Chasing Mavericks: A Tribute of Mavericks Greatest Surfer named JAY MORIARITY On Theaters Oct. 26, 2012

Mavericks Greatest Surfer: Jay Moriarity

Big-wave rider Jay surfed the Mavericks, the breakers up to 50ft high that crash along the Santa Cruz ­coast in winter.

He was just 16 and working part-time in a pizza parlour when ­photographer Bob Barbour took a shot that made him famous.

It made the front page of Surfer magazine and he became a hero to surfers around the world.

Then, the day before his 23rd ­birthday, the sea he loved claimed his life. Ironically he wasn’t surfing.

Jay drowned off the Maldives while free-diving, staying on the seabed without oxygen to practise his ­breathing techniques.

Kim brought his body home and scattered his ashes in the waves he worshipped as hundreds of surfers formed a vast circle of boards.

As film-makers recreated the ­amazing life story, Scots-born star Gerard, 42, who plays Jay’s trainer Rick “Frosty” Hessen, got a chilling ­reminder of the sea’s lethal power.

Swimming out to film a scene he was battered through rocks by a series of waves and held underwater for almost a minute as rescuers on jetskis raced ­towards him.

Gerard, barely conscious, was dragged out of the water and had to spend a night in ­hospital.

He says: “It was a pretty close call. These waves came out of ­nowhere.

“I was with three of the best surfers in the world and they were shouting, ‘Paddle, Gerry, ­paddle!’. But this wave spread across the skyline, 30ft high, and just dived on us and it took me. It ripped off my safety leash so there was nothing to pull me back up. I was just tumbling, tumbling, ­tumbling… going, going. I was thinking, ‘I need to get up!’. Then I felt the next wave hit and it all started again.

“I had a few hairy ­experiences in ­training. I got out of my depth and sometimes I was under water for 10 or 15 seconds, but this time, I was ­under for nearly a minute.”

Of Men and Mavericks follows the relationship between Frosty and hiseager young pupil Jay, played by ­newcomer Jonny ­Weston.

After Frosty agreed to train him he made Jay write his life philosophies. The title of one essay was prophetic: “What would I do if I was going to die ­tomorrow?”

Whatever Jay’s answer, the way he lived touched the lives of hundreds of surfers, many of them inspired by that iconic image of him riding the Mavericks.

Photographer Bob, 61, recalls: “The picture was not just sheer chance. Jay was out to prove himself that day. The waves were big and he was going for it. He wasn’t reckless, he was ­supremely skilful. He knew what he wanted to do and was ­determined to achieve it. When you look at him there, at the top of the wave, you see so much grace.

“In fact it wasn’t so much a natural ­talent with Jay, he ­really had to work hard at it. He was dedicated, totally.

“If he said he would see you on the beach at 7am, he’d be there at 6.30 and he’d stay until the job was done.”

Bob adds: “I’ve worked with hundreds of surfers. I know what their egos can be like. Jay was different. He was the best but he treated everyone as his equals. There was always a friendly warmth in his eyes.

“I guess it’s difficult for people outside the community to realise how there’s a special bond between surfers.

“It’s built out of a respect for the ocean, and for the way each one takes on the challenges.

“Surfers understand one another and why they do it. So the loss of someone like Jay really touched everyone’s hearts in this neighbourhood. If he had died on a big wave rather than out training, maybe that might have been easier to accept.”

When Jay died, he and Kim’s first ­wedding ­anniversary was approaching. But they were ­childhood sweethearts and had been together as a couple for years.

A decade on from his death, Kim, 34, has moved back to Santa Cruz and is due to remarry this year.

But Jay’s memory is, not surprisingly, still very precious and vivid.

“Sometimes I’m overwhelmed with a feeling that he’s close by. I keep his ­image near to my heart,” she has said. “I was just numb after he was gone. I was ­upside down, turned around in the dark.

“I watched him grow into what he ­became. Being a big-wave rider is really very cool and people idolised him.

“But meeting him on the street you would never know that. He would treat you like you were his brother or sister. He had no ego. He was just incredibly real in a world…”

Mavericks: The $24 million wave

In one of the first efforts ever to quantify the worth of a wave, a group of academics, surfers and environmentalists have put a price on Mavericks. It’s an exercise some environmental economists and ocean advocates call “surfonomics” – a calculation of the intrinsic dollar value of Mother Nature’s unique features.

The study, conducted earlier this year on the Mavericks parking lot and the beach wrapping around Pillar Point, rendered a report that puts the value of the famed wave break at $23.9 million a year.

Save the Waves Coalition, a nonprofit group devoted to preserving surf spots around the world, produced the report. Mavericks Surf Ventures, the company that hosts the Mavericks Surf Contest, and contest sponsor Jim Beam helped fund the study.

Save the Waves conducted a similar study two years ago in Mundaka, Spain, where a river mouth generates a world-famous surf break on the country’s northern coast. But the study focused on the economic impact to the locale after a sandbar break crippled the renowned break. It was a post-mortem assessment. With the Mavericks report, released at the end of October, surfers and ocean advocates put a price tag on the annual net worth of the wave.

“There’s not a market value for that but it clearly has value. … The idea is, if you’re going to spend $10 on gas and four hours of time to go visit someplace like Mavericks, well, it’s at least as valuable as that money and that wear and tear on your car or you wouldn’t go,” said Chad Nelsen, environmental director for SurfRider Foundation. Nelsen occupies a seat on the coalition’s board of directors and is writing his dissertation at University of California, Los Angeles, on the economic value of surfing.

