Listen: Watch Out El Niño, Italo Is Hurt And Coming For You

Ethan Ewing caught 199 waves over six days while shooting SITD. In El Salvador, he couldn’t surf more than four before to avoid a Round 2 loss to Callum Robson.

Correlation, causation, or cosmic intervention? Buck and Mikey investigate none of these properly.

The duo discuss the carnage in El Salvador, where a physically compromised Italo Ferreira has maintained the rankings lead, the unlikely but very real scenario in which Filipe Toledo, Griffin Colapinto and Ethan Ewing are all out of the comp, and how an in form Al Cleland Jr is making inroads at a wave perfectly suited to his brand of powerful rail surfing. There are also opportunities to damage your finances with our in-house financial advisor, Michael Ciaramella.

Episode 1 of Surf100 Challenge Series Presented by Pacifico is discussed, its first weak link revealed, and a candid assessment of some of its characters takes up a chunk of airtime before Buck teases Episode 2, dropping soon on Stab and our YouTube channel.

There is also the pressing matter of a Florida man who voluntarily paid his way into 27 wavepools around the world, occasionally going to the extreme of renting a towel, and confirming that Switzerland remains one of the world’s leading innovators in extracting money from foreign visitors.

For those allergic to saltwater, this may be the most comprehensive guide to wave generating machines we’ve ever published.

Guest starring in this episode of The Drop is the infamous El Niño, the weather phenomenon invented by the Pixies for their 1989 hit “Wave of Mutilation”, which accidentally brought immense joy to surfers worldwide and a considerable amount of distress to coastal populations.

Buck and Mikey discuss, analyse, dissect and speculate on what the Northern Hemisphere might have planned for its AW27 presentation thanks to the return of the prodigal son and the apocalypse foretold in his wake.

To wrap up, they wander through upcoming Stab Premium projects and 12 chances for our members to win one of the SITD boards made for (and in some cases ridden by) Ethan Ewing.

All of which is to say: plenty happened in surfing this week.