[Idol eyes]

Spider Boards...
They are now shaped in Newquay (aswell as SA)... mostly by Daniel Keggie, (DK Surfari).
He shaped my 9.4
You need to contact Brandon @ emoceanal... Newquay.
They still use a type of foam that is banned every where in the world except SA (the Manufacturing process is banned) however this is a bad thing for the folk that make the stuff, but great for surf boards... It really is light and suits fishes, funboards and alike!!!
Pin tails all the way for me now!!! loose and more acute take off ratios...
Think a egg could be worth looking at... Or 9plus magic carpets... But they a bit too retro for most! suit Longboarders!

[granticus]

Does anyone have any experience of Spider boards?

Yep, Have a 6'' 8 squash tail thruster (kinda like a fat boy flyer thing, ie. lots of volume, good as a drop down board when moving towards a 'proper' shortboard).  The board goes very well, particularly in down the line point break surf I think Spider Murphy tested his shapes at J-Bay??  It is, however, let down by quality ie. a crappy glass job and has prooved to be fairly repair intensive.  There's more filler than board!

7''0 Rounded Pin from a mini-mal??  Hmmmmm..  7''0 rounded pin says this to me... large and I mean large (overhead plus) barrelling surf, the size would allow you to get into the wave ealier and the rounded pin would give you the hold you need to handle such waves.  It all comes down to how you want your surfing to progress and what kind of waves you want to get on.  So what are you after in your surfing experience... just gliding nice and smooth in a straight line, hot dogging (cross stepping, nose riding etc.), barrels, lip snaps/smashing, big hacks, aerials, big waves, small waves, what's your pleasure?  there will be a board to suit.  A few more questions where would you normally surf and what size waves do you feel confident in? Are you looking to drop down to an even shorter board in the future?(be honest!).  This will give us something to go on and then we can prescribe the correct treatment for your surfing needs.

[SA Chris]

I had heard about the glassing being an issue, but could only find old threads on the internet referring to them, so was wondering if it could be a problem of the past? SA Chris, when you say cast your doubts on this, do you mean they confirm your doubts or cast them into a firey pit of hell? Afraid I'm a bit too tired to read anything more complex than the beano at the moment.

I mean that they cause me to cast doubts on the quality. Unless you are going for super high performance, go for a heavier quality glass.

My understanding of foam manufacture is that one process ( I think the one that uses TDI - trimethyl di-isocyanate) is banned in most countries, due to harmful emissions which are bad for the planet, but SA regulations are a bit more lax.

Is the Roger Cooper a lightwieght epoxy board? I assumed it was conventional glass fibre? Reason I ask is that I have lightweight epoxy longboard, and it is really dire in any wind or chop, which slaps the bottom and reverberates.

[Falling Down]

Gruff - Epoxy is the resin coating.  The O'Shea boards are still hand shaped.

[Adam Lincoln]

I'm generally happy in anything up to head high surf, and have occasionally bricked it in bigger. And whilst I realise I have a long way to go in surfing, I just feel like I'm gravitating back towards a slightly shorter board. Not exactly shortboard, just shorter board, I'm also just not that keen on long boarding, and don't really see the attraction in nose riding/ cross stepping etc.

Not sure what the others are going to recommend for you, but i have a 6'11 Spider Murphy thruster i am about to de-wax and sell on ebay. I used it as a transition board from Mal to shortboard. With your height it might not be a bad option?

[Idol eyes]

Do not like poxys!!!
Tufflites r okish,
think shortboards like the bonzers suit Epoxy/tufflite fabrics...
but anything larger... to much reverberation (or something like that).
you can get Bamboo boards nowadaze... and balsa... think the size and ethical statements you have made may warrant research here!
Foam boards are where its at!!!
Triple, or rosewood stringer 9 footers...
single fins and funky concaves...
Oh yeah!!!


I am the wrong person to ask for advice though...

[Falling Down]

I'm generally happy in anything up to head high surf, and have occasionally bricked it in bigger. And whilst I realise I have a long way to go in surfing, I just feel like I'm gravitating back towards a slightly shorter board. Not exactly shortboard, just shorter board, I'm also just not that keen on long boarding, and don't really see the attraction in nose riding/ cross stepping etc.

Not sure what the others are going to recommend for you, but i have a 6'11 Spider Murphy thruster i am about to de-wax and sell on ebay. I used it as a transition board from Mal to shortboard. With your height it might not be a bad option?

