Slating the 11 times world surfing champion, Kelly Slater

I wince while watching a video replay of Kelly Slater jumping switch-foot between 6-foot barrels at Padang Padang. He’s so awesome and yet I’m so over it. This twenty-year long adulation has become a little schizophrenic of late, a little up and down; I think I have Slater Fatigue Syndrome (SFS). Not to be confused with tall poppy syndrome, SFS is directed more at Slater’s sparring partners – or lack of.

Where has the competitive spirit on tour gone? In a recent post-heat interview a young new talent admitted he’d been “so honoured” to surf with the world champion. Modesty and respect aside, it makes me wonder if he and the other title contenders have lost sight of the competitive point: wanting to win and the faith to do it. Are they afraid to knock the King off his pedestal?

Confidence and competition are so entwined in surfing, or any sport for that matter, that the slightest erosion of either compromises potential and success. Take Tiger Woods as an example of what a blow to the ego can do to a sportsman. Woods’ list of accolades includes 14 professional major championships, 16 World Golf Championships, and 71 PGA Tour event wins, equating to more major career and PGA Tour victories than any other active golfer. But what’s Woods been up to lately? After December 2009′s hyperbolic media attention over the extramarital hanky-panky, he’s finalised a divorce, been dropped by a heap of sponsors, lost the world number one ranking, and hasn’t won another PGA Tour event. “Confidence is contagious, so is a lack of confidence,” said Vince Lombardi, the NFL’s most successful and competitive coach.

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I’m not asking that Slater be cast as a moral reprobate; I’m just looking for a bit of perspective. He was also once a plucky start-up, copping criticism from the old stalwarts as he sidestepped Tom Curren-like flow in favour of air. He didn’t rocket to the top straight away, either. In Kelly’s first year on tour he finished 43rd, and it wasn’t until half way through the following year that he exploded into action to take the title. The tipping point could have been sparked by anything and I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess. But I like to think that he just decided it was time to win, because he knew he could. And he still can, he knows it, the surfers on tour know it, the media feed it, we love it. It’s like a self-perpetuating cycle and it will only end when the surfers start believing in themselves, when they stop snapping under pressure and start giving it back to him.

You can admire Kelly’s alien ability all you like, but don’t underestimate the unwavering faith he has in himself and the cunning competitiveness that clinches each win. After two decades these are very well practised assets. Combined with his skill, it’s the winning trifecta.

“Kelly plays the heaviest mind games,” says Maurice Cole. Having shaped the board Kelly won his first world title on and enjoying a working relationship with him since, Maurice would know. “He might say, ‘You’re riding that board? I reckon your other one was better this morning. He’s always planting that seed of doubt and that’s part of his psychological edge.”

Before this year’s Quiksilver Pro final Kelly asked Taj, “40 minutes, right?” He was referring to a Hurley Pro a few years ago where Kelly trumped him in the dying minutes of a final that had five minutes added to it. It was a tactical psyche-out and it seems to work every time. After 14 years on tour Taj can only come second so many times before succumbing to a severe case of Slater Fatigue Syndrome, surely. ”Second is the first fuckin’ loser,” Andy Irons told Stab a few years ago. “If I can’t get first I’d rather get last.” Surfing has enjoyed some spectacular rivalries: Midget Farrelly and Nat Young, Rabbit and Mark Richards, but none as ruthless as the fight between Irons and Slater.

Irons had true grit. He understood that while surfing is fun, winning is business and business is cutthroat. “My whole driving force right now is to take his little pretty picture and just crush it,” he said in Blue Horizon, a movie that portrayed him as an arrogant prick. His whole driving force, that’s what it took to lift three world titles from Slater. While it’s all the Hawaiian master would muster, he never lost the mongrel and he never backed off.

Today, there seems to be a disquieting lack of hunger on tour. “There’s no room for nice guys,” Maurice reminds us. “You’ve really got to be his enemy. Everybody is too scared because they want to be liked and the last person you want to be hated by is Kelly Slater,” he laughs. “That’s part of the psychology and he plays the card very heavily.”

