don't just sit there!

Funny how a view that most members of the public would see as calming and something to sit still and soak up has the absolute opposite effect on us. That can't get your suit on fast enough excitement, a flurried burst of hectic activity slowing only when you make it out back and float waiting for the first set to roll through!

go west?!

could it be magic?

Most people will be familiar with the concept of having a "magic board". It's a much used phrase in connection with the ASP world tour and most surfers will feel like they have owned one at some point over the course of their surfing life.

The board in the picture above is one of mine. I pulled it out of the shed the other day and paddled out on it for the first time in ages. Sure enough, once i'd dodged the crowd enough to slide into a head high reeler, my feet found the sweet spot and i started a session full of smooth carves and cutbacks that only a true twin keel will give. Although the design has moved from being "new" (again) into being almost a standard "summer shape" they really are versatile boards and will handle most things the UK can throw at you.

This one is a 5'8 classic keel shaped by Larry Mabile that i brought back from the US four or five years ago (back in the glory days of $2 to the pound!). It's got a more 70's influenced template and bottom contour than the heavily concave bottomed ones that the likes of gulfstream and christenson make.  Larry is not that well known world wide but incredibly well respected around san diego and is one of the best fish shapers you could go to having learnt his craft under Skip Frye at the G&S label many moons ago. He also makes a lovely version of skip's eagle gliders but i think even virgin would baulk at flying one of those back!

I can honestly say i've never had a bad surf on this board, ever! In fact from where i'm typing it is the first "magic board" i've owned. The Bar of soap could be the second, but i digress....... It got me thinking about how much of the magic is in the shape and how much is in the eyes of the beholder? I mean how much of my love for it is in the fact that it suits me, my surfing and the waves i surf beautifully, how much is in the foam? Would it be magic for anyone, everyone?

Proponents of moulded or computer shaped boards will rave about how the technology allows mass production of a perfect prototype with all the flaws ground out by testing but it isn't entirely true since either process only replicates to a certain level of accuracy and the hand finishing, whether by surfer or chinese labor is still influential. In fact, i've heard quite a few people voice the opinion that it's the imperfections in a hand shape/ finished shape that will make a board magic and another of seemingly identical shape a dog.

For the record my fish was a custom order of a "model" Larmo has made for years, i have no idea if a computer was involved!!

changing man

you know that can't get into your suit quick enough feeling?


I

relations

Two different branches of the simmons design tree with the same basic ideas within them but a different application.

It's interesting how influential Richard Kenvin and his championing of Simmon's ideas has been over the last few years in terms of board design outside the thruster realm. Although you could argue that the recent trend to shorter wider thrusters has some roots here also!

Before Kenvin's original simmons replicas no one was really using the concepts Simmons came up with all those years ago, with the possible exception of the hull crews and whilst related, they are very much a different type of craft. Since then, more and more shapers are offering some kind of take on the concept.

Take these two, both definately directly inspired by Kenvin but neither direct copies of the original "casper"

On the left is a 5'2 Tyler Warren Bar of Soap. The shape originally came from Tyler making a small version of the original "casper" mini-simmons for the daughter of his father's friend. It came out so well, he kept the first and made her another! Hands down the favorite board i've owned to date. It has the chracteristic short wide mini sim style but with the wide point pulled aft of center, snub nosed with a wide tail block. It's stringerless with two very wide based keels which owe more to a conventional keel fish than the half moon simmons style. The bottom contours are the classic simmons bellied entry into flat but through the fins theres vee and deep double concave (spiral vee if i remember correctly!) The rails are soft in the front third but pretty hard through the fins and pretty thinned out.  In the water it's fast and lively, very responsive, probably best described as a fish with afterburners. I've overtaken people who've dropped in on me on this one on more than one occasion. Although it's still a lateral style board it's looser off the top and goes more vertical more easily than the other mini sims i've ridden.

On the right is a 5'6 Jeff McCallum Mford. Named after Jeff's tattooist mate Milford Barnes, he asked Jeff to make a board that felt like floating on a cloud (allegedy - it's unclear how many ales had been consumed at this point!) Jeff is credited with making the second ever mini simmons and is part of the same san diego surf scene that spawned kenvin. This board takes the bottom contour and the rails of the simmons but marries it to a template based on Greenough's velo kneeboards with a widepoint forward and a narrower tail block. The fins are quad half moon keels and the deck is concave. The rails are softer and rounder than the soap but still follow the same high to low shape. Bottom shape is still bellied entry but very quickly goes flat for most of the board with a medium single concave through the fins. In the water it's more idiosyncratic to surf, smoother and more flowing through the water, more lateral, more hull notes in there. It's wider and a bit flatter and goes better (brilliantly) in junk waves.

