I had this ultimate wave of envy wash over me yesterday. 50-75000 people lined the surf arena at Huntingdon Beach for the US Open of Surfing. I got to see them from my living room in a grey and cloudy and getting dark in Dublin.
In my whole life, I think the only time I got to see a broadcast of a live board sports competition that wasn’t snowboarding was probably when Eurosport used to show the live windsurfing from the Palais d’Omnisports in Paris every December. Indoor windsurfing. Interesting thought. The turbines were pretty damn big but it’s from there that I know the names of Bjorn Dunkerbeck and especially, Robby Naish. The rest of the time I just had to rely on summaries on YOZ type programmes and occasional rebroadcasts on Extreme Sports Television. Pretty depressing really. In 2007 I went to a couple of major kitesurfing competitions and was really there, on the beach, at a PKRA event. This year, I’ll go to the ASP in France because I have wanted to do it for 10 years or more. Go to a real, proper surfing competition.
Via my twitter feed where I follow a couple of surf companies, one of which is Mick Fanning’s sponsor, Reef, I learned that the US Open of surfing was live on the internet. It must have been the first big year for them to do a major web broadcast like this because they have not shut up about the feedback they are getting. The feedback is positive and justifiably so. It may be because this year I have decent internet access thanks to UPC in Dublin – maybe on 3MB eircom I wouldn’t have enjoye it so much. The picture quality and streaming has been top quality and and the commentary was fantastic. Unlike my impression of most American sports broadcasts (witness the fun and games with American golf for example) it has been remarkably devoid of advertising breaks with a short one between the changeovers.
The surfing was of mixed quality. I would say it wasn’t all that consistent – but then neither were the waves. I’m angling for Kelly Slater to win and I have no idea why. I’ve always liked him in the few interviews I’ve seen him in and you can’t deny his out and out greatness as far as surfing is concerned. I really like Mick Fanning as well; he always seems to be a very considered person when you see him interviewed too. So I’d be happy to see him win as well.
There was a lot of entertainment to be had from the tow-in expression session – pretty much wipeout central. And the women’s competition had some very decent and respectable heats – my god those girls are all so young. And that’s where I feel a certain amount of envy.
We can’t all grow up near Huntingdon Beach or Bondi, or Waimea Bay. I grew up 60 miles from the sea. I don’t think anyone even tried to surf on the beaches in Kerry when I was a child although there is at least one surf school in Banna, and two or three on the Dingle Peninsula now. I’d love to have had the opportunities these girls had. Actually as a child growing up I’d have probably appreciated figure skating even more but that was even harder to get to. I was 15 when I finally got a test of windsurfing and I loved it.
The way I see it, I think that normal broadcast television is dead. I’ve always wanted a demand package whereby I could decide what I was going to get in the way of television but your options for that with cable are somewhat limited and to be blunt, when UPC are trying to sell me premium channels, like, SkySports for example, I just don’t want them because they don’t add anything to my life.
Looking – from my point of view – at how successful the surfing broadcast was for this event – and it was laid on by the event itself rather than by any of the sports broadcasters in the States – I’d have to wonder if that’s the way things are going to go. I know a couple of the sports clubs in the UK have tried to take back control by setting up their own television channels but as I don’t give a toss about football I have no idea about how this might have worked out for the clubs in question.
I would love to see the PKRA do something similar with the kitesurfing. I realise that surfing is a far longer established sport with a much bigger industrial base behind it – I doubt the US Open of Surfing could have come close without the support they got from Hurley, G-Shock and Casio to name just three of their main sponsors. I think Nike 6.0 are there as well.
But I came away from that broadcast wanting two things. 1) I want a Casio G-Z One phone. I really, want one of them. POssibly you’d have to have lost a phone to seawater to understand why but the commentary team had one guy out in the arena on a jetski (that was sponsored by Red Bull) and he had one of those phones with him so they called him up on it. And while he was on the phone to them (which was filmed from another jetski) he dunked it in the sea and it was still working. The call was still open.
I so want one of those. I bet they’re not available on the O2 shop and anyway I’m tied into my bloody iPhone for another year at least. I want that because without the US Open of Surfing, I would NEVER have known it existed.
2) I want the new girls surf movie from Nike 6.0 to reach me. Apparently it’s going to be great. The trailers look pretty hot so the question is will it turn up on the front of Surf Europe like Cancer to Capricorn did, or will I be able to download it or will I have to bribe someone to get it for me in the States.
They mentioned something about a follow up to Blue Crush which was one godawful movie, but nowhere near as bad as the MTV reality show about the girl surfers was.
No, this Nike 6.0 sounds just the ticket.
Finally, I hope I can pick up enough signal to watch the end of the surfing tonight. But I will be in Achill Island so it’s anyone’s guess.
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