There’s one guy on tour Maurice thinks doesn’t have the ability to beat Slater, but at least he’s not afraid to hate him. Adriano de Souza represents a new crew of ambitious Brazilians who have come from hardship and have had to fight for every dollar, scrap for every win. Unlike many of their Australian or American counterparts, these guys have already faced their fears on the streets and slums of Brazil. They’re up for it.

Irons wrote the blueprint to beating Slater, and Mick squeezed a couple out through sheer will. Otherwise the Darth Vader intensity has debilitated the confidence, competition and ability of three generations of surfers. In 2011 though, a couple of new kids on the block have shown themselves to be precocious much in the same way that Kelly was twenty years ago. It is now their turn to challenge the status quo, to come up with the antidote to SFS. They just need to decide that they can.

This story received some contentious commentary here. What do you think?

PNG Liberated

By Keri Algar

For a real giggle check out unstucktravel.com

what: surfing in papua new guinea

where: new Ireland island, north east of mainland

when: Christmas/new year’s 2010/2011

Surf pics, thanks to Steve “Froey” Arklay Photography

A soundtrack to PNG could start with David Bowie’s Space Oddity because as one salty sailor said, “It’s damn remote out here” and a queer place to arrive at. Then anything by Norah Jones to fall asleep to in the warm tropical breeze and bam! Rage Against the Machine’s Wake Up blares as your camera is nicked from under your nose in the bottle shop (Bia Stoa) and finally, Pharoahe Monch pumps Simon Says. Yes, PNG is a mixed bag where the melodic and the mental live side by side. It’s filthy, furious and fabulous.

Predator or prey?

Be careful, warned everyone before we left. It’s dangerous, they said, violent and volatile. In fact a month earlier an AusAID worker had been raped close to Madang, a budding tourist town on the mainland’s north coast and while the news was preoccupying, it was also thrilling to hear the words ‘bow and arrow’ and ‘surfing’ used in the same sentence.  (Coincidentally at the luggage carousel at Port Moresby, an Australian builder working in the highlands described meeting some young AusAID workers and his account of the situation made me wonder if the regrettable, terrible violation at Madang had been symptomatic of parachute aid work.)

With the exception of a chubby Brittish-looking couple there were only silent stares from black as night Melanesian faces, half a dozen thick on both sides, that lined the path to the domestic terminal. Once inside it was a matter of wriggling through the mosh pit at the check-in desk and getting amongst the rank and pervasive body odour of a dozen local men, I liked it.

On the bus

Inconvenienced and disgruntled travellers will tell you that Air Niugini is bedlam and you could be waiting days to get on a flight, which might be true and sure, we did have to stay a night in Moresby on account of the chaos, but Air Niugini covered the exorbitant hotel and after having been stung by so many airlines, getting on the next day without paying a dime for our board bags was a bonus. What’s more, scotch fingers and apple juice go down a treat when you’re flying over turquoise waters freckled by idyllic islands; scoping potential: hello paradise.

“Girls!” said Lou, Nusa Island Retreat’s surf guide, as he greeted us at Kavieng airport, “Welcome to the wild west”. We drove through the hot, dry, dusty roads alongside dilapidated decades-old buildings where only locals loitered under the shade of enormous leafy trees. Hearing our plans to play it by ear, Lou was keen to point out that this really could be lawless like the wild west, particularly during the holidays when he said the locals get on the turps and all hell can break loose, (with no Clintonesque character to save the girls’ day). Ultimately though it was arriving at Nusa Island, with its sand-floor bar, weird collection of injured animals and birds, beach side bungalows and easy access to the waves that convinced us to stay. For a pair of skint surfers AU$200 a day is a blow out, but we were the only surfers on the island (!?!) and it was worth its salt. Nothing is cheap in PNG.

the flair that twisted the knee?

