Thruster V Single Fin

[Beanpole]

I used to have a 6'6" Deanie model years ago. Had some great waves on it particularly on long hollow waves. One session at largish Lennox comes to mind
Anyway due to its lack of rocker it was a rocket down the line but it was often stiff in sydney beach breaks.
I've always found the sleak shapes from up north don't cut it in Sydney and visa versa.
A McCoy Nugget at Burleigh anyone?

[Laurie McGinness]

I'm a long time sceptic on additional length and volume, so my comments were limited to the very bottom of the range of what people are surfing. The problem with applying it more widely is that in the conditions that most of us "enjoy" it can very easily become an escape. You will get more waves with more length and volume and in the first instance you may not lose much performance but it's a slippery slope, add a bit more and you lose a bit more performance and so on and so forth until you're on a mal or whatever. I'm clinging to 6'4" like my life depends on it....though I'm not above sneaking the 6'7" into the line up when the crowd goes from obscene to ridiculous!

[collnarra]

Surely as you get older performance decreases... none of the 50 year olds I see in my line up surf "well" on their 6'4"s and I think that they're basically doing the surfing equivalent of wearing the same clothes that their kids wear. Silly and a bit embarrassing.

Not that that is any reason to get a mal or a fun-board. Surely there's a happy medium, a performance board for the older gent that's still fit and enthusiastic?

(I'm just thinking 25 or so years hence, for me)

[Laurie McGinness]

As a fifty year plus "gent" on a 6'4" I readily admit that from some perspectives I would be better off on a longer board. I would probably catch more waves and surf more gracefully. Against that is the upper limit such boards place on your performance....you are never going to be as dynamic. For me the thrill in surfing has always been in pushing some sort of limit so the idea that I should retire to Noosa and take up graceful positions on my mal as I cruise along in a straight line is repugnant.

The "happy medium" collnarra, in my observation, is simply a step in the wrong direction. As a famous Welsh poet once said

"Rage, rage against the dying of the light!"

of if you prefer Neil Young,

"It's better to burn out than it is to rust"

...and it may surprise you to know that I'm not quite ready to move into neatly ironed shorts, long socks and sensible shoes just yet either!

A word of advice, make as few concessions as possible to the aging process!

[Nick Carroll]

I dunno Coll, physical performance limits do decrease, but technical skill can continue to develop well into middle age I reckon.

Be that as it may, my writing mate Tim Baker once voiced a very interesting theory regarding the Retro board phenomenon. His theory was that most surfers are most at home on the boards ridden during the era that most closely matches their technical skills.

What does this mean? Well: there's no doubt that successive generations of top surfers have built and expanded the sport's technical skill and style range. Top surfers today are light years ahead of the top surfers of the 1970s in terms of pure expertise. Of course they wouldn't be where they are now without the efforts of prior generations ... but the point holds.

But the technical skill development hasn't just been restricted to top surfers. Today's average surfers are doing stuff that 30 years ago was in the realm of the gods. If ya don't believe me, go back and have a look at the surf movies of the day, and try to do it without being blinded by the haze of nostalgia. What you'll mostly see is surfers battling with the formative structure of technical surfing skills that today most of us take for granted.

Tim's idea was that perhaps the general surfing standard among many surfers today has caught up to what was being done when a lot of those designs we consider "retro" -- the 6' singly, the 5'8" fish, the 5'11" twinny -- were in fact the cutting edge. And that because of this, many surfers are feeling a real sense of natural comfort on these boards.

I think this is a great insight which gets well beyond the supposed marketing of Soul, etc and digs right into the DNA of surfing and surfboard design. It might also have something to do with why so many older experienced surfers just can't imagine stepping onto a "funboard" -- the design never really existed, it's purely a response to the modern beginner, and as such fits nowhere in their DNA strand.

[Laurie McGinness]

The test of that theory Nick would be to compare the performance of today's average surfers with the performances of the stars of yesteryear. I'm not even going to offer an opinion on that mainly because the thought of actually sitting through a seventies surf movie fills me with horror. Once in a lifetime is surely enough.

