Inkling
Another August afternoon in Cocoa Beach. Muggy, stifling. Peel-and-stick air. I’m up on the dune crossover, sweating, sniffing sargassum, anguishing over the silt-gray bathwater, and doing my best to stanch that inevitable leakage of the soul that comes with these Florida flat spells.
My shaper, Larry Mayo, has been preaching the glider to me all summer, but I’ve fended off his advances, content with my two-board quiver: a 9’9″ noserider and a 7’9″ egg. What now? I haven’t surfed in four days. I’m puddling out on the planks. I finally give in and order a 10’6″ Mayo glider.
Call it kismet. For the next two months, I’ll miss appointments, neglect friends and family, forsake all other boards and gods, and ride, live, breathe, and dream of nothing but the glider.
Provenance
The great-grandfather of the glider was the olo: 16 feet, 150 pounds of open-celled wiliwili, hand-hewn, parallel of rail, convex on both deck and bottom, lacquered to a shine with kukui nut oil. With all that speed and cutting heft, the olo alone could lock into the ‘ōhū (the non-breaking wave) and soar across those green, glowering mammoths of the deepwater horizon.
Tom Blake, who had heard tales of Kalehuawehe—a long-forgotten olo break outside Waikiki—decided to resurrect the hallowed spot in the winter of 1929 on his next-gen big board, the ‘ōkoholā: a flat-decked, pintailed, 15-foot hollow redwood racing model. Later, on June 1, 1936, Blake would set the world record for longest ridden wave of the century on one of his ‘ōkoholā gliders, hitching a triple-overhead bombie outside south Castles, trimming past the reef at Public Baths, and sliding all the way to the beach at Stonewall—a 4,500-foot sojourn, all told.
In one scene from Blake’s 1935 book, Hawaiian Surfboard, Duke Kahanamoku builds his own ‘ōkoholā and catches a thousand-yard ride outside Waikiki (a break he and Blake would name Papa Nui, or “Big Board”). According to Blake, Duke had gone “stale on surfriding…the ten-foot board held no thrill for him.” But that first magic Papa Nui glide rekindled the ecstatic fire inside him, and the Duke shouted his long, careless rapture to the skies.
The story resonated with Skip Frye, who talked about Blake’s book in Thomas Campbell’s classic film The Seedling. In the early 1990s, Frye, too, had grown weary of the 10-foot board. All the hotdogging, noseriding, and posturing had lost their appeal, so he built himself a 12-foot big board: the Eagle, the archetype of the modern glider—straight, sleek, and sharp, with a rounded-pin nose and a singular focus toward effortless glide and down-the-line speed.
The board draws its way with a parabolic clarity. I relax, skim my hand in the cool fire of the curl. It’s thrilling: 300 yards of analog flow.
On it, Frye could sit well past the lineup, connect unheard-of sections, and “cross-country” surf the coast, roaming from one reef to the next. As he talks story in the film, Frye slots into a chest-high wave at San Onofre, parallel stance, ankling, all controlled thrust and easy power. The swooping, majestic turns, the predatory grace and intensity, the speed and swing weight and glide provided, as he put it, his “biggest buzz in 40 years of surfing.”
Rebirth of Wonder
I launch the Mayo glider on the first hurricane swell of the season, Ernesto. Chest-high forerunners of a rising swell. A north breeze ruffling the surface. The waves are too soft—bellying, fizzling in the trough. Today’s not the call. But the board paddles out as if on a gust of wind, like a scull, and I soon find myself in position to pick off one of the ‘ōhū.
The glider cleaves the entry with finesse, makes my noserider feel blunt in comparison—the difference between a broadsword and a cudgel. I take it straight stance, Waikiki-style, to carry the trough. When the bar shallows out again, I step back to the tail and aim for the inside reform.
What is that feeling—when the walls of the universe melt away, when no further effort is required, when all the hours of clutching and straining give way to that pure, blissful forward motion? Go loose. Let the wave lead. The rail accepts the speed line, and it’s clear to me what got into Duke and Skip. It’s like first love. Or, to borrow a phrase from Ferlinghetti: the “rebirth of wonder.”