There are lots more variations on these ideas out there. Mccallum himself makes at least two other shapes based on the simmons idea, Royal makes his Simzers, Baugess makes copies of the original casper and bing, zamora and christenson all have versions. Unfortunately hardly anyone over here has jumped on board although dale walker and Tim Mason have been making some, steve croft at empire has his lumus model (a bonzerised quad version) and Nineplus have one in their new Hasu range thats out soon . It's only a matter of time before more shapers do, they are superbly suited to our regularly average waves and a whole heap of fun!

factory effluent

Just around the corner from the american road (so named as it's a remnant of WW2 military excercises) i sits this sign. It reads "Factory Effluent" and sat in the middle of a lush green vista, it's incongruity with it's surroundings made me pause for thought.

The shot, sadly, is a typical holga near miss, in my minds eye, the sign was a lot more legible! It's certainly not my best photo but if this truly rubbish run of "summer" conditions continues i am actually going to run out of photo's to post!

 It's on the way back from a short mountain bike loop that BGA took me on. I'm sure he took some sort of satisfaction form watching me hyper ventilate up the hills but the rush of bumpy downhill single-track is worth it and a new pleasure i've been introduced to recently.

Meanwhile the ocean went from flat to howling onshore mess and as i type looks like it's heading back to flat again, while i heroically fought some kind of stomach bug from under the duvet. I hate being ill - i'm really bad at sitting still!

 I did watch Steve Cleveland's new movie "Paradigm Shift" which runs along similar lines to his previous films. It's got some great surfing in it and some clever editing. Jai Lee and Dane Peterson probably have the best parts but Knost, Warren and all the other usual suspects are all present and ripping.

It didn't totally blow me away although that might be because i've hardly surfed at all myself recently and my stoke is at a low ebb. I think maybe watching it made me sad i'm not about to hop on a plane to california this year rather than get me excited about going surfing later as it usually would, which isn't Steve Clevelands fault!
 It might also be because the progression in logging seems to have slowed a little - there's no new noseriding trick that i hadn't seen before, nothing really made me stop and rewind. The level of noseriding is now so high it's inevitable it will plateau a bit before the next climb.
I certainly can't put my finger on anything that's wrong with the film, so ignore me and buy it, you'll love it and i'm sure i will once the flat spell is over!

Jack Coleman's "Polyester" is worth a watch too especially if you're an Alex Knost fan. Be warned it is SUPER arty, all scratched painty super 8, weird angles and a velvet underground type soundtrack. It's reminiscent of early Volcom films and definately in the "art piece" category but a good diversion for half an hour and i really like it.

 There's (pleeeeeeese!!!) a small chance of a loggable wave at this end of the week. If there's anything at all in the way of tiny clean waves i'm breaking the sup or a belly board out, i NEED some kind of sideways sliding action and at this stage i'm really not being choosy!

in the estuary...

It's a boat.....who'd a thunk?!!

count trimula..

There's something refreshingly simple about the feeling of pure trim you get from a true displacement hull on a clean wave.

I hadn't ridden my hull for a while but just cruising down the line, connecting sections with that hot knife through butter feel was so much fun on this particular day.

 Nothing else gives you quite the same slingshot feeling out of a deep full rail bottom turn either. Good times!

While i'm talking hulls, this one was shaped by Tim Mason a couple of years ago. Tim's fundraising efforts i posted about a few weeks ago are still going strong and the Timmy Mason Trust now has full charitable status which is excellent news and a real testament to the Tim, Kate and all those in the UK surfing community that have donated time or product.

the lookout.......

First cross-processed roll through the Lc-a was mostly a success, feel like i'm learning the camera a little. Still feels a little odd and frustrating to be so reliant on batteries, especially in the cold months of our climate.

Next roll loaded is fuji velvia which is my favorite 120 film to cross process. Excited to see how it comes out of the Lc-a!

tugs like gravity

I started typing "i'm going to be landlocked for the next week" but as i'm off to the lake district, i'm not sure how true that statement is! I'm really looking forward to visiting a part of the country i've never been to before and hopefully getting some good photos.

It's Good Friday today and while i'm heading north, no doubt lots of people will be heading south west towards the coast. If you are, please remember to be courteous to other surfers, especially locals. There's no excuse (or need) to drop in on people and ruin their wave and it can be dangerous too. If you're bringing an SUP, do the decent thing and find your own peak.

