There’s an entire taxonomy of superstition: touching wood, saluting magpies, holding your breath past graveyards, crossing fingers.

Essentially, a series of nano-religions based on the hope that one can steer clear of harm’s way, unjinxed. And, as far as surf travel is concerned, unskunked.

Fingers Crossed, Tosh Tudor’s new edit on his Foamballed broadcasting network, alludes precisely to that. The title nods to managing expectations, because nothing jinxes a session faster than mistimed optimism.

It’s said that early Christians crossed their fingers to recognise one another under the threat of Romans, their lions, and dinner parties with awkward endings.

Here, you get the sense that Tosh and Koldo Illumbe — two light, loose-limbed goofyfoots with impeccable taste in round waves — could reinvent the gesture not just as a makeshift amulet but as a kind of secret handshake, earned only after logging double-digit minutes inside those very waves.

Tosh, son of Joel, keeps adding to his PhD in tube ergonomics, and his half-Basque, half-Indonesian travelling companion Koldo, with privileged access to the world’s best cold and warm-water lefts, doesn’t lag far behind.

Tosh’s unorthodox approach to tube-riding looks less functional than he proves it to be, making this and other recent edits essential educational viewing.

Trigger warning: the unexpected ear canal absorption of “Pendulum” by Sports Coach might momentarily trick you into thinking you’re rewatching Zipper with Chippa, Eithan, and Taro. You’re not.

But feel free to do so here.

In the latest episode of How Surfers Get Paid, Stephen “Belly” Bell recalls the time he told Dane Reynolds he’d have to enter contests as part of his contractual obligations.

Dane insisted he didn’t like them, despite finishing #4 in the world in 2010. “Every time he won, he loved a surf contest,” Belly said, referring to Dane’s reluctance to paddle out in lycra in front of hundreds, sometimes thousands.

Some of Dane’s Chapter11 disciples, meanwhile, would kill for a shot at the Big Show — Dimitri Poulos chief among them.

Above, DP takes a DR approach to an overdone but rightfully enduring Californian tradition — the short flight to the best righthand pointbreaks in the Northern Hemisphere during summertime. No, Ribeira D’ilhas probably won’t stand up against these waves come September, but it’s darn good prep for the 2026 CT schedule.

The (unsponsored) 22-year-old is currently sitting at #14 in the Challenger Series, with an entire crew at CH11TV HQ clocking off and cracking cold Coors Lights every time he surfs a heat (trigger fingers at the ready as his USO R64 is shortly upcoming).

At upload time, the description for the clip you’re about to watch reads: “Dimitri Poulos will probably be Ventura’s next surfer to make the tour one day” — and Dane’s fingers very likely typed it.

If you’ve been remotely observant, you’ll already know something significant is about to unfold.

For the past three or so years, Logan Dulien’s been drip-feeding us b-sides from the final instalment of his Snapt series. Last week, the Snapt5 trailer dropped, and as expected, it set off a domino effect. Jaws. Guts. Pants. Everything fell in a rather undignified manner.

The film will have 19 sections and run a lavish 1 hour and 15 minutes. Trailer below.

Of course, it comes with eyes that water a little too easily, given what this release means. The fifth instalment of Snapt is the beloved saga’s final curtain.

“This is really just one last go at it — for the love of surfing, the fans, and my passion for surf films.”

In the lead up, over the past three years, we’ve seen Clay Marzo’s Desert Point leftovers, Noa Deane doing Noa Deane things, Taro Watanabe in remote Indo — all of them leaving a rather unsettling taste in the mouth. If these are the scraps, then whatever’s still simmering might just burn the house to the ground.

Now, we get Jack Robbo’s rehearsals. And at this point, it’s starting to feel a little absurd. A couple of moments here that should, by any rational reckoning, make their way into the canon of surf films across any conceivable cinematic universe. A Bruce Irons-esque straight-air-to-rev, for one, and a fall from the curtain air-drop in West Oz that whispers at Manners’ Blastoid moment.

