Over 1,000 kilos of coke worth over £70 million has washed up on France beaches and the French public prosecutor has said over 100k’s of coke are washing up each day!
Cocaine has been washing up the beaches of France stretching from Nantes to as far south as the resort town of Biarritz, including Capbreton and Le Porge.
Over 1,00 kilos of 83% pure coke has been recovered so far. A major police and customs operations is under way with beach closures, helicopter searches and surveillance along 125 miles of coast.
Two people out walking discovered two packages on the beach at Arcachon, south-west of Bordeaux, on Friday containing 3kg of cocaine. On Monday a 17 year old was caught trying to take 5k’s off the beach at Lacanau. There are also report from La Rochelle and north of Arcachon, but all techs acorns 500 km’s of coast are affected..
The coke is so pure Philippe Astruc, the Rennes public prosecutor, said it is a health hazard.
“It’s a very pure product that must not be consumed in this form because there is a very high risk of overdose,” he told France 2 TV. “There is absolutely an immediate health risk.”
These have been several similar incidents over the years on the same coast, usually after large storms and high strength north westerly winds…
A stormy October Saturday saw Newquay’s Jay Quinn, Welsh, British and European Champion, win and retain the Surfaced Pro title, defeating UKPSA Pro Surf Tour title contenders. Runner up went to Swansea’s Patrick Langdon-Dark who clinched the UKPSA Men’s Tour title with his second place. Third and fourth went to the new stars in British surfing Stanley Norman and Seth Morris.
In the Women’s Division Ellie Turner turned up the heat and battled it out with Peony Knight. The lead went back and forth but eventually claimed by Ellie. She had to win to take the tour title. Third place went to last year tour champion Emily Currie. Fourth Lauren Sandland. Seth Morris stole the show in the Under 18 Boys. Making the final of the Open Men’s, spending more than three hours competing in cold stormy conditions. Second went to Noah Capps, in doing so taking the UKPSA U18 Boys tour title. Third was Max Hudson and fourth Stanley Norman.
Unfortunately due to deteriorating conditions the Under 18 Girls final was cancelled, deemed too dangerous. The UKPSA Under 18 Girls Tour title was then tied between Lauren Sandland and Belle Betteridge but on a count-back Belle took the trophy.
Dave Reed Tour Director commented “The event was one of the most challenging we have ever put on. Postponed from May, then September, now run in extreme surf and weather. However, this did not blunt the performances of the surfers as we saw spectacular surfing and worthy winners crowned. I would like to thank Watergate Bay, Extreme Academy, Christian Surfers for their sponsorship along with Korev, Boardmasters Foundation, Fistral Beach, without them we would not have an event”. Adding “Would also like to thank Sumo Media for providing events live to the world free through online streaming.”
We are now looking forward to 2020, which promises to be a very big year for Global surfing.
If the world of social media is to be beleived the two time world champion is well and truly o the mend, we look forward to seeing him back in a jersey soon.
The Two Ronnies, Little and Large, Morecombe and Wise, Ant and Dec, all fine duos in their time, but now we have Barracat and Bartlett. Here is their first show remarkable for Barracats fine North Devon tones and the fact he missed two waves one after another in a wavepool. Also Lee Bartletts admission that he likes to go right. Which to be honest is hard to believe.
Quiksilver and the World Surf League have announced the return of the most anticipated and exciting surf event in twenty-five years, the Quiksilver Pro G-Land, which will hold a coveted spot on the 2020 WSL Championship Tour from 4th – 14th June 2020.
The Quiksilver Pro G-Land will offer surfers on the tour the ultimate challenge, taking them out of their comfort zones and into one of the most remote locations in competitive surfing history in Grajagan Bay, Indonesia. The competition will make its much-awaited return to the raw, remote location where the jungle meets the ocean and let the world’s most talented surfers take on the waves.
Today’s announcement has been pioneered by Quiksilver and confirms the whispers within the surfing community for a number of years. It was Quiksilver who brought the inaugural Quiksilver Pro G-Land to the tour in 1995 and challenged surfers to take on the isolated conditions, with Kelly Slater winning the first competition and inspiring the infamous ‘Dream Tour’. Twenty five years after the Asian Financial Crisis marked the end of the G-Land event, the brand is bringing it back to the tour for 2020, continuing to showcase Quiksilver’s commitment to surf travel and chasing the perfect waves.
Competing in the most exciting contest in surfing history will be the winners of this year’s world championship tour.
Garry Wall, General Manager of Quiksilver commented: “Bringing the Quiksilver Pro G-Land back to the surf calendar has long been an ambition of Quiksilver and 2020 is the perfect time for our surfers to get back out to Grajagan Bay and really return to raw. As a brand we want to challenge our athletes and inspire future generations, and this competition will do just that, it’s time for a little disruption.”
Kelly Slater, unprecedented Surf Champion and inaugural winner of the Quiksilver G-Land Pro, said:
“The greatest ever tour event is back! Great move. Might need to win that thing again…”
Still hard to believe this is rolling through a field in Bristol…
Catching up with The Waves Nick Hounsfield after a pretty eventful 12 days!
It’s hard to believe it is less than two weeks into the history of The Wave. The amount of hype, expectation and smiling faces must have exceeded all hope. Some whinging too, but we expect that will die out as the project grows. Having surfed it, and been in contact with many who have, I have to say it is fun, and you leave surfed out. Sure it’s not Pipe on the M3 setting but for most it is better than their average surf. A few ‘advanced surfers’ have complained they can’t surf the pro setting yet, but if you look to the long game and speak to those who’ve surfed it turned up to 11, you can understand why they haven’t unleashed the beast.
