Surfing
Archive
The year ahead will be filled with goggles that guide us down the ski hill, stoves that could save humanity, and Kubrickian pods that will carry us to the edge of space
View from a Blue Moon, the first surf film shot in 4k, from Brain Farm Cinema, John Florence, and Blake Vincent Kueny, follows Florence and some of his closest friends as they surf at some of his favorite spots around the world. It is…
Want to find the crowd-free surf of yesteryear? Drive from Los Angeles to Baja, load five days of gear onto a SUP, and haul ass through thick fog, screaming seagulls, and open ocean to the rocky, big-wave coast of Todos Santos.
In Stand Up and Ride, from the December 2015 Issue of ϳԹ, writer Joe Carberry led a glorious SUP expedition to Islas de Todos Santos. Once there, the team found surfing bliss that seemed like a throwback to a different time, proving that a paddleboard can be the ticket to adventure freedom. …
Forget a beach cruiser. This is how we want to carry our boards to the sea.
Take it from the world-champion surfer: there’s a right time for working, competing—and fighting for your life
Presenting the best trips in one of the hemisphere's hottest travel regions.
Presenting blueprints for the best way to beat post-summer blues
The weekend-long event features a multi-heat dog surfing contest with prizes in four different weight-class divisions and even tandem heats with the dogs’ owners.
The debate about whether there is a measurable difference between waves made in pools and ones in the ocean is over
Numbers-obsessed fans are reinventing fantasy sports for the skiing, surfing, and fly-fishing set
Learning to ride the waves isn't easy. But pick the right spot and find a gifted enough teacher, and you'll find your flow state
There's no quick fix for post-traumatic stress disorder, but research has shown that surfing's physicality and flow can give victims some relief and a way forward. The author hit the water with his close friend Brian, a former Navy SEAL whose service in Afghanistan beat up his body, tortured his mind, and pushed him into a zone where violence—against himself or others—seemed inevitable.
Don’t get skunked when you’re flying to score
An Italian surf pro is leading a group of groms up and down unexplored parts of the Korean Peninsula in search of legit breaks
The company’s financial woes have little to do with the sport, and everything to do with changing fashion tastes and questionable business decisions
From extreme athlete Niccolo Porcella, the man who survived The Biggest Wipeout Ever
With grown-up leadership and slick production values, the World Surf League is betting that it can attract a mainstream audience online
The strategy: Stick with it, shoot what you love, and stay on the move
Surfboard Fin: A structural element, usually made of wood or fiberglass, attached to the bottom of a surfboard to aid maneuverability.
Surfer Jamie O’Brien and his team made the fiery stunt look easy. But turns out, it took months of planning and some very specific gear to get right.
We asked a great white expert to explain the pro surfer’s terrifying encounter at Jeffreys Bay
The notion that wave riding is a form of high art is outdated in the face of a multi billion-dollar global surfing industry. Young competitors want to represent their countries on the largest stage. We should let them.
Retro looks with a powerful modern engine
First there was an algae-based surfboard. Now we have El Portobello—a sustainable board you can grow yourself.
The best part of a summer surf road trip? The real riding begins after you park the car.
The best stories aren't just on paper anymore. Our (totally subjective) ranking assembles the millenium's 33 best new classics.
It maps waves, predicts conditions, turns surfers into citizen scientists, and could be the data-collecting tool climate scientists need to study our rapidly acidifying oceans.
Women who want to learn how to surf are often dismissed by instructors. Not so at these surf-centric escapes.
Business-ready in and out of the water.
A surfboard manufacturer and UCSD researchers teamed up to create the world’s first sustainable, algae-based surfboard, which they'll have the pros test before producing it commercially.
Norman Ollestad's father taught him to surf during rambling, tough-love safaris down the coast of Mexico. Then the education came to a sudden and tragic end. Forty years later, Ollestad heads south with his own son—and finds that the old road maps can only take them so far.
This month, Insight Editions released “The Finest Line,” by big-wave surfer Rusty Long. The coffee table book chronicles all the best big-wave spots and surfers in the world with large, brilliant pictures by some of the top surf photographers.
A handful of Cocoa Beach, Florida, residents want to build the world's first man-made surf arena. If they succeed, they'll bring world-class swell to the East Coast.
Record snowfall, week-long freezes, and big cities brought to a standstill is how the winter of 2015 will be remembered across much of the Northeast. For some, like York, Maine-based photographer Nick Lavecchia, the winter brought in big swells, endless fun, and a group of friends to enjoy it with. We caught up with Lavecchia for a glimpse into the last few weeks on the snowy shores of the East Coast.
Stephanie Gilmore was a world-champion surfer when a brutal attack by a stranger nearly ended her career. Now she's back on top, with a sixth world title, and reveals how she found happiness again—in the most unexpected places.
