Grain on the North Shore with Rastovich & Beachley
by Brad
Over and over we have written on this site how grateful we are for all the terrific people that have been drawn to Grain over the years. We’ve noted many times how fun it is to make new friends of people that feel the same way we do about the beauty and performance of wood boards, of those who want to work with us to design and create special boards and those who want that indescribable feeling of building their own. But lately, we’ve been uncovering a small subculture of sustainable-wood-board enthusiast where we wouldn’t have looked for it just yet: among elite pro surfers.
People seem to think of pro surfers as mostly a feather-boarded, vert-and-air club that just wouldn’t have much interest in our stock of down-the-line drivers and retros. But we’ve all noticed that among the general public there’s an increasing awareness of the impact our choices are having on the planet. And those pros most known for their social consciousness are acting on that awareness and looking for boards with low-impact credentials.
Molly, Brad & Allen meet Dave Rastovich in the Billabong Board Room
As a result of a small misunderstanding (read:debacle) we recently ended up out on Hawaii’s fabled north shore spending a week with Dave Rastovich as he built a new design we did especially for him to use at Backdoor. His injuries caused the week to get off to a creaky start, but the board came along well, especially considering we had no shop to work in and built the thing out on the lawn of the Billabong House above the Banzai Pipeline. Over the phone, we joked with Mike that we were going to name the board “The Pipesmoker” (’cause we knew he’d hate that) but the more we joked about it the more it appealed to us!
Dave was just great to hang around with – he had a lot of thoughtful insights about his work with Surfers for Cetaceans, The Sea Shepherd Society, and surfing in general. All the pros staying in the Billabong House were very patient with our presence there, and couldn’t believe that the rough-looking board of days one through five was the same graceful stick we had to show by noon on day six.
We left the board to be glassed by Mike Mattison, who Akila Aipa put us in touch with, and fitted it out with Island Fin Design thruster glass-ons. Our greatest regret was that we weren’t able to be on hand to see Dave take the board for it’s first paddle-out as we had to leave Oahu before the board was complete. Nick got a ton of great photos though, and he put some of them on a new Pro Gallery. Big thanks to Allen Anderson, one of our class-attendees who grew up in Hawaii and came down with us to help us find our way around and to work on Dave’s board.
Famed Sugar Mill, home of Island Fin Design and north-shore-grown surf industries
But before we flew back into a blossoming New England winter, we had a chance to spend a few minutes with another of Australia’s great surfers, Layne Beachley. She had ordered some boards from us, and we had offered to build her a finely shaped fun-board for her home break. Layne wanted us to make her board as green as we could, even if it meant a little extra weight, so we glassed it with bamboo cloth.
Though she was getting in a few sessions before heading to Maui for the Billabong Pro, we got to show her new boards to her out front of her beach-front cottage. For us, one of the best things about building boards for people is getting to see their reaction when the boards come out for the first time. It was just the best feeling to have built these boards for Layne who, as a seven-time world champion, and social activist has been an object of our admiration for years.
top: Layne Beachley checks out her new fun-shape
bottom: Rasta gets started
Both Rasta and Layne were full of jokes and fun, and it was great to get a chance to meet them and get them on some Grain boards of their own. These two new designs should show up in our line of boards real soon… keep an eye out for them. We love their shapes which clearly show the influence of the two seasoned, socially conscious pros who helped design them.
On top of all the rest, we almost forget that we were lucky enough to be perched right above the beach for two-plus days of primo Pipe. There for Pipe Masters, Nick watched Joel Parkinson hit his perfect 20-score in one heat – done before only by Slater. All day long for days, surfers were splitting peaks, making huge drops and deep tube-rides one after the other. The pure skill in the water was a thrill to watch, and it was our view for a whole week of work on the North Shore.
