Reruns
The surfacing material (Volkem) Dale used on my mat wore down after two years of use in the sandy, occasionally dredging beach breaks I frequent. (If I don't come home with my ears full of sand it wasn't a good day.) I think two years out of a single "wax job" is pretty good. I will be the first to admit that I am not “handy” around the house so if I can resurface my mat, successfully without gluing myself to it, you can too! BTW there is a great tutorial with pictures on surfmatz.com.
Even thought I am a huge fan of quivers of surfboards the mat provides a quiver in a bag. One of my favorite things about riding a mat is that you can and do "reshape" your surf craft at will. If the surf is up you can add more or less air that you usually do. You might swim out with the mat deflated and blow it up after you are outside. (This works great). I usually take a few waves to fine tune the inflation for every surf to get the right combination of drive and drift for that day's combination of swell(s) and tide. One of Dale's many strokes of genius was designing the mat and the valve so that you can actually let more air out of the mat while you are setting up the inside section. So how would you feel about a board that takes off outside like a long board, flies through the outside section like a bonzer, cuts back like a fish and rides the inside bowl like a pin tail pocket rocket?
Even thought I am a huge fan of quivers of surfboards the mat provides a quiver in a bag. One of my favorite things about riding a mat is that you can and do "reshape" your surf craft at will. If the surf is up you can add more or less air that you usually do. You might swim out with the mat deflated and blow it up after you are outside. (This works great). I usually take a few waves to fine tune the inflation for every surf to get the right combination of drive and drift for that day's combination of swell(s) and tide. One of Dale's many strokes of genius was designing the mat and the valve so that you can actually let more air out of the mat while you are setting up the inside section. So how would you feel about a board that takes off outside like a long board, flies through the outside section like a bonzer, cuts back like a fish and rides the inside bowl like a pin tail pocket rocket?
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