I tell this story all the time, it was 1980 and I was working for Natural Progession in Santa Monica, I’d shaped maybe 15 boards. It was one of those June gloom kinda days, and there was a nice little south swell up. As in most surfboard factories, the crew all surfed and would often agree to split for the day and go surf. This particular day happened to fall about 48 hours after I had completed my first start to finsh board…

I’d shaped, glassed and sanded it myself! It was pretty rough as you might imagine, being my first. On this morning, head shaper Dean Edwards, decided it was a good surf session day, so we all raced up to Malibu. Dean had hired me a few months earlier and had taken me under his wing, my first shaping mentor!!! He is a master hand shaper, and an even better artist… if that’s possible. When we arrived, we found a glassy 2-4 swell peeling down the point with trademark Malibu perfection!!! I remember it so clearly, I was super stoked to ride my board, this was it’s maiden voyage after all… I don’t even remember the dims, but it had a rainbow acid splash on the deck and black rails.

I was fired up to surf with Dean, and actually surfed really well! I was pulling these nice roundhouse cutbacks and bouncing off the foam then racing to the next section and doing it again… After several waves, Dean paddles over and says, “You’re surfing really well on that board, let me try it.” Of course I gave him the board and hopped on his.  Remember, this was 1980…

Dean was into asymmetrical outlines, and his boards had scooped out foot wells on the tail. It was like having a tail pad, but this was way before astrodeck had kicks on thier pads… Dean was super innovative, but his board felt so foreign to me, it was like an alien. I didn’t even want to catch a wave because I could ”FEEL” I wasn’t going to like it. Moments later Dean paddled back from the one wave he had caught on my board and promptly made the comment, “It’s not the board!” I’ll never forget that. Talk about a light bulb over the head moment…

He was clearly giving credit for my nice cutties to “ME” and not the ”BOARD” Since that day I’ve continued to grow as a shaper, I’ve worked for many of the biggest names in the business, I’ve made boards for pros, joe average, and straight up rank beginners, I’ve tweaked my designs, fine tuned them, and devloped my own look, and yes, the board is very important… but, through it all, I’ve maintained my belief that “it’s not the board, it’s technique that makes the surfer…” and I can’t think of a better example than my little story here to convince a person that there is some “REAL TRUTH” in what I’m saying.