Matt Warshaw's profile on Michael and Derek Ho ran in the October 1986 issue of SURFER. This version has been shortened and edited.

Sandy Beach, east side of Oahu. It’s just past noon, the sun is beating down dry and hot, the trades are wailing sideshore, the surf is head-high and gutless. Three local boys take turns on the set waves, turning across the choppy, blue faces, trying to connect the flat spots.

Derek Ho is in the parking lot, toweling off next to his new car—a clean, midnight-blue Honda Prelude with tinted windows and furry white seat covers. A semi-tough machine, a good cruiser. It fits Derek perfectly. He just got out of the water and, under his deft touch, the waves had looked almost fun. Really good surfers do that—make junk look decent. Derek had been shooting out to the flats and inscribing long perfectly curved roundhouses, looking like the last person, bashing high against the foam on the rebound, then moving on to the next one—finding speed from God knows where.

Derek gets in the car and shuts the door, blocking the wind. He looks out the windshield. The thing about Sandys, he says, is that there’s always something to ride. Once in awhile it gets okay, but it’s usually like this. Good for training, he says. “Yeah, this is definitely work today. I just got these two new boards. I wanted to see how they go.” He pauses. “Actually, this isn’t that bad. There’s nowhere on the island that has any waves right now. I'd probably be out there even if I didn’t have new boards.”

Derek Ho's time has come. He’s focused and intense and silently charging. No power fists, no loud statements to the surf press. His energy is channeled directly into his surfing. He paddles for lots of waves and works each one as far as it will take him. Then he paddles back out, quickly, and does it again.

He is quiet, particularly if he doesn’t know you, and maintains a constant demeanor of cool, bordering on dangerous. When he does get around to smiling, though, he does a good job of it, with big, white teeth and crinkled eyes. It’s just not something he does all the time.

Contest surfing means a lot to Derek at the moment. He just made the world tour Top Sixteen for the first time, finishing the’85-’86 season in 10th. As for the coming year, he hedges at first then speaks his mind. "I’m 21 now, and feel like I’ve got my trip together mentally and physically." A pause. "I could go top five. That’s what I’m shooting for, top five.”

Derek rode his first wave in 1967. At age two, the baby of the family, he was lifted onto his father’s shoulders as he rode in at Waikiki. Derek isn’t even sure if he remembers the moment, or if he’s just heard the story enough times to make it real.

He does remember, at age seven or eight, watching his big brother Michael surf in the Town contests. “It seemed like he won every one. I’d just watch and learn.”

Michael, of course, was a huge influence on young Derek, along with Gerry Lopez. In later years, he was greatly impressed by Tom Carroll’s power and aggression. The resulting style has bits and pieces of those three surfers but is Derek’s and Derek’s alone—the most distinguishing trait being a curled-up trailing arm. He surfs fast and clean; the maneuvers are adjusted as sharp an angle as possible without being jerky.

Derek rolls down his window; it’s getting hot inside the Prelude. Another set comes through and a friend of Derek’s gets the third wave. It has a bit of a wall, not quite as fat as the preceding waves. Maybe it's getting a little better. Derek watches, calm but intent.

Which prompts the question: Is it hard to leave this land of warmth and waves to compete in colder, small-wave latitudes? "Maybe it is for guys who ride big waves all the time. But for me, I ride big waves and small waves here, so I feel pretty comfortable when I travel. The cold gets to me sometimes, yeah, fullsuits and everything. But if everybody's gotta surf in the wind and rain, I’m there, too.”

Small waves certainly didn’t prove to be an obstacle at Allentown, PA, last year. Almost lost in the pool of negativity following the wave-machine event, was the fact that Derek just ran all over those tiny, frothy waves into the runner-up position. He can rip low-energy waves on a world-class level—the reward for these Sandy’s practice sessions.

On the flip side, of course, he can rip Pipeline when it’s inside-out, carnivorous, spit-bellowing madness. He’s one of a half-dozen names mentioned during any “Best at Pipeline" conversation. He didn’t get out there enough there this year—nobody did; it was an off-year for west swells—but the place is often on his mind. “I dream about Pipeline; about coming out of incredible barrels that I couldn’t believe I’d ever make. I’m looking forward to next winter.”

Derek recalls his first time there (“quite a few years back’’), sitting near the channel, taking off on the odd shoulder, never imagining that someday he’d be out in the middle of the pack, taking off on the biggest waves. He kept at it, though, and made steady progress. "Ahh, yeah, I feel pretty confident out there," he says, then pivots to a humbling experience last winter. "It was big, about 8-12’, and I was riding a 6'4". I was having fun, actually getting a lot of waves, maybe going for it a little more than usual. Then I got hung up at the top of a ten-footer, and just went head-over-heels. Yeah, I was scared; I was sure I was going to get hurt. I thought I was history.” He popped up, unharmed.

He smiles a little, then nods towards the windshield in the direction of Half-Point, a nasty little reef/point near the Sandy Beach bodysurfing area. “Actually, I’ve gotten hurt worse out here than I have at Pipeline.”

Four more surfers are paddling out, while one makes his way in. He stops by Derek’s car. “It’s fun, man," he says. "It’s getting better." Derek nods and, on cue, a five-wave set arrives—and it’s time to get back out there.

Michael Ho has been in the Top Sixteen as long as there’s been a Top Sixteen. Ten straight years. Other than Shaun Tomson, he’s the only person who can claim that. To go back even further, Michael Ho was in the finals of the ’72 World Contest in San Diego. So it comes as a slight shock to realize he’s only 28-years-old.

Michael lives at Sunset Point with his girlfriend Bryan. Their house is beautiful, newly built, modern and elegant, with hardwood floors, high ceilings and picture windows—as clean as possible without being sterile. Certainly nothing you’d want to track sand into, but Michael shakes his head and says his friends still do.

