John Witzig's "We're Tops Now" ran in the May 1967 issue of SURFER. It was the magazine's first genuinely notorious article. Witzig was justly angry over the way SURFER and the rest of the American surf press had downplayed Nat Young's win in the 1966 world championships—and it wasn't just Young; Australian surfing in general had not received its due from the Yanks. "We're Tops Now" was Witzig's nitro-burning corrective.

On Witzig's request, this version has been slightly edited to restore it to its original draft form. Witzig also clarified that he did not choose "We're Tops Now" for the title. "I was aggressive and rude," he said in 2020, "but that title was just crass."

"The High Performers?" Rubbish! That's all that can be said 

After Nat Young completely dominated competition at the World Surfing Championships at San Diego, we might well have expected a more accurate assessment of California surfing than "The High Performers." Yet not, since this history is indicative to an absolute degree of the California scene as a whole. Has everyone forgotten that David was beaten? Thrashed?

Up pours the smoke. To laud, to deify, to obscure. To obscure the fact that everything the pedestal of California surfing is being built upon means—nothing!

"The whole sport is following Nuuhiwa now" . . . "and another thing was my rollercoaster" .. . My rollercoaster, David? MY? Ha! McTavish has been doing rollercoasters for years.

Off with the rose-colored spectacles and look beyond the David. If everyone is not too conditioned by the propaganda: STOP. Reassess. Establish the real value in California surfing.

"Tell us, David . . . how does it feel to be told that the whole sport of surfing is following you?"

Tom Morey said that his noseriding contest at Ventura was just a game, but it seems a pity that he didn't tell all the surfers in California. For when this "game" has come to be accepted as "surfing" then the time has come for re-evaluation. It appears to me that a largely false set of values has been created in California surfing. The East Coast, following blindly along the path that has been set, has not only emulated the mistakes that have been made, but have taken it upon their own shoulders to take this "Californian" type of surfing to a further ridiculous extreme.

"Nat will thrash Nuuhiwa and make Bigler look like a pansy." These were the words of Bob Cooper when he saw Nat at Rincon in the week prior to the World Championships at San Diego. It was far more than a superficial comment when Cooper noted, "I haven't seen power surfing since I was in Australia." Cooper knew that Nat and Drouyn were not two isolated instances, but were indicative of the new school of thought in Australia.

Those of us who were conversant with the present trend of surfing in Australia were astonished at the corresponding lack of development in this direction in the United States. Probably nothing has had such a profound influence in leading Californian surfing out on a limb than has the noseriding fixation.

I need no justification to claim that this obsession with noseriding has been initiated and vigorously promoted by the commercial interests in the sport. The number of "noseriders" that have been sold gives more than credence to this argument. The real aim of surfing has been lost in a morass of concaves and the idolatry of David Nuuhiwa.

There can be no greater indictment of Californian surfing than the fact that Nuuhiwa took only his noserider to San Diego for the World Championships. Surfers had been telling themselves for so long that they were right and that they were good that they had come to absolutely believe in it. How much a shock has it been to see the idols, the graven images, fall so unceremoniously to the ranks of the also-rans.

What was it that made Nuuhiwa take only his specialist board to San Diego? If this can be honestly answered, then this curious ailment that has stricken Californian surfing will have been partly remedied. Not only did Nuuhiwa think that all he had to do to win the World Championships was to perch on the front of his board: not only did he know that everyone in California would agree with him: but he thought that the rest of the world could not see through his self-induced delusion. This delusion has been expressed, and I suppose partly caused, by a second great anomaly in the Californian surfing system. While the noseriding preoccupation has produced surfing specialists on a scale never before envisaged, the restricted wave system used in contests has produced a group of the most ordinary and average surfers that I imagine have ever "led" Californian surfing.

What has happened to surfing? On one hand, there are the specialists who have made "surfing" "noseriding"; on the other, an uninspired personification of normalcy, neutrality, and mediocrity. In the middle somewhere are the group who are not really good at either.

I cannot state that there are no good surfers in California. I cannot state that David Nuuhiwa cannot surf well according to the standards which I seek to establish. I do state that the "system" has created a standard of surfing, a pattern of riding, that does not allow surfers to perform to the full extent of their ability. Nuuhiwa is simply a product of the system.

A contest system should work to draw from the competing surfers their best. When the surfers have to work for, to surf for the system, then the system has defeated its purpose. The Huntington contest is a prime example of a restricted wave contest. Through Australian eyes, this was the most tedious and uninteresting contest that I have ever seen. Even the stupidity of the mass public enthusiasm for nose work did little to arouse interest. The surfers, restricted and confined by the system, did not attempt anything which would constitute a chance. Indeed, they could not.

