Long history about skateboarding

History of Skateboarding

LUKE BEACON

NOVEMBER 7, 2013

It all started around the late 1940’s early 1950’s when the California surfers weren’t able to surf because the sea was too flat, no one person started skateboarding it seems to be spontaneous invention of multiple people they had the great idea to take the handles of wooden scooters

or screwed roller skate wheels to 2x 4’s and started surfing the sidewalks just to get the same sensation of carving a wave but on the sidewalk. Back then the scooters and roller skates had metal wheels.

1960’s Skateboarding had become all the rage, companies such as Makaha started producing boards at this point the board didn’t have a nose or tail and were just a basic oval shape.

1963 The first skate contest was put on in Hermosa Beach, California. Competitions had started to be set up like down hill slalom and then freestyle such as Woody Woodward, Danny Berer and Torger Johnson paved the way for modern skateboarding by doing tricks like hand stands and ballet moves.

1965 Skateboarding seems to fade away over night and became a fad that came and went. Some seem to think this was down to the clay wheels that were being used instead of steel ones. They tended to to break apart and become unsafe leading to many injures, a few hard core skaters carried on.

1966 Brothers Paul and James Van Doren, along with Gorden Leen and Serge D’Elio opened the first Vans store under the name The Van Doren Rubber Company.

1969 Larry Stevenson made the 1st real innovation in skateboard’s when he invented the kick tail which allowed the skaters to break and have more control over the board as well, which lead to lots more tricks being invented.

1970’s Vans introduce the vans “#95” know today as the “Era” everything changed for skateboarding with vans coming out with there waffle sole which provided a superior grip and foot protection.

1972 The invention of the urethane wheel by Cadillac Wheels Frank Nasworthy making it a lot smother and safer for riders.

1973 The skateboard truck was invented. Ronald Bennett of Bennett Trucks, known for its signature red bushings. The Bennett Truck gave skateboarders the ability to turn and have better control on their skateboards. Skateboarders could adjust the tension on the bushings by tightening or loosening the king pin.

1973 Santa Cruz was set up by Rich Novak, Doug Haut, and Jay Shuirman, and the official title of “NHS, Inc.” was later adopted (the first letter of each of the founders’ surnames were used)The company’s first line of products consisted of fiberglass skateboard decks, loose ball bearings, and rollerskate wheels

1973-75: Fiberglass boards made by surf shops out of fin material became popular with the surf crowd. Companies experiment making skateboard decks, using everything from wood to aluminum. The first full-length skate movie, Spinnin’ Wheels, is released.

1975 Road rider wheels were invented. They were the 1st skate board wheels to use precision bearings making the ride even faster and smother putting an end to cadillac’s wheels which still used loose ball bearings.

The same year there was a freestyle and slalom competition held at ocean festival in del mar California. a team of skaters called the zephyr team entered and showed the world what skateboarding could do. they had rode their boards like no one in the public had ever seen before, changing skateboarding from just a hobby into something more exciting and serious. The zephyr team had a lot of influential skaters such as legends like Tony Alva,  Jay Adams , Stacy Peralta  and Alan Gelfand  (nicknamed ollie).

The Zephyr team started skating abandoned empty pools. They would stand in the shallow end of the empty pool and roll toward the deep end, steering their boards around the bowled end in what’s called a “carve.” Carving is basically a wide turn in which all four wheels of the board remain on the wall of the pool or bowl. witch had the same sensation as surfing, around this time skaters were finding new ways to skateboard and so these new ways drove ‘shapers’ into new designs: freestyle and slalom boards stayed ‘small’ and the park boards grew from 7-10″+ the wider boards were created specifically for the vert skating

1976-78: The California drought forces homeowners to drain their pools. Though skaters have been riding swimming pools since the introduction of urethane wheels the previous year, they now view the empty pools as territory to be conquered In these early days, it was noted that Alva hit the lip of the pool so hard that he caught air witch gave birth to the 1st aerial, a front side air. Pool skating had become so popular that skaters that didn’t have accesses to pools started up what was dubbed a poor mans pool which consisted of layers of plywood shaped into a half pipe shape which lead to the vert ramps and the birth of vert skating.