Nick and Craig.
How has the launch gone so far? Are you happy with response? Everyone is smiling…?
I can’t believe it’s less than two weeks since we officially opened out doors to the public – so much has happened! We knew our Warm-Up period would be all about getting feedback from people, learning what is and isn’t working, tweaking what we are doing – and potentially making major changes if needed. We knew we wouldn’t be perfect on day one and were prepared to react to feedback. We have had hundreds and hundreds of very happy people through the doors already and there have been a lot of smiles on faces. We have also learnt that certain things aren’t working as we would wish, but we can fix those issues with time.
The biggest development for us has to be the decision to suspend the intermediate surf sessions. The feedback from the first few days clearly showed that the wave we were pushing didn’t deliver a great intermediate experience, it was more of a step up from beginner experience. The last thing we want is for people to leave The Wave feeling disappointed and we do not want people to pay for an experience that doesn’t deliver, so we took the big decision to remove this wave from our line up. There is another wave setting that is a brilliant intermediate level wave and we are now looking at how we integrate this wave and run specific sessions purely for intermediates and beginners.
Pretty much everyone is leaving with smiles, particularly the adaptive surfers who got a sneaky preview…
Highlights of the first week for you personally…
There have been a lot…
Joining our First Riders for the first line up. They were such a brilliant mix of people of differing backgrounds and surfing ability, and they all came out beaming, despite it being a pretty wet, grey day!
Having the UK adaptive team on site testing our processes and enjoying a sunny, surf session
Seeing some incredible pros ride out waves, including Kanoa Igarashi and Justine Dupont.
Watching my boys surfing The Wave for the first time, that was so special.
This moment pretty much broke everyone.
What are the wave settings and what is the commissioning process?
The Wavegarden Cove technology can create a wide range of waves at the push of a button, from the most gentle beginner waves, right up to some really hefty, barrelling waves. I’ve seen them all and they are truly amazing. We have the ability to push 19 different wave types, but to get these waves ready for the public we need to make sure each one has been properly tested and risk assessed. That is not as simple as it might sound – for example one of our findings is that the bigger waves create currents in other areas and we have to fully understand the impact of these before putting users in the water. We have a duty of care to all of the people in our lake – we have to be 100% happy that we fully understand each setting and we won’t hurry the process just to get more waves in place quickly.
What have people seen so far and how does that compare to every day sessions for everyone that has booked – which settings will they ride when and why…?
Most of the footage and photos out there are of people riding out regular advanced wave setting. These are the waves that have gone through our rigorous risk assessment process and they are the ones we are happy to open with during out Warm-Up phase.
Our current advanced setting delivers a friendly wave, much like a fun sandbar, that starts off shoulder high on take-off, with a gentle first section, which then winds up speed into a faster and small barrelling second section. This wave is so much fun and a great starting point for surfers who have never surfed a reef before. During the session the wave grows in height and becomes a little bigger and faster. We have had hundreds of people feedback that is is great fun and brilliant for improving fitness. A number of pros including the UK team have ridden these waves and they had a ball!
We have invited some expert riders in to help us test the next set of waves and we have shared some of these images. This is not us teasing the general public, but rather we wanted to show the exciting potential of the Wavegarden Cover technology and get everyone excited about what is coming. We will be introducing some of these next level waves to sessions over the coming weeks, once we are happy they are fully risk assessed.
Power, shape and very shallow…
If you are building in an introductory process for surfers then what is it…how will it work? Will surfers have to prove they are capable of riding the advanced settings? I guess there are real issues where surfers claiming they could ride ‘advanced waves’ could ruin sessions if they actually can’t surf the wave, which is a possibility… or worse hurt themselves…
It’s becoming very apparent that a lot of people overestimate their surfing ability! There’s been a lot of talk about the advanced waves not being big enough, but we have had a lot of surfers book into an advanced session who are clearly not ready for this wave yet. They are struggling consistently with the take off and consequently wiping out too much and not getting the most out of the session. They are still ‘Beginner/Intermediates’ rather than ‘Advanced’ surfers.
This makes a bit of a tricky situation for us. We are hampered by the need for a surfer to correctly judge their ability and select an area that’s right for them. If we simply push bigger and more difficult waves in the advanced area then the experience won’t be great for people that have over-egged their skills (or for those in the water with them) – and worse still, it could be dangerous. We are working through how best to handle this at the moment but there isn’t a simple answer!
It’s coming, but you are probably going to have to prove yourself first.
Anything else surprised you? Having surfed it I think it is better than I expected.
One thing that surprised us was the number of surfers out there that are so quick to judge and shoot us down. It’s such a strange mentality and surfers in my experience can be the worst for this sort of behaviour. However, people who have visited and had an incredible time are now swift to support us with positive feedback and good honest commentary. We have brought something totally new and totally positive to this world… either engage with it for what it is and what we stand for, or just ignore us.
I think the biggest surprise is the reaction to our building, staff, food and general vibe of the place. I thought this might take time to bed in but already it is the most incredible place to visit even if you don’t surf. Our staff and their passion for what we are doing is blowing people away. I’m most proud of the team, every one of the team goes over and above the normal service levels and the feedback is fantastic. On a rainy day it has an awesome ski chalet vibe and on a sunny day it’s like being in Southern California!
So we are learning, listening, responding and building solid foundations for the future, which is very bright for us all.
