The Shipstern swells, spectacular and terrifying.
Australia is one of the best places to ride the waves and perhaps that’s why Australia’s surfers are among the best in the world as confirmed by this years Billabong XXL Global Big Wave Awards.
The Awards are celebrating their tenth year and 2010 is set to break the waves big style, with Aussies riding out on top. Tasmanian surfers Brooke Phillips and Danny Griffith have both been nominated in the Wipeout of the Year category.
The two nominees are in the top five surfers in the world, which means that Aussie surfers are the best in the world! Well we knew that already right?
Conditions for surfing this year have been tremendous thanks to a last minute off-season swell which saw the largest waves in Tahiti in three years. To get huge waves so early in March is rare and certainly saw the competition hot up.
Surfers are filmed riding the waves and the footage then goes to a panel of experts who review the videos sent in from around the world before selecting the nominees for each event. There are four events in total; Ride of the Year Award; Biggest Wave Award; Monster Paddle Award and Monster Tube Award. There is also an award for the Best Overall Performance for both men and women.
Winners are announced on April 23rd at a gala event in California in front of 2,250 surf world VIPs. The entire event will be available online and this year will also be televised on the ESPN networks. Winners will receive over $130,000 in cash prizes.
Past winners have hailed from California, South Africa, Tahiti and Hawaii – come on you Aussies, what have you been doing? It’s about time Australia bagged a winner and that looks very likely now that Australia have two contenders in the running – as well as a fellow Aussie Ryan Hipwood who is entering for Ride of the Year.
Wipeout of the Year is by far the most favourite category and for the surfers – the most dangerous. The notorious Shipstern swells are amongst the biggest and most popular. Brooke Phillips recalls the time he came face to face with the one of the biggest waves he’d ever seen, let alone tried to ride! “It was one of the biggest Shipstern swells ever. I got this set wave and air dropped down the face and tried to set my rail, thinking I was going to get one of the biggest barrels of my life.”
Luckily Phillips made it through and is now trying to raise the money he needs to attend the Californian event to find out if his efforts have been enough to win him the coveted prize.
I think I might stick to paddling for now! If you fancy your hand at surfing there are plenty of surfing holidays in Australia from beginners to experts, there are even classes for the kids. Take a look at our surfing Australia guide for more information.
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