Nearly two months into this year’s waiting period, the 31st annual Quiksilver-Big Island Toyota Pro-Am Surfing Trials kicked off without a hitch Saturday morning at Honoli’i Beach Park.
Nearly two months into this year’s waiting period, the 31st annual Quiksilver-Big Island Toyota Pro-Am Surfing Trials kicked off without a hitch Saturday morning at Honoli’i Beach Park.
“We knew the waves were going to be up from where they were last week,” organizer Stan Lawrence said. Though conditions were better in the morning thanks to the offshore wind, he said, “It’s been rideable all day.” Surf was between 4 to 6 feet.
East side surfers picked up the top spots in each of the contest’s four divisions: Shayden Paccaro and Jade Steele, both of Puna, took first in the men’s and women’s division. Hilo residents Puna Moller and Patrick Orr were first in longboard and bodyboard, respectively, with Moller defending his title.
Paccaro, Steele, and Moller all earned entry to a Pro-Am event in Oahu, along with round-trip airfare. When Lawrence started the competition back in the 1980s, it was intended as a way for young surfers from the Big Island to find their way to the big leagues.
That’s still the case today. The older generation tends to stay behind the scenes. There’d be no contest at all without the sizable group of volunteers, from scorekeepers to timekeepers to spotters, that come together each year to make the Pro-Am Trials happen.
Lawrence and some friends drove down to Nahala Road on Friday night to stake out the spot for the judges tent. At four in the morning, they were setting up, and by sunrise, judge Jim Lucas said, parking was already starting to fill up.
“I was lazy,” Lucas said. “I got here at 6:30.” Lucas was back in volunteer action after 20 years away from the judging stand.
The judges, sitting in plastic deck chairs under the shade of the tent, clipboards and binoculars at the ready, know Honoli’i well. Most of them knew Drainpipes, too, before the Kalapana lava flow took that away.
“Because we’re all surfers, we all pretty much know what’s a good ride,” Lucas said. It’s admittedly a long day with few breaks, since heats, like sets of surfing waves, take place one immediately after another. But the judges like donating their time for the surfers coming up.
“It ain’t like the old days,” judge Solomon Nihipali said. Nihipali’s a bodyboarder, and said that kids now are picking up more ways to do more tricks on the water: more aerials, more flips.
Boards have changed — in the main events, surfers now compete on boards as short as 5 and a half feet long. “Like a potato chip,” Lucas said. “Shorter boards on big waves.”
The waves weren’t the best on Saturday, but they were perfectly serviceable. The judging teammates consulted among themselves to make sure nobody missed any of the rides, some mirroring the spotters in front of them by raising their binoculars. Each brought his own standard to the table while watching the surfers.
“I don’t give a lot of 8s and 9s,” James Sutherland said. Sutherland’s been volunteering for the past five years, and surfing for the past 50.
“Once a surfer, always a surfer,” Lucas said.
Even so, it’s hard for some to resist the call of the waves. You’ll still find guys like Eddie Pieper, 68, out on the water with his former surfing students,
“Win or lose, it’s great to be out there,” Pieper said.
“It’s rewarding to surf with him,” said Wes Moore of Kona, who placed third in longboard. “He’s taught me so much on the water.”
Email Ivy Ashe at iashe@hawaiitribune-herald.com.