It’s easy to assume that any Championship Tour athlete has checked every world-class, A-list wave off their to-do list at some point. But then again, when taken into consideration just how many waves fit that category and how much of their calendar is consumed by traveling to contest after contest — often with little to no downtime — there isn’t as much time left for glancing at a bucket list and saying, “Let’s book a trip.” Freesurfers have that kind of freedom. Lifelong competitors holding down a spot on the CT don’t, which explains why Jack Robinson apparently had never surfed Cloudbreak until this year’s WSL Finals wrapped up.
Robinson’s first full year on tour was 2021. The last time the CT came to Fiji was 2017. But like the rest of us, Robo had heard the rumors it was coming back on the 2024 schedule. So he and fellow top-five competitor, João Chianca booked a last-minute trip when they saw a swell line up with their schedules.
“I always wondered about this — like, how good is it?” Robinson admits. “I remember Parko was telling me a long time ago, he’s like, ‘You get so deep in the barrel it feels like you can be so far behind and still make it out and be behind the foam ball.’ And yeah, it’s true.”
Outside of all the commotion surrounding Tahiti next year, with both the Olympics and the CT holding competition at Teahupo’o, it’s safe to think most of the anticipation will be for Cloudbreak in 2024. Two top-five finishers from this year getting some R&D in Fiji is no small factor when it comes to next year’s results. And hearing Robinson break down the wave after his first time there is interesting analysis for surf fans. His overall assessment is what any of us say without having ever touched the water there: “It deserves to be on Tour.”
“You can still surf it at any size,” Robinson says. ” I feel like it just will handle as big as the swell gets. There’s really no other waves like that in the world. I feel like Teahupo’o maxes out a bit. The water moves a bit too fast just because it’s a shallow reef, whereas Cloudbreak feels like a deepwater wave.”