Definition
Glide (n.): a smooth, continuous movement.
Part of the problem with classifying the glider as a glossary term is that many of the most elite operators don’t call them gliders at all. To the school of Frye, they’re “big boards,” simple enough.
It wasn’t until 1997 that the name first met the vessel, when Chris Christenson, who was shaping up in Bay Park alongside the Skipper—watching all those beautiful big blanks come in—foiled out his own take on the Eagle, added some Brewer and Diffenderfer curves, and dubbed it the “Christenson Glider.”
A name can take on a power all its own. Become its own theme. (Just ask Steve Lis.) By 2010, “glider” had become a ubiquitous term for any cruising surfboard north of 10’6″. Bing and Kookbox had developed their own models. Surftech was cutting EPS Gerry Lopez gliders on their CNC battalions. Christenson’s first instinct was to claim credit for the name, but he’d thrown too perfect a pitch. And it’s hard to trademark the truth. So he added some hips, rechristened his big board the “Chris Craft,” and moved on—smooth and continuous as ever.
Westward
Ernesto delivers a week of chest-high perfection to the Space Coast. By the time the Atlantic settles down, I’m a full-on convert. An addict. I hop a plane to San Diego on the pretense of doing “research” and look up shaper Josh Hall—Skip’s protégé, a student of the old guard. I tell him I’m seeking the essence of the modern glider and hoping to catch a few rides at the mecca of the movement. We meet before dawn for coffee at his home in Bay Park. It’s been a bad season of surf out here, he tells me, and the Surfline prognosticators are forecasting “1-2 ft. poor” conditions. But Hall seems optimistic. There’s a south pulse on the buoy. “Florida surfers aren’t picky,” I assure him. Hall smiles. “We’ll check a few spots,” he says.
Crystal Pier
An unseasonable La Niña fog: plush, silver, cool, and windless. A stillness to the eucalyptus. Crystal Pier struts its spindles over cut glass.
Here is the cradle of San Diego style: birthplace of the Tribe of the Open Mind—Mike Hynson, Butch Van Artsdalen, Skip—groms in the early ’60s, pre-psychedelia days, days before Windansea, before Hawaii. Since then, Hank Warner, Eric “Bird” Huffman, Joe Roper, Glen Horn, Larry Mabile, Stevie Lis, and Joel Tudor have all laid their tracks here.
Today, it’s middle-aged loggers with leg ropes on waist-high closeouts. Falling back, punting their boards toward shore. “Reminds me of Cocoa Beach,” I say. Hall doesn’t seem to hear me. His eyes are scanning north, up the coast.
Tourmaline
A Sano vibe at Tourmaline Surf Park: VW minibuses and Sprinter vans in the parking lot, leashed-up “social surfers” in the water. It’s small and racy, closing out on the inside. But so glassy. Dream glass. “Looks fun enough,” I suggest. I’m itching.
Hall’s still squinting north, out past the little cove, round to the nose of the point. He’s tracking something…a mirage? Pouring like cream over the misty reef. No one’s on it. It might be 3 to 4 feet, but there’s no way to judge.
PB Point
Hall’s got me on his newest design—Le Sliviar—his 17-year collaboration with Thomas Campbell, an “evolution of the Eagle,” a touch narrower, a touch lighter. It’s 10’10”, with museum-grade abstract expressionist art—shades of pink, tan, forest green—wrapping the rails. Hall has pulled a 10-foot twin Simmons swallowtail for himself. We haul our bounty down the steps and wade out over the “Frye walk”—a stepping-stone path of old gunnery concrete laid out by Skip on the first negative-low-tide day of spring.
A pointbreak is always a surreal experience for a Floridian. A dry-hair paddle to the outside. Blond sandstone scarps all draped with ice plant. This must be a sneaker swell—only five or six friends are sitting on the peak. We set up on the outside, let a few pass under us. A wave swings wide—shoulder-high, gleaming like leather. Hall nods me in.
I fade the takeoff, pivot up high, and set the line. The board draws its way with a parabolic clarity. I relax, skim my hand in the cool fire of the curl. It’s thrilling: 300 yards of analog flow.
