Flightless Obsession features New Zealand’s elite surfers such as provisional Olympic qualifiers Billy Stairmand and Ella Williams along with dozens of the country’s best surfers in a scrapbook-style edit. It is the first crowd-sourced surf movie that Surfing New Zealand has embarked upon to showcase local talent. It has been......
Surf Athletes
We all like to think we are surfers who “could have” made it. These surf athletes actually are making it. From underground heroes to rising groms – this is where we lay bare the best talent in the country.
Five Minutes With: Surfing New Zealand’s Ben Kennings
New Zealand Surf Journal catches up with Surfing New Zealand’s Ben Kennings to discuss broken backs, new constitutions, the Olympic pathway and to find out what he’d do if he had full control of the sport and no resource limitations. The top role at Surfing New Zealand is certainly not......
Paige Alms and Eli Olson win Biggest Wave Paddle-In Award at the World Surf League 2020 Red Bull Big Wave Awards. Celebrating its 20th anniversary, this year’s Big Wave Awards (BWA) honour the best in big wave surfing from the past 12 months, from big-wave breaks throughout the world. Justine......
Maya Gabeira sets a new Guinness World Record for the largest wave ever surfed by a female as she wins XXL Biggest Wave Award. Gabeira’s record-setting wave measured 73.5 feet, besting her own previous World Record of 68 feet. She broke the record at the infamous big-wave surf break, Praia......
World Surf League In Pre-Season Countdown Mode With Charity Events
World Surf League bridges the competition abyss caused by Covid-19 with its pre-season Countdown events. Upcoming competitions will take place in Australia, France, Portugal and Brazil, with nothing on the cards yet for New Zealand’s World Qualifying Series surfers. The idea of these WSL contests is to bring world-class competitive......
Take up one super talented filmmaker. Team them up with one of Australia’s most exciting pro surfers. Send them on a lap of the World Tour together and this is what you get: the epic visual story of Indigenous Australian surfer Soli Bailey. 10 years ago, an Australian surf magazine......
Surfing will make its debut at Tokyo 2020 on July 25, 2021 when the first competition window opens in Japan. In one year’s time the best surfers in the world are set to become the sport’s first Olympians. The International Surfing Association (ISA) celebrated the occasion by announcing the technical......
Filmmaker Morgan Maassen teams up with South Africa’s Jordy Smith to bring this insight into one of the World Surf League’s most stylish surfers. “My longstanding attraction to surfing has always been through the elegance of style,” offers Morgan. “Watching the way someone can navigate a wave, connecting moves, making......
Featured Special Feature: The Ratso Story
I’m standing in the garage with him as he sniffles back the taps and shuffles through a rack full of surfboards, his long hair hanging flat. He pulls one after another out and they’ve all got stories: he’s made a bunch of them, rode others to world titles and has......
On the back of cancelling the 2020 World Championship Tour and Qualifying Series seasons, World Surf League has today unveiled a radical new format for the Championship Tour. To be introduced for the 2021 season that starts at the end of 2020, the WSL Championship Tour will see key format changes.......