By Craig Jarvis
It was a freezing cold Tuesday morning, the waves at Misty Cliffs near Scarborough were abysmal, rain fell gently on to the assembled surfers and organisers as the first heat of the day took to the freezing water.
In the heat was a 21-year-old surfer from Durban named Jordy Smith. It has been said in many forms of media that it is inevitable that Smith will become the new surfing world champion one day. As it is, he shares the same birthday as nine-time world champion Kelly Slater.
As the surfers entered the water, a fierce current tried its best to send them careering down the beach, but today's young surfers competing on the World Qualifying Series are highly skilled and fit athletes, and just paddled hard to stay in the same spot.
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Smith paddled hard into the first wave of the morning, battling against the fierce updraft and the blinding Atlantic spray stinging his eyes. He caught the wave, pumped with his back foot for a bit of speed, and launched straight into a backhand aerial manoeuvre straight into the wind - arguably one of the most difficult surfing moves to pull off.
He landed it with ease, continued his amazing flowing track along the wave before sliding into a reverse, another tricky surfing move. The score was 8.5 out of a maximum of 10, and set the tone for the day.
"It's pretty wild and cold out there," said Smith after it was announced that he had won his opening heat.
Smith has been touted the world over as the future of modern surfing, and with his American counterpart Dane Reynolds, has filled up the surf mags, been placed in a multitude of surf DVDs, and is paid well to represent surfing and other cool brands. It is rumoured that Smith's annual income before prize earnings is a couple of million dollars a year.
Not bad considering the path he has had to follow.
"We were poor, we really were. My dad's business wasn't doing so well and we didn't have much at all. There was a time when the whole family were surviving on Pronutro.
Then when things started turning around with my surfing I started getting calls from Tiger Woods and Kelly Slater and Shaun Tomson, all wanting to give me advice with my life."
Smith is sitting at sixth spot on the World Tour of surfing. He also won the O'Neill Cold Water Classic event in Tasmania earlier this year.
Jordy Smith didn't make it into the final rounds of the Cold Water Classic in Cape Town - written at several local breaks, including Kalk Bay Reef and Misty Cliffs.
- This article was originally published on page 20 of Sunday Argus on June 28, 2009
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