Worth checking out Gruff.. sounds like it might be exactly what you're looking for. 

Do you know what the other dimensions of the 7'0 rounded pin are.  I've got one that I use as my travel board (18.5" wide and 2 1/4" thick)and it's exactly as Granticus describes.. made for big heavy surf and and it wouldn't suit what you're looking for at all.  My mate has a 7'0 rounded pin that's more like a slim mini mal/funboard that would be right up your street.

[SA Chris]

According to the Roger Cooper site info, all of his boards are glass. I think it's just incredibly buoyant, it has a lot of volume. So it's not just me being a bit soft then? Having the board reverberate gets on your tits as well?

Speaking of epoxy...is there a consensus yet? Good, bad, no different? O'shea claim to make hand shaped epoxy boards...is that possible? Forgive my ignorance.

On his site he does have a few epoxy boards, in the minimal and longboard sections, and makes them to order, so you may have ended up with a 2nd hand one. My "epoxy" board is fantastic in calm conditions, but if it is anything but glass and more wind than a light breeze, it slaps around on any chop and reverberates like hell, and I get my fish out.

I would avoid it in an all-round board myself.

There was a good article in Surfer's Path a while ago about pros and cons of different cores, can scan it for you if you want.

[granticus]

I'm generally happy in anything up to head high surf, and have occasionally bricked it in bigger. And whilst I realise I have a long way to go in surfing, I just feel like I'm gravitating back towards a slightly shorter board. Not exactly shortboard, just shorter board, I'm also just not that keen on long boarding, and don't really see the attraction in nose riding/ cross stepping etc.

My suggestion would be to go for something in the 6''8 to 6''10 ish range with plenty of volume and go for a modern template (ie. thruster) but don't get a retro board.  Would also suggest going for a squash tail (rounded).  The idea being to give you more manoeverability, whilst maintaining some float to give you a little more ease of paddling.  As for your backhand take offs... The problems you are experiencing are common and more practice to get things right will be all that'll help...   

[granticus]

  Adam's board would probably fit the bill for someone of your stature. Check the dimensions and make sure it's got plenty of volume...

[Idol eyes]

Good surf here, fistral peaked at about 8ft with the Cribber going off! elsewhere Clean!!!

[Baron]

Went to Watergate on Monday - lovely.

Moving to Devon in the summer. Where's best to get some practice in on the East coast before then? I live in Sheffield.

[Johnny Brown]

Lleyn was good all easter. This was about the only time it wasn't blazing sunshine.



Seem to be improving every session at the mo which is encouraging, need more fitness though and struggling getting out through the white water, got absolutlely worked the last two sessions. Any tips on getting a biggish board out through the breakers? What about turns? I'm pretty much totally self taught at the mo... making it up as I go...

[ben]

JB - what size/style board is it?

minimal upwards the popular technique is to make use of that extra length and get more ground covered between waves, then just paddle at 'em and hope. Pushing the nose under the lip/whitewater should stop you being flipped over backwards.  Another longboard technique is to roll over and pull the nose of the board down under the white water but I've never really mastered it and its time consuming.  Making up ground between waves and using the layout of the beach to your advantage are the keys though, ie don't just paddle straight out but weave around peaks to avoid the worst bits

[Baron]

used the power of my mind to find out what i needed:

http://magicseaweed.com/
http://www.a1surf.com/

for future ref.

[Johnny Brown]

Cheers for the tips Ben, its a 7'8" minimal. I've been trying the roll over technique and by the time I've sorted myself out the next wave is bearing down. Guess I'll try to be a bit bolder paddling straight at them, I was tending to abandon the board when I thought I was about to get flattened. Setting out from the beach I was doing Ok at following the rips, but getting back out after a wave I wasn't so clever.

[ben]

JB - another trick is to bide your time a bit. If you've just had a wave and the rest of the set is piling through, just hang out in the water, holding onto your leash and ducking your head under the waves - until a lull arrives.. then paddle like billio. tbh there doesn't seem to be a great technique for that kind of size board, however it looks like you're getting on ok from that pic, so you may be able to move onto a reasonably fat floaty shorter board sometime soon which you can duck dive.
Abandoning the board is fine if there's no one behind you, but again hold onto the leash so that its closer to hand to get back on after the wave - i find this kind of thing is quicker than trying the rollover thing, getting it wrong and then trying to recover in time

[SA Chris]

JB, what do you weigh? I could duck dive that board reasonably well but you need to be pretty aggressive. It's worth watching the waves and waiting for lulls between sets and then stroking for the horizon. before I learned to duckdive reasonably (I'm still pretty crap) I used to either a) wrap arms around top of board and just push it forward through wave, or b) if they are small enough, push up on the board so that it would sink and let the "wave" pass between me and the board. Never got on with the longboard roll technique - you don't cover thant much ground between waves.

