The admins took down my other post- so here it is again: It's about surfboarting, not baby wipes http://www.theinertia.com/surf/the-peahi-challenge-wipeout-reel-is-pure-carnage/ Check out how painful each wipeout is- either hitting his surfboart mid air then the water- or just the pure impact into the water... One guy gets hung up on the lip and another slids down the face... Man this footage really gives Belmar a run for their money... Any stories???
Once I was surfing Pumphouse by myself it was almost DOH, maybe bigger, and clean. I lived right there so I could get the swell's magic hour. It was May. I saw it break from the road in front of my apartment!!! I said to myself WTF!!! and grabbed the board. I was about 31 or so, in good shape, and sported a gold earring in my left ear that was a sperm whale. I was a Playah. With a capital P. I remember sitting out past the jetty, and when the swell would pass under me ( you had to be very selective), you could not see the crows nest at the top of the pumphouse, the wave obliterated the view. It was that big, high tide,so it was breaking pretty close. The left was working, which is a hairball drop (backside for me), and you could get pitted and spit out into the inlet,but if you ate it, the jetty was there to break your fall. And your neck. I caught a few bombs, then got too tired to paddle back to the takeoff zone at the peak, the current was strong and my arms were noodles. It was getting dark and fishy. I took off too far off the peak, and got whumped, but it happened on the drop so the jetty was still way to the south. I lost my board, the leash snapped, and I swam/washed in. Some local dirtbag ( I have seen him with many a ho) walks up the beach with the two halves of my board and hands it to me with a smirk. My earring was gone. I remember impacting the face of the wave with the left side of my head and bouncing down the face into the pit. I staggered home with my board pieces, and sat down and my wife gave me dinner. After I ate I tried to stand up and could not straighten my back. I walked around like the guy on the cover of Led Zeppelin 4, all bent over for three days, hoping it would work itself out, finally gave up and went to my chiropractor. Thank you Dr. Andre!
Can't compare to a pumphouse sesh as I have yet to have one but wiping out at southside Indian River inlet was by far the worst one of my experience. Getting slammed onto a foot of sand on a mere 6 foot wave almost broke my back. Literally made me scared to surf that place ever since, then I see the wildlyfe crew charging it and am just like damn, that takes some serious balls. Florida (except pumphouse) is much more forgiving, I don't even think I've made contact with the bottom yet, just been ragdolled a bunch in big conditions.
