We’re no strangers to watching surfers throw out claims during critical moments in heats. Sometimes the claim is legit — a true spontaneous celebration of a great wave or a mental maneuver that surprises even the athlete.
Sometimes that claim is a plea to the judges, as if to say, “We both know the score I need, so let me sell it, and please, please, buy it.”
There’s also my least favorite, the no-claim claim.
“I know that was great. You know that was great. And I’m so great that I’m going to downplay how great it was. Because cool points.”
Variations of this include the stoic look back, or the shoulders slumped and head down, as if we’re not even allowed to acknowledge what just happened. The no-claim claim is a claim. And we need to stop acting like it’s not a claim.
This leads us to one of my favorites: holding up all 10 fingers. Why? Because there’s no B.S. when a surfer holds up both hands with all their digits outstretched. It’s not pretending to be humble when humility is nowhere to be found. It’s not begging the judges’ booth to squeak out a heat-saving score by hundredths of a point. That was sick. Give me my 10. The 10-claim is direct. And even if the wave in question doesn’t actually deserve a 10, or it doesn’t get that 10, I appreciate the surfers who don’t play coy.
We’ve all seen the 10-point ride claim. We know it well. But I don’t think we’ve ever seen the…6-7 claim.
Argentina’s Faustino Llorca dropped what may have been the first 6-7 claim this week at the ISA World Junior Surfing Championships. Unless this is the first thing you’ve read on the internet since early 2025, you know what that claim looked like: palms up, waving each hand up and down. Six seveeeeeen. The 15-year-old threw it out after an impressive series of frontside carves, drawing laughs from the announcers on the ISA broadcast.
The beauty of it all: judges scored Pepino’s wave a 6.67.
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