He’s got an Eagle up on the racks, glamorous, heartbreakingly gorgeous. Behold the Edwards influence: narrow template, minimal rocker, the main theme being the javelin––the straighter, the faster.
Contours
After lunch, we head to Hall’s workshop in the corrugated-aluminum village of Morena, a short stroll from Bird’s Quonset hut. He’s got an Eagle up on the racks, glamorous, heartbreakingly gorgeous, shimmering in Shizuka apple green. Behold the Edwards influence: narrow template, minimal rocker, the main theme being the javelin—the straighter, the faster.
The pintail comes from Quigg. Run your hand over the “Frye rail”—Greenough-and Hynson-infused, buttery up front, knifey in the back—and you’ll understand how the board suctions itself naturally into the sweet spot. Tilt it to the lights and note the big concave scoop through the middle—hallmark of Simmons, speed principle of the catamaran bottom—blending to the double concave and the vee panel in the tail (courtesy of McTavish, 1967). “The spiral vee provides lift,” Hall says. “Allows you to get all that rail out of the water and surf it like an 8-foot egg.”
Big-board riders wear small fins on their boards as badges of honor. An 8-inch Greenough 4-A, set in the middle of the box, is sufficient for an 11-footer, given the proper template, rails, and bottom contours. Noseriding isn’t a priority. Less fin translates to less drag, more speed, and better step-off dismounts.
Sunset Cliffs
From atop the bluffs at Lomaland, you can see the fractured reefs fingering out toward Hawaii. “The mana comes up from the Islands with the south swells,” Hall tells me. The wind is still holding its breath. Six or seven distinct peaks are breaking down below. This is Frye’s cross-country field. You could spend a whole day out there, surfing 3 miles and 15 named spots, from Osprey down past Nazarene University.
I follow Hall down the algae-slick steps—the Le Sliviar teetering atop my head—to a spot that’s unbelievably clean. Sheet glass. Head-high miracles. And not crowded, not by any standard. The fog has cleared, the tiger-striped cliffs look like something out of Pissarro, and the air is so articulate that you can hear the ping of the aluminum bats up on the Nazarene baseball field and the crackle of waves a quarter mile away.
Burch
On the flight home, I rewatch a 2016 video of Ryan Burch putting his 14-foot glider through its paces. It’s mystifying to see all that board cantilevered out in front of him and the vee panel at work as he plucks the nose up out of the water and whips those quick lean-back curlicues at the bottom. Every time he straightens out, the glider gathers energy and just wants to fly.
The ancient Greeks believed that light emanated from the eyes, as opposed to the other way around. There’s something appealing to this idea: vision as a beacon rather than a camera. Shoot out. Burn your own reality. Spend enough time on the glider—steadying your own light, smoothing your perception—and you might believe it too.
Home
In many respects, the glider is the ideal Florida surfboard. Nothing fits better on knee- to waist- high waves. You can coax closeouts for 20 extra seconds, trimming to lingering variations of the melody. And it’s versatile enough to handle bigger days. I’ve seen pictures of John Johnson at 12-foot Hanalei Bay that put up a good argument for the glider as gun.
World-class noseriders like Kassia Meador, Jen Smith, Devon Howard, and Erin Meza-Ashley call them “palate cleansers” and use them to rethink their approach to wave riding. It’s astonishing that more people don’t keep them in their quivers. Maybe it’s the price tag. Or the logistical complications. Or the fact that the rides are tough to appreciate from a spectator’s vantage. There’s nothing performative about the glider, nothing competitive. It’s subtle, personal, wholly lacking pretense. Probably it’s best if they don’t become too popular. Who needs more weekend warriors clustering the outside, kicking javelins out from underfoot?
It’s so nice out here, alone. Prowling the glittering fields. It feels like I’m in on a secret. Nothing slips so smoothly over deepwater silk. And to think, all those months Mayo tried to convince me.
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Dan Reiter’s debut collection of nonfiction, On a Rising Swell: Surf Stories From Florida’s Space Coast, is available now from the University Press of Florida and in the TSJ online bookstore, purchase here.
