2023 Ride of the Year Winners: Justine Dupont and Nathan Florence Dominate

Justine Dupont

To be chosen as the Ride of the Year by a voting panel made up of your fellow big-wave-surfing elite, a wave must tick off certain boxes.

First, it needs to be a BIG wave, one of the largest of the year. Second, it needs to be ridden with precision and take a critical line through the most powerful portion of the wave. Next, it needs to have that certain “X-factor,” something that elevates the moment beyond simply surfing and into the realm of the extraordinary. Finally, it must be successful. It must be a make.

When France’s Justine Dupont found herself in the lineup at the Cortes Bank, a remote, shallow seamount 100 miles west of San Diego, California, during the largest swell of the North Pacific season, all the ingredients were in place. When Lucas “Chumbo” Chianca towed her into the biggest peak of the day, the stage was her's, and she delivered the goods, scoring the Women’s Ride of the Year and setting the bar for many years to come.

Video: Johnny Decesare & Tucker Wooding

Nathan Florence

It’s quite astonishing to think out of the hundreds of world-class big wave surfers roaming the globe and the thousands of epic waves they manage to slay each year, that one could emerge as the single greatest of them all, as agreed by the community of athletes and documentarians themselves. But that was indeed the case with Hawaiian Nathan Florence’s perfectly-ridden backside barrel at Mullaghmore Head.

In the spectacular slow-motion video captured by João Tudella, Florence is seen paddling into a frigid left wall, gloves and hood completing his neoprene suit of armor. Knifing the quadruple-overhead drop like a true swordsman, Nathan stalls for the emerald-hued barrel, grabs rail, and gets completely immersed in the foam ball. After several seconds in the suds, Florence emerges from the fray and stands tall like the man that he is, finally sliding into the Irish sunshine, victorious.