The nation's longest-running sporting feud has been reignited by a controversial film about who invented the modern surfboard.

The film has angered former surfing champion Bernard ''Midget'' Farrelly, who has conducted a solitary campaign to ensure his place in history over the man who replaced him as Australia's most recognisable surfer, Nat Young.

Farrelly, who in 1964 was the first Australian to win a surfing world championship, rejects the film's contention that Bob McTavish's design of a vee-bottomed board allowed surfers to go up the face of a wave rather than simply race away from a breaking curl.

To prove his point, Farrelly has posted a photograph on his website of himself at Palm Beach in November 1967 with a vee-bottom board he had shaped months before.

''McTavish had never seen a vee-bottom until then,'' Farrelly, 65, said. ''The past and current shameless hijacking of history continues unabated. As surfers age and the real facts slide into the foggy past, it is easy for the snake-oil salesmen to hoodwink the public at large with books, DVDs, magazine articles and films.''

Rip Curl stumped up the money for Going Vertical: The Shortboard Revolution and the film is showing along Australia's east coast. Producer Robert Raymond said the movie would be shown to distributors at the Cannes Film Festival next week. It had attracted more than 200,000 website hits and he was hopeful of a Californian distribution deal.

The film is set mainly in 1968. It portrays McTavish, 65, as opening eyes to the possibility of going vertical by first failing to ride waves at Hawaii's Sunset Beach then wailing at Honolua Bay, and the American Dick Brewer as helping the revolution by honing his big-wave board shapes.

McTavish's pivotal role in the shortboard revolution is acknowledged by the American veterans Greg Noll, Skip Frye and Mike Hynson. The film also reflects the thinking of Australian surf journalist John Witzig and his filmmaker brother Paul , both of whom recorded the revolution and lionised McTavish as the shaper and test riders Nat Young and Wayne Lynch.

Raymond said Farrelly refused to take part in the film after he mentioned McTavish and Young, who took his world title in 1966. ''I can't see why he's upset about the film,'' Raymond said. ''I'd known Midget since we were teenagers, his wife Beverley was my girlfriend. What's he complaining about? He got the girl.''

McTavish dismissed Farrelly's claim to have beaten him. ''I was shaping vees at [manufacturer] Keyo in the middle of 1967,'' he said. ''Midget likes an argument. It's part of his nature.''

WOW doggie great post for a short boarder
come on show us your longboard [}:)]

No clues to who I am backing

Haha I knew you would be the first to hit back

I dont think its a long/short thing in this instance, its more about board design than anything

Well on a 903 I was going vertical this morning [}:)]

I’ve been listening to this debate around the old interwebs for a week or two and it saddens me that I was not more aware of what was going on back in 1967 when I first learnt to surf for just the one summer, then had a rest for over 20 years.

Amongst all the to-ing and fro-ing I’ve yet to see anyone mention another possibility, that being that the technologies developed analogously, by that I mean, the same or similar solution was arrive at from several starting points.

It happens in nature and is called Convergent Evolution only it’s probably more extreme to the extent that several basic designs and even widely different phylactic groups can eventually be jury rigged to accomplish almost identical tasks.

A placental mammal mole is almost identical to a Marsupial mammal mole and both exploit the same resource.

Flight is a good example of 3 very different groups arriving at the same outcome

Avian (birds)
Mammalian (Bats)
Reptilian (Pterodactyl)

Just Google "convergent evolution" for more examples.



There are even numerous examples in the area of industry and technology where something similar to Convergent Evolution has occurred.

The most memorable one that comes to mind for me is Radar.

Several countries, most notably Britain, Germany, Russia & the USA had developed the same or similar radar based on the experiments done by Hertz in the 19th century and all of them, for some considerable time, thought that they were the only ones who had it.

Is it at all possible that the short boards and the vee bottom could simply be the obvious answer to a problem that existed at the time?

I’m not ruling out the possibility of a few blokes sitting on the sand on the northern beaches back in the 60s and just chewing the fat about board design. But then when they go back to the shaping bay, they’re pretty much on their own and more than welcome to come to the same solutions.

I went to the web site to find the picture but didn't find it. Interestingly though Midge has licenced his super white foam formula to factories in the states, Brazil and Africa.

Is this it?

www.farrellysurfboards.com/

Watched the movie the other day - cracker, it's a must watch for every surfer.

Things I took out of it:

a - surfers in the late 60's took way too much LSD, amazing some of them are still alive.

b - (most important) the modern surfboard would not be what it is with out the involvment of all the people that we're involved as it was more than one person designing this and one person designing that.

How are you getting to watch it?

Is it on DVD or something ?

I've got to see it.

PS. Bugger me, this is driving me mad, I've been all over the internet looking for a place on the northern beached that's showing it and I can't find a thing.

You may have missed the limited time slot obct.

I have not seen it yet only the trailer,I missed the
Gold Coast screening as well,I might email the lads
at mc and find out where we can get our hands on
it.

email sent

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doggie said...

Revvin said...

This one I think

How epic is this pic!! On the rail with the fin just touching the water, I thought I was doing ok yesterday with my bottom turns but thats awesome looks like its a sub 7 footer as well

I wonder if it's the first time the guys paddling out on the logs have seen a turn like that?? I wonder what they're thinking??

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obct said...

How are you getting to watch it?

Is it on DVD or something ?

I've got to see it.

PS. Bugger me, this is driving me mad, I've been all over the internet looking for a place on the northern beached that's showing it and I can't find a thing.

Qantus