Well-deserved win for the Brazilian. Photo: ASP|Kirstin
Perfection, glorious perfection. Piece by piece, this is what made the greatest contest of all time.
1. Medina and the Dinner Suit vs. Kelly Slater and the High Line.
He surfed the perfect contest, almost. Until the last ten minutes of the Billabong Pro Tahiti, Gabriel Medina hadn’t fallen on a single wave. He’d effectively surfed the event in a dinner suit, selecting perfectly angled west-bowl runners, allowing him more tube time than his competitors while letting him avoid the black horizon, or the below-sea-level orbs of doom. Slater, who had been throwing caution to the wind on the bombs, laid down the gauntlet prior to the final. “He’s been getting the deeper, smaller runners all event, whereas I’ve been trying to go the ones which aren’t quite a tow wave,” he’d said.
Employing visionary-like foresight, Kelly had somehow managed to see a way through the infamous Chopes scoop on the bombs, putting himself on a sublime high line that let him avoid the foam ball. It earned him a perfect ten to begin his semi-final with John John Florence, and when Medina fell for the first time with nine minutes left in the event, Slater executed another flawless high line for what certainly would have been the score. If only he didn’t cop a little blast of foam at the end. It was enough to put him off balance and send him over the handle bars handing victory to Medina. He’d get two more shots at victory before the hooter sounded but none better than the first. In the end, it was the 20-year-old Brazilian’s day, Medina putting on a display of tactical mastery you just don’t get from many 20-year-olds in world sport.
Winner’s smile. Photo: ASP|Kirstin
Let’s get into the nitty gritty of what made this contest so memorable — the waves. Kelly called it the best Chopes he’s ever surfed, and the conditions this year will be the measure by which all contests are judged from now. It was all about the intervals (the time measured from wave trough to wave trough). This swell was around the 15 second mark, which is shorter than the usual 18 seconds forecasters typically look for in a good Chopes swell. Such is the volume of water that bends around this unique reef, if the periods are too long and the wave heights too high, you end up with below sea-level cement mixers inaccessible without a jet ski. It’s a phenomenon that’s pretty common with slabs, which actually prefer slightly shorter periods to reduce the amount of water and the speed with which it is travelling across the reef allowing surfers to get into the wave. Had the periods been one or two seconds higher, we would have been staring at jet skis all day. Thank god that didn’t happen.
3. The top 35 justified.
Sometimes, 35 tour surfers can just seem like way too many. Waves like J-Bay, Snapper, and Trestles often reveal glaring technical differences between the lower- and contender-level surfers — but not at Chopes. Pure guts more than compensates for a gap in technique here and the underdogs triumphed this year in Tahiti, throwing a spanner in the works of the world title calculations. Mick Fanning, Joel Parkinson, and Taj Burrow all suffered huge upset losses, though there was no better story than the quarterfinal finish of the heavily criticized Dion Atkinson. He beat none other than Mick Fanning on his way there, all in what was his first-ever outing in Tahiti. Brett Simpson also broke through for a career defining win over Parko, Tiago Pires got one over Taj, and trialist Nathan “Hog Dog” Hedge scored an emotionally-charged victory over world number seven, Adriano De Souza. Jordy Smith, meanwhile, showed that while he’s a technical wiz in the small stuff, he has some serious work to do in the big wave department.
4. The greatest heat of all time.
It was the greatest tube shootout we’ve ever seen. The semi-final between Kelly Slater and John John Florence broke new ground for tube-riding technique in waves of consequence. There was so much to make note of here. John John, for me, is in a league of his own. He takes the waves no one else wants and makes them from a position no one else can. His 9.87 in the quarterfinals against Dion Atkinson is one of the greatest waves ever paddled at Tahiti. Thrown out of the lip into an incredible scoop of Pacific, he somehow found a rail at the bottom, dropped the hammer into a pig-dog stall, then stood tall as he shielded his face from a tremendous blast of spit. He repeated the feat to open up the semi against Slater, except this time he let go of the rail and pumped up his way through ten feet of Pacific doom to beat the foam ball. Kelly, on the other hand, was just that little bit more scientific, positioning himself on waves in a way that ensured he’d get into them and have plenty to do once he did but also allowed him to surf his way out via his now-patented Chopes high-line.
Two of the best, if not simply the two best. Photo: ASP|Kirstin
Like Medina, he barely fell off all tournament and it’s hard to remember a better wave in history then his high line ten to open the semi against John John. After dropping out of the sky, he somehow found his rail, angled up into into what seemed an impossibly high line and just beat the foam ball. He was beaten by Medina in the final, the master tactician who executed some of the deftest speed adjustments and body positioning anyone has seen in waves like this.
5. Black Angels on Big Yamahas.
The question we’re all asking ourselves right now is how did no one die? The beatings were some of the severest we’ve ever seen in a world to our contest as many of the top 35 were forced into going waves they definitely did not want a bar of. The conditions really gave us a sense of just how challenging the Chopes arena is. It’s not just wiping out that’s the danger here, often it’s the beginning of your troubles. The image of a half-dead Jordy Smith getting his first gulp of air only to watch as the horizon turned black and a Code Red special landed straight on his head will live long in my memory. Fanning, Bede Durbidge, and Owen Wright will all testify to receiving the worst beatings of their life at this event. But if it weren’t for the bravery and sublime oceanic knowledge of the Tahitian water patrol, led by the former Tahitian world tour and big wave surfing great, Vetea “Poto” David, it could have been worse. Their ability to duck in between sets, throwing grown men over their sled like a wet towel, and zipping back across near-submerged reef was out of this world. They were the unsung heroes of this groundbreaking event.
