Table of contents for June 2016 (40.4) in Zigzag

I’m not what you’d call a learned man. After high school and in-between surfing every day, I completed a six month desktop publishing course to round-off my tertiary education. How that got me to where I am today I can only credit to hard work. I imagine that a similar amount of determination is required to charge some of the biggest and heaviest waves on Earth, but I haven’t managed to bridge that work ethic over to surfing. South Africa already has enough brave surfers representing on the global big wave scene, so my services aren’t required in that department – thankfully! The South African surfing landscape is awash with inspiring people, and that’s what this issue is all about. One of these brave men is Simon Lowe, and we…

Westerners come to Bali, walk past a place playing Gamelan [Balinese] music, and say, ‘I don’t like it’. But that’s only because they don’t understand it “Listen Bugs, I don’t know what you did or why, but you better watch your step. Word on the street is that there’s someone after you. And he means business.” Ryan ‘Bugs’ Heathcote put down the phone and took a deep breath. The guy on the other end was Lance Morris. Everyone in Bali knows and respects Lance Morris, even the Laskar Bali gang. Sometimes the Laskar indulge a few white guys as peripheral members or allies of the gang. Even if it’s just to send a message like the one that Lance was passing onto Bugs. And the message was clear. Don’t fuck…

SIMON LOWE ON THE PERFECT WAVE Perfect (adjective): having all the required or desirable elements, qualities, or characteristics. As good as it gets. Perfection for the most part is relative, especially when it comes to surfing. So what makes a perfect wave? Looking back at our 2015 reader survey, 54% of South African surfers prefer a big pit over anything else. 34,85% would rather ride a spitting beach break barrel and 12,16% a grinding reef break. Throw all of these together with a bit of size, and the perfect wave on paper is Jaws. Simon Lowe agrees, from experience. After the best season in recent decades at Pe’ahi drew to a close, we caught up with the stalwart South African big wave charger to find out more about the wave,…

Marshall Boulton left Durban’s shores six years ago to work as a surf guide in Indonesia. These days you can find him at the exclusive Nihiwatu Resort on the island of Sumba, home to Occy’s Left (think Green Iguana). When the first good swell of Indo’s surf season wrapped it’s way in to Occy’s left recently, Marsh was there to meet it – showing Aussie pros Asher Pacey and Beau Foster around the lineup, while photographer Rod Owen shot off a boat in the channel. The first six foot set of the morning approached and Marsh took off straight into the tube. That’s when shit hit the fan – or neck met nose, to be more precise. His brand new board buckled beneath his feet after a chandelier landed on…

As the International Professional Surfing (IPS) circuit that had crowned the world surfing champions since 1976 was supplanted by the Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) world tour under the stewardship of Ian Cairns in 1983, Cape Town burst onto the international surfing scene for five years with a series of rated events featuring the world’s best surfers and showcasing the abundance of quality surf on the most south-westerly point of the African continent. By 1983 pro surfing events such as the Gunston 500, Hang Ten, Mainstay Magnum and the Beach Hotel / Lightning Bolt / Country Feeling (Jeffreys Bay), had been attracting the world’s best surfers to Durban, Umhlanga, East London and Jeffreys Bay for 14 years. But Cape Town was yet to host an international professional surfing event! Late…

The king sits in the backyard of his marvellous compound built exclusively of rocks, wood and clay. He is wearing nothing but a cloth wrapped around his waist. His patchy grey eyebrows hang over his eyes, and deep wrinkles carved into his leathery skin suggest his age to unlikely be less than a hundred. Next to him, his wife carries out water in a calabash. Around the corner the village elders are trying to avoid the scorching heat of the Sahel. They sit hardly moving. How anyone grows old in this environment is beyond my imagination. My eyes wander around the walls of the king’s compound until I catch sight of Issa. He stands there grinning in the doorway. Just this morning Issa’s second born came to join his clan…

I am currently staying in a house in St Francis Bay. I know you don’t care. I’m writing it down for my benefit in case I forget where I am. I have spent a fair bit of time in the last couple of years bouncing between a crazy wife in Cape Town and a weird family in Durban. Quite frankly, I don’t know where home is anymore. That’s okay. Pigeons don’t know where home is either. Unless they’re homing pigeons. But this isn’t about them. This is about me. And, to a lesser degree, you. I generally stop over halfway between the two cities while traversing back and forth from one coast to another in search of answers, cold beer and hot women. Fortunately, the midpoint happens to be Jeffreys…

Whapow! And repeat... What were the odds of Matt Wilkinson smashing his way to victory in the first two events of the 2016 Dream Tour season and opening up a big early lead? We know better than to gamble, but whoever did place a bet on that happening would’ve been smiling all the way to the bank. His coach, Glen Hall too – who has clearly been earning his cut of the winnings. From a surfing perspective it’s not a surprise really, as Wilko’s backhand is one we’ve long admired. It’s the focus and professionalism that Matt has shown that has caught everyone by suprise – even his fellow competitors, who had no answer to the Australian’s dominant displays at Snapper and Bells. Until now, Wilko hasn’t been a major…

It’s official – the World Surf League will be visiting Cape Town for the first time since the epic O’Neill Coldwater Classic event that took place in 2009. Yoyo’s in Lamberts Bay and the popular Big Bay in Bloubergstrand will be the venues for the WQS1000-rated events taking place in May. First up is the Cape Town Pro presented by Quiksilver at Big Bay on 6 - 8 May, followed a week later with the Vans Pro Surf Classic at Yoyo’s between 14 - 15 May. Although a stacked international field isn’t expected due to the number of rating points on offer and the cost of coming to SA, it’s an excellent chance for locals to earn some valuable points on home soil, and we’re expecting the action to be…

PUERTO ESCONDIDO The beach break that sets the standard for all others. My first trip there was in 1992, and I’ve gone back almost every year since. Now days it’s a little crowded, but when it gets a bit bigger and the ground starts shaking you can still get a few bombs to yourself. J-BAY Still the benchmark for any right hand point I stumble upon, J-Bay has it all. Fast down the line speed, fun rippable sections, and insane high speed barrels make this the world’s best wave. With family on the point and guys I consider some of my closest friends as locals, it’s a special wave for me on a personal level. I WAS FORTUNATE TO GROW UP AT MY AUNT CHERON’S HOUSE IN J-BAY. THERE I…

There’s a sublime ratio that exists, one that mathematicians have used and observed as far back as 500 BC. This ratio is shown to exist in art, nature and science. Numerically it is (1+√5)/2 or 1.6180339… and it has many names; the Divine Proportion, the Golden Mean, the Golden Rule and Phi are a few. It is a ratio seen in the seed patterns of fruits, the family tree of bees, the pyramids of Egypt, Renaissance paintings, the human body, shells, on Rasta’s boardshorts… the list is endless. It’s also found, intentionally, in Dan Tomo’s surfboards. You know the boards, we’ve all seen them – Vaders, Evos, and Nanos – models pumped out by Firewire and made available on six continents. The outlines of Dan’s epoxy and PU creations are…