Building a Buzz

It has become the talk of the surfing world.

Did Taylor Knox ride the ultimate wave when he successfully navigated an estimated 48-foot monster off Ensenada last month? Or did Peter Mel catch the biggest giant barrel at Half Moon Bay in January?

Normally, battles like this are for nothing more than bragging rights. But in this case, the winner gets a cool $50,000.

It’s all part of a clever advertising campaign by ski and snowboard maker K2 Inc. of Los Angeles, which is taking the plunge into the lucrative surf-wear market.

But unlike many marketing blitzes, the K2 Big Wave Challenge is doing for surfing what Taco Bell’s Spanish-speaking chihuahua has done for sales of tiny canines.

The contest has consumed board riders from Rincon Beach in Santa Barbara to Blacks surf break near La Jolla. It has been the topic of lunchtime conversation at Wahoo’s Fish Taco on Placentia Avenue in Costa Mesa, a popular surf hangout. And it helped Jack’s Surf Boards in Huntington Beach sell 500 Big Wave Challenge T-shirts in four months, at $16.95 a pop.

“People come in and see them, and they have to have them,” said Jack’s co-owner Ron Abdel.

Never mind that there are only about two dozen surfers on the planet even capable of riding a wave big enough to win the K2 contest.

But while intrigued by the idea, some are put off by what they perceive as an intrusion--and one that could result in great injury, no less--by corporate America.

“It’s really a rude thing to have a company come into the surf world and think they’re honorable because they’re offering a reward for something most guys wouldn’t normally do,” Laird Hamilton, a big-wave rider from Maui, told Surfer magazine.

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For riders like Knox and Mel, the pursuit of the Big Wave is an all-consuming passion. Over the past 4 1/2 months, they have had their bags, with airline tickets on standby, eagerly awaiting news of the next big swell.

When they arrive at a destination, they grab a rental car and head for the surf break. Instead of three-piece suits and ties, their working clothes are wetsuits and booties--often donned on cold pavement in parking lots in predawn hours.

When they do paddle out, they are confronted by a world of moving water. There is a thunder of noise as the largest of the large swells push mountains of brine toward shore with a hiss, then a loud roar as each wave collapses.

“Your reaction? Fear, total insecurity,” said Michael Neunuebel, a 38-year-old Australian and former member of the National Surfing Scholastic Assn.’s national team. “You’re just in awe because when you see waves that big, you’re just totally vulnerable.”

Neunuebel’s teammate, Rick Fignetti, a Huntington Beach surf shop owner, said it best: “You got your heart in your throat and you just go down that big wave face. It’s a life-or-death situation. . . . You wonder whether your lungs can hold out and whether you can survive a wipeout.”

Surfing legend Mickey Munoz, 60, of Capistrano Beach was among the first to ride big Waimea Bay surf in Hawaii in 1957.

“There are bigger waves at other places in the world like at Jaws in Maui,” Munoz said. “But those guys are getting towed in with jet-skis. And, that’s not to take anything off Taylor Knox. What’s so impressive with him is that he paddled into this wave.”

What was especially impressive about the big-wave chargers on the West Coast is that they competed in water 20 degrees colder than their Hawaiian counterparts.

“You’re way more relaxed in warmer water,” Munoz said. “In Hawaii, the water is in the 70s and at Todos Santos and up at Mavericks, it’s in 50-degree water. I don’t know whether density has anything to do with it, but it certainly feels denser when it’s cold water.”

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The brains behind the Big Wave Challenge belong to Bill Sharp, president of Katin USA, a Costa Mesa board shorts maker that K2 acquired last fall. Looking to capitalize on the extremis liquidus generated by El Nino, Sharp came up with the idea to pay $50,000 to the surfer who rides the biggest wave this winter, and $5,000 to the photographer who immortalizes it.

The contest, which began in November, ended Sunday and the winner will be announced March 31.

“We wanted to find a way to highlight what is one of the most serious, respected and dramatically visual aspects of the sport,” Sharp said. “And do it a way that people could tell was devised by surfers, not some corporate entity trying to barge into the industry.”

The timing of the contest is no accident. Los Angeles-based K2, best known for its skis and snowboards, is set to debut a line of surf apparel next month.

Sharp, himself a big-wave surfer, knew that the contest would capture every surfer’s imagination--and make K2 top-of-mind in the process.

“Everyone who has been tumbled by a 3- to 4-foot wave off our coastline knows the power that the ocean has,” Sharp said. “Can you imagine what a wave that size would do to you?”

Apparently, surfers everywhere are wondering just that.

The contest “has been near genius,” said Steve Hawk, editor of Surfer magazine in Dana Point. “Surfers are already sizing up waves according to their ‘K2’ potential.”

The Big Wave Challenge has captured more than just the imagination of surfers. It has attracted interest from such mainstream media as CNN and Time and Newsweek magazines.

To aficionados such as Surfing magazine photographer Les Walker of Newport Beach, the contest may have provided a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

It was Walker who snapped photographs of Knox at Todos Santos on Feb. 16, meaning he’ll win the $5,000 if Knox wins the contest.

“There were many photogs out there and I had to get a worthy shot different from them,” Walker said.

He stuffed his camera gear into a waterproof bag and, with the help of a friend on a jet-ski, got a ride to within 30 yards of shore.

Of Knox’s huge wave, Walker recalled that several judges nearby grew silent as Knox turned around to paddle for the wave.

“He looked like a small individual on a mountain of water,” Walker said. “The judges saw the wave coming in and they just went silent. Taylor, being the incredible athlete he is, just stroked for that wave. I couldn’t believe it. It was awe-inspiring.”