Surfing Waves

I can safely say that my review of the firewire dominator is now basically complete.
I was lucky enough to get 3 days of amazing surfing in over the weekend with conditions that were completely different everyday.

The first photo is of a semi-sheltered beach called Tawharanui on our east coast. Thursday night had a misture of wind-swept and low tide swells with everything from choppy must to hollow-dumpy sets. 1 to 3.5ft.
I revisited this beach again on Saturday morning where the swell had dropped off and conditions had cleaned up. Instead, it was offering kneee high, super clean and small conditions on a rising tide. Occasionally the odd 3ft head high hollow set.

I went out again yesterday to an olf fave called 'Te Arai'. It just so happened that I got lost on the way and stumbled across the second image, a place called 'Forestry'. The words 'magical' don't even come close to describing it yesterday. It was the best conditions i've ever seen in NZ and the beach had ENDLESS breaks all the way down with super clean water and not a 100m paddle out like out west coast.
Conditions were 2-5ft and super clean.

SO, the board!
In summary, I can't get enough of it!!
Day 1: It went ok in the wind - swept and hollow conditions of day one. I pearled only a couple of times in the hollow waves on late take off, heck I even nearly got sem-barrelled twice. Riding it as a quad is fast and agile, I didn't find it did further arcs than a thruster set up. It doesn't grovel like a minimal would and you would really have to be right on the pocket / wave face peak to get the wave.
Day 2: I was shocked at how small the conditions were today after I had planned to use my shortboard. Most people on long boards and initially I thought the waves were just too small for this board. However, I got used to paddling a little hard and putting my positioning further forward and bingo- I was catching more 1ft waves than anyone else. When the odd big set came through, I was also one of the few that could take that and ride it out of the Dominator. I nearly got barrelled again! A couple of times the volume got caught up the wave and forced a super steep take off, I got used to it and learned to stick it out hollow take offs.
Day 3: This was the game changer for me. The conditions were much bigger and I had planned to again take out my shortboard to see how much I could rip on this after the dominator. Immediate thoughts were how heavy the shortboard felt (it's also only 6'1 and epoxy!) so the rapidfire dominator is light! The 6'1 felt like I was paddling a brick, after initially thinking there wasn't a lot of paddling difference between them I was wrong. I finally got out back and after letting my shoulders recover took a solid overhead 4ftr. The 6'1 almost felt boring, it felt so slow and steady. I did a super steep drop with almost too much ease, I went to the flats and whipped round a couple of times only to feel board and unenthused. I was suprised. This was the board that only a few weeks back felt so dynamic and amazing after a minimal, let alone of a head high clean wave with some turns!
I decided to go back to shore and swap back for the Dominator, This time switching the quads for a medium thruster set.
Immediately I was back in love, paddling was easier and I could get on to some waves with less effort, earlier and with more confidence than the 6'1 shortboard. I probably got 20-30 waves including two of the best waves of my life. One on my right where I managed 4x sets of full linked turns and actually noticed the spray coming off the turns for the time as I went up and down and tried to cut back on the wave.
I also then got another going left this time where the same thing happened, especially on my backhand side!

I didn't pearl once on day 3 and the bigger waves just brought more life to the board. Turns were flowing with speed as opposed to digging rails and bogging from Day 2. I had gotten used to the speed, flex and rocker of the board. I was literally trying to get barrelled and doing late take-offs with lip-hugging rails on this board.
It really started to come to mind as a 1-day quiver killer. Mine is 33.5l so it is on the bigger side for my weight but it handles well.

I haven't tried it properly on our West Coast in those heaving conditions yet but I suspect anything under 4ft and it would be ok as long as I am on my game. If need be, I think you would only need to slot in a slightly bigger set of fins to be more stable in size.
I never thought I would find my 6'1 shortboard boring and lifeless on 3-4ft waves!

Shaka!

Actually on a side note, of those of you who have Hybrid / grovellers how do u finds img back to your shirt board after them? Similar experience to me?

Great review. Don't let anyone tell you that wide tailed boards aren't very good! Faster and more stable, well on smaller (under head high x 1.5) waves.

Great review, the stoke jumps from the words! Nice to read about the different feel of the boards and how a board's impression can vary when there's a new experience to relate it to!
What do u think causes the difference in ease of paddling, I guess the 6'1" is more rockered and narrower? Or is it the buoyancy of the material?

I had the same paddling experience when I went from the Dom 606 to my fully rockered hpsb 610x19.5x2.5, paddling and wave catching was so much harder. I felt completely without a chance to catch something good in the crowd.

benjl wrote:Actually on a side note, of those of you who have Hybrid / grovellers how do u finds img back to your shirt board after them? Similar experience to me?

I don't really like grovelers to be honest. I think they work well in a very specific kind of wave but I don't think they make good all-rounders.
The easier paddling from the Dominator probably comes from low rocker and presumably much higher volume.

What are the dimensions of your shortboard and of your Dominator out of interest?

benjl wrote:The 6'1 almost felt boring, it felt so slow and steady. I did a super steep drop with almost too much ease, I went to the flats and whipped round a couple of times only to feel board and unenthused

I find this statement a bit strange. For me personally, the ideal board for hollow conditions will allow easy late take offs and provide stability in the powerful conditions. It allows a high degree of control. A high volume, low rocker groveller by comparison is usually hectic at take off, slingshotting the rider into the wave with too much speed and compromising control thereafter.

That said, I've never ridden a Dominator so I could just be talking rubbish.

My choice for a single board quiver by the way, is an oversize shortboard. It has the extra volume for good paddling, but doesn't compromise too much on rocker or outline shape, so goes well in good surf also.

Oh, and I'll be once again enjoying the NZ waves myself in 3 weeks!

