SHAPER'S ALLEY: NORTH SHORE

Check out Surfline's latest chapter of Shaper's Alley featuring Akila Aipa, Eric Arakawa, Kyle Bernhardt, Ken Bradshaw, Noah Budroe, Jeff Bushman, John Carper, Tim Carroll, Owl Chapman, Chris Gallagher, Biro Marcelo, Bret Marumoto, Mike Mattison, Dennis Pang, Jon Pyzel, Randy Rarick, Pat Rawson, Ivan Sarda,  Carl Schaper, Kent Senatore and Nat Woolley.

Todos

Vince preparing for a trip South to Todos Santos

Happy Holidays!

Yesterday

John's wave last Sunday

John John takes Sunset, Vans World Cup

As if he were only good in front of his house at Pipe. Just saying...

JJ put on a clinic up the road the last two days, showing the world that North Shore knowledge is all encompassing. He kind of re-wrote the book, actually. With Futures teammate and Sunset kingpin Pancho Sullivan in his corner, John took his talent and Pancho's knowledge and let it rip. It was a beautiful display.

Bear in mind, last week in Haleiwa he made the Semi-finals at the Reef Hawaiian Pro, with a bag of tricks spawning from insane backside airs, that looked something like this. But, this week was different. It was classic. Late drops, long bottom turns, deep tubes and vicious hacks. The kind of stuff a purist's dreams are made of.

At the end of the day John had four of the Top 10 Heat Scores of the event, including the highest score of 18.40 in the Semi-finals. He had the 2nd and 3rd highest Waves Scores, with only Ola's perfect 10.0 scoring higher.

Enjoy it all via the Vans Heat Analyzer, as many times as you want.

Congrats John. See you at Pipe next week.

SHAPER'S ALLEY: COSTA MESA / NEWPORT BEACH

Check out Surfline's latest installment of Shaper's Alley featuring Costa Mesa and Newport Beach shapers Rich Wisz, James Vartanian, Dan Taylor, John Reinhard, Roy Promer, Tanner Prairie, Cordell Miller, Rich Landerer, Bob Hurley, Mike Estrada, Greg De La Cruz, Dano Forte, Ed Colodny, Lance Collins, Roger Baltierra, Dave Allee and the late Robert Russell Brown.

Surfline - Shaper's Alley

My Set-Up: Flynn Novak

Flynn has been a fixture on the North Shore for years, pulling into bombs at Pipe, putting together super progressive video parts and absolutely regulating Rocky Point. It's his play ground, and he takes it all very seriously. Flynn could be the hardest working man on the North Shore; running a blog, writing editorial columns and pushing the limits. He's a board addict, and of the 60 plus sticks he has, he chose this one as his latest muse.

"This is a 5'10" Bret Marimoto shape. It's 18 3/8" x 2 1/4" and it's just what we've been working on, polishing my shortboard designs over the years. I get a few boards from Bret every year, and he does a great job working off the feedback, making me a better board each time. Lately I've been going with some 5-Fin set ups, which is really cool. You get two boards out of one, and it's great too for travel or at home to have that other dimension. I'll ride it as a normal thruster, and then if the waves have a more down the line look to them, then I'll go with a quad. This board goes really well as both, which I'm super stoked on. Two magic boards in one. Normally I would use the EA Quad set up, where all four fins have a flat foil. To me, they're a little more precise, and I have more control with my turns using flat foils. Sometimes quads have a little slide to them, but the flat foil helps reduce that."

Check out Flynn's Wave of the Winter clip on Surfline.