WE were watching a preview copy of one of the movies to be shown during the Hawaii International Film Festival. It was more chilling than the best Alfred Hitchcock movie. Surfers need to catch
new technologyThis flick caused prolonged chicken skin, brah, and not because it was a murder-thriller. It was a surf documentary, completely dedicated to a big-wave surf spot in Northern California called "Mavericks."
The movie caused me to ponder the extreme nature of surfing today and how the sport is still struggling to come to grips with technology.
Today, I'm more beach buoy than beach boy, but I used to surf. When I see some guy get pitched from the top of a 40-foot wave, it still makes me cringe. And that's what is so chilling about the film about Mavericks, a nasty, bone-crunching surf spot best known as the place where Hawaii surfer Mark Foo was killed.
The film shows a number of near deaths, including a shot of a guy who gets his surf leash tangled in some rocks and is pummeled by tons of whitewater.
It seems insane for guys to go out to places like Mavericks or Oahu's outer reefs with nothing more than a board, leash and a pair of trunks.
This is something like climbing Mount Everest with nothing but sunglasses and a walking stick.
The difference between surfing really big waves and small waves is the difference between regular old snow skiing and launching yourself off one of those 90-meter ski jumps.
And yet, most of today's big-wave surfers still do not use any of today's available technology or safety gear.
So you have a guy almost drown because he doesn't have a quick-release surf leash or because he's held under water for two consecutive waves and can't breathe.
I remember when it was uncool to even have a surfboard leash. Surfing traditionalists have a hard time embracing safety equipment.
But what would be wrong with strapping on a small container of oxygen, with just a minute or two of air, in case you are held underwater for a long time? Some people do wear helmets now at places like Pipeline, but most shun them. Why? Would a professional race car driver even think of not wearing a helmet?
Rodeo riders, the most macho of athletes, wear Kevlar vests when boarding a bronco. Maybe some kind of similar vest would keep big-wave surfers from having the breath knocked out of them during wipeouts.
I'm sure the day is coming when a really hardcore big- wave rider will look like a cross between deep-sea diver and motocross rider. They'll have light-weight helmets, chest protection, fast-inflating vests, emergency breathing apparatuses and perhaps jet-powered boards that would provide just enough thrust to get surfers into waves that cannot be caught by paddling. (You can only have so many jet skis out there towing people around.)
When this happens, you really will see a new age of surfing. With the question of survival minimized, surfers will push the limits of big-wave surfing even further. And surfing will finally have the things that have held it back from being a true big-money sport: more products. (Snowboarding wasn't even a sport 15 years ago and now it supports more high-paid professionals than surfing!) More products means more sponsors. And more sponsors means there might even be enough money in the sport so that more than just a handful of professionals could make, not just a living, but a good one.
Sadly, it will also be a time when we will look back on the deaths of surfers, like Foo, as needless tragedies, sacrifices on the altar of naive, anti-technology tradition.
Charles Memminger, winner of
National Society of Newspaper Columnists
awards in 1994 and 1992, writes "Honolulu Lite"
Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Write to him at the Honolulu Star-Bulletin,
P.O. Box 3080, Honolulu, 96802
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71224.113@compuserve.com.
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