1977 Tony Alva shunned the major skate companies to form his own, Alva skates It was the first company ever run and owned by a skateboarder, as well as being one of the first to use layered Canadian maple plywood in skate decks.

1977 Stacy Perralter and Greg Powell set up Powell Peralta.

1978, In response to the skateboarders’ demands, The Independent truck company was founded by Richard Novak, Jay Shiurman, Fausto Vitello, and Eric Sweson. They then set to work manufacturing a durable truck that had a quicker turning radius as well as combining all the best features of it’s predecessors. The result was the Stage 1 model was the inaugural product, released in Newark, California, US. The Independent truck (or “Indy”) was designed as a response to the lack of quality skateboard trucks on the market at the time. In reference to the two other major truck companies on the market, Blackhart stated that one broke, and one didn’t turn(Bennett Trucks and Tracker Trucks, respectively) following a merger between NHS and Ermico both companies had been developing truck design prior to formation. Ermico consisted of Eric Swenson and Fausto Vitello—Vitello was the founder of Thrasher magazine and Independent was responsible for designing the first production truck that could be easily adjusted and a model that could turn better than any truck in existence.

1978 Alan Gelfand got his nicknamed ollie for inventing the 1st ollie air (front side air)

1978 Stacy Peralta set up the Bones Brigade consisting of Lance Mountain, Mike, Mcgill, Tony Hawks, Tommy Guerrero, Steve Caballero and Rodney Mullen

1979 Steve Rocco becomes freestyle champ

By the end of the 1970s skateboarding took another hit when public skateparks started to shut down because of the high insurance rates due to the danger factor of the new vert skating and lack of attendance because of poor park layouts, shapes and poor construction making it hard for beginners to start. A few hardcore skaters carried on skating the back yard pools and build there own half pipes in their back gardens.

1980’s Tom Groholski is issued the 1st fishtail board the the whole tail of the board is wider making it easier to land and drop in when skating vert, with the rise and popularity of back yard vert ramps Stacy Peralta and Craig Stecyk III started organizing back yard vert comps and would invite everyone.

1980. the 14-year-old Rodney Mullen entered the Oasis Pro competition, defeating the world champion, Steve Rocco, Rodney Mullen later turned professional as a member of the renownedBones Brigade team,  By 1990, Mullen had won thirty-four out of thirty-five freestyle competitions that he had entered, losing only to fellow Bones Brigade member,Per Welinder due to falling over in his run.

1983 Rodney Mullen perfects the 1st ever flat land ollie, which changed skateboarding for ever. People started to see that they can get around the streets ollie’ing up and off curbs or over bins and bush’s. Street skating was born

1984 With the rise of VCR players Stacy Peralta got a video camera and started to film the Bone Brigade and released there 1st video (Bones Brigade Video Show)

1985 Bone Brigade release Future Primitive this video changed skateboarding it show cased street skating and kick started the street skating revolution.Turning hand rails and walls into free skateparks.

1987 World industries company was founded by Steve Rocco and in 1988 Rocco was joined by skater, Rodney Mullen and then Mike Vallaly in 1989

1989  Mark Gonzales approached Rocco with the desire to be involved in his own company. Gonzales was riding for Vision at the time, which at the time, was the largest skateboard company. Gonzales and Rocco decided to name the company Blind, in contrast to Gonzales’ former sponsor. Jason Lee who was, at the time, a World Industries team member, assisted with the development of the brand.

At the end of the 1980s skateboarding took yet another dive in popularity as vert skateboarding became far less popular than street skateboarding. as skateboarding lost its popularity it was harder for skaters to find places to skate,a new bread of skating pushed by skaters like Mike Vallely and Natas Kaupas started to take back the streets and develop this style using the different tricks that Rodney Mullen and the freestyle skaters had invented such as the kick flips and shov’its. With this came another evolution in the shape and size of the board. Boards noses went from flat to having a kicker the same as the tail which allowed the skateboard to be skated either way.

