The Meyerhoffer

Stu Nettle picture
Stu Nettle (stunet)
The Depth Test

You over there! Young rebel!

Have you ever yearned for ye olde days of surfing? Back when surfers were outcasts and social misfits, before mass-marketing and mainstream acceptance created a uniformity in style and thought. Have you ever wanted to step aside from the pack and be noticed for it?

Well, you could do worse then riding one of the new Meyerhoffer designs. Dragging it out of the boot of my car and trundling across the beachpark with it under my arm I felt like a surfer in downtown Alice Springs, such were the stares, and not Manly Surf City.

That a board like this - a veritable triumph of industry - might embody rebel status is a rich irony. After all, the Meyerhoffer is made by Global Surf Industries and they've drawn their own criticism, rightly or wrongly, over their manufacturing techniques. Thing is, the current laissez-faire attitude to surfboard design only extends so far and GSI is yet to be blessed by surfing's arbiters of cool. Hence the Meyerhoffer attracts curiousity, confusion and not a bit of derision.

In short, it gets noticed. But once in the water, how does it go?

Before I began surfing it I had it in my head that the Meyerhoffer was supposed to paddle like a longboard and turn like a shortboard, something I read on the GSI website. So this, then, was the criteria I used.

I rode the 8'0" model and there is no doubting it's paddling ability: it rockets. Because of the lightweight construction and, I assume, the thinner mid-point the Meyehoffer has a twitchiness and acceleration unusual in longboards. Putting your shoulder into it there's not too many waves you can't catch.

The equation breaks down somewhat with the 'turns like a shortboard' part. As far as longboards and mini-mals go it turns very well. A deep vee running through the tail allows the Meyerhoffer - which is wider than a similar length board - to tip over with little effort needed and get up on rail. It also makes it easy to do short arc turns, especially heelside, which is the mark of a good longboard.

The problem, I felt, lies in the amount of nose swinging out front when attempting driving, shortboard-type turns. Despite it's light weight there is simply too much centrifugal force affecting the turn making weight distribution awkward. Often, I found, the only remedy was cutting short the manouvre.

Despite it's unconventional shape the Meyerhoffer comes into it's own when ridden in a conventional longboard manner - turn, shift weight forward, trim. With some extra kick in the turn possible.

Performance aside, the most valuable lesson I got from riding the Meyerhoffer was an understanding that design characteristics aren't absolute. That it is possible for certain elements - bottom contour, tail shape, etc - to work in ways contrary to what we know. Who would've thought a board with such a thin tail could be so manouvrable? Or that such a bizarre planshape could actually work? The design waters have just been muddied.

The Meyerhoffer was ridden four times in waves ranging from two to five feet. Visit GSI's website for more information about the Meyerhoffer design.

Disclaimer: Although Swellnet received no payment for this review, GSI advertise with Swellnet. So, although I've been honest, some people may see this review as a blatant plug. There's not much I can do about that. The most important thing to consider, however, is that I got to go surfing during work hours.

Comments

nope's picture
nope's picture
nope Wednesday, 8 Sep 2010 at 11:56am

all shapers would have you beleive their designs and other similar designs are all that ´work´. dont believe it!
this thing you rode is just 1 example. mcoys are another.
there are limitless options for boards designs and lines to be drawn on waves.
mcoy isnt much better then the others telling the public he is right and the rest of the industry is wrong. though perfer his rebelious attitude!
shapers are far from geniuses as they like to portray themselves to be.
a certain alaia shaper is another good example. saying somthing like every curling of wood changes the whole performance.

kieru's picture
kieru's picture
kieru Tuesday, 14 Sep 2010 at 12:28am

has anyone noticed the similarity between the meyerhoffer and the magnum ice-cream stick?

Craig's picture
Craig's picture
Craig Tuesday, 14 Sep 2010 at 12:35am

I was thinking more a Coke PET bottle...

kieru's picture
kieru's picture
kieru Tuesday, 14 Sep 2010 at 1:01am

nah mate! hack off the meyerhoffer's weird pointy tail (dysfunctional in my opinion) and you have the magnum eco-replica in miniature. plus you get to eat!!

nope's picture
nope's picture
nope Wednesday, 15 Sep 2010 at 11:27pm

sheep.

bookster's picture
bookster's picture
bookster Wednesday, 22 Sep 2010 at 9:06am

Stu you just need a red one and you'll be set...

miller's picture
miller's picture
miller Thursday, 23 Sep 2010 at 6:47am

Thomas Meyerhoffer is a Sweed who used to work for apple as a designer
http://shapeyoursoul.wordpress.com/

"I never did this to get famous.....I did it so people could enjoy a different feeling…People see the board and they think that I made it like this to differentiate it from other surfboards. Or they think, ‘oh parabolic, it's like a ski.' But it has nothing to do with that. I didn't design the board to look like this. It just became like this. I started to take away, and I took away a lot of mass. So where do you take away? You take away where you don't need."

nope's picture
nope's picture
nope Thursday, 23 Sep 2010 at 1:10pm

nice 1 miller. we need more free, outside the box thinkers. in surfworld. or slaters shorter wider!(its been done 100 times b4 people!!! and you can ride it too...) will be the limit of the shaping evolution.

kingofgc's picture
kingofgc's picture
kingofgc Monday, 27 Sep 2010 at 11:21pm

its always hard, but the best way to look at any new design is
don't knock it, until you've tried it.

batfink_and_karate's picture
batfink_and_karate's picture
batfink_and_karate Monday, 11 Oct 2010 at 2:52am

A bloke up the central coast rides one. I was watching him and they clearly do paddle exceptionally well. Looking at him I would have said better than the average longboard.

Regardless, they fail the aesthetic test, and for that reason it is sufficient for me to pass on one.

If surfing doesn't appeal to the aesthete in you, go for it. It's central to me, and if you can have functional and aesthetic than I will go for that every time.

udo's picture
udo's picture
udo Friday, 1 Aug 2014 at 11:35am

Meyerhoffer --------MeyerHORROR ......the new " SLIP IN model" ....holy fuck what a bizarre surfboard.
love to try one but $970 for the 6'6 hmm , described as a cross between a tadpole and a electric toothbrush.
vimeo: slip in the movie. if I didn't know this was a single fin board I would have called its a twinnie or quad.