Billy stepping off with Leon driving this time last year
We've all had a topsy-terving year, but for 7x National Champ Billy Stairmand it's kind of worked out OK...
What happened to your knee and what's the recovery time?
During the Newcastle 5000 wqs event I was free surfing the night before a huge finals day. It was really good air wind. So I went for a backside air tried to land but my back foot slipped off the tail pad and my body collapsed over my front knee tearing my MCL and PCL. I had a grade 3 MCL tear and a grade 2 PCL tear and luckily and surprisingly I didn’t tear my ACL. It’s been 3 months since the injury. At the time it was devastating and I was pretty gutted. But after everything that happened after with the whole pandemic thing it’s almost the perfect time to be injured for me. The recovery is coming along well and I should be surfing again in the next week or 2. I’ve been training a lot and working with my physio to help get it better quicker.
The sort of back-hand loft that will do it...Piha earlier this year
You would have surfed in the Piha WQS, how would that have worked?
Yeah I was really looking forward to competing in front of my home country. It was looking like it was gonna be an amazing event and just competing at home is always such an honour. Especially that big of an event. I would have definitely competed even with a torn MCL but I obviously wouldn’t have been 100%. So in a way I’m happy it all got postponed so when it does come back I can compete at 100% and put on a show for the crowd also.
Also we had a big week locked in staying at your house which I have previously had some pretty good results staying there. ;) so was gonna be a fun one.
If this was a newspaper the caption would be like… ‘Billy looking forward to the future’
So Covid was a bit of a mixed blessing for you huh?
Yeah to be honest the whole Covid lockdown on the world was probably the best timing for me. I was having a really amazing start to my year internationally and was gearing up for one of my biggest years ever. But then the injury. I was scared and nervous for what my year was gonna look like after that.
I probably would have missed a few events and wouldn’t have been 100% recovered for the Olympics. So I have taken all the positives out the of the whole pandemic. It’s given me tome to reflect on what I really want. Which is get a medal at the Olympics. So now I have the time to fully recover, train more, practice more and prepare myself fully for the Tokyo Olympic Games.
Signature Stairmand move on the Piha Bar this summer
What happens for the rest of the year for you and the WQS for that matter?
Ummmm I’m unsure on what the WSL and WQS is going to do. I havn't heard anything from anyone so it’s a bit up in the air at the moment. Obviously it’s gonna be a tough one with the travel restrictions. It’s hard to say what they’ll do if the cancel the whole year also. Some people have won contests already ya know, so it’s hard taking that away from them. I hope we can get to Hawaii at the end of the season and maybe do the triple crown. But I really don’t have any idea on what will happen.
You've been helping the lads do step offs... tell us about the day, looked like an early start?
Haha. Yeah I’ve become a personal driver for Leon Santorik as of late. I’m still not surfing so I’m trying to get as close to the real thing as possible and doing step offs is pretty much it.
Leon knew the waves where going to be good so he messaged to see if I was keen. I also had a couple messages from some of the other boys asking what I was up to this day. I drove to his house stayed the night and we where the first ones out there. We stepped for 6 hours straight.
For me it’s really good practice driving the ski and I also love stepping the boys off into some good barrels. And I’m sure Leon doesn’t mind getting barrels for 6 hours straight. Haha. So was a fun few hours. But I can say it was hard watching everyone getting barreled. I thought about getting one or two. Ya know just step off go straight and get barreled. But then I thought what’s the point. If anything was to happen. Get clamped or back wash or catch an edge then I’m done again. So I didn’t surf. Wise decision from myself. Haha
How does stepping off work, like talk us through actually performing a step off?
It’s so easy and fun. You just wait and hunt for the right wave if you see a peak down the beach then you gas it down then when you get to the right spot you slow rite down turn down the wave to head straight towards the beach and the surfer steps off. Then gas it out in front of the wave and watch your friend get absolutely barreled off his noggin Hahahaha. It can get dangerous at times if it’s a bit bigger. But I think if you have good wave knowledge and a bit of time learning and driving, it’s super fun.
