Jojo Roper’s Biggest Paddle Wave at Mavericks in 2024

By the time Jojo Roper landed at San Francisco International Airport, it was 2:30 a.m. on March 11, 2024. Another 30-minute drive would get him to Half Moon Bay. That left him three hours of shut-eye before he’d suit up to face top-to-bottom Mavericks. Just an average day (or night) of a globe-trotting, swell hungry big wave surfer.

But Jojo found not just the wave of the day on March 11, it was one of the biggest and best rides at Mavs all year. The judging paddle at the Mavericks Awards, made up of Jeff Clark, Heather Hamilton, Fred Pompermayer, Darryl “Flea” Virostko and Tyler Fox, deemed his ride the Biggest Wave paddled into during the 2023-24 season. Fred got a firsthand look at the wave as he shot the sequence from the channel.

The drop is as late and technical as you’ll see at Mavericks. Jojo somehow stays centered in the most critical part of the wave and comes out clean. But just getting there took a concentrated effort by the San Diego man. Still fighting jet lag from a trip to 20-foot Cloudbreak, Jojo was in San Diego less than 24 hours before he headed north.

“Yesterday I flew from Fiji to LAX and drove home to SD,” he wrote . “Outer buoys spiked. Fire drilled. Grabbed the fullsuit and booties and hopped on a plane to San Fran. Delayed plane. 2:30am arrival. 3 hour nap. And straight into this gem. Kicked out in the channel fired up for the rest of the day! Good times shared with everyone! Thanks @lucapadua @aloslebir for looking after me. Hard headed payed off. Definitely my biggest and steepest paddle wave out there this year!”

While we commend Jojo’s effort, we cannot condone getting three hours of sleep before surfing waves like that. Leave it to the professionals.