A contest system must simulate as closely as possible those conditions that are experienced in the ocean. If the freedom that we find so inherent in riding waves is not expressed in our competitions, then these are not true contests of surfing. If we are to derive any value from contests, then they should encourage the surfer to draw on greater talents than he is aware he possesses. A surfer must have that freedom that allows him to attempt far greater things and make a mistake in the process. To my knowledge, achievement has never been laid at the door of the ordinary person. Consistency becomes mediocrity unless measured in terms of challenge and achievement.

This, then, is Californian surfing. But what of Australia? What is this surfing that I find so exciting and dynamic? The theme is involvement. How bitterly ironic it is that the person who has been most influential in the progress of Australian surfing should be a Californian. A Californian that most surfers in the United States would never have seen nor heard of. George Greenough of Santa Barbara is probably one of the unsung geniuses of surfing. Technically, there is possibly nobody who can surpass him. He has a working knowledge of hydrodynamics and has expressed it in his design of surfing equipment. It was Greenough that gave impetus to the smoldering dissatisfaction with the "Farrelly era" in Australia

The surfer with whom Greenough first came into contact was Bob McTavish. A theoretician in his own right, it was only reasonable that he and Greenough might spur each other to greater levels of creativity and experimentation. McTavish and Greenough talked and surfed and began applying their principles to surfboard design. While everyone else in Australia was turning to longer boards, McTavish built short and more maneuverable boards which he could use to place himself in the best part of the wave. McTavish's words best describe his principal motive: "The direction is involvement. Getting into tight spots and getting back out of them. This is, of course, a supplement direction to the all-powerful 'make the wave' motive. The way to get involved, obviously, is to place yourself in a critical position, under, in, over, around the curl, quite often in contact with it." The trend is to push things to the limit. "The tighter you push them, the longer you hold them, the more involved you are, the more situations you can overcome, the hotter you are." This, then, is the McTavish philosophy. The desire to attempt the impossible, to transgress into the realm of the unattainable, to power.

McTavish, the master tactician of the perfect wave, saw his personal limitations in the transference of his thoughts into general surfing. He chose then to infuse with his enthusiasm and his aggression a number of other surfers in Australia. The result of this union was the surfer that the world saw as the best in San Diego.

Nat has an enormous reservoir of surfing talent. He has a feeling for the surf that he can express in his riding. He possesses that superb control under all circumstances that mark him as a fine surfer. He is part of this "power" school of surfing: he has crushed the "pansy" surfers of California and the East Coast: the mediocre "competition surfers" have paled into insignificance in the face of his aggression.

Nat is the best surfer in Australia. Australia is represented by its best. How is it that the United States is not? Of the ten Californian surfers, only John Peck showed some sort of aggression, and David Nuuhiwa showed that he was capable of it. While Australia presented its finest, the U. S. had only its run of the mill ordinary and its specialists. Surfboards expressed as clearly as any other item the extent of the deviation in direction that has occurred in Californian surfing. There was the ever-present list of models proposing to make the rider a genius in some surfing maneuver. Against an imposing lineup we put the small, light, thin and sensitive Australian board. It is the concern of this Australian surfer that his board should express, as he himself sees it, the whole, rather than a series of unrelated or specialist maneuvers. The Australian concern is with "the whole" and the Australian board is designed with this purpose in mind. The direction is positive. It is towards dynamic and controlled aggression in surfing.

What is the future? We're on top and will continue to dominate world surfing. Californian surfing is so tied and stifled by restrictions that are its own creation, and the other countries simply do not have the necessary ability.

What chance is there that California will free itself of its encumbrances? This is something that I cannot answer. General social conditions will continue to exercise an influence over the surfing scene. The drug situation is something which cannot be ignored. While surfing progress, the creative era, is being credited to those who participate, and indirectly, because they participate, I cannot foresee much change. Strangely enough, the effect of these stimulants seems to have a depressant effect on challenge and aggression. I felt like yelling "let yourself go, take a chance." But as is the pattern, this was not to be. Everyone was so confined, so under control, so absolutely without the apparent freedom to express.

An end must come to this monotony. Vigor will replace lassitude: aggression will replace meek submission. The dynamic will force an end to the commonplace. Power will be the word, and surfing will be surfing.

"WE'RE TOPS NOW," BY JOHN WITZIG

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