BMT Rankings 14 February 2010

1. Chris Bertish.

It is amazing how much your life can change in one week. This time last week Chris Bertish was enjoying the unseasonal Cape Summer waves and worrying about how he was going to juggle his work commitments with all the waves he was getting. One week later he is US$50K (nearly half a million rand) richer and is the second South African after Twiggy to hold the Mavericks winner’s trophy proudly above his head. What a week, I’ll say. After getting the call that the Mavericks contest would be on he literally jumped on a plane for San Francisco in the clothes he was wearing. It was a massive gamble for Chris. The costs of his surgical strike would be astronomical and he was funding it himself. While many people would have questioned the rashness of that financial decision, there was one guy who just never lost faith in his ability to win, that was Chris himself. He flew halfway across the world to arrive jetlagged, exhausted and just in time to surf his heat in heaving, freezing 20-30ft surf. His first and second heats he squeaked through. Finally the split decisions went his way, it was like fate acknowledging him for the effort he was making and giving him the nod. In the final he reached deep, shrugged off his exhaustion and did what he really loves to do, CHARGE! In conditions that have been described as the biggest and heaviest ever for a paddle event anywhere it is an indication of what a special athlete he really is to be able to take out such a spectacular field in such incredible waves. This win for Chris comes after years and years of surfing some of the heaviest waves around the world. To those who surf with him in big waves it is not surprising, yet he’s been doing it for so long and going so hard that he sort of blended in to the scene. He often also sacrificed his own campaigns for those of others while managing teams and running around doing the marketing for O’Neill. He was the guy who initiated The Raw Courage Awards after he felt (along with most of us) that Andy Marr got shafted in the XXL Awards a couple of years back and wanted to find a way for us to give recognition to our local chargers. Ironically this feat will do more for the recognition of South African Big Wave Surfing on the global platform than anything he could have done at home. Two out of the last 3 winners at Mavericks have been South Africans. After Twiggy’s break-through victory in 2006 Greg Long stormed back to take the last event, but Chris has responded firmly by hoisting the SA flag once again on the apex of the podium and in so doing has proven to the world that SA Big Wave Surfing is a serious force to be reckoned with. Respect!

1. Sean Wisedale.

Sean prides himself in being a man’s man. He surfs hard, climbs mountains for a living and parties hard when he’s at home and anywhere near Cool Runnings. On Sunday Sean was surfing his local down the coast when half way through one of his waves, just at the point where it was horseshoeing to barrel, his eyes passed over Dr Nikki in her little bikini paddling back out. Sean turned his head so fast he got whiplash, fell backwards off the back of his board and promptly proceeded to get drilled on the head by the lip. He emerged coughing and spluttering with stars in his eyes and couldn’t put together another decent ride the whole session. Eish talk about distracted...