Rasta + Steph Gilmore: Style vs. Spontaneity | “Surf like no one’s watching.”
A couple of the most stylish Aussie’s to do it, Stephanie Gilmore and Dave Rastovich, discuss free surfing and competing and the style vs. spontaneity that goes along with each. As well as sliding the waves on a surf mat.
Sample:
SG: You just seem to surf the way you feel. Your style is so fluid. Yesterday I watched you catch a wave on your mat and I was thinking, “Oh no, he’s not even going to get into this thing.” But you got in and you just did this big double stretch with your arms and just swanned right around the section. I just thought that was so rad. Why do you ride those things?
DR: I think they’re really humbling because, as George [Greenough] says, you’re just dragging your nuts around, lying down on this little pillow of air. There’s nothing tough about it. You can’t really puff up in a lineup, like, “Hey, next one’s mine.”
SG: You could, though.
DR: The great thing is how it brings smiles to people’s faces when you’re flying down the line. You start laughing at the silliness of it all and then other people you pass start laughing because you’re laughing—and because you look so stupid. It’s almost like a community service—lightening up a lineup. Where I live, near Byron Bay, you see the whole surfing catwalk with so much self-consciousness, focusing on how they look rather than how it feels. And you can see the lack of enjoyment in that approach. I love seeing people surf like no one’s watching. To me, that’s style. I don’t have to really agree with the aesthetics of it, but you can just see that they’re fully present and fully acknowledging the good fortune of riding a wave.
SG: Isn’t that crazy, how you can actually see that? When you’re watching someone from a distance on a wave and you’re like, “Wow, that person has a completely different relationship with that wave than the guy on the next wave.”
DR: But there are multiple layers with style. I appreciate people surfing naturally, but also if you combine that with physical grace and flow and balance—all of those things. Speed, but with little exertion. Strength, but with fluidity. I actually used to see that a lot with Andy [Irons]. You’d see him in some pretty bizarre positions on waves. He was just pushing through something and getting in these positions where you’re like, “Oh, what is that?” Then he’d just fly out of it all of a sudden and do something else. Amazing style. Just authentic.
Click over to SURFER MAG and listen to Dave Rastovich and Stephanie Gilmore discuss the relationship between surfing style and spontaneity.
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