It was a lot smaller and weaker than this looks

It looks like this July is going down as one of the most wave-starved months in recent memory. Flatness prevailed with no sign of relief. Once again we resorted to windswell at Diamond Head.

Surf actually was surprisingly fun, with some punchy rights between the longish lulls. Team Shortboard was all going leashless, taking the occasional swim. However, the freedom of less drag seemed to liberate them, with all throwing some wicked fans. Buddy got an especially good ride, doing a floater right in front of his hooting brother's face.

I was once again doing the longboard thang, just trying to style and pose, with some carving in between. The board finally revealed some of its shortfalls, most notably its flatter-than-I'd-prefer rocker which made me pearl on a number of occasions.

Coming in, I decided to prone right over the reef in the whitewater. Not too smart. It must've been near low tide because the reef got shockingly shallow. I was trying to center my weight and avoid having my long skeg hit bottom. I was unsuccessful.

Both Buddy and Makani saw my body shudder as the reef applied the brakes on my forward motion. Buddy was about 40 yards to my side, but the funny thing is that Makani was all the way up on the top of the hill and still knew that I bottomed out.

Fortunately, there was no apparent damage to the box. The skeg itself was slightly crushed on the leading edge, but still in decent shape.

This summer has been a real drag, both literally and figuratively.

Aloha from Paradise,