The Penning of Ink and Sipping of Merlot

Craig Anderson is the most stylish surfer in the world. He brings new levels of relaxation to riding a wave, but can also can thread a barrel (especially at Greenbush on a single-fin), wet his rails and torch super-inverted spins and flips – his tricks in Kai Neville’s new film, Lost Atlas, are proof of that. He’s of a different breed to the contest kids, a professional freesurfer, a title that sounds like an oxymoron but is actually a marketer’s dream and the antithesis of competitive surfing. As Dane Reynolds recently did, Craig has just penned his name on the dotted line of a renewed contract with main sponsor, Quiksilver. For the last 12 years, beginning back when Craig still lived in South Africa before moving to Australia, he’s been on Quik’s roster. Quik have just confirmed that the beak of Craig’s boards will carry the mountain and the wave for another five years, ’till 2016. And speaking of his boards… Craig’s already had a coupla signature models with sled sponsor Hayden Shapes for quite some time, but his small-wave weapon, The Merlot, was only conceptualised eight months ago. And not ’till more recent months has it actually gone into production. The board has a sidecut outline and is real flat through the centre-line rocker, for more planing speed down the line or over fat sections. And who don’t need that? Y’can read more about The Merlot here. Hayden Shapes just released the promo clip below of Craig riding a Merlot prototype in Hawaii. Even though he’s just cruising, it’s still more enjoyable to watch than most other online clips in recent memory. [showvideo]