SURFERMAG.COM CURRENT ISSUE vol. 44 #3

2002 At the $250,000 X-Box/Gerry Lopez Pipeline Masters, Andy Irons beats Shane Dorian, Kelly Slater and Australian Mick Fanning in shifty, six-to eight-foot Backdoor barrels, taking home $30,000 for his first-place finish. Irons' earnings represent a 6000% percent increase over Jeff Hakman's haul 30 year earlier. One needs to compute both inflation and cost of living increases to appreciate how much progress this truly represents.

1971 Two well-known California/North Shore surfers--one of them a primary, if seldom-acknowledged architect of the mini-gun movement--flee the island when felony arrest warrants are issued after a girlfriend is caught passing counterfeit $20 bills at the Ala Moana Shopping Center and names them as the source.

1974 At the Hang Ten American Pro at Sunset Beach, contest director George Downing's innovative new objective scoring system represents a brave attempt to improve over the "biggest wave, longest ride" format that had been the standard in Hawaiian surf competition for over 20 years. Sadly, however, a serious flaw is later revealed. In the semi-finals maneuver-spotter Jack McCoy, who's job it is to call out completed maneuvers, each assigned a certain number of points, is apparently very liberal with his zigs and zags in the case of South African Michael Tomson. Tomson, his score padded with six extra zigs and at least four superfluous zags, advances to the final. McCoy, never suspected of passing the counterfeit zigs, eventually moves to Australia and becomes one of the sport's greatest cinematographers. Tomson, ironically, goes on to form a successful surf wear label called "Gotcha".

1974 Four North Shore beach ladies are strolling on the beach by Rockpile, just to the west of Pipeline, looking for puka shells. If they give any regard to the raging, 25-foot north-west swell exploding on the reef just offshore is unsure--no one ever gets the chance to ask them. Outside, a series of longer-interval swells run down and overtakes a shorter-period set, causing what oceanographers call a "super-set". This super-set pours over the reef and crashes onto the sand, a flexed arm of soup washing up behind the unsuspecting women, sweeping them off their feet and into the maelstrom of receding foam and fury. Witnesses look on helplessly as the four women are seized by the rip and through un-negotiable shorebreak are pounded down through Pipeline toward Ehukai. Here lifeguards and surfers finally reach the four and wrestle their lifeless bodies to shore. Tragically, none are revived; North Shore pioneer Dr. Ricky Grigg, one of the rescuers, performs CPR for over 45 minutes in the attempt. Following this incident, high surf advisory signs are distributed by the Honolulu County Department of Parks and Recreation.

1980 Foodland supermarket opens across the street from Three Tables in Pupukea. Built on the site formally occupied by renowned glasser/airbrusher Kelly Main's Waimea Bay Surf Shop and the Canaday family's feed-and-grain store, with a swoosh of automatic doors Foodland provides North Shore residents living north of Waimea Bay instant access to meat, produce, dairy products and cold beer. Previous alternatives were restricted to a trip through the claustrophobic aisles of Kammie's Market at Sunset Beach, or the long haul to Fujioka's or Haleiwa Superette in Haleiwa proper. This sudden abundance provides an unforeseen challenge, in the shape of increased caloric intake, both solid and liquid, as more than a few prominent surfer's waistlines expand uncomfortably beyond the confines of sponsor's trunks. The trend is especially noticeable after Foodland begins selling Haagen Daz ice cream.

1990 The State of Hawaii's Department of Transportation, responding to increased traffic congestion on the two-lane Kam Highway wandering through Haleiwa Town, begins construction of a 1.8-mile by-pass that will completely skirt behind the site of Chief Kaanui's old village, emerging on the north end of town. It will eventually take a year for every one of the seven minutes the by-pass saves North Shore commuters to complete, including long delays when it was discovered that the new freeway runs through both a ancient heiau and nesting sites for an endangered species of plover. When completed, it introduces the North Shore's first traffic light, the very first between Wahiawa and Kailua.

1970-2002 Relatively unknown North Shore shapers, with proximity to both some of the most powerful waves on earth and the equally powerful surfers who ride them, design and build some of the best surfboards in history. Some of these foam-smiths include Larry Felker, Ryan Dotson, Buddy Dumphy, John Mobley, Bosco Burns, Harold Iggy, Don Koplien, James Turnbull, Jim Turner, Randy Rarick, Tom Nellis, Chuck Andrus, Dennis Pang, Mark Angell, Charlie Smith, Jim Richardson, Gerry Smith, Jeff and Don Johnson and Kirk Bjerke.

1977 The Ride of the Decade, or at least the second half, comes down on a big day at Off-the-Wall, when all-around nice guy Aussie Mark Richards uncharacteristically drops in on '77 world champion-to-be Shaun Tomson. MR, feeling very involved himself, industriously weaves and poses through the curl of one of the heaviest waves to be ridden that season at this photogenic stone/coral-bottom beach break just a flying kick-out away from Pipeline's notorious Backdoor. Unbeknownst to Richards, however, was the fact that Tomson survived the rather brutal stuff job, pulling up into the barrel behind him, successfully negotiating both MR's twin-fin wake and the grinding tube. With only about a hundred cameras firing off sequences, MR emerges from the curl triumphant, acknowledging the hoots and whistles. Then someone tells him. Shaun goes on that season to establish the single greatest performance gap that has ever existed on the North Shore, surfing virtually a decade ahead technique-wise than such luminary contemporaries as Richards, Bartholomew, Cairns and Ho. MR, even after winning four subsequent world titles, still bristles whenever the topic of the Great Wave comes up.