by Board Retailers Association | May 25, 2022 | Awards, Industry, Surf
Sebastian, focused amidst the chaos of Nazaré. Photo: Joerg Mitter. We know this: several massive swells have occurred at Nazaré in the past couple of years. And with them have come the things we aren’t so sure of. Namely, if the world’s largest wave may have been surfed during that time. Claims of catching the elusive 100-foot wave have been made time and time again, so much so that it tends to become background noise. At least until someone confirms it using a plausible system. Measuring waves is a difficult task, especially the shifty monsters on offer at Nazaré. In recent years, however, attempts have been made to standardize the way big waves are quantified, hopefully bringing clarity to the often murky claims. That’s becoming increasingly important as the hunt for the “100-foot wave” has gained mainstream attention thanks, in part, to the recent HBO documentary. “You want the largest ruler possible in the image and to validate its size,” Adam Fincham recently told the Washington Post. Fincham is a University of Southern California associate professor of engineering specializing in geophysical fluid dynamics, who led the analysis of Steudtner’s wave. As they can be easily measured, the “largest ruler possible” is often a Jet Ski. In the case of Steudtner’s wave, though, there wasn’t one positioned correctly within the footage. Instead, they used something else: Steudtner’s lower leg. “That distance does not change since you can’t bend your lower leg,” Fincham explained. The surfer’s entire height is less useful as a reference point since big-wave surfers are often low in a crouch, zipping along at breakneck speeds over often-uneven faces. Using Steudtner’s lower leg as a ruler,...
by Board Retailers Association | May 6, 2022 | Awards, Community, News, Surf
Owen Beim with the winning entry of the Black and White Category presented by White Claw. Last weekend, at the Traveler Surf Club in Malibu, The Inertia awarded the winners of the 2022 Film and Photo Challenge presented by White Claw. And the talent runs thick. A big congratulations goes out to everyone who entered and many thanks to all the talented photographers and filmmakers who participated. It was a huge success! With nearly a thousand submissions and so many people sharing great work from around the world, it’s always tough to select just one winner of each category. This contest is a great reminder each year of the depth of talent in our community. You’re all an inspiration. With that said, here’s a quick look at the winners. Young Owen Beim gets us started with the heat and his Black and White beauty of Eimeo Czermak on a Tahitian bomb (above). “Absolutely pumped to have won the Black and White category,” Beim said. “This shot of Eimeo Czermak is no doubt my favorite shot in black in white and it was truly a moment I won’t forget.” Blair Conklin, deep in the belly of the beast, as seen through the lens of James Ferrell. In the Emerge category presented by Miir, a category dedicated to up-and-comers, James Ferrell captured this gorgeous shot of Blair Conklin in deep. The Wedge continues to help develop astounding young talent, and Ferrell is chief among the youthful photogs in residence at the famous mutant wave. This image of a solid winter swell won Paul Greene the Lineups category of The Inertia Film & Photo Challenge presented by White Claw. Photo: Paul Greene Meanwhile, Paul Greene captured...
by Board Retailers Association | May 4, 2022 | Holiday, Industry, Surf
Let’s celebrate! A surf shop’s value according to Shaun Tomson, world champion surfer, environmentalist, and author: “Surf shops supply what surfers truly need – not what they want, but what they truly need – a great board, a wetsuit, some surf shorts, wax, and a few accessories. Products designed around that existential experience of paddling out towards that open horizon, waiting, and watching, and then swinging around, catching that wave, and getting stoked. Everything else is detail around this core. The entire surfing industry, and every dollar ever paid, is essentially to satisfy that need of being stoked.” Surf Shop Day is the day to celebrate the independent retailers that helped build and continue to maintain the surf industry. These surf shops are where so many of us found our surf stoke – the euphoric smell of surf wax, neoprene wetsuits, and resin curing from a fresh batch of surfboards. Surf Shop Day will celebrate the heart and soul of our business and what it means to our industry and its growth, from the hardworking owners to the enthusiastic sales staff, to the relentless sales reps who keep the machine of stoke going for customers. Let’s shine a light on surf shops in all communities, recognize those who have been there from the early days and throw sunlight on the new ones bringing fresh ideas and enthusiasm to make the in-person, brick-and-mortar experience more exciting. Retailers and brands are encouraged to find their own way of celebrating Surf Shop Day to bring positive attention to our culture, sport, and industry. To help stoke the imagination, the Surf Industry Members...