“Surfing around here is like the 70’s, there’s no tension in the line-up like there is back home,” said Lou, who is originally from the Gold Coast. He wasn’t wrong. Things were looking a bit flat around Nusa that afternoon but we were keen to pop the tropical cherry so headed 20 minutes north by banana boat to Ral Island, one of those tiny sand and palm fringed jewels and a swell magnet where we surfed glassy, albeit lazy 3-foot waves. It’s a shifty right hander that wraps around Ral’s reef, and peaks in a few different spots. Lou had it dialled and was laughing the entire 200 metres down the line as he jagged the random wide ones.

The next day the swell was a little less lazy and we scored a supreme waveathon, no bikini pass required. Bloody Lizzie kept pinching me on the arm (hard) because she just couldn’t believe it – here we were surfing with a handful of local lads who were frothing more than us, unbelievable. And the energy kept building. The next morning Nago Lefts was on and we were into it. For me it was a bit of a mind fuck to paddle into because you’ve got to point yourself right, not left, in the direction of the bubbling reef to get onto the wave, but then it’s super fun, long and finishes in a racy inside section. Local powerhouse and PNG Surf Champ, Titima, was smashing the sets, completely owning the joint while his mates hooted non-stop. “It’s borderline crazy out here,” laughed Lou, with a wicked grin on his face.

hello darkness my old friend

Take your pick of any brand of beer anywhere in the world because they’re all golden at the end of a hot day’s surf. We were invited back for a cold one on the PNG Explorer, a surf charter boat run by Andrew and his wife Jude. The Explorer is the vessel for the search, and it’s crew epitomise the pioneering spirit of surfing, travelling and adventure: these guys are working hard on a good gig. We listened wide eyed to stories of unchartered reefs, uninhibited (or uninhabited?) islands, unridden waves; about how they scratch their heads at dinner coming up with new names for new breaks and then there’s the wave they don’t even want to talk about. This freedom! Coming from Sydney, the mini mal metropolis where kooks pay $5 to park their SUV’s for a one-hour surf, where they name their boats “Liquid Assets”, and only bogans drink coffee from McDonalds, it was dreamtime. What a pleasure to meet people who have challenged conventionality and risen above the mundane! There was a lunar eclipse, we got tanked and had a hilarious night.

By Christmas Eve Kavieng’s dusty roads were throbbing with queues and crowds; it was hot and there was a heavy feel about the place. You often hear travellers say that flashing a smile is the best way to confront a dodgy situation whilst helping yourself feel more secure –  granted – but in PNG you still want to watch your back. We did run into a couple of unsavoury characters, Australians included; it’s like they got washed up at the end of the line and never made it back. In a two week trip it’s hard to scratch the surface but I reckon there’s an undercurrent in this raw, lawless land. The wild glint in the men’s eyes hints at an unadulterated lust for life, for fucking and fighting. We ended up back at Nusa down one camera but in one piece, and up a bottle of rum.

Christmas rolled by, the swell dropped, and we were out of a place to stay but like Lou had prophesised, “Things just have a way of working themselves out around here”. The next minute we were being welcomed aboard a 39-foot catamaran called Baguette by Captain Danny and his crew Don and Rueben – all mad spearfishermen. The lull in the waves continued for a couple more days but we were busy free diving a sunken Japanese WW2 plane, cracking into crays and crabs and market shopping.

After a few bottles of wine the Captain was persuaded to sail up to the outer islands off Lavongai Island (New Hanover), 30 nautical miles north of Kavieng, for a few days of fishing, surfing and New Year celebrations and wow, what a trip. There’s just something about rolling about at sea, at nature’s mercy for wind, weather and food. Speaking of nature, the kids! Athletic and imaginative, I think they’d be happier playing with an eggs box than an Xbox. I didn’t hear a pikinini cry in the two weeks we were there and they were at once shy and gregarious, fearless and cautious, cheeky and polite. They are incredibly endearing kids and with the genetic anomaly which expresses itself as blond hair, unique looking to boot. The kids, like their parents were unassuming and never once asked us for money. 

lizzie ya minx, after a couple of beers

For the two days we took to sail up to Ungalik Island there was no swell (PNG is fickle, right?), but the set up was riddled with potential. We moored up alongside the PNG Explorer and after a couple of days out of the drink were pumped to get back in and stoked when Andrew picked us up en route for a wave – bless him – with an esky full of beers on ice for the most surreal New Years Eve session on record. An easy going right hander over a weed covered reef in a super picturesque setting of lush hills and crystal water. Magic.

