In another thread on board wight in the 1960’s someone brought up a story on the invention of the Noserider. I recall Tom Mory had a contest for nose riding. All manner of strange and odd things were done to make riding the nose easier. Like glassing bricks on the tail glassng a 2x4 to hang over the tail. We Surfers do seem to have inventive minds when it come to making our craft.
It seems to me That this is possibly the place were the concave nose made it’s debut. But who gets the credit for coming up with the idea and shaping the first nose rider with a concave nose?
Good luck finding a copy of that book. It is pretty rare and usually sells for a couple hundred, if you’re lucky enough to track one down. Mine was a gift from an ex. She got it from a public library that was unloading inventory. I think she paid a dollar.
”Nope. Munoz won it on a Hobie.
The first Morey Invitational was held before the Lightweight existed, 1965.”
The credit for being first to deliberately
add concave to the underside of the nose for just nose riding should go to
Edwards and Hobie. The Bing Nuuhiwa nose rider seems to have most of the folks
thinking it was first. David Nuuhiwa had an increditable gift and popularized his
model with ridiculous hang times! I just dig this period of surfing, we are
goofing around riding the nose (while down under there’s a big change going on)
and it is big time, most board makers (except maybe Yater) had a nose rider. My
favorite story is the Jacobs 422, a then ghost shaper (Velsey) put everything
into one board. Wide concave nose with an extreme kicked tail with a dished out
area on the tail deck and maybe the first “stinger” or back to the banjo
stepped in template.
My favorite? Loved the Weber
performers, got the longest tippers on the Con Ugly and the Yater spoon rode
well but the Morey Pope John Peck Penetrator which I believe was in the water
during the ‘65 contest, was fast and broke the rules of conventional rockers of
the day.
The first contest was in 65 and
although Mickey Munoz was the recorded winner and $1,500.00 bucks richer, Tom
Morey admitted years later that in reviewing the judges’ cards and remembering
the third judges perspective, reviewed the other judges scores and surmised that
Hynson won by a couple seconds! Official scores were Munoz 67.0 and Mike Hynson
@ 66.3. The Hobie guys Corky Carroll and Mickey Munoz were riding the boards
that Phil Edwards shaped, blunt concave noses with lots of tail rocker and
large fins. Both Skip Frye and Mike Hynson were riding short around 8 ft. long, wide
boards, sporting squared off noses with big fins and boat decking on the nose. Both
Skip and Mike “took the place apart” that afternoon before the competition on
what would become the G&S “stretch” and along with the Penetrator became
the “Snubs”.
I recall an article about that controversy. Might have been an interview with Morey. The story was that Hynson had caught a wave and rode it well past the judges stand, down the line. The judges did not see him on the inside section, and he wasn’t scored for that tip time.
What happened with Phil Edwards? That book is spendy!!!
What I recalled was written in the surfers journal and mind you age
changes all things, Morey reviewed the cards on Munoz's waves and on one
ride the first 2 judges scored Mickey low the third judge scored him high as it
looked that way from what Tom said was a poor perspective. Surfer Journal
Summer 94
The bottom line is all that's history and Mike Hynson should receive
some recognition, the man has had quite a life, something that most of us will
never understand. The “Endless Summer” gave us intro to the stylish young Mike
Hynson. A great and smooth surfer, he kept improving surfboards to the level of
the “Red fins” The absolute “HY” mark of performance longboards.
The first day Hynson’s board was too fast for the wave, he sprayed Slip Check along the inside rail to create drag, Morey and the judges called foul, the boards had to remain as to how they were upon entry into the event.
Mike Doyle’s Hansen featured his T-band stringer extending out the rear about 4 feet, thus making ther front 25% that much bigger, no dice from the judges.
Dewey Weber had a water ski boot on the tip and with foot wedged in it could lean back to lift weight off the nose, Ross Cave of Surfboards Hawaii, rode the first SH noserider in the event.
The concave nose has been credited to Joe Quigg, Dave Sweet and Sparky of inter-Island before Hobie’s famous one
I guess it was around 15 years ago. I was staying in San Clemente with the Boyds when Tom Called and said to stop by. He had something to show me. We’d been hanging out, surfing and playing ukuleles for about a week when he’d gotten a package in the mail from Bruce Brown.
It was a VHS video of the Noseriding Contest. I believe it was the 2nd one.
Problem. His VHS machine was broken. So he calls Munoz who lived around the corner. No answer.
And then (light bulb over the head) I say let’s go over to Costco.
We go to the TV department and find a VCR. He pops in the tape and we watch it over and over (it was pretty short). Of course it’s playing on every TV in the department.
As we’re watching intently and he’s commenting, people are stopping and asking about it. Not only surfers but mostly just civilians. It was classic hearing Tom explain the concept of the contest to people who knew nothing about surfing.
Just one of those things in the memory bank that bring a smile when I call it back up.
I agree with Ghetto, Phil (for Hobie) did the first real commericial versions of the concept. Who knows where it really started though, possibly in Whitey Harrison’s barn like everything else did.
It’s funny because to noserider thing was so short. Concave noseriders came in mid 65 and were pretty much gone by late 66, replaced by flat bottoms and then finally by shortboards in late 67. I rode for Weber and I don’t think we even had concaves … ever. The Performer and the Feather were flat bottoms only.