During the final decade of the 20th century the absolute cutting edge of performance waveriding was bodyboarding.
Spins in critical sections, inverts, El Rollos, the ARS, and deep, deep tubes... standup boardsurfing had been dreaming about some of these moves for decades. Soft foam bodyboards and hardcore riders made them reality.
The 21st century is now here. What will this mean for bodyboarding? Bodyboarders have, in many underground ways, pretty much been able to write their own tickets by virtue of performance up until now, but the rest of the surfing world is catching up. Bodyboarding remains just under radar; it is barely marketed to at all, disrespected in both the water and the "industry", and under constant attack...yet always poised to break out of containment and ravage the world.
One thing is certain: this decade will make or break bodyboarding as a "serious" sports endeavour. The moment a standup surfer pulls some form of ARS on camera, bodyboarding will lose the "leading edge", and the battle for either survival or evolution will begin. |
