good evening. check out the conditions this morning at backdoor/pipe. the waves were small but it was such a beautiful day. look good and you can see somebody getting barreled…. the waves were coming up throughout the day and it was solid 5′ and perfect by evening. tomorrow? yeah, it’s going to be epic and probably the best day of the year!!! the backdoor shootout will probably get started tomorrow so i’m going to wake up early and sneak in an early morning session…. 7’0’s in the car ready to go… have a great evening….

check out this photo. this is some where in japan. do you know where? back in 1996, i was with todd mitsui and mike woo during a jpsa contest going on at tsujido. i was supposed to surf the contest but up the road, the waves were going off so i free surfed instead. i’m glad i had understanding sponsors…. i use to surf this spot on small days and it was pretty fun. but this day there was a typhoon swell and the waves were barreling.. nobody was out so we were on it. shortly after this session, a surfer died by hitting the wall so they closed this spot and nobody could surf there ever again… i think i got barreled on every wave that day… todd surfed it backside and said it was pretty heavy. one mistake and your going to be sashimi on the wall…. another good memory….
*check out these next 2 photos. i was looking at them and just tripping out how similar they are….

joshua moniz one day ago….

and tony moniz two days ago… same blood, same style….

and last, check out the new 2008 surfing world calendar…. mr. april, hayato maki doing a bottom turn at a secret location in the philippines….

check out this photo. shinpei pulled into a barrel and pushed out through the back. my camera almost hit him in the head but i got off a snap. this is what it looks from behind the wave. pretty cool….

and yes, it’s still so dam shallow out there…. ouch….

and last, i was surfing the net and found this free wallpaper download from surfermag.com. guess who took it? kin kimoto…. this photo is sick!! gosh, i can’t wait till the waves get like this again…

good evening. went out to backdoor this morning when it was still dark. the waves came down from yesterday but still super clean and fun. i surfed for an hour and shot for an hour. it was the second picture perfect day of the winter season. no winds and no clouds…. super sunny and felt super so good…. check out the action today…

i pulled up super early and matchi was already getting ready for the dawn patrol session. check out the sun just coming up from behind the mountain….. norihiko nakayama….

naohisa ogawa also paddled out super early. going backside at backdoor is kind of dangerous because it’s shallow and there’s no channel. if i were a goofy footer, i wouldn’t want anything to do with backdoor. here is naohisa getting ready to bash the lip….

ushikoshi also paddled out early. we call this move in surfing “12’O Clock”, or “Straight Up”…..

shinpei horiguchi giving everybody in japan a peace sign….[:?????$B!x(B???:]

gosh, when i downloaded this photo today, i thought this was tony moniz. but tony wasn’t out today. this is joshua moniz… a mini tony….

this grom got the set of the day. seth moniz pulling in before school starts…
**more photos coming tomorrow morning…