A-frame

Aaberg, Denny

Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

Abbruzzi, Sid

Abellira, Reno

Abubo, Megan

academia and surfing

Adler, Tom

advertising and surfing

Aeder, Erik

aerial

Aguerre, Fernando

Aichner, Scott

Aikau, Clyde

Aikau, Eddie

Aipa, Ben

air-drop

airbrush

Airshow

Ala Moana

Alabama

alaia board

Alaska

alcohol and surfing

Alexander, Kala

Allen, Chuck

Alms, Paige

aloha shirt

Alter, Hobie

Alvarez, Pepe

Ancell, Kevin

Andaman Islands

Andersen, Lisa

Anderson, Craig

Anderson, Simon

Andino, Kolohe

Angel, Jose

angle

Angola

Angourie

Antarctica

Apocalypse Now

Arabian Sea

Aragon, Janice

Arakawa, Eric

Archbold, Matt

Arena, Eduardo

Ashton, Juan

Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)

Atlantic Ocean

August, Robert

Aurness, Rolf

Auster, Ken

Australia

Avalon, Frankie

Azores

backdoor

backside

backside attack, Pipeline

backwash

bail out

Bain, Rob

Baja California

Baker, Bernie

Baker, Grant “Twiggy”

Baker, Tim

Bali

Ball, John “Doc”

Ballard, Bill

Ballard, Rochelle

balsa

Baltic Sea

Banks, Jim

Barbados

Barilotti, Steve

Barland, Michel

Barreda, Sergio “Gordo”

Barry, Michael

Bartholomew, Wayne

Baxter, Jackie

Bay of Bengal

Beach Boys, The

Beacham, Debbie

beachboys

beachbreak

Beachcomber Bills Grand Prix

Beachley, Layne

beavertail

Becker, Phil

Bedford-Brown, Stuart

Belgium

Bells Beach

Bendall, Ma and Pa

Bennett, Barry

Benson, Becky

Benson, Blanche

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

Bertlemann, Larry

Annual Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP) world pro tour competition, founded in 1997; held in the beautiful but deadly left-breaking reef waves at Teahupoo, Tahiti; regarded as the world's most thrilling surf contest. Teahupoo was virtually unheard of when the Black Pearl Horue Pro, as the Tahiti Pro was first known, debuted as a World Qualifying Series event in 1997. (The WQS is the ASP's minor league tour, below the premier World Championship Tour.) Surf magazine coverage of the 1997 Black Pearl Pro, in fact, identified the break as Waterworld. Nearly 200 surfers competed in the $80,000 men's-only contest, including venerated pros Sunny Garcia, Gary Elkerton, and Vetea David. The surf was thrilling, the rides spectacular, and the biggest waves were enough to unman the entire field, and passed by untouched. A dramatic high point came on the third day of competition, when the Aremiti, a $1.5 million catamaran being used as a floating hospitality suite for competitors, judges, and VIP spectators, ran aground—"coral heads disemboweling her inch by screaming inch," as an Australian surf journalist reported. All 150 Aremiti passengers were ferried safely to shore. Teenager Andy Irons from Hawaii won the contest.

The contest returned the following year as the Gotcha Tahiti Pro; a women's division was added (won by Hawaii's Keala Kennelly); and the contest ended in chaos when Conan Hayes of Hawaii, the apparent winner after charging fearlessly through a series of Teahupoo barrels, was announced as runner- up to Australia's Koby Abberton. Hayes stormed off the presentation stage and later said he'd put his "life on the line, and got robbed." A contest judges' scaffolding, built on the reef adjacent to the break, collapsed halfway through the event.

The 1999 Gotcha Tahiti Pro was elevated to World Championship Tour status, and became the sensation of 13-event tour. The biggest waves for the most part continued to roar through with no takers, and 

 magazine described Teahupoo as "a still- unconquered field of play." Australians Kate Skarratt and Mark Occhilupo won; Occhilupo was on his way to a world title. The judges' scaffolding once again collapsed. One week before the start of the 2000 Tahiti Pro, local surfer Briece Taerea broke his back in three places and died after getting caught inside by a 15-foot wave at Teahupoo. Six-time world champion Kelly Slater of Florida came out of semiretirement to win the men's division; Keala Kennelly took the women's. The contest was renamed the Billabong Pro Teahupoo in 2001, and the prize purse was raised to $310,000, with Florida's Cory Lopez and Layne Beachley of Australia winning. The 2011 event was briefly interrupted when the surf grew impossibly big and dangerous; the Code Red Swell, as the period of giant waves came to be known, attracted big-wave surfers from around the world, and was shown live on the contest webcast. Kelly Slater went on to win the event.

2006: Bobby Martinez, Melanie Redman-Carr (last year of the women's event)

Billabong Pro Tahiti

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Encyclopedia of Surfing

Encyclopedia of Surfing