Photo: WSL / Kelly Cestari
It was supposed to be so much more dramatic than this. John John was going to win the 2016 World Title all along, sure. Hell, if it weren’t for a high-ankle sprain going into Fiji last year we might be talking about the guy’s second World Title today. It’s a big maybe, but consider the fact that Florence has been the strongest competitor since midway through the 2014 campaign. He won the 2014 Quik Pro in France, then the 2015 Pipe Pro and the 2016 Eddie off Tour. Then this year we saw him in the final heats of four contests: Rio, J-Bay, Teahupo’o and Portugal, winning two of the contests outright.
The point of all this is the guy’s been on fire like no other surfer, so nobody is surprised to hear he’s finally been crowned a champion. He released the biggest film project surfing has ever seen last year. Hurley has given him a show documenting this year’s WSL campaign in the same fashion. He’s far and away the world’s best surfer today and quickly becoming the most visible. Life is pretty damn good if you’re one JJF. And all that’s just what makes this moment so…unfulfilling.
Win a second World Title in a row by October, or have the belt all but wrapped up halfway through the season en route to your third title, sure.
But no drama at Pipe for the first title?
No Hawaiian flags flying high to begin a winner takes all final of the Pipe Masters between Florence and Gabriel Medina or Jordy? No possible World Title scenario headlines as the WSL packs its bags and heads to Oahu? No nervous tension floating over the bike path of Ke Nui Road come December? No running to Foodland only to learn every case of beer has been cleared from its shelves, already purchased to fuel the biggest celebration in the history of the North Shore? This is what it will feel like if the Cubs win the World Series away from Wrigley Field. This must be what the entire city of Cleveland felt like when Lebron James gifted his hometown their first championship in pretty much anything, ever…all the way from Oakland, California. It’s cool. It’s great. It’s exciting. But somehow just a little empty.
He’s the first Hawaiian man to win a World Title since Andy Irons twelve years ago. And while Hawaii will always be pumped full of AI pride, there’s no denying the slight edge of poetry going to the kid with blonde curly hair who grew up with the world’s most famous wave right in his backyard (or was it his front yard? Seriously, he was that close) over the Kauai native.
This victory lap will start the moment he gets off the plane in Honolulu rather than the night he wins a Title at the very wave that made him surfing’s most famous 8-year old. We couldn’t have scripted a better ending than John John Florence winning his first world title at home. Now we all have to take that script, crumble it up and throw it in the trash.
I feel a little ripped off. Thanks, dude. Thanks a ton.
But other than that I’m really happy John John Florence is a World Champion.
