Table of contents for June 2017 (41.4) in Zigzag

I f I’d admitted it during my high school years, I would have been laughed off the field at lunch break. At the time our interests were; surfing, punk rock, girls and getting up to mischief – in no particular order. So if I’d told my group of mates that I had a great interest in flowers, I probably would’ve been asked to leave the circle of trust. Thankfully we don’t stay teenagers forever, and I can confess my love for botany without fear of being ridiculed. In fact, most of the “tough guys” I grew up with lost their edginess by their midthirties as well. But what has this got to do with surfing? Well, nothing and everything. Surfing as we know is heavily influenced by nature, so as…

“Well, it’s a little bit of an awkward name. We call it the ‘Spermie’ but I think that may be a little inappropriate,” laughs Brandon Jackson when asked about the chunky number he is seen boosting across these pages on. “It’s the Sperm Whale model by Channel Islands, created by Dane Reynolds.” Keen to add a bit of spunk to his quiver, Jacko picked up the 5’4”* glider four years ago, and has recently been grabbing it from the rack more often than not. “Having become more of a desk jockey nowadays, I don’t have the luxury of selecting when I go surf. It’s either before or after work, and the waves are generally small here in Durban with the harbour wall blocking most of our swell,” reckons Jacko glumly…

Five months, that’s how long the wave drought persisted in Durban. The last big day was on 6 October 2016, and the locals were becoming a little desperate Five months, that’s how long the wave drought persisted in Durban. The last big day was on 6 October 2016, and the beachfront only roared to life again on 12 March 2017. That’s 156 days of waiting. In that time there’s only so much breath-hold, running, swimming and surfing training one can do. It also becomes torturous seeing constant Instagram posts of guys getting barrelled in Cape Town throughout summer. Durban surfers were becoming a little desperate. That all changed once we saw a big storm developing off Madagascar. Enawo was the fifth cyclone in the Indian Ocean this year, and the…

Then, because misery loves company, his girl dropped him, his sponsor cut back and a gigantic tree crushed half his house. As bad as it gets, basically Sometimes you just need a luck. Casey Grant was having a bad run. His job as a skipper at the Blue Ocean Dive Resort means he has to tackle the treacherous Umkomaas river mouth daily, ferrying divers out to swim with the raggies at the infamous Aliwal Shoal. One day he misjudged it, got the boat side-on to a wave and flipped, tossing the whole crew. “It was just a stupid mistake I made at sea and it could have cost lives.” He says seriously, cutting himself no slack. In the background, he was circling a business opportunity but things had stalled and…

This is how the wheels come off a surf trip. The Sheriff, when angered, can be a dangerous man “Big jol last night. Way bigger than expected.” Says Sheriff over a steaming cup, early the next morning. “Everyone came out of the woodwork. And now Jordan’s AWOL.” This is how the wheels come off a surf trip. The Sheriff, when angered, can be a dangerous man. But Jordan turned up just in time for the early morning tuk-tuk back to the glassy A-frames of Hikkaduwa. Crisis averted, for now. But Jordan is brave and hung and goes back to sleep on a deck chair in the shade. Eventually the Sheriff, turns around and prods him, not gently, with the monopod. “Get in.” He orders. Jordan does not complain, like a…

Name/ M i t c h D u P r e e z Date of birth/ 17/01/2003 Hometown/ East London SPONSORS/ Billabong / Island Style / Spider Surfboards / VonZipper / Boarding SA / Surfears How did you start surfing? My Dad taught me how to surf on our first trip to Mozambique and Malawi. Favourite shape? 5’1” Slash from Spider. Favourite surfer? Owen Wright. Biggest mistake you’ve made? Back-chatting my Dad. Who inspires you? My whole family because they are awesome! Proudest moment this past year? Winning the PST and Border Junior Surfer of the Year Award – both for the second year in a row. Goal for 2017? To win SA Champs, do more trips and win as many events as possible. Favourite wave? Tofinho, Mozambique. Worst wave…

Wave modelling is done by some of the world’s most powerful supercomputers. NOAA’s bus-sized Cray supercomputer processes 3 quadrillion calculations per second. It produces arguably the best hurricane / typhoon / cyclone forecasts on the planet. The subsequent wave modelling is done with equally gob-smacking processing power. These are great when the forecasts are spot on. But when they’re wrong, we have to fall back on some old school methods. They are real time observations, but have proven themselves over the years to be an accurate and excellent barometer of large cyclone surf. For example: are the waves breaking inside North Beach Wimpy? Are people running around screaming “tsunami”? Is the lifeguard hut floating out to sea? When this happens, we can extrapolate that any forecast less than three metres…

