BREAKING THE SILENCE
The Big-Wave Map Gets Redrawn

Mike Schlebach

But the anonymity of the Cape experience has changed slowly in the new millennium for two reasons. Firstly, the Red Bull Big-Wave Africa event, launched in 1999, has focussed low-key international attention directly upon Dungeons. The event has been a perfect catalyst. Bringing together South African chargers and international stars, the talent levels involved, as well as sheer water-hours logged during event waiting periods, have pushed the knowledge of, and performance levels at Dungeons at an exponential rate. Simultaneously, South African surfers have started resurfacing globally. The victory at the inaugural ISA World Big-Wave Team Championships in Todos Santos by Ian Armstrong and Cass Collier gained attention, as did Chris Bertish’s exploits in California and Hawaii. And Twiggy’s recent darkhorse victory at the Maverick’s 2006 event and the clean sweep of the podium positions by South Africans at the 2006 Red Bull event have also helped put South Africa back on the map.

“You Should Have Been Here Tomorrow.”
With the Big-Wave event set to commence, last-minute flights were booked and trusty guns dusted off and lovingly re-waxed. As the “Nauticat” pulled out of Hout Bay harbor and rounded the shadows of the Sentinel cliffs, which overlook both the Hout Bay harbor and the Dungeons lineup, the rising sun chased away the morning mist to reveal 12-to-15-foot surf at Dungeons, fortified by an occasional wide-swinging 18-footer. With unfavorable winds forecasted over the next days, the event would proceed as scheduled. Long lulls, commitment and local knowledge of the Dungeons lineups proved to be vital.

Despite the stellar international cast of Australians Ross Clarke-Jones and Paul Patterson, Californians Grant Washburn, Evan Slater and 2003 event winner Greg Long, Hawaiian aloha ambassador, Jamie Sterling, and Carlos “The Jackal” Burle from Brazil, it would be a South African sweep of the podium. The hard-charging Durbanite, John Whittle, was a humble and deserving winner, deflecting glory back to the wave itself, proclaiming, “I was just the favored son out there today.”

Modesty aside, Whittle was a popular and deserving winner and honest-to-God madman at Dungeons. Over the past years, he has walked away with more Biggest Wave and Biggest Wipeout speciality awards than any other contestant. He was followed by a pair of Cape residents: surfing’s happiest man, Andrew Marr, in second, and the irrepressible charger Chris Bertish placing third.

But, with typical irony, the forecasted swell actually filled in 12 hours after the flotilla of spectator and media boats had returned to port. “You should have been here tomorrow!” quickly became the surfers’ post-event quip. With heaving barrels and light winds at both Dungeons and Sunset, Friday would be an all-day, all-star affair, with surfers paddling then towing-in at both spots in clean, consistent 20-foot-plus conditions with larger sets. Greg Long was in the Dungeons lineup early, lucking into one of the biggest paddle-in waves of his life and kicking out to see a reported 45-footer cracking across the reef behind him. Carlos Burle paddled into a wave of XXL-contending proportions of his own, making a double touch-and-go takeoff before enduring a predictably savage beating. And as winds filled in later in the day, Twiggy and Greg Long towed into some black-diamond slopes at Dungeons, while the Sunset regulars were doing the same around Chapman’s Peak, with standout performances from Marr and Sunset maestro Pierre du Plessis.