[ric_vidal]

You had me until the last two paragraphs Nick, unless you can quantify what a “funboard” is, but it is probably easier to describe what it isn’t.

As an older surfer approaching 50 I like to think I am still actually improving, and there is plenty of room let me tell you, and yes physically there are some hurdles.

Have I reached the halcyon days of the single fins? Well yes, mine anyway and this is surely about our INDIVIDUAL experience, not the whole surfing fraternity.

My experience with boards is possibly quite different for several reasons, because I make them and because they don’t necessarily conform to the ‘normal’ criteria. A sacrifice in performance, I don’t believe so.

If surfers choose a 6'4" biscuit because it makes them feel part of the ‘tribe’ then so be it, I am not going to single-handedly try and pursuade the greater unwashed that they are wrong, but I pity them and question their level of enjoyment and isn’t that what surfing is meant to be about?

[Johnno]

For me the thrill in surfing has always been in pushing some sort of limit so the idea that I should retire to Noosa and take up graceful positions on my mal as I cruise along in a straight line is repugnant.

The "happy medium" collnarra, in my observation, is simply a step in the wrong direction. As a famous Welsh poet once said

"Rage, rage against the dying of the light!"

of if you prefer Neil Young,

"It's better to burn out than it is to rust"

...and it may surprise you to know that I'm not quite ready to move into neatly ironed shorts, long socks and sensible shoes just yet either!

A word of advice, make as few concessions as possible to the aging process!

Oh so true Laurie, it must be that little bit mongrel in us .................

[moreorless]

As a long-term short-boarder who's quickly approaching 50 I'm with Laurie in wanting to make as few concessions as possible for as long as possible. But I have found that a couple nods to reality have not only helped to maintain performance but have actually assisted with the on-going improvement that ric_vidal mentions. (Although perhaps it's not really improvement but only adaptation to the physical realities older surfers face. Whatever, I still think there's room for improvement and I'm definitely not going to give in.)

The nods to reality have only been a matter of an inch or so in width combined with a flattening of the rocker - more volume to make it easier to get into the waves and more drive once you're in but with little sacrifice to maneuverability. It's probably the sort of gear most short-boarders should be riding irrespective of age and it does me fine.

I also appreciate Nick's comment that "many surfers are feeling a real sense of natural comfort on these (retro) boards", if I get his meaning. I learnt to surf on single-fins around the six foot mark and recently got a retro-modern hybrid single to relive the feeling. It's a damned good board and I rode it virtually non-stop for about six months but I'm back on the 6'3" thruster now. The single-fin will come out when the conditions are right, but for most situations the thruster wins hands down.

I would have loved to see MP or MR in their prime riding the sort of fine-tuned equipment we now have (or Midget, or Nat, or Wayne Lynch, or a host of others). Perhaps we wouldn't notice the generational difference in technical skills mentioned by Nick. Ability is ability irrespective of era. It's just expressed differently depending on the tools at hand.

[Laurie McGinness]

I am more inclined to agree with Nick. I think the evolution of technique has been just as important as the evolution of design.........if you pulled MR from 1977 and put him on a modern board it would take some time for him to approach the current standard. Also, given that the competition is now so much more intense, I can't help but wonder how many of yesterday's stars would not have achieved as much in the modern era. Final thought: The most important piece of surfing equipment is between your ears!

[ric_vidal]

Final thought: The most important piece of surfing equipment is between your ears!

Too true Laurie, but how many people are actually listening?

SOMETIMES it’s a bit like older men and convertibles but why should I care...

[Johnno]

Also, given that the competition is now so much more intense, I can't help but wonder how many of yesterday's stars would not have achieved as much in the modern era.

That's opening a Pandora's box of thought Laurie. Some I think would have picked it up pretty quickly, as in their time they could ride anything.

Designs change quickly from different sizes and stlye of the single fin, all new in its time. Then on to the twin fin through to the thruster, and what a thruster is today.