Today is also the official opening day of The Museum Of British Surfing in Braunton. The opening party last night was super fun and featured the music of one of my favorite musicians, the excellent Neil Halstead who very kindly donated his time and talent. The museums's first exhibition is "The Art of Surf" and it's well worth yor time. This is what they say

‘The Art of Surf’’ is an exhibition created from the Museum of British Surfing’s collection of surfboards and artwork dating back more than two centuries.
Many people describe the act of surfing as an art, and creativity has been at the heart of the wave riding experience for hundreds of years.
Early explorers sketched surfers; surfers decorated their boards, took photos and made films; advertisers plundered surfing’s rich imagery – and today in Britain there’s a flourishing art scene inspired by surfing.
Now it’s time to immerse yourself in ‘The Art of Surf’.
The exhibition runs from April 6 to December 24, 2012.


Finisterre are having a sample sale at the museum today and tomorrow as well so if you are in the area, please make the effort to come and lookn around and support/ reward all the hard work Pete and Howie and eveone else have put in over the last few years!

flare/flair

A couple of weeks ago i had the chance to ride a Bing Lovebird model. 9'6 x 18 3/8 x 23 x 14 3/4 x3 and beautifully finished as all Bings are with the distinctive 3/4 deck fabric inlay charcteristic of this model.

It's not an out and out noserider, more of an all around single fin with a medium weight, shallow nose concave, a relaxed rocker, a lot of v in the tail and a tucked under edge to the rail in the back third. It's a board i've always liked the look of and it's quite similar to a gulfstream log i had a couple of years ago.

The day i rode it was a really glassy thigh - waist high with Saunton doing it's best slow pointbreak impression. Good clean logging waves but perhaps lacking the zip that the Lovebird is designed for.

Off the tail the board is lively and the vee is really noticeable having a slightly different feel to more bellied logs but getting the board on a rail and turning with ease. The board trims fast, zipping along as soon as you take your first steps forward. The weight feels good, heavy enough to give momentum but light enough to feel manageable.

On the nose it's solid enough. It has more rocker than my own boards and that felt a little strange. Getting five over is easy enough but it's not as easy to get all ten pinkies over as it is on a loggier board, though i guess thats not really the only point here. It's also true that the shape is designed with faster or slightly bigger waves in mind than i rode it in.

So overall i quite liked it but i wasn't blown away. It's not ideal for small waves and personally i dont ride a log in anything over 2 ft at the moment. Not for me right now then. I do think it would be a good choice as a one board quiver for the travelling traditional minded surfer or a versatile single fin for those who are still on longboards from shoulder to a little overhead waves.

Obviously it's all just my opinion and what do i know really!

nineplussed...

There are some nice Ca made logs in here right now, the new version of the osprey model looks particularly nice. Shaped by Hank Byzak who has a long behind the scenes history and also has hands on Joel Tudor's Kookbox model's check the shop's blog here

longview

sitting on the stoop..

cold beer, warm air, bare feet and the fading summer sun.

A time to remember in the depths of winter........

only sheep bear witness

windswept seclusion = joyful memory

gul

So after a brief lull in swell and wind hereabouts, it's back to some solid groundswell and breezy conditions again. Almost all my surfs recently have seem to have been battling some kind of strong wind, whether onshore or offshore and as usual i've not had the time to seek shelter on the bigger days. Summer's mellow sessions feel long gone and winter feels just around the corner.

 It made a nice change then earlier in the week to slide into some unexpectedly fun thigh high glass at low tide croyde of all places. Even at that size there's some speed in the wave and getting up on the nose and back requires some deft footwork, especially as it tends to be quite A-framed at lower tides. I took the pointy squire log in and i have to say, in the type of wave it is built for (i.e hollower and fast), it really lit up, light enough to feel responsive not tracky from the back as it zipped along in trim and really solid despite it's narrow nose on the tip.

Having headed beachwards with little expectation of a dip, an hour, alone in the line-up in the fading sun brought big smiles.

 In other news, i tried on one of the samples of the new Nineplus Hasu chest zip suits this week.
All black with a subtle gold logo, it features the lightest, stretchiest single lined yamamoto i've seen. Really looking forward to mine arriving in a couple of weeks now!

on the line.....

wood is good

stuck in third?

the open road

There's something exciting about the start of a road trip. The anticipation as the leaving date approaches, the loading as you try to cram one too many essentials in a little too little space, obsessively checking the forecast. Then the off, the road and the possibilities stretching out in front of you, a map and a hunch and a bunch of cd's..........