So, it’s been over 2 weeks since this exhibition has taken place. That was your spoiler warning. If you didn’t watch the spectacle, I am about to cue you in on what happened. I also have a few more opinions about the whole ordeal. Of course, I’m talking about Stab High, yet again.
First and foremost – complete hats off standing ovation for Sierra Kerr. That shit seriously gave me chicken skin; almost brought tears to my eyes. To fill you in, she landed what has unanimously been labeled as the best air ever done by a female. Take a look.
Not only did this win her the ladybirds division, she also took home the Monster Air award for this feat, as well as nabbing an invitation into the Pipe Masters. Quite a trip for the 15 year old. 35K in the pocket and some history made. Super rad.
The Men’s event was a bit of a different story. If surf fans filled out brackets for this event guessing who would be the winners throughout – similar to that of ‘March Madness’ – I guarantee that not 1 would have been correct.
Did that make any sense?
What I am implying is that nobody – NOT ANY SINGLE PERSON – could have, nor would have predicted this extremely talented field to get whittled down to what became the final heat – Shaun Manners vs. Dakoda Walters vs. Bronson Meydi vs. Rasta Rob vs. Mateus Herdy.
Yes, all extremely talented surfers and aerialists. However, let’s have a look at some of the names who got knocked early: Evan Geiselman, Reef Heazelwood, Mickey Clarke, Ian Crane, Chippa Wilson, Matt Meola, Dion Agius, etc. etc.
On this topic – who the Hell created this list of invitees? How much better would this event have been if it included a few of the CT surfers? Some of the known air guys like Filipe, Italo, Griffin, Yago Dora, and Seth Moniz would have all possibly had a solid chance to win. Or how about the Kai Neville generation? Knees too shot already? No Julian, Reynolds, Jordy Smith, Mitch Coleborn, the lot? Albee Layer? Big list of should have’s..
Baja Koala and Rasta Rob could be the title of a children’s comic book. Err, childrens youtube cartoon series nowadays. My point being – Stab handpicked a bunch of social media famous surfers who they felt could get the most eyes on their project with the least amount of money spent. If they truly wanted to find the best aerialist, they know the steps that could have been taken.
Anyways, Rasta Rob became the winner, and the newest Pipe Masters invitee. Not due to any groundbreaking airs that we were presuming to observe throughout this series, rather by virtue of consistency and cleanliness. Rob, the Florida native will now be competing in what could be a game changing event within the coming weeks.
Congrats to Rasta, as well as to Stab. We’ll all be watching the Pipe Masters…
I’m part way thinking that I should send congrats to the actual parties responsible for this project – Vans and Monster, but nobody reads this shit anyways. This is purely my acknowledgement that Stab is becoming a puppet for those companies which provide the funding for the outlet. Anyways. End rant.
You should watch that whole series if you haven’t yet. It’s free on youtube. Here are all the episodes: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 .
Cheers,
hwilsin