After a morning of sick waves out at Off The Wall, Dean Brady’s kicking back on the lounge with a cup of tea, looking out the bay windows as Mick Fanning, Joel Parkinson, and Tommy Whitaker are getting stuck into the six foot barrelling rights. The hulking Sunshine Coaster is in the middle of a bittersweet Hawaiian winter, catching the trophy wave of his life, only to get clipped as he was coming out. Here’s what the world’s biggest freesurfer had to say.

RCOTR: How’s life?
Brady: Good mate. I’m feeling pretty content.

How would you rate your Hawaiian season?
Probably the best season I’ve ever had for waves. [Mick Fanning takes off out the front at Off The Wall] Go Mick! Yeah! That thing was a drainer! It’s the best I’ve seen it since I started coming here, and this is my sixth time. Last year the early season was terrible, but I’ve found it really hard to get waves. Those big west swells mean Pipe has been the spot, and there’s been only a few waves at Off The Wall and Backdoor, which is usually where I can sneak off and get a few. Having a lot of long surfs and not catching to many has been really hard, but there’s been the odd one. You can’t come to Hawaii expecting to get a whole video section, there’s just going to be the odd clip here and there.

Speaking of getting the odd one, are you the kind of guy who’d rather sit and wait two hours for the bomb, or are you the guy who catches anything that moves?
Depends on what mood I’m in. If there’s only a couple of guys in the pack in front of me I’ll sit tight and wait for something good, but if there’s a good honest tight pack of 10 guys I’ll sit wide and hope that something swings my way. I just like to keep the odds in my favour. [Tom Whitaker takes off on the best wave of the morning] Ohh! Go, go! Yeah Whittsy! That thing was sick.

Are you losing any sleep after not coming out of that one at Backdoor the other day?
I was until I saw a sequence of it. It was pretty unmakeable, and that made me feel a little bit better because it wasn’t an easy wave to make. When I was walking over to Goodall and Laurie’s house afterwards, Shane Dorian and Dustin Barca were saying it was the best wave they’d ever seen at Backdoor, so I had my head down in shame after that. But I guess I was just lucky to get that wave in the first place. It was basically all Pipeline, and my wave was just a random peak at Backdoor. I was probably only a foot or two too deep inside it I reckon. I didn’t get hit by the foamball, it just got under the tail of my board and it lifted it and bucked me off. That’s what was tripping me out. I didn’t get blasted off, the tail of the board just got shunted a bit by the foamball. Knowing I was only two feet away from making the best barrel of my life… oh well, I’ve still got a bit of vision from that wave playing inside my head that I’ll remember for the rest of my life.

What’s your program been this year, just travel and surf?
Yep. That’s been it. I’ve done a few trips for Rip Curl and a few on my own. Just trying to get good waves and improve my surfing all around, that’s been my goal this year.

How’s your strike rate been?
Pretty good. I’ve tried to spend a lot of time when I go to places. I’ve done the odd swell run, but for instance I did a whole month in Puerto [Escondido] before I came here. If you stay in places for a while you’re bound to get a couple of swells. If you’re only there for a few days you barely get a feel for the place.

So you’re not the kind of guy who bitches about living out of a suitcase?
Not at all. While I’m in this position to travel with work, and I’m young and I’ haven’t got many commitments, I might as well hang out while I can.

What have been the highlights of the year for ya?
I had a really good trip to New Caledonia with Brent Dorrington, Dino Adrian and Asher Pacey. That was fun waves and good times. I spent a week down in Tassie with those boys and got some good Shippies. They’re just a bunch of good lads and we got some good slabs on that trip. I love Mexico. It’s the third time I’ve been there, and the second time I spent a month there. I went straight from Mexico over here to Hawaii.

What’s your routine surfing out the front?
Get up at dark and have a coffee. If it’s good get straight out there, and if it’s not I’ll sit where I can see it and play some poker on my computer while I wait for it to get good. I lost $300,000 last night… not real coin, luckily. Dunny and I have got a competition on to see who can get to a million first. Dunny’s on half a mill, but he plays it safe with small bets. I get on the big tables, so I either win big or lose big. I’m all 10 grand buy-ins. I’m rolling big.

