Txaber Trojaola, our first spanish team rider

For the first time in its history, Lightning Bolt has a spanish team rider. We are really happy to welcome Txaber to our team. He is one of the best spanish surfers currently running the WQS. He lives in Bakio and his home spot is Mundaka.

Dentro de poco tiempo, haremos la traducción de la noticia para nuestros fans españoles.

Nos perdonen por sólo tenermos la entrevista en ingles.

Name: Txaber Trojaola Renobales

Nickname? Why did you get it? Antonio & Kangurin.

Birthdate? 14-04-86

Hometown? Bakio

Married, Single or Engaged? I have a girlfriend, Nerea.

Pets? 2 dogs, Gatz and Baloo, his child.

Hobbies and other sports? I like a lot of sports: snowboard, playing cards, the film, and spend a lot of time with my girlfriend and my friends

SOME QUESTIONS about his surf:

Favorite Spots near your hometown or Spain? Mundaka

Regular ou Goofy? Goofy

Surfboards? Pukas Boards. My stander board is a 6`0 x 17 7/8 x 2 1/16

How long do you surf? Why did you start it? I started surfing when I was 10 years old. In Bakio, my hometown, together with my friends and my brother, we spend a lot of time in the beach, and so we started surfing..

Coach, do you have one? What’s the importance? Yes, I got a group of people they help me a lot, a long time ago. I really thank them their huge support!!

Favourite Surfers? There are so many good surfers around the world, but I really get impressed with people like Kelly, Taj, Rob Machado, Kalany…

Surftrips already made and planned? I already made many surftrips, and I visited really interesting places I enjoyed a lot. Right now I have some more planned, but I just want to say the places, when those are really confirmed.

Wave Types? I like a lot the rights and the lefts, with one perfect size, between 1,5-2m hollow and with the possibility of making good Manoeuvres too.

Best spot in the world where you’ve been? Ummm..there are many but I think the best ones are Mundaka, Teahupoo, Barra de la cruz and Snappers…

Favourite Manoeuvre? Tube

Biggest wipe out? Well..Mundaka, Meñakoz and a lot more…Some of them I will never forget!

Top 5 results in Competition?

2^nd - WQS 5* 2009 Newquay Inglaterra

17^th - WQS 6* PRIME 2009 Lanzarote

1^st - Open EUROPA INTERCELTICOS 2008 Sopelana

4^th - WQS 1* 2007 Cordoama Portugal

4^th - Junior EUROPA 2* 2004 Ericeira Portugal

Why Competition, the professional career? The level is too high, and you have to try your best all the time and be ready for it. I have a competitive mind too.

Physical Maintenance? Which complementary sports or activities? Sports and training.

The surf and the Environment. Do you take part on any programme for protecting the beach? Yes, I take part in some movements to clean the beaches, when we get the trouble of Prestige petrol ship, I spent time trying to clean it. And I like, I love a lot the nature. Every time it’s possible, I do whatever it takes to preserve the environment.

Advice to whom is starting to surf? You have to enjoy it a lot and be persistent with it. Finally you start progressing and getting new feelings.

Sponsors? Lightning Bolt, Pukas, Arnette, Euskaltel, San Miguel, Manual accessories.

What’s your idea of Lightning Bolt in the surf world? What made you accept our support for 2010? One Of the oldest brands in the surf world. I like the brand and its history is something special. I thank the support and the idea of the brand.

Surf Objectives in 2010? I want to make the European WQS  tour which it is a part of the world tour too, and I would like to get some good results and improve my ranking in competition. Outside competition, I want to make some reports in different places and get some really nice pictures from there too.

SOME QUESTIONS about his Lifestyle:

Conservative or Liberal? Liberal.

As a basque, do you think the Basque Country should be autonomous? Yes, would like.

Do you support the Spanish monarchy? I prefer to talk about waves.

Soccer Team? Atletic de Bilbao and Atxurre from bakio!

Favourite Meal? My mum meals, like lentejas, pasta, rice, fish…Txuleta…bufff i like a lot all kinds of food!!

Alcoholic Drinks? Which Ones? Beer.

Dramas or Comedies? Comedies for sure. I hate the drama.

Movie of your life? Ali, Braveheart, Cadenza Perpetual, and many more.

Favourite Bands or Musics? I like music very much. Normally I hear all kinds of music, but I dislike Opera, Classic Music, Rap and Reggaeton.

Which bars and discos do you recommend in your hometown? Bar 01, Txoberne, Newman's bar and Bar Bakio. Bakio is small, but we have almost 20 bars!!!

Urban Tribes? Hippie, Punk, Fashion, Rasta? I don’t care much..

Are you against gay marriage? Why? NO, I have nothing against gay marriage, and I have nothing against them. I privilege that people can live happy, and I think, not allowing them the marriage is something really bad for them.

Who inspires you? Honest people.

Are you supersticious? Tell us one example. A little bit. Sometimes when things went good, next time, I try to copy and make everything in the same way to make it happen again.

If you could have dinner with anyone famous, who would you choose? Anyone as long it is sincere and modest people.

Watch below Txaber in action. Some highlights from the movie “Mad World”

Rory Russell roadtrip by Jonathan Paskowitz – Part II

Jonathan continues his roadtrip report. After Pukas, they continue to France...

