handmade

So if you're anywhere near Hayle / Gwithian on the 8th or 9th sept, James Pary's second annual Hip wiggler single fin invitational is happening along with schmoozing oppurtunities with the Bing people. It's kindof the low key Brit eccentric version of Joel's duct tape contests and is bound to be a fun time. Hopefully the weather will be kinder for spectating this year!

Bing, Matt Calvani, Elliot Dudley and Mick Rodgers will be demo ing boards at Saunton from 8 on the 15th sept then hanging in the Nineplus shop in braunton from 12 and at a special film screening at the surf museum that evening. The museum is also hosting a bbq / old board meet with them at saunton from 11 on the 16th september.

Finally, Rich Mcgonical and friends are organising the european fish fry at Crackington on the weekend after (22nd sept) Should be fun and great to catch up with Rob Royal!

Today's reccomended is sound track...... Handwritten by The Gaslight Anthem, shades of springsteen only cooler....

pick up the planer..

This little run of summer waves and weather has given me the first proper chance to run my newest log through it's paces. It's a 9'4 "mod log" from the last batch of boards Randall shaped before hanging up his planer indefinately last year. I loved the look of it when Neil showed it to me and wished i'd had the cash and the space in the shed to buy it then so when it popped up for sale on magic seaweed i wasn't about to make the same mistake twice!

Template wise it's pretty much what a lot of people have been moving towards recently, less Nuuhiwa noserider and more Hot Generation/ Magic Sam with a greenough fin, thin pinched rails, widepoint pulled back a little, plenty of roll out into the rails and only a shallow nose concave. The nose is fairly narrow at 17 3/4 and the tail is wide at 16 1/4. Despite being 23 wide and 3 in the center there's not a great deal of foam in there. It's similar to the boards Dane Peterson has been riding recently or Chonoski's "involvement" Mctavish's

It's not really a "saunton board" being designed for waves with a little more zip but like most boards with a wide point back of center, as long as there is a steepish pocket to tuck into there's plenty of scope to get piggies dangling. Off the tail it's whippy in a pivoty way and it's got a nice responsive lively feel despite it's volan glass. In fact my only negative so far would be that it paddles really slowly although i'm not entirely sure why as it's fast in trim.

It's a crying shame Randall is no longer making boards, his logs are great and he makes a great mini-simmons too. His templates are spot on and the boards are beautifully finished with some very neat creative touches. Mine has a carbon fibre cloth asymmetric tail patch for example!

I think everyone i've known to ride one of his shapes has rated it and there are more than a few people who would like to get a board off him if he can ever be persuaded to pick up a planer again. In a way it's a little bit pointless posting a detailed review since none of you can currently order a board off him so perhaps this can form another little prick at his concious that his skills are prized over here and an occasional trip to the shaping bay wouldn't be such a bad thing!

timmy's trust........

Longtime readers on here will have heard my appreciative comments about Tim Mason's surfboards. Tim is a real craftsman and one of the nicest men you could possibly hope to meet. Tim probably knows more than anyone else in Europe about hull style boards and makes beautiful displacement hulls as well as some lovely casper inspired mini simmons.

What lots of you wont know is that Tim is a real family man and at the end of the last year lost his 7 year old son Timmy after a long battle with cancer. It's such a sad thing that you feel even more keenly when you have your own children.

Tim and his wife Kate have set up The Timmy Mason Trust to help families in a similar situation in the future and to keep Timmy's memory alive.  Their first goal is to raise £5000 to achieve UK charitable status which will really mean they can move the trust forward. They would gladly recieve any donations of course.

To help raise funds, Tim is intending to auction off one of his beautiful boards every month. First up is the lovely Lis inspired fish in the pictures. It's 6'4 and like all of Tim's boards it's a thing of beauty and sure to be a joy in the water. Search my earlier posts to find out how much i rate Tim's shaping!

If you are interested in this board or to see what's available next month check here.

f in good news!

One of Randall's stock boards already has a new home, inside the vintage splitty owned by Pete from the British Surfing Museum, along with a bespoke surfing museum pivot fin to finish it off perfectly.

Understandably Pete is stoked, not least because the Museum of British Surfing is officially happening. As of last week, there is funding guaranteed and the paperwork is being signed to give a permenent exhibition and event space in the centre of Braunton, North Devon. Official opening is set for summer 2011 and the team have lots of exciting plans to go with it. All pretty exciting news and full credit to Pete and B for slogging through the hoops to get it done.

click here for the official word