How’s it been being the odd one out, the only freesurfer in the house amongst all the contest crew?
We’re all on similar programs over here except for the contest days pretty much. But staying with guys you look up to is awesome, guys like Mick and Taylor. They’re always surfing good and trying to push you. But also seeing how healthy they live; their lifestyle, training, eating well. I go through patches of that, I’ll train for a month at home but then get on the piss for a week. I just like to have a good time.

Do you miss contests?
Not all all, I’m loving life. The only pressure I’ve got is the pressure I put on myself to get good waves.

What’s the plan for next year?
I just want to pick some cool spots and hang out for a long time at each, and try and do some bigger and better projects. Maybe work on a movie that’s going to take a year to make, something I can be happy with.

It seems these days to be a professional freesurfer you’ve got to have an angle – you’ve got to be a vegetarian, a whale activist, a musician, an ultimate fighter. What are you mate?
It seems to be smart to have a little niche, but I can’t draw, I can’t paint, I can’t sing, I can’t play the guitar. [Laughing] I’m just me, no cool sprays on my board, no swimming with whales. I’m not going to try and be something I’m not.

“He needs to go out blazing. He doesn’t want to hold back on anything out there.”

Taylor Knox is sitting on the veranda of the Rip Curl house, as Ricky Basnett is walking down the beach for his heat at the Pipeline Masters.

It’s fair to say it hasn’t been Ricky Bobby’s best year competitively. The South African is currently sitting 45th in the ratings… out of 45. As he paddles out at Pipe he’s trying to avoid an unwanted piece of history, if he loses he’s about to go the whole season without winning a heat.

His plight isn’t going to be  helped by a draw bloated with a dozen of the best Pipe surfers in the world. Ricky’s drawn one of them, local lifeguard and big-wave surfer, Dave Wassell.

Ricky’s possibly the most carefree guy on tour, and if he’s feeling any pressure today he’s certainly not showing it. He saunters down the beach like he’s paddling out for a freesurf. It’s why the guys on tour love him. He’s a pretty free spirit with an inventive surfing act. Guys like Bruce Irons rate him as one of their favourite surfers. It’s just that, this year anyway, surfing heats hasn’t been agreeing with him.

I walk down the beach and run into surf photographer and master raconteur, Sean Davey. The expat Australian who now lives just up the road at Turtle Bay always loves it when he catches up with one of his mates from back home. “Prawn Gravy” opens the floodgates, and a year’s worth of conversation gushes like a burst dam. In the space of 10 minutes Prawno’s uninterrupted monologue covers topics as obtuse and disconnected as George Bush, Kiwis, Vegemite, clubbie boats, Youtube, Tasmania, Derek Hynd, chickens, classical music, boards without fins, Jamie O’Brien, King Island, books, and the new T-shirt he’s wearing, each topic segueing seamlessly into the next by some tenuous thread obvious only to Seano.

“Who’s your boy surfing against, Wassellhoff?” Prawn Gravy asks rhetorically, cackling at his own joke. “That’s what we call Dave – ‘Wassellhoff’ – the lifesaver. I don’t think it’s going to be an easy heat for your mate. Wassell’s pretty good out here, dude.” Ricky’s not alone, there’s a whole heap of tour surfers fighting for their careers out here at Pipe today against guys who surf this place every single day it breaks.

Ricky’s heat doesn’t get off to the best start when Dave Wassell nails a near-perfect 9.90 Backdoor pit in the opening minutes. “Ricky Bobby” answers straight back with a seven on the next wave, but by the end of his heat he’s left chasing another seven that never comes. Thirty seconds after the hooter he switchfoots a little one at Pipe, throwing a couple of comical reos, hamming up what should be a wrenching moment.

He gets to the beach and walks up to Rip Curl’s Pit Boss, Griggsy.
“Did you see my last wave? Sick, eh?”