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Are you sure these are the B-sides, Chucky? You sure you haven’t mixed up the clips and slipped Robbo’s actual section in by mistake? No judgment here. For all you’ve done for surfing, you’ve earned the right to fumble. We’ll forgive you.

See also, for a real measure of character — Logan playing manager (or agent?) in the contract negotiations for Clay Marzo, doing the talking, the negotiating, and ensuring Clay got every scent he was worth. And not taking a penny in return. If there’s a hero in the latest How Surfers Get Paid episode, it’s Chucky.

Snapt5 officially premieres on August 2nd at Sealegs in Huntington Beach, during the US Open of Surfing. Blak Bear Surf Club will be premiering their new film as the opening act. And in typical Snapt fashion, Andre Nickatina will shut the party down.

Get tickets here — only 30 left online — the rest can be found at Bear Flag, Aipono Cafe and Frog House in Newport Beach.

Hook, line, and… Cinca. Another crew of surfers has entered the alcohol arms race, again out of the Gold Coast, the same boozy breeding ground that birthed Balter and Fizz.

Enter Cinca: a not-quite-real word dreamt up by its five female co-founders, all incidentally CT veterans: Steph Gilmore, Laura Enever, Nikki Van Dijk, Macy Callaghan, and Dimity Stoyle.

That’s five women, eight world titles, a big wave World Record, a popping DJ, and one tequila brand with a custom vowel job.

“It’s a play on ‘cinco’, the Spanish word for five,” Steph explained. “We added the feminine ‘a’ at the end… ’cos we’re females.”

Uno, dos, tres, cuatro… Cinca.

Got it? Good.

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As for the liquid, it’s not brewed in a Mermaid Beach garage. Like Champagne and Chardonnay, tequila has rules. Namely, it must be made in the state of Jalisco (and a few surrounding areas), from 100% blue agave. Cinca follows protocol. ‘Dreamed up in Australia, distilled in Mexico’, via a third-party distillery, reads their tagline. Ergo: white-label, but make it surfy.

Still, Steph insists it’s cleaner than the bog-inducing hangovers that come standard with your average supermarket bottle. Fewer additives. Better production methods. A gentler reckoning the morning after.

Cinca joins a growing list of surf-adjacent spirits. Taylor Steele’s Solento launched in 2019 and just threw a gluttonous poolside bash at the Mondrian for its eponymous film fest. Meanwhile, tequila as a category is white-hot: it’s now outselling whiskey and vodka in U.S. bars. According to Forbes, 2025’s been its breakout year.

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The plan? BWS and Dan Murphy’s are firmly on the vision board. RTDs are on the horizon. For now, the team’s grappling with ABAC compliance and learning that Australia’s liquor laws make the WSL rulebook look like a napkin doodle.

Personally, I’ve always admired tequila’s unique ability to bestow charisma, courage, and immortality, unlike say soju, which mainly induces tears.

Now that it’s she-GOAT certified?

I’ll take two. Neat. With lime.

A powerful earthquake struck off Russia’s far eastern Kamchatka Peninsula early Wednesday morning, prompting tsunami warnings across multiple countries in the Pacific. The quake, initially recorded as magnitude 8.0, has since been upgraded to 8.7 by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS).

“They’re telling us get to higher ground and that we could possibly see a tidal change of 10 feet which would be huge for us,” Hawaiian surfer and filmmaker Kuio Young told Stab. This is on a stretch of coast where beachfront homes have already been threatened by storms and coastal erosion.

The WSL, currently running the US Open of Surfing at Huntington Beach, has notified competitors that tomorrow’s event is delayed, pending the condition of the beach, the contest site, and whether the city reopens beach access.

The epicenter of the quake was located approximately 125 kilometers southeast of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, a city of 165,000 people on the Avacha Bay coastline. The quake struck at a shallow depth of 19.3 kilometers, intensifying the potential for tsunami activity.

