PAUL
STRAUCH JR.

THE gentleman surfer + HOST

| DUKE KAHANAMOKU TEAM MEMBER + CREATOR OF THE STRAUCH FIVE |

"One of my great lifetime experiences was to watch Duke surf from the sands of Waikiki Beach. Later, at 21 as a founding member of the Duke Kahanamoku Surf Club, I had the privilege on a personal level, to travel with him, become his aikane (friend) and know his Aloha. It was simple… “Smile, reach out to encourage, share what you have and your spirit, and contribute in some way to someone else’s happiness.” I was raised to understand Aloha, literally meaning “your breath of life.” Duke embodied life and Aloha”

GERRY
LOPEZ

mr. pipeline

| PIPELINE MASTERS WINNER 1972-73 + WATERMAN OF THE YEAR 1999 |

"The first twenty years of surfing was just a test to see if I was really interested. Then the wisdom of all the lessons that I was learning started to reveal themselves. Surfing is one of the best metaphors for life. Out in the surf, everything’s moving; everything’s happening. It never holds still, and life’s the same way. It doesn’t hold still for you, either. If you don’t move with it, life, just like the wave, will pass you right by. You have to be paying attention; you have to be spontaneous; you have to be able to go with the flow. If you can’t… I don’t know, maybe you better find something a little more static."

RANDY
RARICK

the Triple Crown of Surfing godfather

| Pro-Surfing Pioneer + Life-Long Global Wavefinder |

"My efforts along the way have always been to honor the sport of surfing and the meaning it has brought to my life and countless others around the world, Surfing is truly, uniquely Hawaiian and I'm honored to have had a career that has shaped and spanned my entire life. I would also like to honor others along the way who have helped me to do that, including Buffalo Keaulana, Rell Sunn, Fred Hemmings and Gerry Lopez."

GREG
NOLL

da bull

| rode the biggest wave ever surfed at makaha in 1969 |

“It’s a neat thing to look back on it and say I had a good life. I owe it all back to the ocean.”

“Those who were there that day at Makaha claim that Noll took off on the largest wave anyone has ever ridden. As it turned out the police roadblocks, the distance of the swell from shore and the presumed scarcity of rideable surf prevented this historic day from being preserved on film. Maybe it’s better that way, to leave it instead to surf legend, to be passed on from one generation to the next. One thing is certain: the size of the wave will not grow in the telling. It’s already too big. And that’s no bull.” Da Bull, Life Over the Edge, Andrea Gabbard

JOEY
CABELL

the speed surfer

| DUKE KAHANAMOKU TEAM MEMBER + WINNER 67-68 Makaha International , 1968 Peru International + 1969 Duke Kahanamoku Invitational |

"I started surfing in Hawaii - the Waikiki Beach area - at the age of seven. I spent my early years riding Queens and Canoes surf breaks in Waikiki Beach with Hawaiian stylists like Squirrelly, Richard Kao, "Rabbit" Kekai, "Dickey Boy" Abbey, Bobby Daniels, Alan Gomes, and many others. These were some of the great surfers of that time. I spent most of my hours of each summer day surfing and for spending money I would shine shoes and make coconut hats and sell them to the tourists. The quality of surfing back then was tops. Those were the days”

MIKE
HYNSON

the REBEL

| STAR OF THE ENDLESS SUMMER, SURFBOARD SHAPER  + DISCOVERED THE PERFECT WAVE at Cape St. Francis |

"My first board that I shaped was a balsa and it was a plank that I had acquired down in Mission Beach that was just laying in this old man's garden in his front yard. It was all water soaked and about 11 feet long. Anyway, I asked him what he was going to do with it and he told me "you can have it if you can get it out of here," so one night I got a couple of my friends together and we went down and we dragged it out of the garden and then brought it down to the beach and dragged it on the beach all the way up to Bird Rock. We dragged it because it was so damn heavy. So, after that, we got it set up and I started shaping it in my friend's garage using a draw knife, an ax, a skill saw, a variety of hand planers, and of course some sand paper. I just kept whittling it down. I kept the same shape from the plank, so it had a big square tail and a wide nose and when I got it down to about 7'11". I originally wanted it to be a 9 foot board, and you would think that from an 11 foot blank it would be a pretty reasonable request, but my imperfections and my inexperience got me down to 7'11".  When it was done it looked pretty good. I went down and I rode it and it seemed to work pretty well, and it was popular with the guys because it was so small.."

