Padang Cup’s New Management: Gen Z

Mostly ecstasy, with a little decay around the edges.

This was Padang today.

The ecstasy was obvious. Three perfect 10s. An average heat total of 16.02 points, rising to 17.83 in the final, culminating in South Coast NSW’s Lucy Darragh and Lakey Peak’s Rajo Barrel winning the 23rd Rip Curl Padang Cup with aplomb under a golden sunset. Two Gen Zs with white-hot futures and a combined age of Ian Crane.

The landmark moment of decay arrived aboard a jet ski during the mens final. When a Russian man on an Al Leone-stickered waterhorse drifted directly toward the end bowl blissfully unaware his noble steed was pushing wake all over the lineup. When somebody (i.e. everybody) pointed out the flaw in this arrangement, he responded with a hostile stare and threatening gesticulations, before speeding off toward Dreamland.

There is probably an essay to be written about Bali’s increasingly surreal convergence of world-class surfing, unchecked development and men from former Soviet republics behaving as though maritime law is an optional Western affectation. This is not that essay.

This is about the Padang Cup, which was very, very good.

There was some concern early. The conventional wisdom is that low tide is when Padang does its best work. It was not especially persuasive this morning.

I headed for the channel early under the assumption that less water over the reef would at least improve the visions. Within about 30 seconds of climbing onto the ski, I was involuntarily rear-naked-choking water safety six feet in the air as we launched over a cleanup set, narrowly avoiding an unplanned electronics salvage mission.

Once we reached the channel, it looked funky. Too big, perhaps. Too south. A strange rib through the end bowl. Roll-ins that looked promising and then simply ceased to exist.

Concern burnt off with the morning fog, around 10am, when Padang decided to behave itself and took on an almost angelic form until sundown.

***

Chirp of it being “the best Padang this season” began circulating through the channel by midday, which is the sort of claim surfers make approximately seven times a year. I’ve been here for exactly 24 hours, and previously not for six years, but concurred with the local boat drivers nonetheless.

Bruce Irons, Taj Burrow and company looked less like veterans indulging in nostalgia than men demonstrating that very specific forms of expertise depreciate more slowly than athleticism. Bruce was sick as a dog, reportedly. His panache tube entries were definitely sicker though.

Now, I wasn’t watching the TV. I simply spent most of the day within earshot of Jed Smith riffing, who was hilarious, informative and and should definitely start a surf podcast. As was Contest Director Harry Mann, who functioned as a semi-staunch terrestrial foil to the intergalactic, mystical and increasingly indescribable reaches of Jedaum’s inner cosmos.

For me, Round 2, Heat 3 of the Rip Curl Padang Cup men’s event was the true highlight of the day. Makana Pang posted 19.23 points to lock in the top spot on the leaderboard. Indo-born-and-raised Rajo Barrel and Dyl Wilcoxen both dropped 10s. Bruce Irons posted a very respectable 15-point heat total. According to far more credible sources who attend this event in the flesh ritually, it was one of the more memorable heats in the Cup’s 23-year history.

It also meant that for the remaining three heats, Tosh Tudor, who sitting fourth on the leaderboard and yanked into the booth for , was tweaking. There aren’t many waves where a 17-plus scoreline is unworthy of a final. That’s how good and consistent Padang was from midday onwards.

And, this feels icky to say, but winning didn’t seem entirely the point. There was remarkably little politicking, sourness or visible ego among the competitors. Winners and losers hung around, watched heats, screamed for each other and generally behaved like people who were quite pleased to be surfing very good Padang with their friends.

You’d almost call it wholesome, were the whole thing not fringed by spider-web-tatted, Y2K-clad degenerates busily accelerating the diminishing returns on the word “core.”

That might be the enduring image of the day: two teenagers winning one of surfing’s most intimidating tube contests, Bruce Irons coughing his lungs out before packing six-foot Padang, Jed Smith broadcasting from another astral plane, and a Russian sipping seltzer on a jet ski in the impact zone.

Bali remains a difficult place to summarise.

The Padang Cup, thankfully, was a little easier.