Interestingly, Kamchatcka is where Fraser Dovell, Letty Mortensen, Spencer Frost and Guy Williment filmed their surf film by the same name Kamchatcka in. See our feature, What’s It Like To Fly Into Russia On Invasion Day For A Surf Trip?.

Letty described the Kamchatcka region as, “old and cold, and they’ve got like 150 volcanoes around the city. It’s really beautiful. You’ll see old, rundown Soviet buildings and then a lot of newer, nicer buildings as well. The people are beautiful, man. We met the surf community there and they were so excited to have us and show us Kamchatka, they love their home.“

Tsunami alerts were swiftly issued for Russia, Japan, Hawaii, the US mainland (California, Oregon and Washington) and several Pacific islands. In Kamchatka, waves as high as 3 to 4 meters were recorded, according to Russian reports.

Japan’s Meteorological Agency issued tsunami warnings along its eastern Pacific coast, from Hokkaido down to Wakayama Prefecture, urging immediate evacuations. Waves between 1 to 3 meters were expected, with authorities warning that tsunamis could strike repeatedly. “Do not enter the sea or approach the coast until the warning is lifted,” the agency said in a statement.

In Hawaii, residents received emergency alerts urging them to move to higher ground, with projected wave heights of 1 to 3 meters. Tsunami advisories were also issued for parts of Alaska’s Aleutian Islands, Guam, and other U.S. territories including Midway Island, Johnston Atoll, and Palmyra Island.

Elsewhere in the Pacific, countries such as Palau, the Marshall Islands, and the Philippines were warned to expect tsunami waves ranging from 0.3 to 1 meter.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center cautioned that, based on preliminary data, “widespread hazardous tsunami waves are possible.” Evacuations are underway in several regions as authorities monitor the situation closely.

More to come.

The northernmost restaurant in Los Angeles County is Neptune’s Net — a campy emporium of deep-fried chum that served as the backdrop for the most crucial conversation in the Fast and Furious saga.

Your next stop — technically — for food driving up Hollywood’s favored stretch of coast would be 12.1 miles north at a Subway inside Naval Base Ventura County, formerly known merely as Point Mugu.

If you don’t live in California, there’s no reason to know about this base or the wave that lingers inside. It remains uncrowded and seldom filmed (didn’t stop Marine Layer Productions from making this classic though), not because nobody knows about it (every CA surfer who can do a foam climb does) but because it’s off limits to the general public 363 days out of the year.

Those two days outstanding, though? Those are courtesy of the annual Point Mugu Surf Contest, a federally-recognized “Community Engagement Event” that allows anyone from the general public to watch the event and anyone who signs up for the contest to surf the stretch of beach for a 48-hour period.

Best part? The base can’t charge anyone a dime. It’s free, unfettered access to a beautiful, unique 1,500-yard stretch of coastline.

The 2025 Point Mugu Surf Contest wrapped up two days ago — on Sunday the 27th. It was a difficult swell window; the waves were pumping the weekend prior and they are set to be fun this coming weekend, but it was slim pickings on comp day. But, thanks to a charmed Southward orientation and an underwater canyon magnifying every burst of south swell, the waves were plenty contestable, with even the odd tube bolstering scores.

The contest runs on an Open system, meaning, in any heat you could have a pro next to a guy who learned to surf last year. The talent distills around the Quarterfinals mark, but it’s pretty novel to see Victor Bernardo do a full rotation and then your buddy Mark grind a could-be-floater out on the sand.

The main talent this year consisted of the aforementioned Victor Bernardo (one of Album’s leading men), Chapter 11 affiliate Cory Arrambide, and Ventura standout Tanner Vodraska.

In the end, it was Cory Arrambide winning for the Men, Demi Boelsterli for the Women, Lou Deforest for the Military division, and Fynn Neth for the Juniors.

Check the status of next year’s contest and sign up here to breathe some of the military industrial complex’s rarified air.

A big week for Brandon Wasserman on Stabmag.com.