Chapter 1 “If you don’t just go, you’ll never get a wave,” says a woman on a longboard at Huletts, while she scratches around looking for scraps between sets. She paddles hard and takes-off on a little runner. Since my days of one-for-me-onefor- you around a Smartie box, I’ve been a fan of equal share. But either I am losing my ability to count, or I suspect some of us might not be playing nice. Is it really harder for women to get an equal share of waves than it is for men? For context, have a dig around in the history books. You’ll find that once surfing was adopted from Hawaii by Western culture, it became primarily a maledominated space. Seven-times women’s world champion, Layne Beachley, believes the place…

Every year around this time, the excitement grows. Winter is when nature delivers her greatest gifts to surfers... deep winter groundswells. And soon the world’s best surfers will arrive and attempt to show us how to surf them properly. The locals will jostle, hustle, imitate, innovate and ultimately give it back just as hard, or harder, because this is our house, thanks for coming! It’s a yearly carnival that accelerates the learning curve of the South African surf community and keeps us conected to the global standard of the sport we love. And it’s the most wonderful time of the year for a surf mag like Zag. To say we’re excited is a bit of an understatement. Every year produces something that makes us sit back and say, hell yeah,…

Although surf conditions are hugely dependent on the weather both locally and hundreds of kilometres away where our waves are formed, if the surf is up then rain or wind aren’t going to keep us from enjoying a sick session – like it would if we’d chosen cycling, golf or cricket as our favourite pastime instead. You’ll find surfers out there shredding in roaring winds and on breathless days, rain, shine or thunderstorm. Whether the sun is sparkling to kick-off a glorious day, like it was this morning for Mikey February and Ian Thurtell to team-up for this grand shot, or there’s no sun at all, some epic sessions are going down. Flip the page for a different perspective.…

In Sri Lanka surf delivers in abundance. What a beautiful dream After 15 hours in transit, the taxi from Colombo belched us into the dark jungle just after midnight. The plants breathing musty tropical aromas, the onshore bringing with it salt and mugginess. Sleep came easy and long. In the morning, with the onshore up, there was no rush. Garrath Glass aka The Landlord, is a South African ex-pat who along with his wife Verity made some money in Dubai before investing it in their own Sri Lankan Shangri-La called Ebb and Flow Jungalows. “Back in the day most surfers on the South coast would only go as far a Hikkaduwa.” Garrath says. “That’s just an hour West and closer to Colombo leaving this area of Midigama and Weligama pretty…

“The waves speak for themselves bra.” Jordan howls. “Just look at the pictures. Super fun. A-frame setups for days. The waves kind of give a feel of a really rippable beachie but it breaks over pretty mellow reef. If you want to get loads of perfect waves with not too much consequence it’s the place to be.” Jordan’s free and easy manner often stood as a stark counterpoint to Casey’s brooding personality, context notwithstanding. Like sunshine and the thunder cloud. But after a few days intensive tropical island surf therapy, Casey has loosened up. And it’s showing in his surfing and an easing of his stormy demeanour. “His surfing is fast, smooth and powerful.” Says Jordan. “But it’s his timing in transition between bottom and top turns that’s just impeccable.…

Victory at pumping Puerto Escondido backed-up with solid results at Jaws and Nazaré, saw Grant Baker claim his second Big Wave World Tour title during the 2016/17 Season. An epic achievement for the proudly South-African charger. But when you break down some of the numbers from his victorious campaign, it starts to become clear just how incredible it was. So, let’s take a look at some stats from Twiggy’s title-winning 2016/17 Season.…

The hobbit-in-chief of this fine magazine gets hold of me once a month to give me a fake deadline and a rough idea of the theme for the next issue. He doesn’t insist that I stick to the theme. In fact, he insists on very little. I appreciate this because he is all that stands between me and an illustrator who would happily hunt me down and murder me when I’m late with the column. Comrade Calvin informed me that the theme for this issue is ‘Awareness’. I wasn’t sure if he was telling the truth or sending me a subtle message that I need to be more aware of the importance of at least meeting his second fake deadline. As far as I’m concerned, there is only one thing…