by Board Retailers Association | Apr 18, 2022 | Community, Industry, Surf
In my opinion, the best kind of comedy is the kind which picks out something that’s absolutely absurd in the world around us and highlights it. Bonus points if it’s something that we do on a daily basis and just didn’t realize how absurd it is. Enter kook shaming. Strange, isn’t it, how we as surfers love nothing better than to shit on other, less-experienced surfers than ourselves? Much like the middle-school playground, it can seem like the only way to get closer to the top is to push others down. “How dare he come down here and disrespect us by doing the things we do every day wrong,” says Luke Cederman of the Raglan Surf Report. “I’ll film him and then we’ll put it on the internet so everyone can see him.” While the video itself is indeed hilarious, it is, or perhaps should be, a bit thought-provoking as well. Is this really how we treat newcomers to our sport? In general, yes. Can we do better? Also yes. Be sure to visit The Inertia website to view valuable Surfing related News and Resourceful Articles regularly. Speaking of helpful articles from the good people behind The Inertia, you may want to click on the following link to learn about how BRA Supporting Vendor Partner SurfCare can help you generate additional revenue from Surfboard Sales without increasing inventory: https://www.boardretailers.org/you-might-not-need-to-worry-about-breaking-a-brand-new-surfboard-ever-again-via-the-inertia/ If you are not yet a BRA Retail Member, you can easily opt in to either Regular (no cost) or Distinguished ($100/yr.) Membership via this super simple join...
by Board Retailers Association | Apr 13, 2022 | Community, Competitions, Surf
A Schnauzer has broken his silence about how some dogs really feel about dog surfing events. Photo: Screenshot/Searle On a recent, sunny California day, a pack of dogs roamed the beach. The waves were up, and there were surfers in the water. But these weren’t ordinary surfers — they were dogs. Their owners laughed and smiled outside the waves, their teeth flashing in the sun, high-fiving when they pushed their four-legged friend into a wave. All looked well and good. Well and good, that is, until one dog chose to speak up. “This isn’t what it looks like,” he told me, his tail tucked between his legs in a classic indicator of fear. “They’re forcing us to do this. Honestly, we’re all terrified. We don’t understand what joy they can possibly get from doing this to us.” The dog — I’ll call him Spot, as he asked to remain anonymous — is a Schnauzer mix. He’s a good swimmer who enjoys swimming after sticks on occasion, but surfing, he told me, is not what he, or most other dogs, for that matter, is meant to be doing. “I mean, yeah, some of us like swimming, but you don’t understand how terrifying this is for us,” he said, staring mournfully out at the beach. His owner, a blond woman in khaki shorts and a flower print blouse, was frantically running up and down the beach, shouting his name. It was his turn to surf in a dog surfing contest, and she needed to put his lifejacket on him. “Just the fact that they’re putting us in lifejackets should tell you something,” Spot said. “Like, if you’re...
by Board Retailers Association | Apr 3, 2022 | Community, Industry, Surf
The surf remains the same but the surfers, well….there’s a lot more of ’em. Photo: Silas Baisch//Unsplash Two years ago, disease spread around the globe, and much of the population retreated to the confines of homes and humble apartments. For those of us stuck in the concrete trappings of modern cities, the urge to get outside grew exponentially each day. When states finally lifted the harshest restrictions and permitted outdoor recreation, the outdoors-starved population flooded the wilderness. A mass retreat away from cities and into nature ensued. For surfers, that meant scores of first timers entering the lineup. For the surf and outdoors industry, it meant record-breaking profits. Even as unemployment surged to heights not seen since the Great Depression, camping and outdoor recreation equipment flew off the shelves. In June of 2020, bicycle sales rose by 63 percent, while kayak sales spiked by 56 percent. In the surf world, board sales rose a sharp 113 percent. With gyms closed and team sports on hold, surfing and other outdoor endeavors took center stage. Two years later, the hordes of new surfers that entered the lineup have twenty-four collective months of surfing under their belts and are shifting lineup dynamics around the world. When I arrived in France in January of 2022, the anticipation of my first surf in the chilly North Atlantic was nearly too much to handle. After weeks of train travel, while lugging a board around the continent, I was finally going to luck into a bit of swell in Biarritz. Biarritz is a surf town through and through with a staunch local crowd. The charming coastal enclave attracts surfers and travelers from all over the planet,...
