Wakesurf board system beater

Have you ever heard the Flyboy wakesurf board referred to as a skim board or a system beater? Typically such references are made by folks that don’t know any better, or have an agenda. They’ve never shaped a board or probably have never even held a Flyboy.  As we’ve mentioned, in the wakesurf community no one outside the Walker family, has ever seen the wakesurf board that James is currently riding, except in pictures and we have more than one prototype. So we thought we would take a moment and do some comparisons of surfboards from the ocean and wakesurf boards that compete in the surf style division. First we’ll show you a picture of a typical shortboard from the ocean.  If you are looking for a bench mark for a surf style board what would be more accurate than a shortboard, right?  Is our logic flawed there in anyway? We don’t think so, maybe it is.  If, we went to the underlying “style” that should be the perfect example and any deviations would be considered a system beater or some “hybrid” variation, right?  How can you say a particular board ISN’T surf style, when that definition doesn’t exist, unless you already have a plan and are just backing into the definition?

This is a picture of a Rusty roundtail shortboard. We’ve specifically chosen the roundtail to document that is a relatively common shape in the ocean. MORE common on shortboards is a squash tail, which is just flat at the back, but also relatively narrow in the tail.

A fairly common definition of an ocean shortboard would sound like the following and we grabbed this from some site:

Short boards lack the speed of a long board but offer you the ability to make tighter turns. They are about 6 to 7.5-feet in length and between 18 to 22 inches in width. People who are between 100 and 139 lbs. should select a short board that is between 6 feet, 2 inches and 6 feet, 4 inches in length. For every 20 lbs., add another two to four inches in length.

Huh, so EVERY SINGLE COMPETITIVE LEVEL SURF STYLE WAKESURF BOARD is a system beater! Those bastards! Can you imagine if you were forced to ride a 6’6″ long wakesurf board in a surf style division? It certainly would impact the tricks that could be performed.  What if you weighed 180 pounds?  You’d have to ride a 6’10″?  A 7 foot surf style board behind the boat?!

Should that ACTUAL surfboard be the benchmark for a surf style board?  There obviously aren’t many current surf style wakesurf boards that would meet that criteria, maybe that one from TWP the Convert, save for the length.  BUT not much else.  So what is the deviaton that makes one board surf style and another not?  And how can one board, that is considered surf style be hugely different than a actual surfboard?  Have an opinion?  Why don’t you weigh in, we’d love to hear how you feel about one board with say a tail-tip 400% of the most common shortboard should be considered surf style.  Doesn’t that create competitive advantage that should be required to be reshaped?  Brought down from 16 inches to 4 inches, like virtually all shortboards?  Or why should a supposed surf style board NOT be 6’2″ or even 6’10″ in length?  Where are derivations acceptable and not,because it’s economically determined. or supportive of one or two selected riders.

We’ve touched on tail and length, what about nose?  Should all surf style boards be required to carry out in that flowing curve to a point?  So diamond noses would extend another 6 to 8 inches.  Why or why not?

What’s your feeling?    Won’t you tell us, please?

Looking to step up your game this season (pun intended) Check out the James Walker Flyboy model at Towanza, our favorite wakesurf board retailer…and James’ sponsor.

Technorati Tags: Wakesurf, wakesurf board, Wakesurf boards