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Board review for Sharpeye’s The Storm My aim is to review boards for the average knockabout surfer (or ‘kook’ like me), without all the technical terms and manoeuvres. Sharpeye’s Storm 6’2 at 32L This year I participated in Surfaid’s, Make a Wave. This is a charity with the main mission to improve the health, wellbeing and resilience of families living in isolated regions which are connected to us through surfing. I surfed everyday for the month of September to raise funds for Surfaid. When The Board Exchange heard about what I was doing they offered to help me out by hooking me up with a new board to surf during September. I decided to choose a Sharpeye Board. I wanted to know what all the hype was about when it came to Shapeye boards. Most team riders on the WSL tour are now riding them, they won ‘Stab in the Dark’ with their model Inferno #72 and they also won the wave pool challenge. I picked ‘The Storm’ by Sharpeye, a signature model favourited by Kanoa Igaras. I can definitely see what all the fuss is about with Sharpeye boards. The high attention to detail is outstanding. I noticed this working at the surf shop every Sharpeye board that gets delivered is shaped and finished perfectly. The reason I chose ‘The Storm’ in PU construction at 6’2 at 32L is because I wanted a performance short board that could be surfed in nearly every condition and if the swell picked up and the waves had heaps of power I wanted something that would hold its own. And trust me, the Storm definitely fits that brief… What a board! When I first got it in the water it took me a little bit to find the sweet spot of where to sit to get the best paddle power. Most of my short boards that I have been riding usually sit around the 6’0 length and have similar amounts of volume. The storm is an extra 2 inches longer and a lot narrower than I am used to. Once I figured where to sit, the Storm paddled really well for a shortboard. I noticed with the Storms extra length I found it has that little bit of extra push to get on those waves earlier. This board feels like it is designed for speed in those smaller waves. I found a couple of quick pumps and I was away. The Storm has a gentle amount of nose rocker, which is what you need for those bigger wave days. Once on the wave, I found ‘The Storm’ super smooth and very easy to turn, especially for a Kook like me. I can’t do snaps or any of those fancy manoeuvres, but I could imagine if you were a shredder you could have a field day with this board. As an intermediate surfer, I found it pretty user friendly for a performance shortboard. The Storm is a board that no matter your skill level you could get some sort of benefit from riding it. If you have been surfing for a while and want to push your surfing to the next level or you want to try different things on the wave, ‘The Storm’ is the board for you! I put a black ‘Octopus’ tail pad on it, and got my self a new set of ‘Mick Fanning’ FCS II fins, which gave this board a black and white theme. These accessories give ‘The Storm’ a touch of class that it deserves. The Storm retails at $925 and I’m rating it a solid 9.5/10! The Storm is clean cut and just ticks all the boxes. What you see is what you get with this magnificent board.
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So nice, I bought it twice. The creme of the crop, as good as a performance board can get. Absolute awesome board. The rails hold the pocket on steep super sucky waves so well. Perfect amount of rocker allowing for late drops and carving on a dime. The board loves straight "up and down" style surfing as in coming straight up to a snap then dropping to a quick smooth bottum turn and hitting the lip straight up even harder. It surfs soooo fast. Awesome drive and loves to be sent off the lip. My Airs have gotten bigger so I creased the last one. The newer one I got has been made to a higher quality than the last and I'm in love. I'll be soon to order another so I won't be left without again. I've ridden high end performance boards from JS, DHD, Al Merrick and this is by far the best. I'm a bit more of a front foot surfer, surfing mostly dredging beachies and felt right at home on this weapon. Its not a great board for below 2ft mush, but surfing under that isn't much fun anyway. Can't recommend enough, cannot fault this board. Couple it with the Toledo M fins and its a match made in heaven.
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Love the drive and release off the top with this board. Projects really nicely up into the lip and has a heap of drove down the line. Volume is 1L more than normal and love it more than ever. I’ll be getting another one of these for sure!!
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It had nice speed and has lots of drive.
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This is a very high performance board, basically the better the waves the better the board will perform.