Winter Wonderland

A few pristine moments from the past few week of waves on the North Shore of Oahu.

Massive Waimea Shorebreak with Jamie O’Brien…

Jamie O’Brien having a damn good dig at some of the North Shore’s least surfable spots: Keiki and Wammy Shorey… He won’t need to see a chiro anytime soon, both these spots will try and pull your spine off.

A Day In The Life: GEAROID MCDAID

words: Gearoid McDaid  photos: Conor Flanagan

Behind the scenes of the Rip Curl 
Padang Cup with G Man

Getting the call to go surf in the Rip Curl Padang Padang cup was an exciting moment for me. To be going to Bali to surf a perfect slab left with only a few guys what could be better?
The waiting period was one month, so I was going to go for the whole month to wait and hopefully score some waves around Indo.
The trip didn't start out too great though as when I was flying to Bali the volcano there was erupting pretty heavily which meant I got stuck in Dubai with no way of knowing if flights would resume. I thoroughly thought I was going to be going back home. But in the end, it eased off, and I was on a flight from Dubai just a day later. The delay was just a taster of some of the mad things that would happen while I was there.

Looking at the long-range forecast for the month looked like back to back swells non stop. But there was one swell that stood out towards the end of the month. The contest ran on one of the first swells as they looked pretty epic and you can never be too sure of a long range next swell the guys from Rip Curl made an excellent call to run when they did. There was a lot of talk around the swell at the end of the month in that it was the most significant swell ever to come to Indo but as it was still a long way out I wasn't really thinking about it. As the month progressed we scored some pretty sick waves. Some little slab missions and we scored pretty pumping Ulus with Josh Kerr and Jack Robinson. And a couple of sick sessions at Padang trying to hassle the crowds haha.

I woke up on the morning of the day of days to 30-foot Ulus with a couple of guys towing the mad walls.

The swell that we had been looking at for so long was arriving, and it held its size and name for being the biggest swell ever in Indo. There was lots of talk of where to go for the swell, but I wasn't sure what to do and ended up just staying in Bali for it. I woke up on the morning of the day of days to 30-foot Ulus with a couple of guys towing the mad walls. We went and had a look at Padang but the tide was a bit high, and there were lots of wash-throughs with the odd in-between one going good. I paddled out hoping that I would get a couple in the gaps in the chaos; but as the tide dropped there were a lot of fun in-between ones. And it ended up being one of the most fun sessions I had out there. With the big wash-throughs, it meant it kept the crowd quiet, there was a couple of people out, and we were trading waves and dodging the unrideable ones. I had surfed for three hours already, and then my leash broke I tried to swim in, but a colossal wash-through came in a pushed me over to this weird slab up the top of Impossibles. I was swimming for around 40 mins before getting to the beach. Pretty wrecked but still an epic session.

World’s Best Adaptive Surfers Shine

Brazil's Figue Diel is completely blind, but that doesn't stop him from finding the perfect spot on the wave above.

La Jolla, California, December 13, 2018 - The world's best adaptive surfers shined on the second day of competition at the 2018 Stance ISA World Adaptive Surfing Championship presented by the City of San Diego, taking advantage of the global spotlight to put their elite talent on display.

Ten of the twelve divisions took to water to represent their nations in the first full day of competition.

The first-ever visually impaired women debuted in the event in both the open and women's divisions, showing how the sport has spread to new athletes around the globe since the inaugural edition

Canada's Ling Pan put on great performances in the visually impaired divisions her first time participating in the world championship.

"It was so nerve-wracking competing in this event for the first time," said Pan. "I realized that I just need to have fun. It's an honor to represent Canada.

"I told my mom that I was embarrassed to compete as a visually impaired surfer. She told me to practice, but more importantly, that my participation here is not just about me. This is about showing other young women that are facing challenges that you can overcome and do anything that you set your mind to.

"My goal is to show everyone, especially other visually impaired women, that surfing is fun."

Australia's Samantha Bloom put on the top performance of the day in the women's AS-4 Division, earning a high heat total of 16.50 in her quest towards the Gold Medal. Bloom is making a strong statement in her first year competing in the event.

Thursday saw the first women divisions of the event take place, which is of particular importance because this is the first year that the women's divisions will count towards the overall team point rankings. The women and open divisions each hold 50% of the weight, underlining the ISA's drive for gender equality across all disciplines of Surfing.

South Africa's Antony Smyth, a 2016 Gold Medalist, led the charge in the open divisions, earning a heat total of 16.33 in AS-1.

Past ISA Gold Medalists Fellipe Lima (BRA), Kazune Uchida (JPN) and Jesse Billauer (USA) also had strong showings, getting off to quick starts in their campaigns to add to their Gold Medal counts.

The 2016 AS-5 World Champion, Brazil's Davi Teixeira, took first place in his qualifying heat of the morning and commented on his fourth experience at the event.

"The level of competition is so high," said Teixeira. "It's getting better every year.

"My goal this year is to ride some great waves and win. Being crowned world champion would mean so much for me and for my family, friends, and country. This is for them."

ISA President Fernando Aguerre said:

"The conditions have been flawless for the first two days of the event. We have had sun, no wind, and plenty of waves on tap. What more could we ask for?

"It's incredible to see how the level of talent around the globe has been growing over the four years of the event. These are the world's best and they did not disappoint.

"The youthful energy and high-performance action that I have witnessed in Para-Surfing this week would be a great fit for the Paralympic Games. We will keep working to get this sport onto the world's greatest sporting stage."

The 2018 Stance ISA World Adaptive Surfing Championship is streamed live daily on www.isasurf.org.

The remaining schedule is as follows:

December 14-16
• Competition at La Jolla Shores, 7:00am - 4:00pm
Sunday, December 16
• Closing Ceremony at La Jolla Shores following the competition Finals

For updated results click here