🍒 Cherry Picker 🍒 Ben Skinner is one of the world’s best performance longboarders, and a master shaper as well. But lately he has had to step outside of his comfort zone and focus more on traditional logging. Over the past year, the Longboard World Tour (under the guidance of Devon Howard) transitioned away from performance surfing and more toward traditional surfing, emphasizing single fin logs, extended noserides, and powerful, traditional turns. Ben loves logging as much as the next guy, and is an excellent noserider, but over the years had specifically focused on performance longboarding because that’s what was required...

Cutting-Edge Combination of Nature and Technology When most people think of Firewire, they think of TIMBERTEK. These are the brown, wooden-decked surfboards that first put the company on the map. Combining lightweight EPS blanks with a laminated wooden skin and proprietary parabolic rails, these boards look good and perform great. They are strong, lightweight, and snappy, utilizing the strength of paulownia wood to supplement the strength and flex of the EPS foam and epoxy resin. Paulownia is a fast-growing tree that produces strong, light timber, perfect for use in surfboard construction. By utilizing this wood in their construction process, Firewire...

The Firewire Omni

The Dominator II with Dan Mann  “The Wire” Podcast Summary Shaper Dan Mann recently sat down with The Wire podcast to talk about Firewire sandwich construction and his new Dominator II shape. Feel free to check out the podcast, or read on for a summary of the highlights from his conversation. Kevin Schultz has been ripping on the Dominator II, which has been a pleasant surprise for shaper Dan Mann. Kevin tried one of Kelly Slater’s Dominator II's awhile back, and is now genuinely stoked on the board. He is especially excited about the sandwich construction, which is something Dan...

Firewire is known for leading the surf industry in terms of modern, high-tech board construction, and recently they have added a number of different construction options to their boards. Two of the most popular—LFT and Helium—provide similar all-around benefits such as light weight and durability, but also have their own specific advantages, depending what you are looking to do on your board. Rob Machado has been designing boards for Firewire for the past few years, and has a lot of experience on both types of construction. He recently did a little video to explain the difference between the two, and...

NEWSLETTER JULY 2020 Staying Safe in the Sun   Understanding the UV Index and How to Stay Safe in the Sun   I was chatting with FCS rep Keoni Watson the other day, and he mentioned that the UV index was going to be super high this weekend—pushing as high as 11. That sounded pretty gnarly to me, but I realized that I didn’t really know what the UV index meant, or where it even came from, so I decided to do some research. I found an online guideline from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and discovered some really interesting...

The Sci-Fi 2.0 - A New Daniel “Tomo” Thomson Shape With Input From Shane and Jackson Dorian

Now Available at Hawaiian South Shore

Honolulu Surf Shop

Daniel “Tomo” Thompson’s Futuristic Quiver   Daniel “Tomo” Thompson has been one of the world’s best surfer/shapers for over a decade. Growing up near Byron Bay, Australia, with a shaper for a father, he has known George Greenough since before he could talk and started surfing the right-hand points of Lennox Head and Broken Head before he could walk. The influence of this childhood had a massive impact on Tomo, who quickly became a pro-level surfer, a skilled shaper, and an open-minded advocate of speed and hydrodynamics. After revolutionizing the fish design in the Australian points—both as a surfer and...