl Pro (Bells Beach, Australia)
2005
Billabong Pro (Teahupoo, Tahiti)
The Globe WCT (Fiji)
Billabong Pro (South Africa)
The Boost Mobile Pro (Trestles, California)
2004
Snickers Australian Open (QS)
Energy Australia Open (QS)
2003
Billabong Pro (Teahupoo, Tahiti)
Billabong Pro (South Africa)
Billabong Pro (Mundaka, Spain)
Nova Schin Festival (Brazil)
2002
The Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau (Specialty-Hawaii)
2000
Gotcha Tahiti Pro presented by Globe (Tahiti)
1999
Mountain Dew Pipe Masters (Hawaii)
1997
Coke Surf Classic (Australia)
Billabong Pro (Australia)
Tokushima Pro (Japan)
Marui Pro (Japan)
Kaiser Summer Surf WCT (Brazil)
Grand Slam (Specialty-Australia)
Typhoon Lagoon Surf Challenge (Specialty-USA)
1996
Coke Surf Classic (Australia)
Rip Curl Pro Saint Leu (Reunion Island)
CSI pres. Billabong Pro (South Africa)
U.S. Open (California)
Rip Curl Pro Hossegor (France)
Quiksilver Surfmasters (France)
Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)
Sud Ouest Trophee (Specialty-France)
Da Hui Backdoor Shootout (Specialty-Hawaii)
1995
Quiksilver Pro (Indonesia)
Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)
Triple Crown of Surfing (Specialty-Hawaii)
1994
Rip Curl Pro (Australia)
Gotcha Lacanau Pro (France)
Chiemsee Pipe Masters (Hawaii)
The Bud Surf Tour (WQS-USA)
The Bud Surf Tour (WQS-USA)
Sud Ouest Trophee (Specialty-France)
1993
Baywatch television series, 10 episodes
Marui Pro (Japan)
1992
Rip Curl Pro Landes (France)
Marui Masters (Hawaii)