Lebowski wrote:My choice for a single board quiver by the way, is an oversize shortboard. It has the extra volume for good paddling, but doesn't compromise too much on rocker or outline shape, so goes well in good surf also.

My choice for a single board quiver is my longboard......long, thick, rockered....goes in everything....

In terms of shorter boards, I agree with Lebo....I have the 6'4" in this:

http://www.sideways.com.au/on-fire-skye ... hortboard/

Flatter rocker, but still enough that it works in a range of waves....is what I ride when I go short almost always....I have a fat fish that I play around with and a biscuit modelled board, but those are both limited and honestly don't go as good as this one; will be selling them off probably. I just keep coming back to it. Lots of boards of this type....I see a lot like this in the lineups and for good reason. I bought it secondhand like all my boards....the guy I bought it from used it exclusively as his step up when he went to G-land....he was stoked on the board and said it went great over there FWIW.

Then again I've never tried a Dominator....

My 6'1 shortboard is 29.1l and epoxy, but with heavier glassing. The 5'10 dominator is 33.5l but is significantly lighter- the rapidfire construction is really, really light! The rocker on my shortboard isn't too much so it's mainly just the volume and weight of the 5'10 that will make it paddle better.

On the type of waves that I experienced over the weekend, the extra volume and speed of paddling made a big difference to my wave count. I had gotten used to the board enough that doing late drops, even with a wide-tailed board was not a problem and actually made the surf more exciting.

As I mentioned, my normal shortboard was more than capable for the same waves but it just felt slow and boring after the dominator. All the things that make the dominator skatey and unsuitable for larger waves also made it more dynamic and more exciting in these conditions. Once I got used to it's speed and manouverability, the normal shortboard felt sluggish and too much grip on the waves. It also sucked trying to paddle for the waves unless I was right in the pocket (I had already done a triathlon on the same morning so my arms had already done enough hard ocean swimming!).
I think for our west coast waves that have a lot more force and 'dump', my normal shortboard will be a better choice but if it's clean and around head height, the dominator will be coming out!

Oh, I must have dialed into the wrong channel. "Dominator" in the subject title made me think this was going to be about wrestling. Well, at least benji had a blast surfing. Excellant report, too.

I finally got to try the dominator in our west coast yesterday in conditions that weren't 'good or near perfect'.

3-4ft of lumpy, choppy, on-shore windy conditions that broke quite far out and broke all over the place. This is very different to our east coast where I had tried it on the other days.
It didn't go well in summary, although could also partly be due to myself having to get used to it again after the 6'3 board that i rented in fiji.

I think this board goes fantastic in clean conditions where you can really use the rocker for easy paddling and to get in earlier than my shortboard but on decent size chop where you have to take off right on the peak, this board doesn't go well. It's too bouyant and light for trying to take off in heavy chop and bounces around all over the place when trying to pop up.

I think if its decent size and choppy, the added weight and rocker of my 6'1 is what's needed for late and lumpy drops.
If it's around head height / less and clean, the dominator is fantastic.

I'm pretty happy with both boards as a quiver and also quite happy that i'm figuring out what each excels in for the right conditions.

I was in a shop the other day and held a Lost RV board in my hands....the board was relatively heavy; salesperson explained that the glassing was heavy on those boards. Was thinking about it while surfing sloppy onshore afternoon chop on a small swell the other day (wet season conditions) and was thinking how a heavier board would cut through a lot of the slop....that kind of board is designed for less than ideal conditions, small, mushy, etc, and that often means lumpy, choppy waves....I wonder if the extra weight would help in those conditions....can't see how it wouldn't....the gain in weight would be offset by the massive volume (42L for a 6' board or thereabouts) and acceleration speed for catching waves I imagine you could get away with less with that wide tail, and maybe it wouldn't suffer at all with the wide planing area and flotation. I go out in afternoons more often than not so dealing with chop is an issue; a board made for perfect conditions esp. for a small wave board would be limiting for me.

Yeah you're dead right. I think that's why some boards like the HS psychadelic Germ are made with a displacement hull at the front of the board which can cut through bad conditions and chop etc. That board is made for 1-4ft.

Could be worth a look at if there's any around you?

I just picked up this yesterday after writing the post for small days...DS, shaped for his brother Brent Symes at 6'1" x 21.5" X 2 7/8" it packs 43L so now I have a real longboard alternative for small days. Glassing is a little on the heavy side for this one as well which is what I was looking for. Will report back; looks the business though now I am better acquainted with what I'm after in a small wave board.

nice one! Looks like a bit of fun for sure. Whats the rails and bottom contours like?
Bet it will paddle awesome!

Here's some more pics taken from the for sale ad (not my ashtray thank you! It's been awhile but still proud to have gotten that monkey off my back!)

.....and I like the color! No boring white deck underfoot!

Well....what looked like a good idea wasn't.....live and learn; big part of why I buy secondhand boards and resell them; sorting out why something works or doesn't and what I need. Turns out I don't need this board; have a buyer already and getting rid of it tomorrow. Took it out in small waves all the way up to overhead barrelling balangan yesterday....bigger waves I'd get hung in the lip and making the flat rocker work in steep drops was a lot of work and positioning in the water and on the board was more critical than what I thought it should have been....smaller waves not so critical, but not as easy to catch strangely as lower volume boards I have.....seemed like I had to be too far up on the board to get in then when standing from that forward position I had to take a step back to get to the tail like I was on a 6'8"....bulbous in the nose.....in steeper waves being so far up made the wide nose prone to shovelling under....if I kept the nose up I'd miss the wave more often than I should have.....I have a fish with a nose almost the same width and don't have these issues; it works like it's supposed to.....the board liked small fat waves which I took it out on one time; those conditions don't really happen hardly at all and I like my fish better anyway. So this boaty floaty was a catch and release.