The thousands of surfing spectators are gone and our pro surfers are now headed to Teahupoo now that the US Open has crowned Australia’s Julian Wilson and USA’s Lakey Peterson winners this past weekend in Huntington Beach, CA.

Now it’s time to give some focus on the East Coast.

Stoked Mentoring, a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, is using the formerly taboo sports of snowboarding, surfing, and skating to teach inner city kids valuable life skills. Stoked’s mission is to promote personal development, academic achievement, and healthy living to under-served youth through action sports culture. Since their inception in 2005, 2,100 youth have been served. Their mission is to empower all youth with the tools and resources to succeed in the future.

This Saturday, August 11^th from 10am – 2pm, Stoked will be throwing a summer beach party at Rockaway Beach (69^th Street) with yoga, surf lessons, surf demos, a ping pong tournament and of course food. It’s a great event to showcase how Stoked changes youths’ lives through surfing!

To purchase tickets and information, go to www.stoked.org/stokedbeachpartyny. Proceeds will help Stoked Mentoring and their partnerships with a vast array of public schools and other non-profit organizations. Continue reading →

The Pacific Festival is back, and the date is set for Sunday, September 2nd, 2012! This year, expect a new cool venue… The Newport Dunes Waterfront Resort and Marina, which is located on the water’s edge of the Pacific Ocean, and promises to bring a whole new vibe!

Last year’s event was held at Oak Canyon Ranch near Irvine Lake. Snoop Dogg was the official festival headliner and was joined with over 50 of independent music’s most talented live acts and DJs from around the world. Five stages housed the likes of: Cut Copy, Black Lips, The Twelves, Fred Falke, Adam Salter, and special dueling decks set by Calvin Harris and Steve Aoki himself. This year’s line-up is still to be announced.

Like last year, The Dunes will showcase favorite live music acts, mix of genres, not covering just dance music or just indie rock. There will also be the best local foods and lots of other surprises that organizers will be announcing closer to this year’s event on Labor Day Weekend.

Pacific Festival Entertainment is the vision of two groups of longtime friends with a combined 40 years of experience in music and event production. Steve Aoki, world-renowned DJ and founder of Dim Mak Records, and Mike Tunney, founder of Collaborative Media, have been friends for over 25 years, growing up together in Newport Beach. As their first business venture, Aoki and Tunney wanted to create a new music and arts festival for the Orange County community that connects culture with community; art with music; and entertainment with philanthropy, thus successfully launching the festival just last year.

Dawn Patrol pre-sale tickets are on-sale now for Pacific Festival. Organizers are releasing a limited batch of discounted General Admission tickets at $40 for loyal friends and fans. This year’s event will have 1 main stage and support entertainment areas. Tickets to this year’s event are limited and will be priced at $55-$75. 18+ age for admission.

Newport Dunes Waterfront Resort & Marina
1131 Back Bay Dr
Newport Beach, CA 92660
Sunday, September 2, 2012 from 12:00 PM to 10:00 PM (PT)

For more information, go to http://pacificfestival.com/ or stay tuned to their official Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pacificfestival as they roll out the rest of the details. Continue reading →

Get ready for Shark Week, which begins in a few weeks. It’s a full week just dedicated to sharks, and it all begins August 12 at 9 p.m. EST. The program by Discovery Channel, which first aired on July 17, 1988, was developed to help the average person have a greater respect for sharks. Shark Week is now broadcast in over 72 countries. This year, the week-long series will be celebrating its 25^th anniversary, and Discovery promises to be its shark-iest ever with “specials that get you so close to the action, if you were any closer you’d be bait.”

Among the programming is the search for the great white sharks of Seal Island, South Africa, with a separate focus on one specifically, the 14-foot shark Colossus, who dominates all other sharks in the area. That segment, called “Air Jaws Apocalypse,” will premiere Sunday, August 12 at 9 p.m. ET. Seal Island is a tiny island in False Bay just off the Southern tip of Africa, where tourists can often view, from their hotel rooms, Great White Sharks as they hunt for Sea Lions. Photographer, author and shark expert Chris Fallows and legendary natural history producer Jeff Kurr team up once again to film new exciting footage of Great White Sharks breaching in False Bay.

Other segments include:

SHARK WEEK’S 25 BEST BITES
Premieres Sunday, August 12 at 10 p.m. ET
In celebration of Shark Week’s silver anniversary, it’s a countdown of the 25 scariest and funniest moments from past Shark Week awesomeness.

MYTHBUSTERS’ JAWSOME SHARK SPECIAL
Premieres Monday, August 13 at 9 p.m. ET
The MythBusters, Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, count down their top 25 shark myths of all time. They also show never-seen-before footage and reveal the No. 1 shark myth that will “literally blow people away.”

SHARKZILLA
Premieres Monday, August 13 at 10 p.m. ET
Discovery will revisit the “chomping capabilities” of the biggest shark ever to swim in our oceans: the megalodon, which was 52 feet long, weighed 100,000 pounds and had 250 teeth, each six inches long, set in jaws six feet wide and eight feet tall.

HOW JAWS CHANGED THE WORLD
Premieres Tuesday, August 14 at 9 p.m. ET
Go behind the scenes of the biggest shark movie ever, and the impact “Jaws” had on the oceans and their inhabitants.

SHARK FIGHT
Premieres Tuesday, August 14 at 10 p.m. ET
Shark attack victims around the world discuss the terrifying moments of their confrontations, and now have devoted their lives to saving their attackers and have become some of the most powerful shark advocates on the planet.

GREAT WHITE HIGHWAY
Premieres Wednesday, August 15 at 9 p.m. ET
Discovery Channel partnered with Dr. Barbara Block, professor of marine sciences at Stanford University, to track the world’s biggest great whites in real time. They’re looking to learn more about the sharks’ mating rituals and, in particular, where they go to give birth, which still remains a mystery to scientists.

ADRIFT: 47 DAYS WITH SHARKS
Premieres Thursday, August 16 at 9 p.m. ET
This is the true story of a routine search mission over the Pacific in WWII gone awry. Two war heroes tell the story of their 47 days in shark-infested waters… and how they lived to tell the tale.

Da-Dum…Da-Dum…Da-Dum-Da-Dum-Da-Dum!

Continue reading →