Photo: WSL
I watched Courtney Conlogue accept her first Rip Curl Pro Bells Beach championship trophy a couple weeks ago when a man who had previously introduced himself to me as “the Aussie-est Aussie you’ve ever met” suddenly appeared over my shoulder. He flashed the single tooth left in his upper jaw and slurred into my ear, “Tragedy, i’nt it?,” waving his hand toward the stage.
“Not for me, man. I’m from California,” I said cheerfully. I contained the excitment just enough to not insert a choice expletive in the middle of my home state’s name. A guy beside us heard me and slowly turned to me, nodding knowingly and grinning widely. I grinned back, words weren’t needed. A fellow Californian, equally amped that the Golden State is finally holding its own among Australians, Brazilians, Hawaiians, and that one forever-grom from Florida.
We have the addition of exceptional California-grown rookies Conner Coffin and Kanoa Igarashi on the men’s ‘CT. They’re joining Best Coasters Kolohe Andino and Sage Erickson, who requalified off the QS with a new fire burning in them. Californians punctuate the highest rankings on both the WCT and WQS with Conlogue, Nat Young, and Erickson earning top ten spots on the championship tours and the top two spots on the ‘QS currently being held by Taylor Clark and Patrick Gudauskas (both from Southern California). And the cherry on top of it all is San Clemente’s Greg Long won the 2015-2016 Big Wave Tour.
“It’s definitely cool to have more Californians. It’s been dominated by Brazil and Australia. I guess this is the next generation for America, so that’s good,” Santa Cruz native Nat Young said between heats at Bells. Soon thereafter, Nat ended Matt Wilkinson’s CT event winning streak, knocking the current world number one out of the Drug Aware Margaret River Pro in Round 5.
“I think everyone knew there were a lot of good surfers from California, and America as well,” he said. “I think it was a matter of time — people were wondering when guys like Conner were going to make the tour. These are the types of waves that suit him, so I think he’s going to do well.”
California’s surf culture all began years before the Beach Boys were singing about California girls being the best (hey, thanks guys). Legend has it that in 1885 three Hawaiian princes attending boarding school near San Francisco went down down to the San Lorenzo river mouth in Santa Cruz. These three sons of the islands credited with inventing the sport were the first documented waveriders in the Golden State over 40 years before their homeland was annexed into the Union.
California is also responsible for some of the pivotal parts of surfing today, all courtesy of an industrious young inventor and surfer of the 20th century named Tom Blake. Blake orchestrated perhaps the earliest documented professional surf competition in 1928 at the age of 24, hosting the inaugural Pacific Surfriding Championship in Corona del Mar, Orange County. Two years later Blake invented the waterproof camera housing, and in 1935 he not only wrote the first full book devoted to the subject of surfing, Hawaiian Surfboard, but he also had this crazy idea to add a stabilizing fin to surfboards after experimenting with an old sailboat keel attached to his own board. Yes, dude is the reason we use fins.
So with such a rich history born in Hawaiian surfing, what is the special mojo that Californians add to its highest levels of competition? Courtney Conlogue said she thinks “a lot of us Californians have a lot of power in our surfing and our style.” Conner Coffin broke the state down by region to analyze each surfer’s strengths and areas for improvement on California’s path to surf world domination.
“It’s different depending on where in California you’re from. If you look at all of us who are from California we all surf pretty different, from Kanoa and Kolohe to me to Nat,” Coffin said. “So I think Nat and I grew up surfing a lot more point breaks and probably watching more of that, so maybe we’ve focused more on power surfing. I think Kolohe and Kanoa grew up doing airs a lot and surfing beach breaks. So I think Nat and I probably need to work on that side of our surfing whereas those guys have been trying to work on what we grew up doing. I think you’re just a product of your environment.”
With Kolohe, Nat, Conner, and Kanoa all holding top 20 spots in the rankings, some may think they aren’t too worried. But even when Coffin held the second-best position in the world at the end of his run at Bells Beach, he expressed nervousness about falling off the CT and his commitment to staying on the elite tour.
“I just want to stay on the ‘CT. I think that’s a lot of motivation for me, just that I’ve gotten here,” he said, humbled after winning a superheat against Mick Fanning and Jordy Smith. “I’m not even going to think about doing the ‘QS this year because I just want to give at least one year of the ‘CT my full attention. I’m not very good at splitting myself. In years past I’ve tried to do a lot of free surf trips and movie stuff and then I wasn’t doing too good on the ‘QS, so I kind of have to focus on something. If you’re doing the ‘QS and the CT it’s so full on, I think I’d get a little bit worn out.”
A lot of veterans are happy to give the young guns advice on doing well their rookie year. Igarashi counted Young alongside Keanu Asing, Wiggoly Dantes, and Kelly Slater as people who have been influential in advising him, while Conner has been getting a lot of tips from Fanning, Smith, Julian Wilson, and Michel Bourez. Coffin noted one important constant in all the advice he’s received that has been ringing most true and helpful to him through the first leg of the tour: just do you, boo.
“The most helpful thing is don’t try to change anything when you get here, stick to your strengths. Obviously I’m always working on bettering my surfing, but I think that once you’re here everyone surfs well enough to make heats. You just have to be comfortable in your own skin and surf to your strengths.”
