Reality TV Goes Surf With ABC’s “The Ultimate Surfer”

In the 1966 classic surf documentary “The Endless Summer”, two Californian surfers set out in search of the “perfect wave”, then believed to be in South Africa. As the cost of the ticket was almost the same as a round-the-world plane ticket, they decided instead to run around the world in the summer.

This summer, 14 surfers, including Ezekiel “Zeke” Lau from Honolulu, Kai Barger from Maui, Brianna Cope from Kauai and Koa Smith from the north coast of Oahu, gathered in a farming country in central California, also. to surf “a perfect wave”.

The cost? Their privacy.

“There are cameras around you 24/7, there are microphones around your neck,” said Smith, who ended up traveling to South Africa after filming to make a video of surf. “Anything you say has the potential to be on the show. This is the scary part. We’ll see what happens.”

Their story will be told starting this week on “The Ultimate Surfer,” a surf-based reality TV show which premieres two nights this week on ABC. The show was filmed over a month-long period in Lemoore, Calif. At the Surf Ranch, the World Surf League’s man-made wave pool designed by surfing legend Kelly Slater. He appears on the show as a special envoy.

At stake is a $ 100,000 cash prize, but more importantly, a place on the League Championship Tour, a series of surfing competitions for the world’s top-ranked male and female surfers. They earn their place on the circuit by accumulating points in qualifying competitions and must continue to be successful on the circuit to stay.

Lau knows how difficult the Championship Tour is. The Honolulu native toured in 2017, but was dropped after three seasons.

“All I knew was that the winner of the show was going to get tickets on the tour the following year. That was pretty much my entire driving force, ”Lau said. “I knew it was out of my element, but the tour was somewhere I wanted to be, whatever. I want to ride against the best in the world and represent Hawaii on this stage.

LIKE ALL reality TV shows, “The Ultimate Surfer” drummed the drama. In addition to surfing, participants were put through skill tests, team building drills, and other challenges that might help or hurt them along the way. They couldn’t reveal much about these essays before the show aired, but Lau said they added a touch to the loneliness of the competitive surfing world.

“Surfing is an individual sport so working with other people was quite refreshing and fun,” he said. “It pushed me out of my comfort zone. I think I learned a lot about myself and that I was able to grow. It was a very good experience for me. “

Cope, who, when not competing, frequents the waves of Kauai’s South Rim, was particularly drawn to the Surf Ranch’s constant 400-meter-long wave. She was not disappointed.

“It was just unreal to be there,” she said. “To have a machine-made wave, instead of sitting in the ocean and waiting for a wave to come in, you know exactly when it was going to come and you knew exactly how the wave was going to be. Honestly, I think. that it was the best thing for my surf, to have this opportunity there and to have this wave.

Surfing has been a savior for Cope. She was born with a deformed left hand and as a child she was bullied. “Being different was really hard for me, and that’s why I fell in love with the ocean,” she said. “No one would ask me about my hand, because no one could see me.”

Now, she is happy to share her life by posting videos of her grueling workouts online. She undertakes aerial surfing maneuvers.

“Strength and stability are really important to me when landing those jumps because I’m big enough for a surfer,” said Cope, who is 5’11 ”.

Out of the water, the scene at the Surf Ranch was extremely competitive but otherwise friendly, Cope said. The surfers stayed in a camp specially designed for them, without outside visitors and not even laptops except in case of emergency. Although the previews showed that the producers had tried to introduce an element of romance to the series by bringing in other attractive young adults, Cope wouldn’t have wanted it.

“I said that when I was on the show, but if I wanted a date I would have gone to ‘The Bachelor’,” she said with a laugh. “I was so focused on the competition. The “love glasses” weren’t really on and I was in full play mode.

Barger was feeling a little nervous about the show’s premiere, as it will give exposure to competitive surfing in a particularly revealing way. “In the world of surfing, we’re kind of just to each other, and not many people get involved in the surveillance other than mostly friends, family and peers,” he said. “(But) this is set up for America to see.”

BARGER grew up surfing Ho’okipa Beach on the North Coast of Maui with summer sessions in Lahaina. As a competitor he has ridden waves all over the world, but he called the Surf Ranch wave “probably the most amazing thing I have ever seen” as well as “the hardest thing to figure out” .

“It’s in the desert, so you have no idea where the ocean is, and the landmarks you normally line up with are no longer there,” he said. “Everything was really confusing about a wave in the ocean, even the way it moves, the way the water rises and falls, even down to the buoyancy of the water.

“All these factors that you would normally have analyzed and get used to have been thrown out the window and all of a sudden a train is coming down towards you, sending this wave really fast, and everyone is watching. I have never felt so much pressure to catch a wave in my life.

Smith, originally from Kauai, also said the Surf Ranch wave posed challenges. The wave has three settings, and for the show it was tuned for barrel and turn. “It was a lot bigger than I expected,” he said. “It was almost a little intimidating at first.

“It’s quite powerful. I think the main factor is that this is a cement bottom that is only about 1 to 1 1/2 feet deep so if you’re at the very top of the lip trying to do a tune and overtaking it, you can put yourself in a pretty dangerous situation.

Smith is a longtime competitor who turned to the movies to support his surfing instead of relying on sponsorships. He also runs a family business in Oahu with three locations called The Sunrise Shack, which sells coffee and health foods.

He said viewers should have a chance to see what “the real world of surfing” looks like. Most of the competitors had known each other for years of competitive and recreational surfing.

“It’s always a gamble when you’re filmed day after day,” he said. “People can say things they don’t mean.”

He admits that a surf-centric reality show could be “cheesy” – the show has been criticized for a variety of perceived flaws, such as failing to invite surfers from foreign countries.

For the contestants, however, it was just pure excitement, he said.

“We had no idea what we were going to do each day,” he said. “You just had to be ready and be in a very clear-minded space. Your body had to be ready. Your energy level must be high. You had to be prepared to do whatever they presented us with. And it was just a very strange and exhausting space, but it was also very rewarding. “