EDITOR’S NOTE By Cash Lambert
Visit the Waialua Sugar Mill - home to several iconic shaping factories - on a summer morning, and the mechanical noises of machines and other pieces of equipment cutting and cleaning and slicing are a contrast to the lush and untouched Waianae Range that stands in the distance. Step into any of the dilapidated warehouse doors in the area, and you’ll be met with a familiar smell of resin, and the hands behind today’s most innovative and progressive surfboards, who, in turn, are undoubtedly aiding in shaping the rapid progression that the sport has seen in recent years (the Big Wave arena! 720s! And anything John John does!) Ask any shaper why he or she picked the trade, and under goggles and respirators, they’ll say something such as “I like working with my hands”, “it stokes me out to see people stoked on something I worked on” or “it’s cool to walk out at Pipeline or any beach and see someone getting absolutely barreled or doing a huge air on a board I built.” This issue is dedicated to the board builders, those who labor on foam while swell lights up the reefs just a few miles away, those who value negative feedback over positive, who talk numbers and geometry and whose vocabulary includes words like torsional stability and resonance. Flip over to page 58 for our Beach and Board Buyers Guide, where you can shop for your next surfboard, and hear from a collection of Hawaii’s shapers on new innovations, the best selling models today and what we can expect in the future. In this issue, we also highlight a surfboard design that has been kept under wraps for 8 years, known as Project X, and later renamed Project XO (page 38); we take a look at Kekoa “Bam” Bacalso’s quiver (page 76), and so much more (Shadowing Zeke Lau at his first CT! Behind what’s fueling Barron Mamiya’s QS win streak! Ah, and Laserwolf’s dreamy portfolio!) Other than shining a spotlight on those behind today’s boards and their products, we hope that this issue helps you get your quiver dialed in, because those summertime Town swells are just around the corner.