“It more accurately gets to the total value (of Mavericks), as opposed to spending associated with it,” says Dean LaTourrette, executive director for Save the Waves.

LaTourette says surfers are merely a “subset” of frequenters to the beach. The worth is contingent largely on the “visit-and-watch component,” he says.

A pair of economists at the University of Hawaii extrapolated the hard numbers from a six-month test period running January to June and responses from 200 Mavericks beachgoers. According to the report, people pay more than 421,000 annual visits to Mavericks – an average of more than 1,150 per day. Mavericks is valued at $56.70 per visit, meaning that’s how much money people are willing to pay for the experience. And those figures exclude the estimated tens of thousands of surf-watchers who roll in for the one-day Mavericks Surf Contest.

Makena Coffman is an economist and regional planning professor at University of Hawaii who is unaffiliated with Save the Waves and Mavericks Surf Ventures. She helped craft the methodology of the study and co-authored the report.

To establish a solid grasp of the fluid surf break, Coffman and a colleague at the university extrapolated findings from a litany of queries to visitors using a “travel cost” model. Driving distance, number of trips per year, why people visit and how long they spend at Mavericks are among the determinants shaping the conclusions. More information about survey data should be available when the final report is released later this month, Coffman said.

When questioned about the specific figures, Coffman held firm on each finding save for the annual population estimate, which she calls a “first pass” at understanding visits to the area.

“We took specific measures to underestimate that,” she said.

Nelsen said the coalition “could have done a more robust study,” given that conclusions stem from a six-month period that missed the heart of surf season on a famously mild year for big waves. Still, he says such studies are an important means of understanding the economic weight of natural beauty people might take for granted.

“Often the perception is zero (value),” Nelsen said, “and when management decisions are being made at the Coastal Commission and they’re trying to balance a decision on development, developers always have hard numbers for anticipated revenues and job growth. This will give us at least one measure of looking at the values that exist today for these spots.”

Watch the trailer of Chasing Mavericks (HD): On Theaters October 26, 2012

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Chasing Mavericks Trailer: Gerard Butler Grumbles About Waves

Seemingly losing himself at his 8 Mile star's behest, Oscar-winning director Curtis Hanson has made only two features since 2002's Eminem vanity project, and it's unlikely anyone recalls those films nearly as fondly if at all compared to past Hanson works like L.A. Confidential or Wonder Boys. (In Her Shoes, with Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette, and Shirley MacLaine? The Eric Bana-Drew Barrymore poker drama Lucky You? Yeah, well, those happened.) His latest questionable attempt at making something memorable: Chasing Mavericks, an inspirational film that tells the true story of late surfer Jay Moriarity, here played by Jonny Weston and the hair of William Katt.

In the film, Moriarity stumbles upon Gerard Butler and friends surfing on "Mavericks"--a thought-mythical site with waves that crash with all the force of Sarah Palin's political career. The young surfer insists on riding the dangerous waves, but before he can do that, he's going to need some Miyagi-style training. And we all know there's only one growled, in-and-out-American accent that can offer that kind of sage surf advice.

Gerard Butler Rides Waves In 'Chasing Mavericks' Trailer Butler's seasoned pro teaches Jonny Weston's newcomer how to land the big waves in exclusive new sneak peek.

Are you ready to see the next great inspirational surfing movie? It's called "Chasing Mavericks," and it's based on the inspirational true story of surfing legend Jay Moriarity. And although the film won't be in theaters until October, MTV is here to help whet your appetite via our exclusive debut of the trailer.

The two-minute teaser opens with an introduction to our protagonist, young surfer/dreamer Jay Moriarity, who cuts class to watch a group of skilled surfers ride the massive waves at Mavericks, a legendary surf spot in Northern California. We watch Jay observe the more experienced riders with awe, and it is clear he wants to follow in their footsteps.

"Have you ever felt like you were meant for something more? Something bigger than you?" Moriarty, played by newcomer Jonny Weston, asks in a voice-over. We see Moriarty befriend one of the seasoned pros, played by Gerard Butler, and beg him to help teach the young Moriarty how to ride the "mythological" waves. Butler's character, Frosty Hesson, is reluctant to accept the instructor role, but the youngster's fighting spirit reminds him of himself, and so the two embark on a journey that will change both of their lives.

We see bits and pieces of the classic training montage: the student's clumsy first moves and falls, the grumpy instructor's discontent. One scene shows Moriarty trying to learn to hold his breath during a class at school and he passes out mid-lecture.

The final minute of the trailer shows us a glimpse of that one huge wave that they've been training for, along with more of Moriarty's emotional journey, the ups and downs, the good, bad and ugly, all set to the appropriately inspirational/pump-you-up track "The Fighter" by the Gym Class Heroes.

"Chasing Mavericks" also stars Elisabeth Shue, Leven Rambin ("The Hunger Games") and Abigail Spencer and opens in theaters October 26.

Chasing Mavericks on HD (Oct 26, 2012)

Chasing Mavericks Trailer From Trailerpulse

Based on the inspirational true story of surfing icon Jay Moriarty, “Chasing Mavericks” tells the story of a young man’s quest to surf Northern California’s most dangerous wave, and the local legend who takes him under his wing. What begins as a mentorship turns into a unique lifelong bond, as the two unlikely friends discover that there is nothing more powerful than pushing your limits and chasing a nearly impossible dream.