First, his 2022 How Surfers Get Paid interview resurfaced, spotlighting royalties, equities, and YouTube monetization as the holy trinity of surfing’s modern revenue stream. Second, architecting the star signing of Erin Brooks to Nike as “an all-round athlete”. Apparently, the Swoosh is allergic to calling anyone a plain old surfer — the brand applied those same lofty terms to announce Italo Ferreira and Sierra Kerr’s deals.

Now, Brandon’s rounded things out by luring the GOAT to the green pastures of William Morris Endeavor (WME) Talent — the agency managing the deals, partnerships, and speaking schedules of some of the biggest names in sport, fashion, music, and film. On the roster? Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, Serena Williams, Luka Doncic, Dua Lipa, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Christian Bale, Billie Eilish — and now, Kelly Slater.

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Always good to remember: surfers remain the tallest midgets in the pop cultural koi pond. Nevertheless, the GOAT may cast the longest shadow of our salted kind. 11 world titles, 56 CT wins, youngest and oldest World Champ…

Brandon already manages 3x World Champ John Florence and reps Ethan Ewing, Erin Brooks, Kai Lenny, and Nathan Florence. Not clear on the difference between a manager and agent? You’ll want to watch our latest episode of How Surfers Get Paid.

“A manager is across all the day-to-day projects, partnerships, and business transactions. An agent hunts deals,” Brandon told us previously. For Slater, he’ll be playing the latter role only — driving the next wave of sponsor contracts. But, just to be clear, Terry Hardy still owns the Slater chessboard.

Terry — Kelly’s longtime manager of 20+ years — is the guy Brandon once described as “the guy who brought Hollywood dealmaking into surfing.” He reshaped what athlete contracts looked like, adding zeroes and equity stakes to contracts that once offered a few trunks and a handshake. He’ll continue managing Slater and his businesses, which include enough ventures to keep a small village employed: Outerknown, Firewire, KLLY, KSWC, Austin Surf Club, Freaks of Nature, Endorfins, Rhythmia (ayahuasca retreat), and YORKS (Nova Scotian repurposed lumber).

“It’s pretty rare to have your business built out to a point where you need both an agent and a manager,” Brandon explained. Which is why, to date, only John Florence and Kelly Slater — both serial entrepreneurs — require that level of infrastructure.

Slater credited Hardy with shielding him from the industry’s messier politics and negotiating some of the most consequential contracts of his career.  “He would deal with the bullshit,” Kelly recalled in his HSGP interview. “The business side, the politics. That’s what Terry does best — keep all that stuff away from me.”

With Hardy at the helm and Wasserman out shaking the money trees, Slater can clear his inbox, chase swell, and clock quality time with his new-ish born — preferably somewhere without cell service.

More on surfing’s powerbrokers in the Agents + Managers episode of How Surfers Get Paid.

Our wireless fidelity-connected devices recently lit up with images of Mikey February at a remote wave, a world away from you and me.

Immediately contacted by Stab, Mikey told us he didn’t want to put out any footage from the swell just yet. The instant gratification of claiming pole position on a surf media outlet felt misaligned with the wishes of locals hoping to shield their wave (and its preferred conditions) from the clout circus.

Both Mikey and his travel companions stood their ground, but that didn’t stop poached images from circulating before the release of this clip, much like the previously bootlegged tracks that now make up Piano & a Microphone, Prince’s first posthumous album.

Recorded straight to cassette in a single take, the album’s opening track imperfectly aligns with a wave that, despite Mikey’s flawless approach, remains the unequivocal star.

Prince’s enigma only deepened with fame, and while they exist in very different worlds, Mikey’s trajectory draws curious parallels to The Artist Formerly Known As.

With a sparing but not inconsequential output, Mikey February’s Spearhead Unlimited seems to project onto him a spirit seldom found in the rest of the professionalized surfing scene.

Prince once said, “I’m searching for a higher plane, but I want the most of being on earth. When you have faith, serotonin starts pumping in your brain.”

Finding this wave took more than mere faith, and maybe now Mikey’s a little closer to whatever the multi-instrumentalist was on about.