MR comes to mind just by his winning world titles on a twin fin but had started out as a kid on single fin. In every period we have seen a few surfers that have been head and shoulders above the rest. With Slater and Co being the current group. But given the equipment of today during their prime I think they would rip today at todays standards.

Another that comes to mind is Col Smith from Narrabeen as Occy's style is not to different to how Col use to surf. The way Col ripped up Burleigh that year was awesome.

I have found that 45 was around the time that I felt that my reaction time became a faction slower. But up until then, kept pretty on par, with what could be achieved on a board. As you would see something new then try it yourself. But at my age now the body, or more to the point, the knees are not going to hold up doing floaters or airs. Just don't flex like I use to. :?

[Nick Carroll]

You had me until the last two paragraphs Nick, unless you can quantify what a “funboard” is, but it is probably easier to describe what it isn’t.

As an older surfer approaching 50 I like to think I am still actually improving, and there is plenty of room let me tell you, and yes physically there are some hurdles.

Have I reached the halcyon days of the single fins? Well yes, mine anyway and this is surely about our INDIVIDUAL experience, not the whole surfing fraternity.

OK my definition of a "funboard": a short longboard with a thruster configuration, usually between 7'6" and 8'0", designed specifically for low level ease of performance and paddling comfort.

And I would suggest that as surfers we're both individuals and part of a wider surfing continuum, inheriting attitudes, style and technique tics, and even a vision of waves for which we are only partly responsible and which we only partly understand. Which indeed we're wrestling with in this very thread.

I do not believe there's any point in trying to extricate a great surfer of one era from his or her time and picturing him or her transplanted into the future, it's of little help in understanding what's really occurred and indeed it does a sort of disservice to the surfer involved. For instance, MP's style and technique contribution fit the times during which it was delivered; part of it lives on in the surfing DNA of many surfers today. The top surfers of today are way more proficient than MP was then ... but they wouldn't be as proficient had MP not made his contribution.

Seeing surfing in this way makes it possible to respect all the good surfers through the years without becoming too addicted to one era or the other. It even makes it possible to learn from the best surfers of today -- which is the best way to keep improving as you grow older. The angles and lines of Andy, Joel, the Hobgoods, Mick etc, they're beautiful, fast, fluid, and surprisingly basic, done with great enjoyment and technical skill, and there's no reason why we can't all take leaves from their books.

Lozza I have indeed forced myself to watch 70s surf movies in recent times and they're definitely evidence for the theory voiced above.

[Laurie McGinness]

Yeh that is a can of worms Johnno what I was thinking was that the standards have risen in terms of the basic physical qualities necessary for success: speed of movement, aerobic fitness etc etc…also that if you go back to Midget’s era the actual qualities themselves have changed, for example speed of movement is much less important on mals.

So I'm not really trying to drag people out of their era so much as as to put the era in context with the present.

As far as age and performance goes I think I did some of my best surfing in my early forties but the fifties are another game entirely. My strategy is to actually reduce my surfing hours and increase my fitness work. Light weights and lots of stretching help keep the joints moving. Part of the reason for this is that being based in Sydney the fitness value of surfing is fairly low compared to what it was. This is one of the saddest things about the current over crowding…..no-one gets much exercise. Some of them might as well be at home on the lounge!

If there is no structural damage to those creaky knees Johnno try some dead lifts and half squats with light weights.....you might discover a few muscles you had forgotten existed!

Nick I had a very painful experience with Morning Of The Earth that turned me off surf movies for life....but we don't need to go into that here.

[Johnno]

If there is no structural damage to those creaky knees Johnno try some dead lifts and half squats with light weights.....you might discover a few muscles you had forgotten existed!

Thanks for the tip Laurie, one is OK the other I have manager to stay away from the surgeons knife with a few exercises he gave me to do.

I'll get into a routine and give them a go, one good thing about up here is you end up doing a lot of walking / wadding through water which helps.

[ric_vidal]

...one good thing about up here is you end up doing a lot of walking / wadding through water which helps.

Yer, and 500m paddles so your shoulders will be fine...

[Johnno]

That bit comes natural ..........................

Staying upright (all the way through), while going the other way, is the hard bit.......................