Retro Revalution - the surf comp that changed perception!

Classic Boards from Vudu Surf (Photo: Stix)

The new School of Llandudno go old School. (Photo: Stix)

It’s been an emotional three days for me, since we had the Retro contest on Sunday. The amount of positive messages and feedback, have been simply amazing. We started the event, because we wanted to bring back what was good and pure in surfing – the Stoke! No judges, results or competition, as Andrew “Roosta” Lange stated, we took the Con out of Contest. The result was one of the most enjoyable days on the beach, probably since the seventies hey day of hippy vans, mind enhancing narcotics and free love.

The Boys were having fun. (Photo: Surfers against Shark Cage Diving)

What was the point, one could be forgiven for asking – I mean what’s the point of a contest that has no results, does that not make it redundant? Simply put that’s right, but we wanted people to come down and enjoy a surf session with total strangers, not to compete, but to actually enjoy surfing together. We wanted people to experience the joy of riding a piece of surfing history, that rides totally different to the super expensive, light weight pocket rocket they surf normally. To just for a moment enjoy the same feeling a living legend like the Oom Whitfield, Johnny Paarman or Shaun Thompson felt on one of their surfboards from the 60’s, 70‘s and 80’s.

Roosta cross stepping where most are running. (Photo: Winston Kletter)

The God of surfing must have blessed us, because the howling, raging South Easter backed off, the supposed to be Flat Ocean was delivering perfect little 2-3ft peaks and over a 1000 people made the most of the idyllic day. “Well done man! I just called Spider and the boys back in Durban and told them today makes me feel like I am back at the old events at the Bay of Plenty!” some swarthy father of a local Grom tells me. It warms my heart. “That was the most fun session in ages!” local ripper, Michael February shouts with joy as he returns his board after the heat. Everywhere I looked on Sunday, people with silly grins, bright loud retro outfits and the sound of laughter met my eyes. The bar ran out of beer three times – it was exceedingly hot and thirsty work having so much fun – and even this was met by a shrug of the shoulders and the sight of men drinking pink fruit mixers instead. Ladies in bikinis were everywhere.

The Lawn was busy! (Photo: Stix)

Surfing wise the crowd got to enjoy some of SA’s top surfers caning it on retro boards. Jordy Smith, Royden Bryson and Michael February, the contest machines, were joined by big wave legends such as Mickey Duffus and Mikey Schlebach. Local rippers like Liam “Yeti” Wood and Logan Eales showed the crew how barrels get ridden in the Gat. The girls were going hard – local lifeguard Kirsten Kingma surfing her heat in a Bikini, real old school style even with the 10-degree water temperature. Roosta was not to be outdone at his own sponsor event and made one of the most ridiculous tail drop board shuffles ever seen. The Kat would have been proud!

Jordy, Roosta and Twig jammin retro. (Photo: Stix)

jordy taking a retro board to new places, Pottz would be proud. (Photo: Winston Kletter)

Once it was time to reward the masses for their participation, every single entrant won a prize, from t-shirts, to deck grip, from ladies underwear to ding repair kits. Best wave of the day went to the Fool himself, Michael Grendan, who popped up from the deep south of Scar Barbaria to educate all of us on what is possible on an old, aircraft carrier of a John Whitmore surfboard. He won a collector’s “Life of LLandudno” book in honor of his skills. We had prizes for best retro wetsuit and board, won by stunning local girls, who refused to let the boys dominate proceedings.

The Fool took the best wave award! (Photo: Stix)

After the dust settled the bar took off with music from the local patch surfers. Twiggy poured the tequila, the bands jammed hard and we danced our feet off and away, like the carefree hippies of yesteryear. The day was done and we had just for a moment got rid of all the modern day worries and complexities, replaced instead with good vibes, good times and retro vibrations.

Captain Kai

Big thanks to RVCA, Vudu Surf, Roosta, Robby MacDonald, Debi Shabason, Sally Berold, Andrew Black, Gavin Wright, Hurricane, Llandudno Lifesaving, Pull In Underwear, Reef Wetsuits, Suikerbossie, Carey Ann, Wet Sack, the musicians and theGoodLife. If I forgot anyone, please forgive me - Everyone who came or was involved deserves a prize! ;)


Everyone was a winner, but the official prizes were:

Best wave - Michael "Fool" Grendon - for a long barrel on a old John Whitmore beast.
Runners up - Liam "Yeti" Wood and Sean Gibson, also for tubes.

Best retro wetsuit - Amy Kins

Best retro bikini - Leonie von Hase

Best retro boards - Robby MacDonald for the best collection in SA!