Surfing

For the fourth year we're across in Japan for Greenroom Festival, Yokohama. A two day event that celebrates surf through art and music and pulling a crowd of around 10,000 people. Sam & Patchy PreppingBespoke ^Aloha Goods BoothTCSS Complete Booth SetupTCSS Greenroom Team (Pama Davies, Patchy, Rama McCabe & Thomas Bexon)Rama Custom Boardshort BuildingDoc - Always Big in JapanMain StageSide of Stage with Ray Barbee& Tommy Guerrero

Wooden Surfboards reinventedShaping surfboards is an art and there’s certainly some romanticism connected to it. You know: Creating something out of nothing, living close to the sea, hanging out with the surfers and being one, providing the base for awesome surf: Great surfboards in a variety of shapes, each made for a certain type of wave.. But the other side of it are usually toxic materials, toxic liquids, bad air in the workshop, white powder that comes from sanding the boards into the final shape all over your skin, slowly diffusing those chemicals into your organism.Stefan from Kun_tiqi Surfboards is a shaper, he is a surfer and though born thousands of miles from the sea, he now lives close to some of the most beautiful beaches in Cantabria, Spain. Entering his workshop feels different. It mostly smells like wood – even though he admits: “I repair lots of conventional surf boards so I have the usual repertoire of chemicals. My workshop does stink sometimes too, but I hope it gets less as more and more people surf wood instead.” His own label – Kun_tiqi Surfboards – wants to provoke a different thinking. In the old days of surfing surf boards were made of wood. They were heavy, huge and could never provide the performance of modern surfboards. Then came a revolutionary time for surfboard shaping and connected to it a different style of surfing: The aera of boards made of polyurethane or polystyrene foam covered with layers of fiberglass, cloth and polyester orepoxy resin, made for more radical turns, shorter and lighter boards arrived on the stage.Stefan wants to prove that a step back can mean a step forward too – just in a different direction. His boards are made of wood, balsa wood in that case, but constructed in a hollow structure which provides more stability than foam boards while maintaining the same performance, weight and feel in the water. The only difference: “Surfers who started riding my boards were surprised by how much they float in comparison to regular boards. In terms of maneuverability and speed they are the same though.”“We now offer different shapes – ranging from a 9” performance longboard, over noseriders, evolution boards, retro single fins, fish boards down to shortboards everything – each made for performance while lasting longer than conventional boards. Not a single customer managed to snap a balsa board yet – they are built to last and perform…” If he’s not in the workshop caring glassing his balsa boards he’s surfing the area around Santander – often using his bike to get there. “Cantabria is a beautiful area. It’s still relatively free from crowds, people are relaxed here. And slowly people start to be more conscious about their environment too – they start to realize that if it stays that way we have a little paradise here at the north coast of Spain.”This is taken from : www.oldyoungsea.com a great site about an upcoming film of traveling and surfing from the South of France through Spain and down into Portugal. This is just one of the many stories told along the way. Check it out, Stefan and his Kun tigi Surfboards have been on this blog many times in the past.

Cutting loose, getting hammered, and maybe even scoring in Tahiti

With the waves taking a brief respite, Creed McTaggart, Noa Deane and Ryan Callinan hit the coping and the court.

In which our quarterfinalists are decided.

Taylor's winter edit from time on the rock Plus, a couple from home

The quarterfinals are set after a tube-filled day in Brazil

The Billabong Rio Pro returned to Barra Da Tijuca for the second consecutive day

It works with a paddleBrian giving it a tryNo wind requiredIt flies on a wave

Still some fun waves around with the swell still in the 4ft range out of the SE and a light WSW wind blowing making it quite clean. Pretty similar to yesterday with some fun peaks around and plenty of options, definitely worth getting out there. Another good looking day with still pretty chilly winds.