SKIP
FRYE

THE SHAPER

| WINNER 1965 US Surfing Association in Ocean Beach + 1969 Mission Bay Aquafair in Pacific Beach  + SHAPED FIRST BOARD IN 1963|

"I didn’t start really surfing until I was like 16 or 17.  I hung around the surf shops, did odd jobs.  I cut grass for a living, and worked at supermarkets – a couple of different supermarkets as a bag boy.  Surfing was my priority back then. When you do go surfing, you’re happy.  One thing I’ve noticed about the guys that hang at the beach all the time, the beach rats that are there all day, every day – they’re not stoked.  It has to be like the epic day of the year, and then they get a little buzz.  Whereas the guy that works real hard, he doesn’t even care if it’s blown out or whatever."

SHAUN
TOMSON

THE WORLD CHAMP

| 1977 IPS World Surfing Champion + 6 TIME winner of the Gunston 500 in Durban |

"Being in the tube is surfing’s existential moment, the absolute essence of what surfing’s all about. The fear aspect, the exhilaration aspect, the intimate connection with nature. It’s just you, and the wave, and your board. That moment of absolute connection that’s really sublime. When it feels like time has slowed down, it feels like you could actually control the wave in some ways. There’s no sensation of sound, just for me, it’s absolutely silent. Because I think your senses are so focused on everything else, that sound is not important. You’re just striving towards making it, striving towards coming out and then you just have that feeling of being absolutely connected and part of the universe, a part of nature. You’re operating at the very best tubes, the most exciting dangerous ones, when the coral might just be a couple feet below you. You have this feeling of, it’s not invincibility, but this feeling of absolute supreme confidence, and this feeling of like “this is what you’re meant to do.” On the very deep challenging technical tubes, you’re always on that absolute balance, you’re on that razor’s edge of making it, or not making it. And then woooosh, that compressed air will often just blast you out. When you come out, you have this feeling of exhilaration that’s unmatched in any other endeavor."

PETER
COLE

THE ORIGINAL NORTH SHORE WATERMAN

| WINNER 1958 MAKAHA INTERNATIONAL SURFING CONTEST |

"Sunset has always been my favorite spot, and probably the reason that I like it the most is because it’s so difficult. It’s a challenge, and you can have good days and bad days. But when you get a good wave, it’s never boring, it’s always got variety, every wave is different from the previous one. The thing that makes Sunset real neat is because every direction swell, and even within the same direction swell, every wave is different. So there’s a judgment factor thrown in there, that, to me is a very important part of surfing. It gets sometimes lost, judging the waves, picking the waves, and the thing at Sunset too, is that you always have the time to think about what you’re going to do. You take a wave and turn, you can figure out where you’re turning, you can figure out when you want to come back up. It gives you a lot of time to think about what you are doing. So, to me it’s always been my favorite spot. It’s the most consistent spot. It gets every direction. It’s always breaking. It has the best wind conditions. And it’s got the power you want. And it’s got the whole package. And it doesn’t have the media after it. It doesn’t have the hype."

FRED
HEMMINGS

THE POWERHOUSE SURFER

| WINNER OF THE 1968 WORLD SURFING CHAMPIONSHIPS, FOUNDER OF THE PIPELINE MASTERS+ THE INTERNATIONAL PROFESSIONAL SURFERS WORLD

" I got a summer job when I was fifteen and I worked as a Beach Boy assistant — I wasn’t a Beach Boy — I was a Beach Boy assistant, which means I was a gofer for the Beach Boys. If boards had to be taken out or if someone had to paddle out and bring someone in, or early in the morning, setting up and bringing all the boards out of storage … I was a Beach Boy assistant. And my immediate boss was James Koko and there were a number of wonderful Beach Boys and what a merry group of men. They were just the happiest and they were very content in who they were. They weren’t trying to be high mucky-mucks or hotshots. They were very content at being Beach Boys. They loved the lifestyle and they had this sense of sharing. For them, I kind of got the impression that taking someone surfing wasn’t a job, even though they were getting paid to do it. I got the sense that they would have done it anyway, because they just loved sharing the lifestyle. Those men, besides being excellent surfers and canoe steersmen, were just a merry band of men that lived on the beach of Waikiki. In the Romantic Era."