JUDGES
Greg Bertish (Chairman)
Greg Bertish is a South African waterman, adventurer, businessman, social activist and philanthropist. Greg was brought up in and on the water in Cape Town, South Africa, with his two brothers, Conn and Chris (who won the 2010 Mavericks competition and recently completed a solo SUP crossing of the Atlantic), sailing, water-skiing, surfing, windsurfing and kayaking from the ages of 5 years old. After traveling the world surfing, Greg founded True Blue Surf Travel in 1998, Africa’s first surf travel company. After becoming the first person to surfski at Dungeons in huge surf, Greg began stand-up paddle surfing in 2008. He represented South Africa at the 2012 World SUP Champs and has competed in and won numerous SUP events in multiple disciplines. He is also a South African champion lifesaver and a former nominee for the Raw Courage Big Wave award.
Following a series of life-threatening heart surgeries precipitated by a heart valve infection contracted in the tropics, Greg started All-Heart to assist persons dealing with trauma and medical hardship resulting from heart and other related health problems. In 2016, he sailed an 8-foot dinghy 200km around the Cape of Storms, wrote a children’s book about the experience, and started a non-profit organization, The Little Optimist, to raise money for the Red Cross Children’s Hospital and to inspire children and survivors of serious medical conditions to never give up. In 2004, Greg founded (and remains the chairman of) Sharkspotters, a non-profit organization dedicated to the sustainable coexistence of sharks and people that developed and runs the first and only shark detection, protection, and warning system of its kind in the world.
Chris Dennis
Chris Dennis is an accomplished surfer and free diver from Trinidad & Tobago. He comes from a very humble background, being born and raised in the coastal fishing village of Balandra, where he developed a deep affinity for the ocean and ventured into surfing. Surfing was his way out of poverty and opened up many opportunities for him. In addition to representing Trinidad & Tobago at surfing's World Qualifying Series for a few years, he has also focused his efforts on helping to improve the sport locally by coaching and mentoring young and upcoming talent. It is through the intervention of sport that Chris sees the possibility of positively affecting the lives of young people and dissuading them from a life of failure and frustration.
In 2018, Chris teamed up with the Positive Vibe Warriors Foundation from California/USA to do a surfboard drive and get surfing equipment for the purpose of introducing more youth to the sport of surfing, a successful effort that was profiled in the film, “Breaking Boundaries”.
In June 2019, Chris co-founded the non-profit organization Waves for Hope, offering youth & community development programs. The surf therapy program for at-risk youths in underserved communities of Trinidad uses a safe space, caring mentors, the fun activity of surfing, and evidence-based exercises to build healthy relationships and develop skills to cope with stress. The beach functions as a safe space where the participants are mentored by caring coaches and are given the opportunity to learn new skills to cope with their difficult situations and build positive relationships.
Chris Dodds
Born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and instantly infatuated with beach life and wave riding, you could say that the ocean set its hooks in young Chris early on. Born as Christophe Duvivier Masi, his first five years of life in Rio were blessed with a big family and lots of beach days. He then moved with his mother and stepfather to the midwestern United States and so began his landlocked era and the birth of the American boy, Chris Dodds.
While the rural upbringing in small towns deprived him of a regular relationship with the sea, sliding sideways still found Chris via skateboarding and snowboarding. He learned to surf in Rio at Aproador Beach when he was 10 and continued to learn when he visited Brazil to stay with his grandmother and family. Those early sessions–and the immense joy that came with them–were what inspired his eventual desire to teach others to surf.
He studied journalism at the University of Colorado at Boulder, where certain professors inspired him to follow a path of helping others and sharing information that can positively transform people’s lives. His studies were complemented by the stunning mountain wilderness of Colorado and the realization of how powerful access to open space and natural areas can be–powder days at incredible mountains provided peak life experiences. While snowboarding and living in the mountains is an amazing way to live, it was only a matter of time before Chris returned to the sea and rekindled a daily relationship with the ocean.
After finishing school, the winds blew westward to California and his life as a surfer began in earnest. It may sound ironic or laughable to some but surfing is what really made him take life seriously, it provided what nothing else truly could–meaning. This started as a personal quest, a reason to stay close to the natural cycles of winds, tides and, of course, swells. Surfing became the salvation from a larger system that seemed to be in the throes of a massive existential crisis, an antidote to a modern society suffering from a disconnect to the natural world.
While many friends were climbing the corporate ladder, Chris struggled to find pursuits that met his standards for integrity and did not add to the overwhelming chorus of exploitation for the sake of profit. To put it simply, the only avenue that beckoned was to accept surfing as the art of life–a raison d’etre–and to find ethical ways to support that quest and to share that joy and healing with others.
Miraculously, Chris scored a job with Thermal Travel that provided a carte blanche to explore the world of surfing and led him to discover incredible people like Chris Dennis and Babs and share their stories with travelers. He also picked up a summer job with the Surf Education Academy and mentored under Sean Brody, the former head of the Team USA Para Surfing, and that opened up the incredible world of adaptive surfing.
Today, Chris works for SURFER Magazine–an opportunity he would have never thought possible just a few years ago. While performance surfing is incredible, what he loves most are the inspirational stories that are wonderfully abundant in the global surf community. He is forever indebted to the power of the ocean and will forever serve as a steward of the seas and as an ally of anyone who wishes to participate and experience the power of surfing.
Kris Primacio
Kris, who is Hawaiian but grew up in Seattle, Washington, has been obsessed with surfing since she first got pushed into a wave at San Onofre in 2011. Her passion for surfing, combined with the solace she found in the water after her father was diagnosed with cancer, led her to begin volunteering for surf therapy programs, which eventually led to her current position as the executive director of the International Surf Therapy Organization (ISTO), a non-profit organization she helped found in 2017 in Cape Town, South Africa.
ISTO, the fiscal sponsor and partner to the Aloha Award, is a collective of the world’s leading surf therapy practitioners, clinicians, researchers, and influencers. As the #1 resource for the surf therapy sector, ISTO sponsors, develops and disseminates research, evaluation, and training tools, programming, and conferences on surf therapy for the benefit of its 135 surf therapy member organizations and the general public.
Kris utilizes her psychology degree as a highly-skilled, compassionate, empathetic, and solutions-oriented professional dedicated to providing exceptional care for children, adolescents, and adults. She has provided care and support to patients and family members in healthcare environments, Seattle Children's Hospital, Group Health Hospital, the Special Olympics, and Northwestern Hospital, to name a few. Kris uses her branding and fundraising background to help bring exposure and identity to ISTO. She applies her genuine love for the sport of surfing and proven knowledge of the therapeutic powers of the ocean to help advance the exposure and research on surfing as a health intervention through ISTO.
Brisa Hennessey
Brisa grew up in the jungle of Costa Rica with her parents before moving to Oahu’s North Shore, while also spending chunks of time in Fiji. Brisa grew up immersed in nature with access to some of the world’s best waves, where she has nurtured a deep connection to the ocean and surfing.
Brisa is a professional surfer, a two-time ISA gold medalist, gold medal winner of the 2019 Pan American Games, represented Costa Rica at the 2020 summer Olympics in Tokyo, and is now sending it on the WSL championship tour, where she won first place in the Hurley Pro at Sunset Beach.
Brisa's heart of gold, love of sharing the sport of surfing with people in and out of the ocean and promoting the Aloha spirit makes Brisa an exceptional global ambassador of surfing and the Aloha Award.