SMALL BUT PERFECTLY FORMED

Staff Christmas do last night, started off easy but ended up having a bit of a session - the prospect of an early morning surf - the first for ages - was slipping away - fortunately the 'eye' of my hangover storm seemed to pass over at about 9am so I hauled off to Gwithian and met Gavin for a frosty, knee high perfect wave on a pushing tide.

We were both a bit rusty - not so much balance wise but I felt sort of clumsy on the board - my feet always seemed to be in the wrong place - too far forward, wrong side of the stringer sorry centre line just plain rubbish for the first half an hour or so but soon as the session went on we both started to pick up the game and got stuck into a few small but half decent swells that washed the hangover mugginess away.

We swapped boards part way through, Gavin's 9'0 Starboard felt like a skateboard after the 10' C4. But it was such a blast the C4 turns from the tail the Starboards turning point is directly under my feet seemingly at the mid point of the board. If the Naish mimics this feel but with more nose rocker I'm going to be in for a treat. Roll on Wednesday.

Swapping boards made me think about how far we have come and how good these boards are. Gavin rated the C4 over his Starboard - I did not want to get off the Starboard - what's going on? Perhaps we get to a point where there isn't better or worse - just different - just different enough to take us out of our comfort zone and give us something different to think about.

Also managed to pick up a secand hand Kialoa Shaka Pu'u paddle - that should turn up next week. The pu is a slightly smaller blade and full carbon - my fibre glass paddle has been fantastic but I've always hankered after a carbon never even used one - now we'll see.