Eric Lazar finds surfing silver on O‘ahu

LIHU‘E — Eric Lazar was proud to win second place at the Hawai‘i Adaptive Surfing Championships that was held at Queen’s Surf Break on O‘ahu that wrapped up on June 11.

“This was the first stop of the inaugural Adaptive Surfing Professionals World Championship Tour,” Lazar said. “By getting second, I earn eligibility to participate at the US Open Adaptive Surfing Championships that will be held Sept 8-11 in Oceanside, California.”

Lazar said because this is the first time for adaptive surfing tour, there’ll be just two stops. The first was the championship meet in Waikiki, and the second stop will be in California. He said next year, there are plans for four stops including the addition of a meet in Australia, and England.

Access Surf launched its first competitive adaptive surf completition in 2007 as part of the Duke’s OceanFest in Waikiki.

He added that the theft of a customized adapative surfboard from Spike Kane affected the entire meet as other participants sympathized with Kane on the loss of his board that, to date, has not been recovered.

Lazar earned silver after participating in the Prone Assist (Men) division after being edged out of first place by Jesse Billauer. Third and fourth place in the division were awarded to Scott Davis and Buster Kawasaki, respectively.

Some of the other winners at the Hawai‘i Adaptive Surfing Championships include Alcino “Pirata” Neto in the Above the Knee Standing (Men), Mark “Mono” Stewart in the Any Knee Kneeling (Men), Victoria Feige in the Any Knee Kneeling (Women), Pegleg Bennett in the Below the Knee Standing (Men), Jimena Ruiz Rojas in the Below the Knee Standing (Women), Elias Figue Diel in the Blind/No Vision (Men), and Barbie Pacheco in the Blind/No Vision (Women). A full roster of winner can be found on accessurf.org/2022hasc/.

“I was surfing since 1976,” Lazar said. “It was always my dream to become a world class surfer. In 2003, I suffered an injury that left me paralyzed. But that didn’t stop me from surfing. I saw a quadriplegic get help by being laid out on a surfboard, and that kept me inspired. With the help of Kaua‘i Ocean Recreation Experience, I could continue surfing, and they hooked me up with the contests.”