HALEIWA, Hawaii — Last Monday afternoon, Tikanui Smith, a major surfer from Tahiti, received the call he had been waiting for all his life.
The Eddie Aikau Big Wave Invitational will finally take place in less than 48 hours. The event, perhaps the world’s most prestigious and elusive surfing competition, is invite-only and is held only when the conditions are truly right. Waves in Waimea Bay, on Oahu’s North Shore, should always reach heights in excess of 20 feet — that is, a wavefront of 40 feet, about the size of a four-story building. Those conditions are rare and even rarer to last long enough to hold a full day of competition.
The last time this event was held was in 2016.
“When I got the news, I stopped talking, stopped laughing, and became extremely serious,” Smith said. “It’s on, the dream is on.”
The announcement, delivered in a group message on Instagram, sent 40 invitees and 18 substitutes scrambling. There are planes to catch, friends’ couches to claim, large specialized surfboards, and safety vests to pack. The exclusive list includes surfers from South Africa, Portugal, France, Chile, Brazil and California, and is just a few miles away along the Kamehameha Highway.
If Smith, 31, wants to succeed, he’ll need to hustle. He lives on Moorea Island, and will have to take a boat to Tahiti, then take a taxi to Faa’a International Airport, then board the last flight of the day to Los Angeles before boarding another flight to Honolulu. It was a 20-hour travel plan for him to arrive in time for the competition.
Jody Grosmaire, his brother and coach, dropped everything to join him. The two gathered passports and necessary documents related to Covid-19, and then set off on what Smith called a “possibly once in a lifetime” journey.
By the time they landed in Los Angeles, they had received a flurry of messages. The event has been cancelled. The forecast has changed just enough to lift the big surf world. It is assumed that the bump is no longer large enough for Eddie.
Eddie’s brother Clyde Aikau said: “Due to windy conditions that will prevail early in the morning and due to the size of the large early morning wave, we will be canceling Eddie’s trip on Wednesday. Fly on the morning of January 10, Tuesday.
“We’re expecting, we’re expecting,” he said in the same breath at the cancellation, knowing heavy disappointment had befallen the traveling surfers. “We are looking for the 22nd, which is expected to be even bigger with many better waves.”
Big surfers know that nature can be fickle and that even a team of forecasters can’t predict an ever-evolving wave. But the rush of a scheduled unexpected event, followed by the emotional fallout of the cancellation was unique to Eddie.
“It was a big roller coaster ride,” Smith said. “Maybe that’s what makes it all the more special.”
Like many major surfing competitions, Eddie has a month-long run. When weather models and buoy data detect big waves, big surfers are notified that the contest is on and the race with the waves begins. But most major competitions hold the event after it’s called, even if conditions change after it gets the green light.
Eddie is distinctive in its specificity and is described in the tagline: “The Bay calls to the day.” If it is too windy, or if the waves are too small or too unstable, the competition will not be held, even if the best surfers in the world have all arrived and the beach is packed with spectators. On February 10, 2016, the contest was postponed on the morning of the event because of a major change. It was finally held a few weeks later when a monster wave arrives, bringing waves up to 60 feet high.
The event has been held since 1984 to honor Eddie Aikau, a surfer from Hawaii and the first lifeguard on the North Shore of Oahu, home to some of the most dangerous and popular beaches. world. Aikau has saved more than 500 people as a lifeguard, and is known as a surfer who will defy big waves that no one else can try.
Aikau was bigger than life when he joined the crew of a canoe that was traveling up and down the ancient Polynesian migratory route between Hawaii and Tahiti in 1978. Within hours of setting sail, ship, hokulea, upside down. After waiting for rescue, Aikau grabbed her surfboard and paddled towards the Hawaiian island of Lanai for help. The rest of the crew was eventually rescued by the US Coast Guard, but Aikau was never seen again.
The Eddie Surfing Competition was founded six years later and has only been held nine times since. The invitation to the opening ceremony — whether the competition is held or not — is an expression of respect and recognition from the Aikau family.
Isabelle Leonhardt, a major surfer from Colima, Mexico, said being invited to participate in the competition was “the greatest honor in the world”. She was one of many surfers who traveled to Oahu for the 2022-2023 competition opening ceremony on December 9.
Leonhardt, 39, said: “In Hawaii, it represents the history of the big waves and the surfers who have conquered these waves, just like Eddie. “The way he lives and what he has done for others makes it all the more special, because I feel like in this event you can set a purpose for surfing.”
Smith also attended the opening ceremony, just like he was first invited in 2019. He grinned as he greeted the other big surfers and hugged Clyde Aikau, who was wearing a necklace around his neck. he. Attendees were traditionally blessed and all paddled out to Waimea Bay for a ceremony.
“The first time I paddled out, I was in tears,” Smith said, pointing to goose bumps on his arms. “Probably because I’m Tahitian — we’re Polynesian too — that means a lot more to me than the surfing competition. When you paddle out, you feel that Eddie is coming to us.”
Early in the morning of January 11, when invitees were expected to await their heat, many still sailed out to meet the monster rolling across the North Coast. Crowds met them at the beach — many locals took the day off work when the event was first announced — and cheered as the surfers plunged into the strong waves.
There’s Koa Rothman studying the waves rolling in and Eli Olson arriving after “riding some fun waves”. Landon McNamara paddles on a board with the bumper sticker “Eddie Going,” he says, a reminder, “it keeps me going.” Bianca Valenti enjoys being “re-acquainted with the waves”, waves that break only once or twice once or twice in winter in a good year.
And there was Smith and Grosmaire, jubilant as they watched the massive suits roll into the bay. When the event was canceled, the two decided to board the next flight from Los Angeles to Honolulu.
The same instinct brought Leonhardt to the bay, even as she was a surrogate on the women’s guest list. Her journey began on the afternoon of January 9 when she moved between buses, taxis and flights from Colima to Guadalajara to Tijuana to San Diego and then on to Honolulu.
One by one, they timed the dangerous shore. And one by one, they returned to the sand, buzzing with the excitement that had brought them here for the first time.
After all the bay did not call the day. But the rage still comes, so do they.