Somehow, New Years Eve was debaucherous and edifying at the same time. We got loaded on the Explorer and then left the drinks for Ungalik where we’d been invited to celebrate with four villages to share songs, dances and comical mimes. A few of Andrew’s mates got hammered by betel nut and spent an intense half hour entertaining the villagers with their dribbling.

New Years on Ungalik Island

At midnight, according to Lavongai tradition, the villagers lit bunches of bound palm fronds along the beach and looking into the black horizon we saw the various island coastlines dotted with fires. The kids were running around laughing, positively mental, burning palms in tow. In Australia a consortium of authorities would’ve been brandishing fines all over the show to keep the nanny state organised, functional, predictable, manicured and boring, but on Ungalik Island if you don’t want to get burnt you get out of the way.

And just like that the trip was over: two days after we’d flown out, a solid ground swell hit the region – I don’t even want to think about how epic it must’ve been. Happily though, PNG marked the unwinding of time and the opening of doors, to see through the social distortion and reach for the sky.

LG asks Mark Webber to dance in 3D

By Keri Algar

Mark Webber wins the Monaco Formula 1 Gran Prix

SYDNEY, NSW: Making a rare appearance on Australian soil, Mark Webber stepped out of the hot seat and onto the dance floor last night to demonstrate LG’s new range of 3D capable technologies.

The lanky Formula One driver was strapped into his dancing shoes to showcase the new Microsoft XBox 360 Kinect on the LG 2D-3D Plasma TV in front of an encouraging crowd of spectators. Kinect technology uses full body movement, motion and depth sensors to control the game, thus removing the need for a hand-held controller.

Tim Barnes, the new marketing manager for LG home entertainment was there to introduce the new range he described as “pinnacle” and “exciting”. The 2D-3D TV is the first of its kind to attain a George Lucas endorsed TXH Certification, originally developed for cinematic sound, but now used to test cinematic vision. The TV is accompanied by a 3D Recorder and Blu-ray player.

LG said it hopes that the TV’s ability to convert 2D to 3D (20 different levels of depth are available) will combat the thorn in the side of the industry – the lack of 3D content available.

Speaking with Barnes, Webber said that technology played an important role in the aerodynamics of the vehicles and in coordinating the hundreds of people in his racing team. Webber said that “competitor analysis” and learning from past mistakes were essential to improving ones game.

Dreaming of Whales

By Keri Algar 

What a Wonderful Whale!

Imo’s Whale Poem 1  

How often, one wonders, would a whale 

Whilst splashing his almighty tail, 

Stop and think with certainty
The Most Important Mammal is me! 

Did you know that when Orcas travel in groups they breathe in unison? And that the largest animal in the world, the Blue Whale, eats up to 3,000,000 calories a day, and has 40cm of blubber around it?! 

 While you watch in childlike awe as whales cruise along the coastline – giant, majestic and mysterious – they are chatting away to each other in dialects based on locality and family bonds. That’s their song. 

 Like every other living creature, whales play a significant role in our planets environmental health. Not only is their place in the food chain critical, but even their poo plays an important part! Baleen whale poo is rich in iron, which is fundamental for the growth of phytoplankton. Phytoplankton sequesters carbon dioxide and in turn provides two-thirds of the earth’s oxygen! 

 These days the Southern Ocean especially is lacking whales, lacking poo, lacking iron, and lacking phytoplankton. But ‘Save the plankton’ doesn’t tug at our heartstrings like ‘Save the whales’ does. Why? 

