Stephanie Gilmore won her first world championship at age 17 on a day off from high school. Over the next four years she led the sport of surf, claiming consecutive world titles as the undisputed champ, until a violent turn of events abruptly ended her winning streak. Stephanie in the Water is an intimate documentary that chronicles Gilmore’s return to the top and the costs that come along with being a five time world champion.
Every August, Honolulu’s premier ocean sports event kicks off on Waikiki Beach. It’s Duke’s Ocean-Fest, a nine-day tournament with events like tandem surfing, paddleboard racing, and surf polo—water polo on longboards! More than 2,000 athletes from Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and the US compete. Now in its 13th year, the festival honors Duke Kahanamoku, Hawaii’s famed Olympic gold medalist and aloha ambassador, who died in 1968. “He helped pioneer and expand surfing to the rest of the world,” says event director Brent Imonen. Which means the Duke also helped fuel a whopping industry: Surfing looks likely to reach $13 billion in global revenue by 2017 … More