I'm looking for a new shortboard and id like to go as short as possible. The board will be for good chest+ days and hurricane surf. I weigh 210 and I'm 5'10" I'm an advanced intermediate and comfortable riding a variety of surf and surfboards. Anyone have experience on both a traditional shortboard and a more modern shorter wider board in good surf?
check out a 6' hayden shapes hypto krypto im 195 and ride a 5'8. its fast and will hold in big stuff , i used that board all winter.
I'm 6'1", 205 and I picked up a 6'4" Firewire Dominator this winter specifically because of my big guy/shortboard complex. I used it during the Andrea swell and the few decent swells before/after Andrea and it was great. Definitely my favorite board right now. Holds nicely in overhead stuff. You could probably go 6'2", maybe shorter but the 6'4" is perfect for me right now. I also took it out with NJShredmachine in 23 foot overhead beachbreak here in NJ. It also did well in that.
My buddy in hatteras has one of those but hes 50lbs lighter than me so I havent tried it. Like the look of it though
I am 6'1" 190lbs or so. I have a 6'6" Firewire Spitfire that I love. I just picked up a 5'9" Firewire Baked Potato Timbertek and I couldn't be happier with it. It just flies on surf knee high and up and catches everything in site. Much more floaty than the Spitfire and that took some getting used to but after the last week I think I got it down. Already had two guys on the beach walk up and ask me what I was riding since it looks so small and I have gotten some crazy long rides over flat sections etc that a normal board would never make unless you weighed under 135lbs. Great boards, both of them.
I'm close to your size. 5'11" weight floats between 205-220. Mt last two boards have been custom coils. I've been real happy with them. Shaped my Mike Daniel in FL The one I use for better surf is a 6'5" flashback fish model. Basically a shortboard with a semi-fish outline. I had it done up with a round tail, but he can do whatever, and I think most go for a swallow on this outline. I had him shape it as an all purpose board, thigh high up to a few feet overhead. I've since bought another coild for small stuff (5'11" disc) so the flashback is used for chest or better. Had I planned on using it for only chest or better stuff, Mike probably would have pulled the tail in a tad, because with punch at 1-2 foot overhead, I can feel the wider tail a tad when I lay into a bottom turn. However that tail also lets me ride well formed micro-sized waves, so not a bad trade-off for me. If you don't like fish shapes, he has a shortboard model called a widerboard which is more high performance then it's name would imply, but it can be tweaked however you want. Then there's an m-80 model which is somewhere in-between those two. One of the biggest advantages for me is the construction. The boards are much stronger than poly. Being heavy, I had issues with delams under my rear foot on traditional construction. One of my equally sized friends rides an off the rack Lost Squash-it in these conditions, and that board performs pretty damn well for something off the rack, so if you don't want to wait for a custom, you could always check out one of those. I think it's around 6'4" or so. Then again, it probably cost as much as one of my custom coils.
Oh yeah, I ride it mostly as a quad, with MRTFX up front, and small GL trailers in the back. But when it's bigger and has some punch, I swap the 2 GL trailers for the 1 MR trailer. It's fast as hell as a quad, and I definitely lose some speed, but when it's got push, it just feels right as a tri on the drop/bottom turn. More stable and more confidence inspiring Bigger but not heavy (think short period windswell), I leave it as a quad and enjoy the extra speed. It's a real fun board, just wish I could ride it more.
I'm 5'11 x 235 and I ride a 6'3 x 20.5 x 2.75 Lost Mini Driver. Something like this will work for what you're looking for. Get it in Hydroflex PU if you want it to be sturdier than standard PU. I kinda regret I did not go shorter.
I'm 6.0@195 lbs my 6.4firewire dominator floats my fine.even with full suit and all the winter gear.you can go on the FireWire website to find your volume range. If you buy a poly board it might be different. Epoxy seems more buoyant.
Have you ever contacted Eavey? His little simmons type shred sleds look really fun. Not sure how his prices are, though.
I'm 6' 0 220 and ride a 6'0 thing and 5'8 superbuzz from Stretch. Talk to the man himself and he'll get you dialed in, his craftsmanship is amazing.
