Continuing our theme of "Old Guys Who Can Still Surf Riding Prone" -- albeit sans displacement hull -- here is Kevin Merifield. Still flying at 80!
Great video and article here...
And some granny surfers here...
From Mikey
22 hours ago
More Proneman
Hi Paul,
I did not know how the Santa Anas would be
blowing at Rincon or if they would even be in play there......
Arrived
in the dark and felt them blowing up the trail into my face. Sat on the
beach waiting for some light but was pretty sure the waves would be
ribbed and marginal with that wind.....Sets were overhead but wind
seemed like it would persist so I moved on......
I headed
south and looked at 5 or 6 spots but they were either more than I
wanted or wrong wind. Malibu wind was the same direction as Rincon wind
and waves were tiny. Topanga was good but inconsistent and crowded.
As I headed home, I thought I would keep an eye on the wind and possibly surf in the afternoon.
Around midday
I noticed the wind at Malibu was diminished and I figured it would get
immediately crowded. The crowd was not bad as it glassed off and I made
my move....
I got a few at 1st point around 2 pm and then
paddled up to 2nd where I lucked into 3 or 4 good ones. My persistence
paid off and went home with a smile on my mug.
Hope you are getting a few up your way!!
Roger
A Really Big Mac
Some nice gliding on a big McTavish single fin called the Sugar. It's been around for a few years...
From Lou
Alexander Headland Long Board Club..Sun Shine Coast..Maroochydore region..Hayden Kenny boards.
Some
guys that i used to know from coming over to PNG surf camp, and used to
do Business with me when i had Fox Westsuits ..send these pics through
in the last week.They are a solid bunch of guys and well established
club.😎
From Lou
"Victorian surf legend Wayne Lynch reveals a close connection to South Australia"
Came across this article...its older but says a bit about John Arnold and his period along with connection with Lynch..
Thought it may be of personal interest to you ...
Take it easy Paul and hope your travelling well and getting some H2O time😎
Lou
Simmons Used A Shaping Machine...
...so why can't I?
:)
Here's my new 9'2'' Velo Simmons being milled out. Monster 11'3'' blank, 1/2" balsa stringer.
(Photos courtesy of Spencer Kellogg Studios...New York, Paris, London and Ventura.)
From Duke
Hey Paul… long, long, time.
So long that a good friend of mine, who
used to rip is hanging up his surf trunks because of hip and knee
problems, but wants to keep in the water on his stomach. i told him he
should look into 4th Gear. ( I bought one from you back in the day, and I
can’t find it anywhere.) I googled 4th Gear to see if you were still on
it. Good surprise.
Anyway,
though I’d send you a picture of 021, that is now a wall hanger in my
Carpinteria residence. (I’ve turned into a SUP surfer.) It’s one heck of
a great design.
Hope all is well and best wishes,
Duke
Latest Velo-Simmon cut file
Inspired by Proneman
and Richard Safady, I've gotten totally hooked on prone riding a
Simmons-type board in small, weak surf. (Which is the kind of
surf mats don't go too well in.) I like riding prone, and I like being
about to utilize waves no one else is interested in. And I love the feeling of being on a hull.
This is on my 9'4'', which I made last August...
My new cut file is currently 9" long x 23" width. (I say ''currently,'' because I may make it longer. Haven't decided yet.)
Velo nose and tail. Velo is 5' long and 22" wide. At 9 feet long, there's basically 4 feet of straight added to Velo's outline shape in this design. There's an inch of width added in the middle to mellow the outline curve...but it's still pretty damn straight. (The arc tail is added in the hand finishing process.)
Just ahead of center, the hull is 2" deep...which is really extreme for a conventional foam hull. In comparison, Liddle's most extreme hulls are 1.75" deep. Velo's hull is 2.5" deep...but that would probably be to radical for this application. Then again, who knows?
Some images from the virtual shaping bay...
RIP Ken White
Vale Kiwi White
Swellnet Dispatch
Friday, 19 June 2020
This week, ten emails worth of photos arrived in the Swellnet inbox. All of them documenting the wonderfully well-travelled life of Ken 'Kiwi' White, a fellow who, we'll clarify from the outset, was not a New Zealander.
Ken's nickname was born when, as a tot, he was playing Cowboys and Indians and Mum White painted stripes on his face using boot polish. The brand? Kiwi polish.
Born in Cheltenham, Adelaide, in 1945, Kiwi's life was taking a well-worn trajectory from school into his first job. He worked on the factory floor at Elders with faint hopes for elevation into the office, which was occupied by a certain class of character: conservative, well-mannered, short back and sides, on the rise.
The first surf films were coming out of the US and Kiwi suddenly saw a different future for himself. He politely informed his manager he didn't share his vision and took off.
Coming of age during Australia's first surf boom, Kiwi was a nimble natural-footer who tasted minor competitive success. In 1964, he surfed in the World Titles at Manly, the year Midget won announcing Australia as a force in world surfing. Yet it was Kiwi's appetite for adventure, and his Forrest Gump tendency to cross paths with fate, the '64 titles just one example, for which he's most well known.