What do you mean by turns? Judging by pic, first you need to get out the white water (you don't look far off); try paddling diagonally instead of straight for shore, and correct, so that the wave reaches you where it is peeling along the line. As you get to your feet look down the line where you want to go and you (should) go in that direction. easier to learn this front hand rather than back hand first. For turns up and dwon wave apply snowboard technique, but exaggerate it a bit. Glad you are progressing.

Abandoning the board is never a good idea in my opinion. You learn more from duking it out with the waves, and lose time retrieving the board before getting going again.

[Johnny Brown]

Cheers guys, that's just what I was after. I'm 11 1/2 stone, to be honest I think the waves were a little big for me at the mo, the smallest session I got on great. All beach breaks though so not much consistency in where they break, I did get a couple of waves where I was out of the white water, more by luck though!

[Falling Down]

Nic pic JB..

First off, try to get used to not abandoning your board at the first sign of trouble. It's a bad habit for a number of reasons:

- It's dangerous if there are other surfers in the water.  
- You'll regret it the one day you do it in in big surf and your leash breaks leaving you in the sh*t.
- It's sort of like resting on gear or grabbing a clip in that it'll become a habit every time a large set looms on the horizon and one that's hard to break.
- It'll actually drag you further backwards more than hanging on and taking a beating.

Just hold on to the damn thing for dear life. When you start going out in heavy places you'll appreciate why.  I have indentations in the rails of a couple of my boards from gripping so tight.

As for paddling out, like the others have said.  

- Wait for the lulls, but start to paddle out just at the end of a set so you are already motoring during the lull.  
- Paddle out away from the peak rather than into it, if you are surfing the mouth, there are rips either side of the main boardwalk peak that offer an easier route out back.
- Keep paddling until you are sure you are out back. Usually the water colour will change to a deeper blue, green (or brown) when you're out of where the waves have been breaking.  Once you're there, give yourself plenty of time to recover and let a set or two go through.
- Keep your head down, forehead on the front of the board and keep a steady even stroke and it'll take some of the strain off the shoulders.
- If you've caught a wave rather than paddling right back out to the peak keep heading diagonally to the direction in which you were riding away from the peak as it's likely that the water is draining back that way and you'll eventually pick up a rip.

Duck diving
- It's tricky on bigger boards but one way is to make sure you tilt it sideways as you push it down so it cuts through the water easier.

Turns?

- You're probably looking down at your feet a lot at the moment so once you get confident just look and point (seriously) where you want the board to go and it will do so through the twist in your shoulders  .

Me and Mrs FD have a few weekends in Abersoch coming up so I'll PM you once we have dates firmed and see if we can catch some waves.

[Johnny Brown]

Perfect. I've left all my stuff stashed down there so will be well keen.

[SA Chris]

I'm 11 1/2 stone

Quite a bit less than me, but I have seen guys with less weither than me duckdive it. As always, more about technique that power. I found practicing duckdiving when you don't have to (in about chest high where you can stand up if it goes wrong) to be a bit of a confidence builder.

[clm]

i found a weird sort of press up/ half duck dive worked ok on the big bic.  kinda punch the nose of the board under the white and dive yourself as over/through it as you can.  i still seemed to spend an awful lot of time getting mullered.  can duck dive the new one

ps.  how on earth did you manage to get to nigels port when it wasnt force 6 onshore.

[Johnny Brown]

That photo is at Ceriad, should be obvious from the peak (and lack of chop). Weather was amazing all weekend though, light winds and swell, mostly sunshine (Jim asked if I'd been on a sunbed today), when we left on weds there was still a decent swell and the wind was even offshore.

Most of the time the waves were too big for the push-up method. It worked fine on the smaller ones though. Got the new board sussed yet?

[Falling Down]

It's not the easiest place to learn to surf with it being so peaky and with the wave jacking up quickly so good effort.