 Our wonder of whales has led to the ongoing and passionate plight against pro-whaling nations such as Japan and Norway. Is this because whales have become a symbol representing all living things that need protecting? What’s our connection to these ocean mammals? 

 You will find the answer looking into the eye of a cetacean. 

 Along the Great Australian Bight, the Mirning people have their own whale tale: 

 “A long time ago, a great White Whale Spirit called Jiddara came down to Earth. He came from the stars to swim in the oceans of the infinite void of Earth as it then existed.  As the Seven Sisters chased down after him, Jiddara dived into the vast blue depths of the ocean, thrashing his tail, and then rose to meet the new dawn. From this point on Jiddara created the Earth and the Sky, leaving the echoes of his Dreamtime journey imprinted in there at Whale Rock in South Australia. We are born as a result of the whale being the mother of the sea. In the time of the ‘Beginning’, we were born from the ocean, in the foam along the shores of the great South Seas. In the dance of the Beginning, we were born to dream the whales. The whale is our family. Over thousands of years, we have come to this place where the whales gather every winter to mate and give birth. We share food together; we eat shellfish off the same table – the reefs. They are our brothers and sisters in the ocean. When we die, it is with them we return, to the Morning Star.” Narrated by Margaret and Bunna Lawrie from the film “Whaledreamers” 2006. 

Whales appeal to the human spirit. If you’re into whales, give ‘em a hand! 

See if your area is registered in the Humpback Icon Project where communities adopt a specific Humpback Whale. The whales pass our coastline twice a year and you can be a part of celebrating the migration of an individual whale. Spot their unique body markings and personality! Check out the International Fund for Animal Welfare: www.stopwhaling.com.au 

Support Save The Whale Campaigns through organisations such as Surfers for Cetaceans, Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd, and Whales Alive.  Find more save the whale organisations at www.oceania.org.au/soundnet/cover.html#actionalerts 

Imo’s Whale Poem 2 

 

 

(that's not Imo's butt)

What does whale poo look like? 

Asked Barry to his dad, 

Does it look like ours and smell really bad? 

Or is it long and squirmy, does it float or does it sink? 

And if other fish are around what water would they drink? 

Do whales have a secret loo that they can swim off to? 

And how often does a whale really need to do a poo? 

Barry goes on thinking, then exclaims with a start: 

Imagine all the bubbles if a whale was to fart!  

Instructions, by Neil Gaiman

Instructions by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles Vess

Bloomsbury, $24.99

Keri Algar

If you ever needed a set of instructions to navigate through one of Neil Gaiman’s fantasy worlds this is the book for you.

Gaiman has written his latest children’s book in keeping with what he is famous for: convoluted fantasies and a wicked imagination. In this story the reader is given recipe-like advice for travelling through a mysterious world of twisted oaks, peering eyes, and lurking gobblings.

Like most of Gaiman’s work the fairytale has a murky moodiness about it which will sit well with his die-hard fans. The illustrations add to the intrigue with images like a ferryman, who is seen from behind as a shadow and reminds one of the grim reaper.

The instructions take the reader through a door and into another realm, down a path, past a castle, over a river, and home again.

Like many children’s books the story offers a milieu of educational metaphors, from living courageously to the dangers of avarice and showing empathy. Yet despite being set in another world, some of the strong directive statements tend to strip the story of the wonderment and awe children’s books traditionally inspire.

It’s difficult to get a child’s imagination flowing with statements like “Favours will be returned, debts will be repaid. Do not forget your manners. Do not look back.” While an adult could take their pick of metaphors from every page of prose the advice tends to severe a child’s imagination rather than giving it room to grow.

The slightly adult theme and overall lack of warm fuzzies is occasionally intercepted by more gentle guidance such as “Ride the wise eagle (you shall not fall),” and “dragons have one soft spot, somewhere, always”. It tends to lift the mood a bit.

The curious fairytale winds up where it began and leaves the reader wondering whether to read it again.