Wegener “Alaia” Surfboards Giveaway
My surfing has become a daily ritual now. There is truly no better way to start your day. Wake up, grab my board and hit the water. I have been lucky enough to been given quite a few boards to shred on through the blog, as most of you have seen. But this is something that I just needed to try for myself. Surfing in the ancient style on a finless wood board has been overlooked for many years now. In Hawaii the board was called alaia. In Japan it was called itaka. There is evidence of early surfers riding this style from all around the world but in the early 1900’s this style vanished. The thin, flat rockered board moves across the wave very quickly. The hard edge of the rail bites into the wave like a long fin and the gentle curves on the bottom hold the board into the face of the wave. The board is as light as possible so it accelerates quickly and the wood is sealed with oil which is slippery in the water. This makes the board move faster through the water like a fish. The ancient Hawaiians had a special word for how to surf the alaia. It was “lala.”. It is the controlled slide in the pocket. The way you do it is you use the edge of the board to hold in across a wall, then break free for a controlled sideways slide in the pocket, then grab the wave again to gain forward momentum. When you want to continue with forward momentum, you put weight on the inside rail and the board grips the wave and takes off again. Last week I received my very own Alaia from Jon at Wegener Surfboards. I won’t lie, I was sceptical at first look. But that disappeared quickly once I got it in the water. I can’t thank Jon enough for hooking me up. And now in a partnership with my friends J.F. & Vivian at CRUX Magazine, we are gonna hook you up! Head over to their site for more details on how you can walk away with your very own Alaia right now!!
Posted on July 29th, 2010 by Chris Is A Liar
1 Comment
Posted in: Contests & Giveaways, Special Delivery, Surfs Up, Swag
July 29th, 2010 at 8:55 AM
Yes!