My Shaping Career

I started helping rough shape Balsa boards for Velzy and Jacobs in 1958, in their Venice shop. I was also shaping in my garage for Dave Sweet (first foam blanks) about 15 boards a week and building my own boards with my label at the same time. When I graduated from High School in ‘59 I went straight to Hawaii to live my dream. I met Don Hansen there and we discussed opening the first surfboard shop in North County San Diego. He would be the owner and money guy and I would be the Hot name surfer shaper. His bankroll was $15,000. I shaped for Hansen about 6 years mostly making my own Mike Doyle signature model and designing some of his line like the first short board called the 50/50 designed by Mike Doyle. I shaped about 5 boards a day so it added up to several thousand boards over my career which still is not over. In 1970 I came out with the first soft-board with Tom Morey. It was a real hit and the beginning of surf schools. I remember we made 3000 soft boards in one year. Nobody even considered us in the surfboard business yet we were making more boards than anyone in the business but they still thought of them as gimmiks,toys etc. We laughed all the way to the bank. Shaping and riding your own equipment is a fantastic feeling. What other sport can you do that? Every curve, rocker shape and fin combos make the board react different. Now I am just shaping a few boards for my wife and friends and prototypes to be sent to China to be hand copied. You don't lose your touch with age in fact you get better. In 2009 I received the coveted award... I was inducted into the Surfboard builders Hall of Fame. Quite an honor. 

-Mike

New RT SUP Board!

This is a real mans size board packing floatation of 290 liters, a larger volume than most 14 foot race boards and it's 12'6"! A very narrow specially shaped entry, a wide tail, double concave bottom and 32" wide makes this the most stable board of its kind. Don't let the width fool about its speed. Do you know how much speed is lost because of the rider trying to maintain balance ???  a lot. This board floats up high and dry so you’re not carrying pounds of water on the board as it goes over the tail or the rails. With only 3" of total rocker we have a full water line contact which gives it maximum speed per length ratio. The slight rocker and the thick tail make it really forgiving in head on chop because you can move back over a foot or more from your regular trim spot to go over rough conditions and the tail won't be dragging because it's to thin. Also heading downhill (railroading) the thick tail lifts up on every ripple and swell to make the front drop in for the extra ride and distance. Also the curved entry makes sure that when you catch a swell it doesn't broach like the straight up and down nose entries. Remember also even though this is a thick board in the front and  on the rail profile you are only standing four inches above the water because of  the giant stepped down center, this really gets the center of gravity down low for maximum stability. This board can be considered the ultimate for light weight riders in chopping conditions, the ultimate for big guys that the other boards just don't float and for touring or fishing you want the volume.

SUP Trolling

This gear is made for clean water, with no kelp or ell grass, Bahamas, Florida , Hawaii Cabo, Cancun and other clear water places. The first pic. is the whole enchilada wrapped around a piece of foam. Thats 25 feet of kiteboarding string or 100lbs test monofiliment. 20 feet of 50lbs monofiliment. 8 inches of 45 lbs steel leader and then the lure, a jointed Repala. The jointed repala is the best since it gets better action at such low speeds. It's hard to set a hook into the fish at such low speeds so I attatched the line directely to the paddle so you usually hook the fish on the recovery part of the stroke and the recovery part is when the lure really get some good swimming action. Thats a stick on leash plug that I put ahead of the pad I am pointing to, I use that string to tie my catch on and also to tie the rig to when going out through the surf. You wanna keep those hooks away from the body. You have to paddle on one side and then pass the paddle over your head to the other side or else the string will get caught on your body. You get used to it after awhile. A basic slip knot is the best for attaching the string to the paddle. It makes paddleing less tedious when you fishing because you never know what might hit it. Once I got pulled off the board and pulled throught the water of 100 feet before the line snapped. Thats why you want the 50lbs test so it will break if you get a 100 lbs of Roosterfish and believe me it can happen.  This method will also work great in Lake Tahoe and other clean water lakes. But they won't need the steel leader at the end of the line because trout and bass don't have the gnarly teeth that these salt water fish have.  Most of all our fishing is right along the beach but this year we are moving out for Dorado and Tuna, keep ya posted.
Mike

My wife Annie and I just got back from Aspen . We do a type of snowboarding thats called carving. You use hard boots and a narrow snowboard and your feet mounted almost straight ahead. The idea is to lay over on the turn so the body is almost touching the ground and you never want to slide the tail of the board.. You can feel the G's as you pull into a turn. It's just like surfing and alot like supping. You can see in the video on Vimeo call Chasing Doyle,,,that you use your hand in the turn just like you use the paddle for support and a pivot point. It's a fantastic feeling and you need about a 10 foot wave to get the same feeling plus you get about 100 turns per run. Check out the video http://vimeo.com/19948823
-Mike