It's 5am in J-Bay.

[Nick Carroll]

GT is Greg Tomlinson, from Sth Laguna/Salt Creek area in So Cal, spearheads Von Zipper on the west coast, ex MTV veejay (used to do spring break crosses in the late 80s I believe!), long time surfer and a really nice straight-up bloke, very articulate and extroverted in real life. Puts on a slightly more manic edge for the commentary. Very pro though -- those snap crosses to interview are not as easy as they appear.

I'm gonna work on the webcast at Chopes and will do my best to get fully across all the fascinating details that got away from the comment crew this time round. I wonder for instance how many times people have won semifinal heats in the last five minutes from a combo position. I can only think of two in my own memory -- Tom Curren in France in 1991 (Sunny Garcia was the victim and he smashed his board to pieces against the scaffolding afterward) and lil brother at Pipe the same year. No doubt there's been others -- but it's usually a sign of a surfer at the absolute peak of his/her competitive powers.

Watching Jordy, even online (which I rather distrust), was most interesting. He looks like everyone else, then he doesn't. I think he has more in reserve actually. But it is a long fucken time till December.

Poor mustkill doesn't know who the judges are. It's because he doesn't read the surfing magazines. See below an interview by yours truly with new head judge Richard Porta from ASL262.

Flickoff
RICHARD PORTA

Richie is 46 years of age, hails from Vicco’s Mornington Peninsula and has been surfing since he was eight. He’s an experienced amateur-level competitor, who began judging as part of surfing in club contests, and moved on through the judging ranks to ASP world tour level, serving until recently as head judge of the women’s tour. In March he signed up as the ASP World Tour’s head judge after the previous head, Perry Hatchett, was shown the door.


You came to the Head Judge job in awkward circumstances. How did you cope with that?

Well I felt like I’d been given plenty of training and opportunities over the years by ASP Australasia, and it would have been remiss of me not to step up and do it when asked. So when Brodie (Carr) asked me to take the job, I said yes. I guess the way I saw it, there’s been a lot of change in the sport in the past 10 years, and we could choose to keep things going the old way, or start to open it up to younger blood and look to the future that way.

The judges are the keepers of the flame in a way – they’re largely responsible for the credibility of the ASP world championship. But there’s not much reward, and as recent events have shown, there’s not necessarily much job security. Is this a concern? Why would a young guy try this as a career? How do you prepare for new blood?

Well no, there hasn’t been much job security. In the past you’d just work your way in as a judge, go from event to event, and once you got to the end of the road, there was nowhere to go, and you didn’t really have anything to show for it. The ASP management has told me they want that to change and I’m going to be working with them to bring about some of that change. Things are already happening, the regional judges are doing head judging at qualifying level and that’s not been the case in the past. But it’s the management’s job to work on career paths, places you can go from judging in the future, and I’m going to be talking with them about it as time goes on.

A close observer of the panel told me a couple of things about this year so far – that the judges are more relaxed and talking between each other more, but that there’s also a bit more confusion among them. What’s your response to these observations?

Someone mentioned the same thing to me about the judges talking more. It surprised me a bit because it’s not something I’ve noticed. The judging process hasn’t changed too much from my point of view. The judges still write their scores down like they always have, we still do the same processes we always have. We have the video replay just the way we have had for the past couple of years, and we do use that, but not for everything – I don’t think it’s a good idea for us to watch every wave, just so we don’t become video judges, I think you can lose a lot of confidence in your judgement that way. We might use it to look closely at something, or to compare a ride with something that happened earlier in the heat. It’s a tool, not a crutch.
As far as the second part goes, I disagree with that. I think the scoring’s been pretty tight so far. The surfing this year has been varied and dynamic; surfers are doing such a wide range of moves. It’s not just about one form of surfing or another, not just about airs or about heavy carves. It’s our job to promote the sport and to promote that high level of performance to the surfers. And to make that top layer of scores, that nine to 10, really count for something. If a surfer’s doing that, really ripping, doing a wide range of different moves, he’ll get a high range. If he’s just surfing nice and pretty and doing standard moves, he won’t. The surfers know that and they’ve responded, the standard is way up.

At the same time, with such a wide range of different moves on the table, isn’t there a risk of confusion? How hard is it to separate a big reverse from a heavy 270 degree carve? Isn’t there a danger of becoming too focused on single moves, rather than rides?

