Joel Tudor discusses why he was suspended from the WSL, what makes a successful longboard contest, and the future of professional longboarding. Check out the full episode! • Joel Tudor | Surf Sple...
When I used to live in Del Mar, I used to surf all the North County spots, & occasionally I'd be out surfing & Joel, or Rob, or Taylor would paddle out & just surf so effortlessly & flawlessly, with such cool style...I used to really love watching those guys catch waves, & Joel in particular, on his longboard, made catching waves look so easy...anybody can agree or disagree with his viewpoints on professional surfing & longboarding & localism, but nobody can argue that he is an absolute master of his craft
Not sure any of these other guys have the ego nor whine like joel. Mass hypocrite who acts as though he's owed respect. Once you start whining, calling others out and acting like an elitest then you become useless in your community. Who cares about your surfing talent any, surfing means nothing to 99% of society, millions of us have martial arts trading too so what is he gloating about anyway?
@Slater McDavid I'd hardly call Joel Tudor "useless in his community." And, yes, he has an ego & he is opinionated, but I don't think he's a whiner. I, for one, do respect his elite level athletism--whether it be in jujitsu or surfing (&, I've also done both for many years). All I know is that when you actually watch this guy out surfing at his local spots, especially when you're out in the water--it's just really something special. Plus, this guy (as he says) is getting old now--which makes his surfing even more impressive.
@@aitutaki50 Love watching him surf, just not when I'm one of the many others in the water he burns ha. We have a ton of talented surfers here who don't care about his or anyone's talents but Joel is a person who behaves as though he's to be viewed a 'legend' in and out of water, which isn't everyone's view. He makes the choice to get on social media, so there will be opposing opinions other than those who call people 'legends' and kiss ass.
Word, didn't really see how much surfing was about giving the 'push' to sponsored surfers particularly at the amature level. Started snowboarding, skating more, came back to it and saw the circus for what it is. Surf for the soul. Nothing else
great ramble; so now I've gotta listen to the rest of the interview... Listening to Joel talk about trying to balance surfing with competition/contests, I'm reminded of the Frank Zappa line, delivered while the sound crew struggled to eliminate feedback from the sound system while playing a show at Pauley Pavillion; "...that's what you get for trying to play music in a place built for basketball..."
My first surfboard was an old used and beat up Hawaiian Pro Designs Takayama Joel Tudor model 9’0”. I love that board so much. I snapped the nose off of it while surfing Crystal Pier in PB, some time around 2006.
Your rock Joel!! Solid ambassador for the soul of riding waves.. Your ideas on keeping wsl tour humble, practical, and on the best spots is spot on... you should reach out to those in charge. Insist on it. Obviously they are listening.. and banning you from any contest is ridiculous.. that was the call of just a few.
To me this was an extremely interesting conversation. After all the years of Joel's success in bringing what I would call, not style longboarding, although it is, but then all good surfing is style surfing, it's just that for the sake of different sports, we need to define which style is going to be set for the criteria of a particular sport. I consider that there are several different distinct sports of surfing which are extremely important do differentiate it you are going to have serious completion. Many types of surfing used to seem similar in the old days, but now there are many with specifically vastly different boards and riding styles. There were the old hundred pound redwood and koa wood finless planks in Waikiki in the mid 30's and early '40's where surfing was done heading mostly straight towards the beach on small waves at canoes and Queens. Then you had the world's first all balsa pintail with a glassed on fish like fin brought over in 1947 by Joe Quigg, which was ridden by Rabbit Kekai, George Downing, and Wally froyseth in bigger waves to success, and became the shock of the surfing world. This launched surfing in the hollow parts of the wave as the new style. Then you had Joe Quigg's own personal super light all balsa pintail board made specifically for Malibu in the late 40's, which Joe rode to success, attacking the curl and hollow parts of the wave at Malibu. So impressed was Guard Chapin, Miki Dora's step dad, that, Guard approached Joe and asked him to buy the board for Miki's Christmas present in the early '50's. So Joe sold it to him which launched the greatest longboard style in surfing history, still to this day. Then in 1953 Joe and his wife Aggie and my sister, just born moved to Hawaii, and Joe made hot little balsa boards for all of the hot young kids from Waikiki a to Ala Moana, as well as racing paddle boards, and the world's first big wave guns for huge Makaha and Sunset. Then Hobie called Joe in 1957 and said, Joe, Gordon Clark and I have figured out how to make successful polyurethane foam blanks. I need good shaper's and I have hundreds of orders. Come over here and shape for me and you can do all the boards you want. I had just been born, so Joe packed up the family in 1957 and moved us to a beach house on the oceanfront in Newport Beach, two blocks south of the river jetties. Well Joe shaped for Hobie, but also designed and built