PARKO’S SASHIMI FOOT from Joel Parkinson on Vimeo.

This is the last time, we promise.

Video by Asher King

Shot-shot... Jordy celebrates a big win at home. //Kirstin/ASP

Consigned to the lounge with his gammy foot, Joel watched every heat at J-Bay. Here’s his rap on what he saw…

THE WAVES

The waves were epic. That first day looked unreal and it made it a hard contest for me to watch. The waves looked a lot like last year – my kind of conditions, fast with long walls – and it was definitely the kind of waves I’d been surfing at home before I cut my foot. I found myself mindsurfing everything. The first four heats were really hard to watch because I was getting pissed off that I wasn’t there and it was perfect, but after I got over it I started analysing everyone’s moves and strategies. I was the supercoach on the lounge. I learned a lot sitting on the couch and watching it, all the strategies and tactics from a new angle, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time.

THE RIGHT WAVES

It’s a hard wave to surf when it’s a bit bigger. When it’s four foot every wave is good, but when it’s six foot like it was on the first day some of them can be burgery. You really had to pick your waves. But it’s more the man-on-man heats when you see wave choice becoming really crucial and there were plenty of guys making mistakes… which is easy to say from my lounge. I was ripping on my lounge. There were a couple of things I pinpointed that guys should and shouldn’t have done and it cost them the heat. Bottle did all the hard work against Adriano but then let himself down by taking the wrong wave. There were a lot of crucial wave choice decisions that cost guys heats. You really see the pressure element at J-Bay. Because they’re generally long period swells and you can have long lulls, the scoreboard pressure at J-Bay is really important. If you’ve got one good score at J-Bay you can apply pressure and force the other guy into a dud wave and get him panicking. The scoreboard pressure is one thing I really noticed when I was watching heats, playing the chess game from the couch.

ANDY

Andy was great. He definitely had flow for sure. J-Bay was never his prime wave when he was on tour, despite the fact he won out there before. It was never his comfort zone. It was no Teahupoo for him. Watch him though in this next contest. If they get some good waves this year in Tahiti look out. One thing that never really changes with your surfing is your ability to ride the barrel, and I reckon in Tahiti he’s going to find himself in his first final series for the year, for sure. Every event this year he’s looked better and better, and if he manages to make a final somewhere soon or even wins one, then look out. He’s the kind of guy who feeds on confidence.

DANE

Dane lives by the kind of surfing we saw in J-Bay, it’s all or nothing and that’s what you’re always going to get. He can do every move in the book and he goes for it, but if he doesn’t make it he’s going to end up with a shocker heat like he had against Taj. He probably only needs to pull himself back 10 per cent in some situations and he’d be winning some heats he’s losing, but the way he surfs he’s not going to do it. That’s not Dane. And if he did pull it back then you wouldn’t be seeing those heat scores of 18 or 19, you’d be seeing 15s and 16s, and then again it’s not quite Dane. He’s still the most exciting surfer to watch on tour and he always goes for it… whether he makes it or not depends on how he’s felling.

KELLY

I was pretty surprised Kelly lost. I thought he was looking real comfortable and calm in his first heat, and when he’s comfortable and calm at J-Bay he’s gonna win. But it didn’t happen against Shaun [Holmes]. Maybe he was thinking too much about Shaun. He’s such a nemesis out there and he gets guys so spooked that maybe he got in Kelly’s head a bit. Or maybe Kelly just had a shocker. I wonder if it was board choice even… his board didn’t look that great to me. Sometimes J-Bay doesn’t have a pocket to surf in, and when that happens and you get longer barrelling sections you can see which boards are really going well and which ones aren’t, and it looked to me like Kelly’s board wasn’t really working for him.

UNDERDOGS

Melling obviously was good, and Bottle was really good too. Shouldn’t be a surprise, they’re both pointbreak surfers and should be suited to J-Bay. In that one heat Bottle showed us what he can really do, he showed how good a pointbreak surfer he is. The Burleigh came out in him. But J-Bay’s inconsistency got him in the end… it got a few guys who were in form. Guys who just didn’t get the chance to ride waves. J-Bay can do that to you; you can be the most in-form surfer in the contest but if you don’t catch waves you won’t win a heat.

MICK

Damo has got some form at J-Bay, he’s no slouch out there, but in saying that you’d think going up against Mick, well, you’d have your money on Mick. But I thought Mick would have surfed a little better – read that it was a slow heat and caught a few more waves because he’s so good at turning four and five waves into sixes and sevens. He kinda waited for solid waves I guess, but if he had of surfed what was in front of him he would have won. No one surfs those little rock barrels better than Mick, he’s so fast and can fit turns in quicker than anyone. But in saying that Damo surfed the heat – and the whole contest – well I thought.

