"Pressure Drop: The Quiksilver, in Memory of Eddie Aikau," by Brock Little, SURFER Magazine, May 1990

Early Sunday morning, January 21, 1990, George Downing sat in the lifeguard tower at Waimea, timing and counting the sets. For the past three years, anytime the swell has been over 10', George has been in the same tower doing the same thing. And for three years, the question has been: When are you going to run the contest? And for three years, George held firm to his 20'-minimum rule. If Quiksilver wanted a big-wave contest, it was going to be held in big waves.

After all this time, though, the pressure was starting to mount. Quiksilver was getting impatient. So were some of the surfers.

Back on the tower, George's notepad didn’t show a wave breaking over 15'. It was already 8:00 AM, and he’d called the event on without one wave being close to the 20' standard. But George knew something we didn’t. At about 9 AM, the waves started to pick up: first 18', then 20', and soon a 25' closeout set. After three years of waiting, “The Day at the Bay” had finally arrived. The Quiksilver was on at perfect Waimea.

The wind was straight offshore and there were huge waves to be ridden. Between sets, the ocean would go almost dead flat, and this made the day even better: after a surfer wiped out and got through the set, he had time to clear his head and get himself together.

The first of six hour-long heats got started at 11:00 AM. The format of the contest was simple. Each surfer would surf twice. In each heat, 11 surfers were allowed to catch a maximum of four waves each. Most surfers caught their limit of eight waves for the day. The four best waves, regardless of when you caught them, were tallied for a final score. Five judges scored on a scale of 1-20, so the most a person could get on one wave was 100 points. The guy with the most points at the end of the day would get $55,000.

The first heat had a lot of good surfers, including Mark Foo and Darrick Doerner. Darrick caught four solid 20-footers. He took off deep and rode perfectly, like he always does at Waimea. Derek Ho also got some near-closeout sets.

Kerry Terukina had one of the most awesome wipeouts of the day. He paddled into a jacking 20-footer, looked down, saw he was too late and dove into the pit. He must have fallen three stories.

In the same heat, Roger Erickson caught a massive wall—one of the five biggest waves ridden all day. Roger may be a rookie husband and father, but he still has big balls. Later, he caught a 20-footer with Tony Moniz, which they rode all the way to the shorepound. Tony jumped off like anybody else would. Not Rog—he powered right through the gnarly suck-up, made it to the beach, grabbed his 10’8", confidently walked up the sand and got a kiss from his wife Allison.

I was in the second heat, along with Johnny-Boy Gomes, Aaron Napolean, Richard Schmidt, Brian Keaulana, Dane Kealoha, Ken Bradshaw, and four other guys. At the beginning of the heat, a 25'+ closeout set came in. The trick to catching one of these waves at Waimea (not a top-to-bottom closeout, but a rideable closeout) is to stay on the reef when the wave jacks. If you go too far out, the water’s too deep, and it’s impossible to get in.

As the set moved forward, the pack began stroking outside. I stayed farthest in, hoping to stay on the reef. When I arrived, I realized I was still too far out—and I was 10 yards inside of anyone else. I paddled hard to get back to the lineup but didn’t get there in time. 

 One of the only closeout sets of the day, and I missed it.

Luckily, about 10 minutes later, another one came in. This time I stayed inside with Bradshaw and Aaron, and I was in perfect position for the first wave. It was huge—who knows, maybe 25'. I stroked into it, stood, looked down and swore. I knew I was in trouble—too much face, too many chops. It was possibly the biggest wave of my life. I got about halfway down, but couldn’t hold on. I didn’t penetrate when I fell—I skipped. When I finally sank into the wave, I knew I’d go over the falls. Luckily, I grabbed a breath as I was on the way over. With that breath, I had enough oxygen to get through a fairly severe thrashing. That was a $55,000 wave, and I blew it.

Both Brian Keaulana and Richard Schmidt caught some big waves but were over-powered by whitewater. Johnny-Boy surfed well also, considering he doesn’t surf Waimea that often.

Keone Downing was in the third heat, and he dominated. He caught four of the biggest waves and rode them all the way through, oftentimes kicking out just before shorebreak. He knew how to win the event: He took off late and deep, and when he straightened out the whitewater didn’t brock him off.

Keone’s an upright surfer, like me. Except when the whitewater hits me, I usually go flying. I can understand how people who squat and have a wide stance, like Cheyne Horan and Darrick Doerner, can make it through whitewater. But I couldn’t figure out how Keone stayed on through the foam. That was key to his victory.