Setting up base in Port Lincoln, Kiwi and mates explored up the Eyre Peninsula in their 30s-era wagon emblazoned 'West Coast Surf Chaser', copying the 'South Coast Surf Chaser' belonging to the guys back east across the gulfs. Other crews also had their 'chasers', The Surf Seekers, The Malibu Maniacs, Murphies Mob, Joie De Vivre, and later the Roaders.
Arguably, the West Coast crew had the richest pickings, but every crew put in the highway miles - that's the lot of being a South Australian surfer.
The difference with Kiwi, however, was that his travels went beyond the state - he surfed all around Australia - and they also took him beyond Australia to the best surf in the world, to Hawaii, California, Mexico, Indonesia, during an age that leaves a modern surfer green with envy, and he didn't even stop when the crowds came. Kiwi was travelling into his seventies and collected passport stamps from 101 different countries.
Back home at Port Lincoln he did seasonal work, first on the trawlers and later as a tuna spotter from a plane, and then leaving when the fish did.
Active into his seventies, Kiwi hit a stumbling block early last year. He began having trouble breathing, struggling with his surfing, and, unusual for Kiwi, he didn’t feel like eating or doing anything active.
So he had tests done, and the doctors initially gave him the all clear, but Kiwi insisted on further testing. Two weeks later, he was called back into the doctors for his results.
He had mesothelioma, an aggressive cancer caused by exposure to asbestos.
Kiwi claims it was an early surf trip to WA, telling the ABC: "We were getting ten shillings, or one dollar, to fill up a big wool bag. The asbestos would come in and we'd rake it down and then we'd pick it up in our bare hands. No mask, no goggles, no protective gear at all, we had boardshorts, T-shirt, pair of thongs."
"I had a feeling this wasn't doing us any good. Both of us lasted ten days."
Despite the disease, Kiwi continued surfing and competing. Even winning the Over 75s division at Crescent Head last year with a bung lung and a grim diagnosis.
Kiwi is survived by his wife Robyn and daughter Sophie.
Click here for more pics. Thanks to Lou G for the link.
From Glenn
Nice interview with Nat Young regarding his new book, Church Of The Open Sky, along with some transition stories as well.
"George is the only genius we’ve ever had in the evolution of surfing. We’ve had a lot of really talented, smart people that have contributed a lot, but for me, George was the genius. There’s so many aspects to what George is thinking. From cameras, to boards, to fish, he’s out there."
---------------------------------------------
Some recent footage of McTavish to go with it...
Malibu: Tummy Tutorial From Proneman
..."I've been using the GG Stage 6 Hatchet fin.....either a 7 1/4" or in this case the 9".
I think the 8" is probably the best overall fin for the board and that is what I normally used on the other 10' 4" Simmons, which is over on Oahu."
Roger
---------------------------------------------------------
Some thoughts on this clip from PG...
At first glance the wave and the ride seem like "nothing," but they're a textbook example of why we love hull surfing. Lying down on a long hull visually exaggerates what we feel riding standing up.
You can see clearly see the tail drift out as he rides, and the belly and rail grab hold of the curve/texture of the wall and pull the board up the face. The entire ride is an extended "drift" in the pocket. With minimal rider input, the board rises and falls up and down the face, slotting itself in the ideal position, moment to moment.
Roger paddled out at 4:45 AM, and there were people surfing. Most of them left as the sun was about to rise, but he stayed in the lineup until the lifeguards arrived.
Some thoughts on this clip from PG...
At first glance the wave and the ride seem like "nothing," but they're a textbook example of why we love hull surfing. Lying down on a long hull visually exaggerates what we feel riding standing up.
You can see clearly see the tail drift out as he rides, and the belly and rail grab hold of the curve/texture of the wall and pull the board up the face. The entire ride is an extended "drift" in the pocket. With minimal rider input, the board rises and falls up and down the face, slotting itself in the ideal position, moment to moment.
Roger paddled out at 4:45 AM, and there were people surfing. Most of them left as the sun was about to rise, but he stayed in the lineup until the lifeguards arrived.
The wave in the videos was ridden at about 6:15 AM, April 8. There was just a touch of sunrise, and the moon was full...that combined with the open aperture of the camera combine to make it look lighter than it was.
VW Vanagon Partial Update, From Proneman
Proneman
Malibu: April 2, 2020
According to KP, they were handing out $1000 fines for surfing Malibu. They must have been pretty tough, because only a handful of people were out over the course of the afternoon, and there was plenty of surf.
One SUPer was out alone for awile, and picked off a set wave...
A few moments later, he ended up near the pier, and made a run for it as the Lifeguards closed in...
People on the sidewalk took notice of the action. The bust itself generated more social distancing issues than that guy surfing...
After it was over, sets rolled into Malibu with no one out. Probably empty as it's been since the 50's...
One SUPer was out alone for awile, and picked off a set wave...
A few moments later, he ended up near the pier, and made a run for it as the Lifeguards closed in...
People on the sidewalk took notice of the action. The bust itself generated more social distancing issues than that guy surfing...
After it was over, sets rolled into Malibu with no one out. Probably empty as it's been since the 50's...
50's Malibu Sliding
Gidget with a totem-board. Probably belonged to Mike Doyle.
Angie Bane
Joe Quigg
Bob Simmons
Matt Kivlin
Probably Vicky Flaxman, with Nick Gabaldon in the back
Simmons board in perfect trim.
The Unknown Simmons Rider.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
