Shane Borland Crowned World’s Best Surf/Skate Crossbreed At Keris Cup
+ Sky Brown dislocates her shoulder, still packs proper Padang tube.
We invited more skaters to Stab High Sydney than any jump comp we’ve run in the past.
Two-time Olympic gold medalist Keegan Palmer made an appearance, along with Greyson Fletcher who, until his early 20s, had rejected his royal surfing heritage. An enigma, then, in the mythical world of adult learners becoming competent surfers.
Sky Brown and Shane Borland were there too, though whether they’re skaters who surf or surfers who skate is still unclear. Zeke showed up as well, obviously. Just as competent on a plank of wood as he is at heckling world champs, that guy.
Are surfing and skating slipping back into each other’s arms again, after years of awkwardly avoiding eye contact? Maybe. The day after Stab High Sydney wrapped, the Keris Cup kicked off — a surf/skate rendezvous at Uluwatu Surf Villas, where two Stab High competitors, when it was all said and done, took home the bounty.
“It all started on Sunday, the day after Stab High,” says Shane Borland. “I kind of missed that day though, because I didn’t want to miss the Stab High after party. Basically, the comp organisers sent out invites, and everyone just stayed at the Uluwatu Surf Villas. They had a bunch of filmers there, and we could go surf anywhere we wanted.”
The comp format went like this: three days to grab your best three surf clips from anywhere in Indonesia. At the end of it, you submit your picks, and on the final night, there’s a skate jam. Whoever’s going hardest, both in the water and on land, takes the win. And, by some quirk of fate, or perhaps the mercy of Vishnu himself, Bali got clobbered by an unseasonable Padang swell for the entire comp window.
“We were thinking about getting a boat to Deserts, but it didn’t work out,” says Shane. “I got an air at Nyang Nyang, a tube at Padang, and some turns at Temples,” he adds, listing off the clips he submitted. “Then yesterday, right before the skate comp, me, Zeke, Alex Sorgente, and Alex Midler paddled out to outside corner. It was fucking bombing. I packed one, and that was one of my clips, too.”
A hell of a lineup of skaters mentioned right there.
“Man, the best skaters in the world were in the comp — Pedro Barros, Keegan Palmer, a bunch of Olympic medalists,” says Shane. “It was funny, all the skaters were kind of heckling each other in the water. Everyone was pretty frothing to like get clips. I feel like the skaters were real competitive with their surf stuff, amongst each other. They all wanted to try to surf the best.”
Michelin stars in the judging booth, too — Nathan and Christian Fletcher, Christian Hosoi, Marlon Gerber, and Omar Hassan. After dissecting everyone’s surf clips, those same eyes turned to judge the skate jam.
After an hour and a half of skating, bodies glistening with sweat like they’d just been dunked in a vat of lube, the judges deemed Shane Borland the worthy victor of the first ever Keris Cup.
Best surfer/skater in the world, as it stands. But he wasn’t the only winner.
“There was a Jay Adams award too, for whoever was sending it the hardest,” says Shane.
Hell of a story, so strap in. Shane picks it up:
“Sky Brown dislocated her shoulder the night before while skating. There were all these physio people around, and none of them could get it back in. Sky was just chilling, with her shoulder completely dislocated. It was pretty crazy.”
“Then Nate Fletcher just strolls up, says, ‘I got this,’ and pops it back in on the first try. And then she paddled out at Padang the next day. Everyone was out there — Nate, Christian, Greyson Fletcher, all the skaters. Nate and Christian were kind of blocking for Sky, and she got completely drained on one. And then she shredded the skate jam that night and won the Jay Adams award.”
There you have it. Stab High alum take the inaugural Keris Cup.
