Rampaging Hippo

Ryan Hipwood leads the mutiny that turns the stationary Forster trip into an urgent search and destroy mission to Stradbroke Island. “I knew the Goldie was pumping so I was finding it pretty frustrating down there,” he said. While Hippo is no slouch in beachbreak waves his big-wave credentials are starting to stack up. In November he and Koby Abberton won the ATP Pichilemu World Cup Tow-In Event in Chile, which has automatically earned them a start in the Jaws contest. “I’ve never surfed Jaws before,” admits a pumped up Hippo. “I guess there are big waves and then there’s Jaws. It’s a whole different level”. And it’s strange watching one of the world’s most talented big-waves surfers in waist high waves when you know he’s on call to surf 50-foot Pe’ahi. Hippo seems to find it strange too. After a lacklustre shoot on day three he hurls his shit into his ute and roars out of town, leaving the bathroom fan on and his thongs behind. The cops book him for speeding outside of Coffs, but what chance have they got against a rampaging Hippo? The next morning he’s up in the dark and gunning across to South Straddie for the best sesh of the trip. The day after, when everyone is too fingered to get out of bed, Hippo is back at Straddie - this time with Channel Nine filming him from above. If freesurfing is a job and some people say it is - Hippo’s a Clydesdale.