When it came time to find someone for the cover of our annual happiness issue, Stephanie Gilmore jumped off the page. With six world surfing titles and a balanced outlook on life we could all learn from, the surf star lives by some pretty simple words: "I'm going to just enjoy exactly where I am." Fortunately for Gilmore, she is usually in places like Hawaii, Mexico, and Sri Lanka chasing the biggest waves she can find. We caught up with one of surfing's best photographers, Morgan Maassen, who has been shooting Gilmore for years, both on and off the water. Maassen says it best, "Stephanie always has three things on her: a magic surfboard, some sort of exotic guitar, and her golden smile."
Surround your teens with furniture inspired by the 11-time world champ
Performance wear that makes you the canvas
It’s not just for elite athlete. Training alone—in the right dose—will make you a faster and more resilient athlete.
Specializing in one sport will take you only so far. To really break through, you'll need to branch out.
Examining the perpetual youth and singular talent of surfing's king
The Olympic gold medalist makes a name for herself as a big-wave surfer.
America's best kept surfing secret? Missoula, Montana. Not your first guess, we know, but photographer Paolo Marchesi stumbled upon a band of dedicated wave junkies in the heart of the West. Strongwater Surf Shop doesn't have beachfront access, but the store and it's loyal followers will do anything for a few good turns. Marchesi caught up with the crew this summer for an unexpected day of endless rides on the Lochsa River.
After his loss to 20-year-old Brazilian phenom Gabriel Medina in historic conditions at the Billabong Pro Tahiti, the 11-time world champion will want an even dozen more than ever.
Last year in Nazaré, Portugal, the Brazilian surfer nearly drowned while trying to ride the biggest wave ever surfed by a woman. Most of the alpha males who dominate the sport say Gabeira doesn't belong in their ranks, but nothing will stop her from going back in.
Cold-weather surfers are cut from a different cloth. Eager to travel north, these guys dodge icebergs between sets and aren't afraid to freeze for the perfect Arctic barrel. Photographer Chris Burkard has the heart of a cold-weather surfer but more impressively, the eye to capture these stunning Nordic scenes from places such as Iceland, Norway, and Russia.
Though tourism is El Salvador’s fastest-growing industry, its long history of gang violence and civil unrest has put it on the State Department’s travel warning list. Its capital, San Salvador, has one of the highest murder rates in Latin America, due primarily to bloody wars carried out…
For some surfers and SUPers, hanging ten is the holy goal—toes on the nose, nothing in front of you but pure green wave. With a nerve disorder threatening to destroy his balance, longtime kook Erik Hedegaard asked a waveriding genius to train him for one last shot.
With a world record on the line, determining the winner of the Billabong XXL "Biggest Wave" award turned into one of the toughest judgment calls in big wave surfing's history.
Perth was thrust into the public consciousness recently for being the home base of the search for missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 in the Indian Ocean. But this city of 1.7 million people with a Mediterranean climate on the remote southwestern corner of Australia has hardly been a secret…
Timbertek's packable Baked Potato is a tough and tiny surfboard
Some of the world’s scariest waves explode off the coast of Portugal, and North Shore gunslinger Garrett McNamara won’t stop until he’s tamed an elusive wave he calls Big Mama
Professional coach Candace Shadley dishes her secrets on how to become a better mountain biker.
Great beginner surf destinations need consistent waves, easy access to skilled instructors, and sparse crowds—a trifecta that can be especially hard (but not impossible) to find on the East Coast. These five, spread from Florida all the way up to New Hampshire, are the standouts. Each one boasts the…
What’s a niche adventure photographer to do when social media and technology create the perfect environment for copycats? In the case of North Shore wave photographer Clark Little, put down the coffee, assess the mayhem, and then dive right in.
Every good athlete has at least one soft spot. Want to be great? Strengthen your weakest link.
A peeping stroll is not an acceptable last outdoor gasp before winter. Presenting the best active autumn escapes.
You don't need to spend a fortune to have a great adventure. With a few tweaks, you can avoid the 10 biggest—and often most expensive—travel mistakes.
Surf icon Dave Kalama is still riding 60-foot waves and winning Stand-UP-paddleboarding races two years shy of his 50th birthday. What’s his secret? Stephanie Pearson enlists at the waterman’s legendary North Shore camp, where he serves up nonnegotiable commandments for lifelong fitness—and lots and lots of crunches.
The surf legend's crucial exercises to achieve full-body strength for any athlete
Photographer Chris Burkard chartered a Soviet military chopper and four-wheel-drive carrier truck, gathered six of his toughest friends, and set off on a two-week exploration of the remote, wild 780-mile-long Russian peninsula. Guess what he brought back?
At age 14, Zak Noyle took his first photo at a Hawaiian shore break. By 25, he was a senior staff photographer at Surfer. We checked in with him several accolades and awards later, on his 27th birthday.
Alejo Muniz wins $100,000 in a wave-less finale, and eight spectators are arrested in a riot.
Australian surfer David Scard, 37, runs Kirra-based World Surfaris’ Stealth Travel Club, which whisks surfers to the biggest waves at a moment’s notice. His success rate: 100 percent.