There’s something to be said about ditching the rash vest, throwing caution of a cliff and never looking to rescue it.
Barnaby Cox, 25, is a UK surfer born and raised in the coastal town hub of Bude. While no-one’s every written that sentence about Bude before, it’s also very true. Bude is a stomping ground for a variety of surfers. Barnaby’s more a testament to the homegrown here, as comfortable in a powerful westerly at home as he is under the hood of some far-flung Indonesian razor-reef.
Few days ago, Barnaby dropped his latest edit, called IYYE, shot by lensman Rob Blackett. The theme of the flick is poignant: Barnaby removes himself from competing in 2023 and goes on a bit of a surf mission, travelling, coaching and generally doing the things all 20-something-surfers should.
“We landed a sick one in the Maldives,” said Barnaby. “So spent all our savings on a three month Indo trip to take us up to the start of that.”
Caution, meet wind. Pic: Aquabumps.
Before that, the Bude ripper headed to South Africa to link up with Surfers Not Street Children, where he volunteered at the organisation. “South Africa is kinda somewhat en route to the Maldives so it was a chance I couldn’t not take to stop off for six weeks, before we started our second season of work in the Maldives,” he told Wavelength.
What followed was a sort of media silence from Barnaby. Unheard of in this day and age. “As I was now travelling more and not competing, I didn’t have any pressure to post stuff on social media for sponsors, so the majority of clips sat on the hard drive,” he said. “Then I finished up my two years of work in the Maldives and it felt like a bit of an end of an era. I was looking back over all these clips and memories and was actually so frothing on them. I started to feel like I should put them out there because I’m proud of them, and one day would look back and be stoked.”
What’s a guy to do with limited budget, stacks of epic clips and no editing experience? “I’ve worked on clips and filmed with Rob [Blackett] a handful of times and loved his stuff so reached out and he was stoked to take on the challenge. I’m so grateful to him because he’s renovating a house and is busy being an aerospace engineer so doesn’t have much free time and it’s really nice he spent it editing for me.”
In case you’ve not heard of Rob – you can usually find him shooting the eyes out of any session around his base in Cornwall. There’s a diligent style, and attention to detail that Mr Blackett exudes, likely honed by crouching over exposed rocky outcrops along Kernow’s fair coastline.
The kicker? You can book in for lessons with Barnaby too. Check it, here.
