Mavericks Contest Wrap-Up

Posted on February 13th, 2010 by JZ

South African, Chris Bertish with his epic performance, takes home $50K for winning this year’s historic Maverick’s surf contest. A long period, 22 foot swell pounded in and had this place off the charts, making the waves perfect for the contest. The 24 surfers in the contest, made it happen Saturday by paddling into some of the scariest waves known to man. Some guys pulled back on some of the larger waves saying that it was a toss up with being either the best ride of their lives or risking their lives. The most asked question that was going through these surfers heads was, “What would have happened if I’d gone?”.

The scene sounds ridiculous; hundreds of boats and 30-40 Jet Ski’s in the water, 4 helicopters hovering overhead, broken boards, broken bones, and even the spectators getting hit on shore by the monstrous waves.

During the contest, a couple hundred spectators were standing on a seawall when a rouge wave rolled through and took a lot of people down. An injured spectator said, ” it just came out of nowhere and wiped us all out”. Two walls of water crashed into the seawall sweeping people into the rocky beach area that caused broken bones and emergency personnel to come help the victims. Luckily no one was swept back out into the ocean.

Thankfully no one died during this event and everyone was able to walk away with the experience of witnessing one of the biggest, or maybe the biggest, paddle-in wave contest held at Maverick’s.

Check out the video below of the spectators getting a taste of the powerful waves that the surfers in the pictures below were daring to ride.