You ever get that feeling where you can’t believe what you just saw? Well I just had that after watching this video for a wave pool in Texas. Watch it here but be warned, as Surfing Magazine’s Brendan Buckley said: “It is such a piece of shit.”
I get it – it’s an ad for a wavepark in Texas, which is inland and aimed at appealing to “inlanders” but how could we let surfing sell out so hard? First the Olympics now this?! If this is the direction surfing is headed with the advent of wave pools then I’m moving to Mars (I heard they found saltwater!).
Buckley goes on to hammer home his point
“It should come as no surprise that a “SURF PARK” in “Austin, Texas” would release a video meant to stroke the fantasies of the general public. Where else would they aim their marketing? At the construction workers who drive beat up Fords to religiously surf some reef, somewhere? Like hey, come do four angry man turns and get a $5 sandwich on your lunch break here at the SURF PARK? Fuck no. They need to cater to the pale masses. The ones with more money than imagination. They need to create a dream, convince these people its theirs, then sell it to them and charge ’em for an overpriced Pepsi on the way out. Nobody builds a wave pool to not get rich.”
I made my girlfriend watch it and she thought it was an ad for car insurance for fuck’s sake. “Why is there a kid pushing a bicycle, where is that guy’s fins, why are they drinking coffee and why is there a guy with a prosthetic leg?” she asked. But more importantly, why NLand Surf Park, why did you cruel our culture with your shithouse ad?
We’d love to hear what you think.
