![]() Hubert Chanson, a professor of hydraulic engineering at the University of Queensland in Australia, has documented 190 tidal bores around the world. See what it's like to ride the "silver dragon" at the 2013 Red Bull Qiantang Shoot Out. "I was in the white water trying to come out of this turn and this branch comes right by me!" You've got cement pilings," says O'Brien. "It's definitely an obstacle course, because you've got boats. O'Brien said riding the "Silver Dragon," as it is sometimes called, is really different from riding an ocean wave, especially in a crowded environment like Hangzhou, where the buildings rise to 50 stories and there are more people than in New York City. The unconventional contest brought together eight surfers to ride a natural phenomenon that's been around for at least several thousand years. "The wave is so cool, because it's so unpredictable," says Jamie O'Brien, a professional surfer from Hawaii's North Shore, who won this week's 2014 Red Bull Qiantang Shoot Out along with a fellow teammate. Surfers came from as far away as Southern California to ride the Qiantang Tidal Bore - a big river wave that forms during China's Mid-Autumn Festival, when the moon is full, and barrels upstream for miles. The hottest surfing in China this week wasn't along some palm-fringed beach in the south, but on a muddy, sometimes trash-strewn river in the eastern city of Hangzhou. The unusual wave draws international competitors every fall. During a surfing competition this week on a river in Hangzhou, China, surfers rode a 10-foot wave.
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