BEST HEAT

The Bede and Jordy semi, for sure… a bit of controversy. Jordy definitely got the score he needed on his last wave, but I thought maybe he should’ve needed more. Did he deserve what he got with his Superman on the first score? Probably not. I only watched it once and haven’t watched a replay, so that’s off one viewing, and there’s a big difference between watching it on TV and watching it live on the point. I might have given it to him if I’d been there, who knows. But I’m not much of a Superman fan. I don’t really get off on them. You might as well do a double grab. They just look a bit ugly to me. But it was great to see Jordy get a win, and to get his first win at home too must have been incredible for him. You could see how much it meant to him.

THE WORLD TITLE

Jordy’s got to number one but it’s the one time of the year you don’t want to be. The first thing I thought about when Jordy won and was that first place on the ratings was that he’s going to draw Manoa Drollet at Chopes. And Kelly went down a bit, so did Mick, so they’ll avoid Manoa. You can’t forget how gnarly that guy is at Teahupoo, especially if there’s swell. Once they get to Trestles I think those guys are really going to start firing up – Mick, Kelly, Taj and Jordy are all amazing out there. From Trestles it’s heading into such a heavy stretch. As hungry as Jordy was heading into J-Bay, he’s gong to have to be just as hungry coming into Pipe in four months time if he’s going to win the title, and there’s a lot of surfing between now and then. Every one of those guys still has a good chance at winning the title and I wouldn’t even be looking at the ratings and the numbers right now. They don’t mean a lot.

THE TOECUTTER from Joel Parkinson on Vimeo.

Okay Joel, talk us through the wave.

The wave I cut my foot on was such an incredible little wave. A sick, sick wave. A tank. Did you see how square that wave was? It was mental. Mate, it was one of those waves that when it stood up on the bank and I was paddling into it, I knew I was taking off two feet too deep even before I stood up. But it was such a drainpipe that I was like, “I’ve just got to have a go at this!” From the moment I saw it I knew it was going to be a rad drop and that I was going to be a little bit too deep. I would have had to take off on the shoulder to make it, but I was going anyway. Once I pulled into the barrel the foamball just got under my board and blasted me forward. I thought for a second it might just fire me out of this thing like a bullet in a gun. Instead the foamball flipped my board over and the fin has sliced my foot. I knew instantly I’d been cut. I dealt with the wipeout and just as I’ve equalised underwater and got my bearings I’ve reached down and felt my foot, thinking that I’m up for a few stitches, maybe three or four at best. But when I put my hand down there all four fingers have disappeared into the gash. That didn’t feel good. Then once I got to the surface I’ve lifted my leg out of the water to have a look and there it was – my heel just kind of sagged off, a quarter of my foot just flapping around. It was like watching a horror movie. Just went, oh my goodness, get me to hospital.

Describe the scene once you washed up on the beach.

First up I’ve got to thank the paramedic who was there and the lifeguard. But the first guy who got to me on the beach just happened to be an off-duty paramedic… how lucky was that? The first guy I yelled at for help on the beach was a paramedic. It was good luck for me but not for him; the week before he’d been up the Seaway when a girl was run over by a boat and lost her leg. He’s had a pretty heavy week. Andy [Irons] was with me down at the waterline, and he was next to me as they carried me up the beach. I was asking him how it looks and all he could say was, “Oh bra, oh bra…”

I heard you were cracking jokes while they were treating you on the beach?

The whole scene was pretty intense. It was school holidays and there were kids around everywhere who were starting to freak out. I didn’t want them freaking out because that would start me freaking out. I tried to keep everyone calm around me, cracking a few jokes, going to the paramedic guy, “So I’ll be right to surf tomorrow, eh?” Then I look at all these peoples’ faces standing around me and they’re white as ghosts and nobody’s laughing. It was pretty wild just trying to deal with it, but then as soon as I got into the ambulance the pain started to kick in. I got from Snapper to North Kirra in the ambulance, about two minutes down the road, and told the bloke, “Mate, this is really starting to hurt.” And he’s just pulled out the green painkilling whistle and I was off with the fairies after that.

What was your worst fin chop before this one?

I almost cut my toe off once in Hawaii, and I’ve had my fin go through the webbing between my toes twice, once before my first heat in J-Bay last year. That one was three stitches, the Hawaii one was eight stitches, and I’ve had 10 stitches in my head, so I’ve smashed my record with this one. The doctor put a lot of stitches inside the cut – he lost count. Then on the outside there were 15, 20 maybe across the bottom of my foot. There was a bit of work to do there. This shits on anything I’ve done to myself in my whole life; my ankle injury, my knee, medial ligaments, this shits on it for pain and sheer gruesomeness. You wouldn’t wish it upon anyone else in the world just to come up after a wipeout and see your body hacked at like that. Come up and one of your limbs looks horrifically not right. Like when a footballer seeing another players knee bending the other way, just that immediate horror of seeing a body not looking like it should.

What’s the prognosis for getting back into the water?

