With the announcement Luke Thompson from Durban qualified for the World Surfing league’s Championship tour, Trident began to ponder. Mostly about the state of competitive surfing in South Africa. Which in turn led us to a thought: Rassie Erasmus should coach surfing. And every other sport for that matter.
We can hear you scoffing from here. Hear us out though.
Matty McGillivray, from Trident’s neck of the woods, sadly failed to re qualify for the ‘CT in 2026. In Matt’s case, he fell victim to the infamous mid year cut. The base jumping loon spent several years on the tour, and his unceremoniously falling short of the cut line really seemed to mess with his game. Enough to make re qualification near impossible. However, one door closes and another opens. One young surfer falls off the tour and then Luke qualifies. The young surfer with the bleached buttery locks has officially joined South African tour stalwart Jordy on tour, and although he’s a rookie and likely to make rookie mistakes – Luke will hopefully do great things. However, the reality for a 21 year old surfing competitively at the highest level on the Championship Tour just has to be overwhelming.
Enter, Rassie.
Cue a certain rugby coach. You don’t win two World Cups without having some insight into an athlete’s psyche. Rassie Erasmus should coach surfing. And cricket. Football for sure. But let’s hit the brakes a bit here. A few more things for Trident and our beloved readers to ponder.
Firstly, Rassie has proven himself a genius for rugby which clearly is a team sport. Secondly, rugby is about as far from surfing as rubbing two wooden sticks is from a nuclear power plant. Thirdly, perhaps it’s a stretch to say Rassie could coach every other sport. Although Trident remains on the fence about whether or not eSports are actual sports, could you see the man coaching professional Fortnite or League of Legends?
We’re pretty sure Rassie didn’t win two World Cups in a row furiously playing Counter Strike while barking instructions to his players, forwards coaches and backline coaches. So how applicable is his coaching genius in rugby to other sporting codes? Here’s the rub though. Most, if not all of Rassie’s’ coaching genius is likely to be transferable to surfing. The cliché goes along the lines of, “the game is won in the mind, not in the field.”
Change field to waves, and you gotta wonder. Any surfer on the tour could potentially win the whole damn shebang. But how many actually believe they can win it? You see?
The fact is, Rassie gets into his athlete’s minds and brings out the best in them. He could probably coach an SA Ice Hockey team to victory (does Ice Hockey even have a World Cup?) Indeed, the man could probably coach stuff that isn’t even sport; like speech therapy or teaching English in Vietnam. And his first language is Afrikaans.
Yes, we’re a fan of Rassie’s.
But that’s not the point.
The point is, shouldn’t we seriously consider his talents when it comes to coaching South Africa’s top echelon surfers? Jordy is having a staring contest with middle age, while Luke is as fresh faced and green as a home schooled kid. Both are on the CT. Competitive surfing’s the highest level of, well competitive surfing. Rassie taking a rookie and veteran under his wing would be the perfect balance of enthusiasm and experience. Sure, nowadays most surfers have coaches, but none have the chops as one Mr Erasmus. And quite obviously, all surfing coaches come from an actual surfing background. Why not a coach from a completely different sporting code?
For a sport that not only prides itself on being left of the mainstream, surfing is left of the mainstream. Fact. So why isn’t anyone trying a new approach to getting another South African to win a World Surfing title? Trident has bemoaned the reality of for all South Africa’s surfing talent; we have minimal World Title trophies on our metaphorical shelf. Notably in our two articles on what it will take for another South African to win another surfing World Title; here and here. In our opinion, if Rassie has already won 2 Rugby World Cups, he probably has the coaching skill, acumen and sheer brilliance to coach even a behemoth such as Eben Etzebeth to learn to boost an alley-oop at Lowers. Let alone two World Class surfers already grinding it out for the accolade of World Champion.
So come on surfing administration of South Africa. Let’s get this humble chap from Despatch involved in coaching surfing. What could it hurt? Darn it, Trident would pay him to coach us.