Ross Clark-Jones also caught some big waves in the third heat, and Ronnie Burns was impressive, too. Clyde Aikau surfed like only an Aikau can. He just goes for it. When Clyde rides Waimea he’s really comfortable and it shows.

Keone ended the round with a score of over 300 points and became the guy to beat. It’d be tough, though, because he was so far ahead it was ridiculous. I figured I could only fight for 2nd place.

After the first round, they shuffled the contestants and I wound up in heat one of the second round. It included Brian Keaulana, Aaron Napolean, Darrick Doerner, and Tony Moniz.

Before the heat started, I was sitting in the lineup talking to Tony. I told him I was stoked and didn’t really care whether I won or lost. I was just glad all the waiting was over. Tony agreed, saying how hard it was to be physically and mentally prepared, year after year. We were still talking when a set began to approach.

We both let the first wave go by. The second wave looked pretty big, and we began to hassle for it. There wasn’t a drop-in rule, but if you took off deeper than someone, you’d get a lot more points than if you were dropping in on him. Luckily, I got deeper than Tony. He backed off and I went for the wave.

Right as I stood up I realized I was too deep. I knew if I straightened out I’d get eaten. But the thing looked like it was going to open up, so I decided to pull in. I couldn’t believe what happened next: I’d been trying to get barreled at Waimea my whole life, and it was finally happening. I was in perfect trim, and the perspective reminded me of inside Sunset, only the barrel was bigger. I made it out then fell off, basically for no good reason, thinking as I hit, 

In retrospect, I remember moving forward on my 9’6" to get into full forward trim as I went into the tube. After I came out, I wanted to turn back down the wave. I wasn’t comfortable turning the board from where I was standing, though, and I began to lose my balance. Then my board hit a chop, and off I went. The wipeout was minor, but I was so pissed at myself. Another $55,000 mistake.

After that wave, I caught a couple of pretty decent ones. A late drop felt good, and a wave I rode with Owl was strong.

When the other guys in my heat heard I got a barrel, some of them started to pull in too. Michael Ho, a full psycho who gets little Waimea credit, took off on a set wave and pulled into a bigger tube than the one I had. He didn’t come out, but it was one of the waves that shot him into 4th place overall. Aaron Napolean also pulled into the pocket, but instead of traveling straight out, he snapped under the lip and fell.

When I came in after the heat, my shaper, Gabe Garduque, whose word I trust, told me I might be leading the contest. I wasn’t so sure but figured I’d find out in about two hours, after the final two heats.

For some reason I didn’t feel like hanging out, watching. I decided to go home and relax. I laid on my bed with the remote control and watched TV, switching channels every two minutes. I thought about how I'd done, and if I lost how it wouldn’t really matter. I told myself I’d had an unreal day of riding big surf; the ultimate high. The problem was I couldn’t totally convince myself. I really wanted to win the money.

I turned off the TV and got back down to the contest at about 5:00 PM. I asked my friend Ronald Hill if I missed anything. Ronald said not really, the guys who had a chance to win—Derek Ho, Darrick Doerner, Big Rog, Clyde and some of the others—didn’t get four really solid waves.

As we were talking, a big set came in. Guys were taking off, and even though I was disgusting myself by thinking bad thoughts, I was hoping they’d fall. No such luck.

Ross-Clark Jones rode a huge one, a then Keone. Right then, I had a strong feeling that Keone was going to win.

When the contest was over, we had to wait about 90 minutes for the results. I was stressing; I wasn't sure how I’d done, figured I was in the top five. Only the top three would get any real money. Fourth through 33rd was worth $350.

After about 20 minutes, I saw George walking around with a huge grin on his face and I knew Keone (George's son), had won. I could only hope for 2nd.

George took the microphone just as it was getting dark He gave a little speech, and began reading the results. He started at 33rd. By the time he got to 4th and said "Mike Ho," my heart was pounding so fast I thought I'd have a heart attack. Poor Mike had to go home with $350.

Third place was worth $5,000. George started by saying only one persona perfect score of 100. Richie Schmidt had caught one of the biggest waves of the day; he free-fell halfway down the face, made it, and got perfect marks. It pushed him into third. I got up to get my 2nd-place prize of $10,000, as they announced that Keone won. The pressure was off. I was stoked.

Eddie and Pops are probably sitting around somewhere laughing. First they made sure the swell would be big enough to hold the contest. Then they sent the waves and their spirits straight toward Keone.

Keone is $55,000 richer, and I did pretty well too, money-wise. But I have a feeling that, eventually, we won't be remembering the cash so much, as we will the rush of an all-time day riding Waimea.

1990 Quiksilver, in Memory of Eddie Aikau

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