Back in late May, Hawaiian Nathan Florence paddled into arguably the best wave ever captured on film at Teahupoo. The video, shot by Tim Bonython, is currently circling cyberspace via Instagram. It seems the legitimacy of anything newsworthy in the modern era lies in how many times something will get reposted. Let’s just say Nate’s 15 seconds of fame has been receiving the royal treatment from his peers.
But it’s not the first time many have seen the footage. It surfaced during the Fiji Pro waiting period while many of the top CT surfers were staying on Namotu. A select few were privy to a message that held the holy grail of surf footage, earmarked for John John’s upcoming movie. The word on the coconut wireless was that Hawaiian enforcer Eddie Rothman had even requested the filmmaker to bury the footage or risk feeling the full force of his wrath. Obviously he chose the smart option until Nathan Florence yesterday beamed it to surfers the world over.
But why now? The unusual timing of the footage got me thinking back to an article Sean Doherty wrote in Surfing World earlier this year titled ‘Is The Death Of Big Wave Mythology Upon Us?’ It was an excellent piece about Mark Healey’s Puerto wave that spread as quickly as it disappeared. Doherty writes:
“It was the most hyped online surfing clip since, ya know, that last one. Healey’s wave was poached, posted, hashtagged, hailed, dissected, measured, hyperbolised, hypothesised and became instant folklore within the hour. And then, just like that, it was gone, scrolled off the screen and replaced by Matt Meola’s spindle 540, which in turn will be replaced by a Teahupoo wipeout or a surfing dog.”
The take home message with Seano’s piece is that, had a fraction of the people seen that wave, the Chinese whispers, embellished truths and bullshit would have coated it in the romanticism essential to surfing folklore and cemented his personal legend forever more.
The last time a wave created so much chatter was back in 2002. Andy Irons’ free fall, rail slide to stand up tube at 12-15 foot Teahupoo had a transformative quality about it. The wave, featured in Jack McCoy’s Blue Horizon, propelled Andy into greatness and was one of the defining moments in his career.
“My brother was right there,” said Andy. “And he was going. The only reason I went was to not let him get the glory. I would rather go over the falls, head first into the reef, crushed rather than let him make the barrel, get the shot, cover, talked about, everyone thinks he’s cool…”
Cool for 15 seconds or cool for a lifetime? Maybe that’s a question burning inside the modern professional surfer’s psyche, where recognition is but a few taps and an upload away.