I think there was more danger of that in the past. A couple of years ago you’d see guys do that, nothing but race down the line and set up one reverse and that was it. We’re not seeing that any more. If you’re a good surfer you know when you’ve surfed a wave good and when you’ve surfed it as hard as you possibly can, and you know it when you see it. Like Fanning’s first couple of heats at Snapper, just sooo smooth and complete. Or Jordy Smith at Winkipop on that small day; he did those three huge moves. We’ve had heats you could throw a blanket over and got ‘em right and I’m pleased about that. What we’re trying to do now is to pick those rides, the ones that people will remember later from an event, and reward them.

Well there haven’t been many 10s this year.

No! One actually, at Margarets. Josh Kerr got that 10 and it could’ve been a 12 really. But none at the world title level. There’s been a couple where some of the boys threw a 10 and others threw a 9.5, so we ended up with a 9.73. But I’m OK with that. A 10 really has to be a special ride.

You’ve been judging performance waves so far this year, but before you know it you’ll be at Teahupo’o. In the past, that’s been a place where 10s have flown – guys have performed fairly easy rides deep in the barrel and got 10s just like that, just because the wave itself was so good. How are you gonna deal with that?

That’s a really good question. I was talking with Pancho Sullivan at Bells about this one. Pancho was very clear about it; he was saying that at Pipe and Teahupo’o, don’t worry, we can all ride these barrels, it’s not a problem. So that does raise the bar a bit for what can be achieved. It’ll be interesting because that’s the event where the (45 to 32 man) cutoff occurs. We’ll probably see some guys throwing ‘emselves over some ledges… But a 10 has to be more than just about the wave, it has to be about the ride. And whether you get “chicken skin” watching it. You have to feel a 10, not just see it.

Have you talked with Perry at all since your appointment?

Yes, a couple of times. Once when I called him to tell him I’d been offered the job, and again when I saw him at the Margarets event and we had a chat there. I worked under Perry for nearly 20 years and learned a lot from him, stuff that helps me now. On my side there’s no bad feeling at all.

[mustkillmulloway]

thank u.....good informative interview

i don't neccesarly agree judges should be there to "promote"the sport

theres a can worms right there opening

but..thats only one out 5

c'mon....in pretty much every other proffesional sport the officals own up too names and faces

whats the asp hiding


look forward too your commentry....maybe in the long lulls you could introduce the other faceless four

and explain what there scoring and how

or is that who there promoting for which sponser

[mustkillmulloway]

perry, seriously, got the hatchet from the top job

so is the asp still working too his formula or does ritchie now call the tune :?

ffs...who's in charge the boat and when do i get my captains wages

[mustkillmulloway]

That’s a really good question. I was talking with Pancho Sullivan at Bells about this one. Pancho was very clear about it; he was saying that at Pipe and Teahupo’o, don’t worry, we can all ride these barrels, it’s not a problem. So that does raise the bar a bit for what can be achieved. It’ll be interesting because that’s the event where the (45 to 32 man) cutoff occurs. We’ll probably see some guys throwing ‘emselves over some ledges… But a 10 has to be more than just about the wave, it has to be about the ride. And whether you get “chicken skin” watching it. You have to feel a 10, not just see it.

.

dino...save yourself the trouble copying and pasteing the rulebook

obviously it's only a guide too judging and it can change event to event what scores and doesn't


i'm seeing more and more...in my very limited asp viewing...( i fall asleep waiting for them catrch a wave it's pretty bloody inconsidate these africans hold there contest so late at night...fairdinkum )

is rather than score waves they score surfers and heats


like...the better surfer gets the win, but the scores aren't what they should be....same for the loser...he might get marked up for lesser waves too

p.s got me the judges names from the last event fossil fool....no....still waiting on it...u can't find them either

p.p.s found this....worth a look see
http://insurfnews.com/?p=316

[steve shearer]

Watching Jordy, even online (which I rather distrust), was most interesting. He looks like everyone else, then he doesn't. I think he has more in reserve actually.

Not sure what you mean by this NC?
I reckon most keen surfers could pick Jordy from a mile away.
Just his physical presence on a wave stands-out.

The surfer he most resembles, ironically, is Bede....they both ocassionally have a ponderous look to them which makes you think they need extra volume in their boards, especially Jordy, but they both have massive top turns.
Jordies has more rail comittment and edge work to it than Bede's and judges are showing they will award massive scores for it, even on the smallest waves.