| vagabondsurf.com It's about life - not "lifestyle" |
| WHAT IS KILLING BODYBOARDING PAGE 3 |
| WHAT'S WRONG WITH RECREATION? |
| What's wrong with recreation? Nothing! But you would have a hard time selling that notion to today's sports accessories companies. In the surfing world right now the only place where a long-term acceptance of reality seems to live is in longboarding, which on the face would look like the least contemporary form of riding waves one could imagine. Even the forgotten surf mat, still in production in the U.S. in just about as soulful place and circumstance imaginable, has more avant garde vibrations attached to it than a longboard. Yet in many ways it is the younger longboarders who are spearheading the retro renaissance here. Sure, Slater and Machado have dabbled - opens minds are what has kept them at the top. But take a look at surf shop racks; the movement is gaining momentum. Then look at the U.S. and Australian magazines. Beyond the Fish shapes, the magazines which feature re-examined shapes in editorial content and ads are almost all longboard magazines. Longboarding, with a higher top-end age demographic, is more open minded than any other major form of surfing. Unquestionably the spearhead behind this in the U.S. is Joel Tudor, who actively sought to learn from older surfers. Older surfers were once the "youth of today", however, and more than a few of the older guys made the transition from long to short boards during the shortboard revolution. While they may not want to revisit some smaller shapes while in their 40's and 50's, they might have good memories and encourage younger surfers to try a variety of shapes - and this would make an inviting climate totally unlike what is portrayed in the "cutting edge" surf magazines and surf culture, one of trial and error, of experimentaion, and of learning. In the pro world, however, you don't get points for trying something different. You mostly win by being more standard than the standard. Hence the instant popularity of air contests, where more is better, certainly for the viewers and judges. Back to longboarding, though - with so many adult practitioners there is a maturity in longboarding that so totally seperates it from the "pro surfing" mindset that it has transcended the very same "non-performance" stigma which unfairly chokes bodyboarding. There was a built in population for longboarding, however. Bodyboarding and bodyboarding media, with the insistance on acknowledging only young people and the handful of world class riders, not only effectively shuts off all veteran riders but closes off a huge economic market for themselves. The equipment design innovations appear scarce. A bodyboard of 2002 looks pretty much like the bodyboard of 1972 (see the Bodyboarding Photo Gallery for examples). The view from the Box isn't too good. |
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