Because it’s a flesh wound it’s one of those things we really don’t know how long it’s going to take. It’s not like, “It’s a grade one medial tear, you’re out for four weeks.” There’s no timetable on this and I won’t know until I’m up walking around on it. I’ve been getting some physio on the foot, and I’ve got an electronic machine that stimulates bloodflow through it. I’ve got to get the movement back in my toes as soon as I can, and then I’ve got to put weight back on it. With the scar tissue in the wound it’s hard to tell exactly how long it’s going to take to heal. I haven’t pulled out of Tahiti but I might have to. You’ve got to stay upbeat with something like this and use some positive energy to help it heal.

What did you learn from dealing with the ankle injury last year that you can apply to this one?

That I’m not coming back until I’m 100 per cent. Because I was chasing the world title last year I was coming back at 60 per cent and I never want to do that again. I hated last year going to Trestles thinking, if I can just get a 9th here I’ll take it. You need to go into every event thinking you can win it. Even if I get it to 90 per cent with this injury I’ll wait. I want to come back at 100 per cent. I was talking to Hog [Nathan Hedge] today and he was talking about his shoulder injury that he did a few years ago, and he said it was the best thing he ever did, waiting a bit longer for it to heal rather than rushing back.

That’s two major injuries within 12 months. How unlucky are you feeling right now?

Pretty bloody unlucky.

You were just three days away from getting on the plane to J-Bay. Surely that added to the pain?

It did. I was so fit and I’d trained so hard and all the work had been done. I was so ready. I’d finished training and was only a few days from getting on the plane. All the hard stuff was done and I was so ready to go and start reaping the benefits of feeling amazing and surfing J-Bay and surfing heats again, but now I’m here lying on the couch instead.

Are you going to be watching the contest webcast?

For sure, I’ll be cheering on Deano and Andy and Mick. I’d love to see a Deano and Andy final. I wanna watch the heats… but I’m not so keen on watching the waves. There’s swell coming and I’ll just be torturing myself by watching it. If it’s pumping I’m going to be in all sorts. But I love watching the heats live when I get the chance, screaming at the guys on screen telling ‘em what they should be doing. You never lose a heat watching it on the beach, and I don’t intend to lose a heat watching it on the lounge. I’ll be the supercoach on the lounge telling everyone what they should be doing.

And what about the other 20 hours a day on the lounge? How much Oprah and Doctor Phil are you watching?

I’m over the couch already. I’ve been reading my fishing mags and watching some fishing shows on the Discovery Channel today, which were pretty cool. As soon as I can walk around I’ll be getting my boat out into the river and going fishing. Hazza’s injured and has got a boot on his foot at the moment, so he might be my fishing partner. We might go chasing some whiting and flathead in the river. I think just getting into the outdoors at the moment will be good for my mind.

THE TOECUTTER from Joel Parkinson on Vimeo.

Kirra in the mirror. //Pat Stacy

I’d never surfed The Left before.

On the speedboat on the way over from Bali Andy was frothing. He’d surfed it a bunch of times and was telling me it was one of the best lefts in the world. I was hoping he wasn’t talking it up too much. After listening to him I didn’t want to get there and find it wasn’t the best left in the world.

We get there and it’s two foot and no good. Nothing. Mate, it was three foot and a fat little lefthander when we pulled up in the morning because it was high tide. It doesn’t really do much on the high tide. But as the tide starts going out it gets bigger and bigger and better and better. It’s an amazing wave, a unique wave. It’s almost like a novelty wave in a way because it’s so tidal and so much water moves up the point out there.

JS was the first one out. He paddled out at quarter past 11. I jumped in half an hour later, and we got out at six that night. Over six hours in the water. It was kind of onshore when we paddled out, then this rainsquall swept through and after that it went perfect offshore and was unbelievable.

You take off up the top and it’s this 60-second ride down to the end section. The top of the wave has a few barrels and also lets you do a few turns, but if you get too carried away up there you’re going to blow the best barrel of your life down on the inside. You just go into survival stance from the top of the point down to the barrel section, just race it, then you just lock in. I reckon one in every 50 waves will let you out down there, but it’s so perfect that it just keeps staying open. It’s pretty heavy. You get in the barrel and there’s not much margin for error because it gets really shallow down on the inside. I had to straighten out on a couple down the end because I just couldn’t keep up with it. There was a bit of dry dock reef but down there, but it’s not too bad, you know. I didn’t lose any skin.

Andy surfed the best, definitely. He got better and better and his barrel riding got more fine tuned as the day went on. He kept pushing himself harder. Andy just goes straight to another level when a wave gets like that. He rises to the occasion, especially in hollow reef waves.

We had a great window at the bottom of the tide and it just pumped. The only other left I’ve surfed like it is Speedies at G-Land, but I was really young when I surfed Speedies and didn’t have a good sense of backhand barrel riding and couldn’t really appreciate it. But after that afternoon at The Left I’ve got to say that’s the best lefthander I’ve ever surfed in my life. I love going left because I hardly ever do it, and I’ve been surfing so much at home recently that I’ve been dreaming of going left all day, surfing perfect lefthand barrels. It’s not even one of those things where you wish you could surf that wave on your forehand. That wouldn’t even make it special because it’d just be like any other day at home on the Gold Coast.