"We got to Pukas and were so stoked to meet our friends there. Rory ran into Peter Daniels a legendary shaper and dear friend who he had many adventures with and Matt Biolas the owner of the Lost Brand and a good friend of mine from San Clemente, California. Not to mention the Puka’s owner son, Miguel. The shop there was amazing, I have never seen such a well run factory anywhere in the world.

We then headed north to Biarritz in France. We had invited the boys to come visit us at the Uncle Zizu surf shop for a little party the next day.
The French surf scene in Biarritz was awesome! The town is amazing, the hotel was beautiful and the French guys that meet us were great, Nicolas Pinot and the French photographer Yves Sobanski.
We went to the Surf Session magazine office and surfed cold overcast waves that day, it was gloomy and very cold but the people were great .
We had a good promotion with an awesome surfshop called More and Less, and we met a great guy from the local paper meet to have an interview. Turned out Rory had met him years and years before at the Pipemasters dinner when he was in Hawaii for the newspaper Sud-Qwest.
We got together later that night with our whole team, the local surfers and heroes like Peter Danels or the world class champion, one of the creators of a famous surf brand Jeff Hackman, and a slew of others at the Uncle Zizu Surf Shop.

We then went to an amazing space where we met one of the premier shapers in the area JP or Jean Pierre Stark, we checked out his amazing shop and met his team
Rory there shaped the first Pipliner board to be made in France ever…. Nicolas and Yves Sobanski were crying, they were so happy!!!!

It was a great adventure and so many nice people along the way.
We said our goodbyes and the boys started their 10 hour drive back home."

Rory Russell roadtrip by Jonathan Paskowitz – Part I

Jonathan Paskowitz, our international brand manager was there and tells us what happened around the legendary Rory Russell in his roadtrip in Europe.

"As I arrived to Portugal a few days before, I went to Porto airport and picked up Rory Russell with the original surf hero from Portugal Pedro Lima, a 75 year old man that is not old. He is full of life and surfed before surfing ever existed in Portugal. Pedro was a diver with Jacques Cousteau and pioneered body surfing in Europe long before there were even surfers in the European community.

We only stayed one day in Porto then drove to Lisbon the next day to meet the press and show the fall line to the Portuguese press and local magazines. We had a great time in Lisbon on the beach on a cliff overlooking one of Lisbon’s premier surf beaches. Rory even went into the water to help some kids surf with Bryan Porter our man from the states. The kids looked like they had a great time and Rory and Bryan we very funny with them. Back to Porto again and we started off on the Rory Road Trip to Spain and France. We picked up the guys Joao Diogo and the Lightning Bolt team riders Alexandre Ferreira and Pedro Soares, our new friends on the next part of this adventure. We drove north out of Porto to the boarder of Spain, rocky green mountains and little villages with farms. Really an incredible rich and glorious view whenever you looked out the window.

The Europeans maps are a joke!!! So hard to read. We missed our turn so many times I thought we would never get there. Mundaka was our first stop and we were trying desperately to get there. Finally after so many turns, we got to Mundaka and found the hotel Mundaka. It was now 04:00 am!!!!

We woke up the next day to meet our Spanish salesman Eduardo, great guy with a lot of style, he brought his charming girlfriend with him and was going to take us to meet a writer from a Spanish surfing magazine as well as a famous surfboard collector in the area.

We headed off for a little adventure in the area next to us in Bilbao. We all really wanted to see the city and have a dinner in the main town, we were really surprised to see the architecture and the modern mixed with the old.

In Mundaka the surf was really small but you could see the incredible potential of the waves there. We said goodbye to our new friends there and dropped into the Mundaka surf shop before leaving on the way up the coast to our next stop France. We would stop on the boarder to see the Pukas surfboard shop on the way.

Rory Russell Roadtrip

After more than 30 years, Rory Russell is back again with Lightning Bolt, a brand that never really left his heart.
And this month, you have the opportunity to meet him if you are in Portugal, Spain or France.
Rory Russell will be on a Roadtrip (20-26 March) together with Lightning Bolt Team Riders Pedro Soares and Alexandre Ferreira (aka Xaninho) and also Lightning Bolt USA Brand Manager Jonathan Paskowitz.

He'll arrive next Wednesday to Portugal, then the team will leave in a Lightning Bolt Van directly to Mundaka on the 21st, and from the 23rd to 26th they will stay in Biarritz

The Pipeliner Shaper didn't come to Europe since 1983 and this is a rare chance to meet this natural born surfer and entertainer.

The Pipeline Surf Legend moved to Hawaii with his family in 1964 and lived on Oahu's famous North Shore for 38 years. He has won several world class surf championships including: two Pipe masters, 1976 and 1977, Waimea Pro in Brazil, 1975; All Japan pro in Chiba Japan, 1976; and Oahu North Shore Lightning Bolt Surf Championships in 1977.
Besides his great achievements in contests, he’s also famous for his entertaining character. Rory has co-starred in such surfing films as five Summer Stories, Sundance, Red Hot Blue, Hot Lips and Inner Tubes, Surf Superstars and he has also made numerous TV appearances including on ABC's wide world of sports, ABC's American sportsman and many promotional appearances in TV and magazines (surfing, surfer, surfing world).
Rory has been involved with teaching people how to surf for 20 years and his students have included Bill Murray who he taught to surf while in Indonesia. Rory's surfing exploits are legendary and his students have a great time in his classes.