He sits back on a big, comfortable couch, smiling and congenial; the ideal host. He’s in high spirits this evening, completely at ease. Very different from the man who is known as one of the hardest interviews in surfing. It’s a bum day for a reporter when the questions are longer than the answers.

That certainly isn’t the case tonight. With Derek off in Town securing their Japan tickets, Michael recalls a bit of advice he gave his little brother, a long time ago: “I used to go down and watch him in all these little amateur contests. Mom and Dad would drive him down there and I'd meet 'em. This was years ago and I remember going, ‘Hey man, you gotta narrow your stance. What's with the Waimea stance? The wave’s only this big. Narrow it down.’ I'll never forget that.”

Did Derek listen? Michael nods. “I can’t take all the credit, but yeah, he’s got a pretty smooth stance now.”

Back to Michael’s longevity. He listens with a smile as his name is grouped with Jeff Hakman, Michael Peterson and Barry Kanaiaupuni—all members of the inaugural Top Sixteen, back in 1976. Michael recalls: “Those first years on the Tour were pretty interesting. None of us really knew what we were stepping into. For me it was great, going to Burleigh, Bells, Jeffreys, Japan. All that traveling—I learned a lot.”

Looking back on all the contests along the way, hundreds upon hundreds of them, Michael says the most memorable one was either the Duke win in '75 or the Masters win in '82 when he had a broken wrist. “I was only 18 when I won the Duke; it was my first big win on the North Shore. Winning the Masters was great because I didn’t think I had a chance, you know, with the cast. The first time I surfed with it was the morning of the finals.”

He goes on to say he doesn’t think he’s quite as aggressive at Pipe as he used to be. “No, not on the rights, for sure. When it’s 10', I don’t go right as often. I know the factors a little better than I used to: splitting your head, that kind of thing. A few years ago, I just might have done it for the hell of it, but nowadays,” he shakes his head.

Is Michael Ho mellowing with age? He laughs. “I think I am, yeah, I really do. I get pretty excited when I surf, still, but not like before. Like, I go surfing with my brother now and notice him just going 

, paddling for any little wave, and I’m checking this whole scene out, thinking, ‘Wow, that was me.’ Derek is so hungry right now. Sometimes I have to kinda elbow him and say, ‘Hey, cool it.’”

Which brings up the subject of his semi-retirement. He leans back on the couch and gives a faint smile. “Yeah, I guess it’s true. I won’t be going to South Africa this year, and there's so many events in Australia, so I'll miss some of those. The whole tour is just a little too long. I think I’ll be getting into more of a promotional thing here at home, instead of straight competition.”

Michael is surfing as well as ever. He hasn’t lost a step. Last winter he won the Triple Crown for the second time in three years, closing the deal with an impressive win in the World Cup at big Haleiwa—featuring another patented Michael Ho display of flawless positioning. (Derek, by the way, won the Triple Crown the year Michael didn’t.) Citing his relatively young age, Michael feels he could maintain a Top Sixteen slot for three more years if he toured full time. But after ten years, it’s just not something he feels he has to do. If he ever had anything to prove competitively, he’s done it.

The phone rings and Michael gets up to answer. He talks for a while, hangs up and says Derek’s on his way over with take-out dinner.

Michael points out to the front porch, now empty, and tell me that winter when he and Derek had 30 or so board laying out everywhere. The two are close enough in weight (Michael is eight pounds heavier) to ride each other’s boards, so they did a lot of trading off.

The conversation goes back to Michael and Derek both being in the Top Sixteen together—the first time in professional surfing's history that two brothers have been so highly ranked at the same time. Michael surprises me by saying that he and Derek have never surfed against each other in a professional contest. “Yeah, and the funny part is, everywhere I go, it’s ‘Hey, your brother is beating you now, your brother’s beating you.’ Well, first of all, like I said, we’ve never surfed against each other. And second, he’s not beating me, he's accomplishing what he’s accomplishing. He’s doing his thing, and I couldn’t be happier. You know, I’ve done what I’ve done, now it’s his turn. I’m just stoked to see us both doing so well at the same time.”

It’s near 10:30 when Derek finally arrives. Michael heats up two Seaview takeout dinners, seafood plates. Both are relaxed and talkative. Derek recalls the end of last year’s Tour, and how Michael had to make an eleventh-hour move for the Top Sixteen. “Yeah, Michael was right on the borderline—he had to come back there at the end to make it.”

Michael takes over: “I remember thinking, 'Hey, we got something on the line here, me and Derek, I better get my act in gear.’ Derek was looking good, holding down his end, you know, so it was up to me to make a late charge.” He did, and the Ho’s made history.

They almost always travel together, usually with one or two other Hawaiian surfers, and they informally coach each other during contests. “It’s not a full-on thing,” Michael says, “but well see what the wind is doing, let each other know what’s going on, tide changes, stuff like that.”

And how do they get along on the road? Michael: “Well, there’s little things, you know, that’s my wax, that’s my cord’ that kind of thing, but no big thing."

Derek nods, "We get in little quarrels here and there. I mean, we’re brothers. But we get along pretty good most of the time.”

The food is almost gone, and the two poke around for the last few bites. They agree it’s a little strange that they've never met man-on-man, but neither thinks they'll behave any differently when it happens. Derek: “No, we’d both be going for it, we’d both want to win. Him for his points, me for mine.”

Race for the priority buoy, the whole thing? They both smile and Michael answers: “Elbow for elbow, the whole way. I’d probably take a chance on the interference.” They both crack up.

Michael says, “But afterwards, when the contest's over, it’s over.”

Derek nods. “Either way, we’d both be happy.”

"HEY BRUDDA, SEE YOU IN THE TOP 16!" HO BROS PROFILE (1986)

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