boats for Carter Pyle's Newport Boats in Costa Mesa, and also built his own surfboard factory on 21st Street, between the pier and the crab catcher. When Joe first got there in '57 Miki Dora hounded him for some boards, so Joe made him several boards for Malibu, which became the new look of the late '50's early '60's that Miki blew everyone's minds with. That became the look of all the board builders in the early '60's. Hobie, Velzy, Bing, Jacobs, Weber, Noll, Harbour, Hansen, Wardy, etc. Miki's surfing changed the sport once again in 1957 through the early sixties. David Nuuhiwa was also hounding Joe for boards in that early sixties era and they were his board of choice until the other board builders fought over him and Miki, and we're able to get them as their team riders in the mid sixties by sponsoring them. Then the hippie era hit with drugs, hard rock and everyone cutting their longboards down into short boards. Those boards sucked and by 1969 the advanced board builders like Joe Quigg and Ben Aipa we're coming out with flaming hot shredding machines, that were blowing minds. And the new short board advanced high performance style of surfing was born. And all the longboard shops that didn't change with the times went under, out of business. You couldn't give a longboard away. No long boards until sometime in the eighties when the new high performance longboards came in. They looked like hamburger flippers. Narrow tails and super wide over rockered noses. And a hideous style of longboarding was born. Then some time later Joel Tudor came along riding actual old '60's boards and started beating everyone with a classic 50's-60's style. And then the revival of classic longboarding was born. And here we are today. The longboard builders over the last 35 years have gone through every fad of board that has come along, but especially in the last ten to five years. All the new young hipsters have migrated in their longboard choices more and more to the 50's/60's Joe Quigg Miki Dora Malibu Board. Joe's world firsts have stood the test of time as the world's most advanced high performance surfboards.
So cool....loved the information....to much politics evolved....that is exactly why I was a free surfer......iam 68 and pirated waves in Central America and South America back in the day.. Kids your welcome....I didn't have a cell phone or jet ski to get me in the line up Just grit...that is what Joel is saying....peace
The WSL is the Aussie Surf League. Everybody needs to ride a thruster. Jumping in the air will get you a 10. A long tube that you don't come out of is a 0. Style and flowing with the wave count for 0 . And the Tequila, Beer, wine commercials, peddling Alcohol to young Surfers, all for $$ profit.
I would also like to voice my opinion on Joel Tudor and this issue with WSL. First of all, what Joel Tudor has done with longboard surfing and competitive longboard surfing is one of the greatest ventures in surfing history. He has done such a wonderful soul style of surfing contest. The WSL is a corporation, too much of a contrived big business.
WSL is cancelled! And I am more of a fan of Joel's than ever. WSL is such a cringe, corporate institution. Capitalism will never groove with surfing WSL is creepy and wack Good for you Joel, way to speak up
Between the Mid season cut last year in short boarding and, this incident, it’s all completely absurd. The WSL in 2023 can’t seem to take any form of criticism. The question I wanna ask is, What can we say nowadays?
Joel Tudor was charging Montauk NY Hurricanes 3 months ago a well liked character in a drinking town with a fishing problem where somebody always doing something bad on a full moon. Thr Right Coast Joel's a visitor well liked by the year round Montauk community a dad family Guy an American athlete competitor
All I see is hundreds of young kids riding longboards all summer long here in Delaware and we are a very small state...When I was growing up in the eighties and nineties there was no one but a few older guys riding longboards...I'm guessing there is a lot of money in longboarding now.
I watched a couple of WSL events last year and decided comp surfing is pretty lame. I’d rather watch Nathan Florence’s paddle out videos. Joel is spot on about wsl,using the image of female surfers to sell lots of shit.. But not giving them the credit deserved.
Equal is a big complicated word. Women watch women's sport but a lot less men. More men watch sport and mostly men's sport. Don't think that will change because it won't. Men aren't going to watch women's sport even if those are the women with p3nises. They aren't even going to QS events who make less money because of views. Respect people in surf sports for their performances because that's why and how surfing is judged. Pay them likewise.
why does diversity matter? Oh right because as soon as there is diversity then everything is magically better like mana from heaven. You buy into the DEI cult
Sorry... "computer scoring"? Is he talking about how the wsl arrives at an average wave score? Drop high and low and average remaining 3. Thats just simple 4th grade math. No high tech computer wizardry there.
Joel T seems brutally insufferable. A bit of humility would do wonders. At the end of the day, nobody watches or gives one wet-fart about any long boarding event. That’s why there’s no money in it, which JT is either genuinely oblivious to, or is just willingly ignoring. The WSL is an organization run by the biggest collective of half-wits and hangers-on left in the “industry”, and even they recognize long boarding is a turd not worth polishing, which is really saying something.
