TAI

Felt nice. Very knifey compared with most of the other boards. Got through the water really well. I liked the fins we used on it as well, the KR ones? But mainly I liked its quickness and the feeling of really cutting the water and being so alive. It drove off the bottom and top really well, with a highly refined feel to it – almost an electric-like feeling. I wonder if some of that might have been the tail shape. Slightly rounder than a typical squashtail, it might have helped going rail-to-rail. I didn’t get all that many waves on it, but I didn’t need to – I could tell it was good already.

MIKEY

I’ve seen friends of mine surfing ESPs, but I’ve never had one. We went on a day trip to Uluwatu and surfed a place called Lurchers. It was up near the monkey temple. The board was pretty fun – too big for me, but it felt really good underfoot. I think I could have ridden it as a gun really well – maybe a 10-foot day would have been perfect. Very smooth through bottom and top turns.

ESP Surfboards, Ed Sinnott

PH: 0404 059 321

WEB: www.espsurfboards.com

EMAIL: axissurf@yahoo.com

Ed Sinnott
Byron Bay, NSW

ED'S CALL: “The Grinder is built along the parabolas of market forces – definitely a high-performance board, probably for younger surfers. It’s inspired from team guys Declan Wise, Jono Salfield, Dylan Hunt, John Schmidenberg – Jake Spooner just won an Aussie title on one. The design is like a hologram, it can grow or shrink to fit body size and needs, so pretty much all those guys have one. Rob Page has been helping me test ’em as well. Those guys have been surfing a while; they’re so in tune with their equipment and they know exactly what they’re looking for. Re the thumbtail: I’ve always liked the idea of reducing the tail area to fit more into the pocket – I’ve never been that into squaretails. I’m more of a swallowtail, pintail guy.”