by The Editors on August 25, 2026
After investigating the ski patroller avalanche death at Mammoth Mountain in 2025, Cal/OSHA has fined the resort more than $100,000, according to a story on NBC 4 Los Angeles.
Cal/OSHA issued Mammoth Mountain Ski Area, LLC, the company that owns and operates the Mammoth Mountain Ski Resort, three violations following an investigation into a 2025 avalanche that killed 30-year-old ski patroller Cole Murphy and left a second patroller seriously injured.
Mammoth Mountain, in a written statement, says they have “fully cooperated with the investigation” and are currently contesting the citations.
[Link: NBC 4 Los Angeles]
by The Editors on August 25, 2026
Steve Hawk, the former Surfer Magazine editor
who once clowned us for reading Richard Russo on the beach at Old Man’s, has a novel out. His first. Nearshore. It’s a surf-noir thriller about nukes and surfing and Silicon Valley and we can’t wait to read it.
If you’d like to hear him discuss the new book, in person, with the godfather of surf-noir Kem Nunn, then tonight is the night (August 25. 2026). Camino Books in Del Mar, California is the place. Click here for all the details.
If you miss this one, and want to catch Steve at a different book store, click here for info on the rest of his book tour.
[Link: Camino Books]
by The Editors on August 25, 2026
Turns out Lost International and Matt “Mayhem” Biolos didn’t have the legal legs to stand on during their multilevel lawsuit against Lady Gaga, Inc. according to a story on The Fashion Law.
A federal judge has dismissed the trademark lawsuit accusing Lady Gaga of infringing surf brand Lost International’s MAYHEM trademark in connection with her Mayhem album, tour, and related merchandise. In a newly-issued order, Judge Fernando M. Olguin of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California granted Lady Gaga and merchandising company Bravado International Group’s motion to dismiss Lost’s second amended complaint with prejudice, finding that Lost failed to sufficiently allege that the defendants’ use of MAYHEM was explicitly misleading under the Rogers v. Grimaldi test.
It was worth a try, right?
[Link: The Fashion Law]
by The Editors on June 27, 2026
You have to love Surfline. We don’t mess with it much because, why, but when we do we’re continually amazed that surfers actually pay $120 a year for this kind of data.
The June 27, 2026 report for our spot is as follows: the Surfline app says 1-3 feet, the Surfline website says 3-4, and the Dawn Patrol app for Apple Watch (which is reportedly “powered by Surfline”) claims 4-6 feet all for the same secret SoCal beach break. If you look closely at the info (in the graphic above) you’ll see that the tides are correct. The swell direction is dead-on, yet the wave heights are all over the place. What gives?
Maybe our friends at Surfline and/or Dawn Patrol can explain this to us. If they do, we’ll let you know.
by The Editors on June 5, 2026
Utah’s richest man, Cloudflare founder Matthew Prince, believes it is time for Vail Resorts to begin selling off some of its assets and he would like to buy Park City where he grew up skiing and once worked as a ski instructor, according to a Jason Blevins story in The Colorado Sun.
The big problem, Prince says, is the stable of resorts are worth way more than $5 billion and Vail Resorts’ market capitalization — the company’s current share price (around $137, down more than 60% from its 2021 peak) times the number of outstanding shares (around 35.6 million) on the market — that is less than the combined value of all those ski hills. . . “At some point shareholders are going to say you know what, you don’t get to be a capital allocator anymore,” Prince says. “I was hopeful they would come to that conclusion themselves.”
As Prince points out, the issue is that because Vail Resorts’ properties could be worth more than the company they may become a target for corporate raiders who buy the entire company (which Mr. Prince doesn’t want to do) and pay for the purchase by selling off a couple of the big names in Vail’s 42 resort portfolio. The rest could be profit.
It’s a clever angle by a billionaire who wants to own his home mountain, but he may be over-valuing many of the smaller resorts that are literally worth nothing when peeled off from the major label resorts. Either way, more power to Mr. Prince. Anything that breaks up the current resort megacorp monopoly would be. . . epic.
[Link: The Colorado Sun]
by The Editors on May 29, 2026
After a serious NO to Paul Naude’s efforts to buy Rip Curl it looks like surf co.’s owner KMD Brands might be rethinking their whole “stick it out together” strategy, according to story on Australian Financial Review.
KMD Brands, owner of Rip Curl and Kathmandu, will consider all options, including a potential break-up of the business, in a sweeping review of the struggling retailer. . . The review, announced on Wednesday by recently appointed chairman Philip Bowman, marks a shift in tone for the company, after it spurned merger interest just four weeks ago and said it planned to retain its core brands.
As we’ve mentioned before, saying no to Mr. Naude rarely goes well. It will be interesting to see how this all sorts out.
[Link: Financial Review]
by The Editors on May 29, 2026
“Another knockout, fractured jaw/cheek bone, lacerated kidney. I’m sure there’s tons of people see this happen again and think ‘Damn this dude’s an idiot and never learns his lesson’ or the classic, ‘Told ya you shoulda started wearing a helmet’,” Huston said.
Cue the helmets and street skating discussions.
by The Editors on May 21, 2026
We’ve all heard the stories of Jack O’Neill wanting to stay out surfing longer during the icy cold winters of Santa Cruz, but it appears a Berkeley physicist named Hugh Bradner may have been Jack’s inspiration, according to a story on KQED.com.
O’Neill has long been considered one of the fathers of the wetsuit, along with the Southern California company Body Glove, a distinction both were happy to cultivate. But this line on the O’Neill company blog raises questions about those claims: “Seeing the successful experiments of UC Berkeley physicist Hugh Bradner in the early 1950s, Jack O’Neill switched to neoprene.”
Either way, we’re all thankful for all their work.
[Link: KQED.com]
by The Editors on May 21, 2026
Fried chicken restauranteer Tony Hawk is reportedly putting some of his investment cash into a new MMA venture called Global League, which is funded by a $60 million war chest, according to a story on Bloody Elbow.
“We are building something authentic, something that belongs to the athletes and to the fans who live and breathe this sport,” Scott Coker said. “I’ve spent nearly two years developing this concept, and I’m thankful to Peter, all of our investors and the team we’re putting together.”
With the UFC throwing fists on the White House lawn, what better time to get in on some modern, visceral gladiator action. Beat their ass. Make some cash.
[Link: Bloody Elbow Photo: Gemini AI]
by The Editors on May 17, 2026