90‘s From the evolution of street skating, board shapes are becoming thiner (7inches) and lighter allowing the board to spin quicker when performing flips tricks and tiny wheels become all the rage.

 

1993 Girl skateboarding brand was founded after a selection of team riders from the World Industries distribution company decided to found their own brand the main figures that were Mike Carrol Rick Howard, Spike Jonez and Megan Baltimore (Baltimore was an administrative employee at World).

1995 ESPN holds the first ever X-Games. The event was a huge success and brought skateboarding into the mainstream light sparking interest in many more young kids

1997 the first Winter X Games were held, and “Extreme Sports” were classified. Plenty of skaters resent the way skateboarding has slowly moved from underground to mainstream. However, the X Games did bring vert skateboarding back into popularity. The X Games and competitions like that have continued to keep vert skateboarding popular, even though few skaters actually ride real vert ramps. Vert skateboarding has slowly become a much loved spectator sport.

By the late 90s, skating appears in commercials for everything from soft drinks to phone companies. Fashion trends begin to reflect the influence of the skating crowd well into 2000, so did the rise in popularity for skateboarding, fueling more and more commercialized skateboarding competitions like the X Games which, brought back vert skateboarding and CBS coverage of skateboarding events. video games, children’s skateboards and commercialization have all pulled skateboarding more and more into the mainstream. With the benefits of skaters being more accepted, and the label that all skaters are criminals slowly being dispelled. Also, with more money being put into skateboarding, there are more skateparks, better skateboards, and more skateboarding companies to keep innovating and inventing new things.

However, there is a large group of skaters who miss the underground days, and who strongly disagree with the way skateboarding has been made more mainstream. One benefit of skateboarding is that it is a very individual activity. There is no right or wrong way to skate.

History of surfing

Surfing is one of the oldest practiced sports on the planet. The art of wave riding, is a blend of total athleticism and the comprehension of the beauty and power of nature. Surfing is also one of the few sports that creates its own culture and lifestyle.

The act of riding waves with a wooden board originated in Western Polynesia over three thousand years ago. The first surfers were fishermen who discovered riding waves as an efficient method of getting to shore with their catch . Eventually catching waves developed from being part of everyday work to being a pastime. This change revolutionized surfing.

There is no exact record of when stand-up surfing became a sport. It is known that during the 15th century, kings, queens and people of the Sandwich Isles were big into the sport of "he'enalu" or wave-sliding, in old Hawaiian,. "He'e" means to change from a solid form to a liquid form and "nalu" refers to the surfing motion of a wave.

Early historical records of surfing appear in the late 1700s, when Europeans and Polynesians made first contact in Tahiti. Navigator Captain James Cook described how a Tahitian caught waves with his outrigger canoe just for the fun of it: "On walking one day about Matavai Point, where our tents were erected, I saw a man paddling in a small canoe so quickly and looking about him with such eagerness of each side. He then sat motionless and was carried along at the same swift rate as the wave, till it landed him upon the beach. Then he started out, emptied his canoe, and went in search of another swell. I could not help concluding that this man felt the most supreme pleasure while he was driven on so fast and so smoothly by the sea."

The first Polynesian settlers to land in Hawaii were most likely skilled in simple surfing, and after a few hundred years of riding the waves of Hawaii, the well-known Hawaiian form of the sport emerged.

The Hawaiians who surfed, the ali'i or high class, claimed the highest reputation for skill with boards on waves. They developed their own prayers, board shapers, wood and beaches where a select few could surf with people of their talent. No one dared to drop in on their wave in fear of getting punished and possible dying. The surfboards underwent a sacred ritual before construction. Only three types of trees were picked to make a board. The board maker would dig up the tree and around the roots place fish in the hole as an offering to the gods for the tree. The process of shaping then began.

There were four basic board types used in ancient Hawaii:
- The paipo or kioe, a body board, from 2-to-4 feet long, usually used by children.
- The alaia (ah-LAI-ah) or omo (O-mo), a mid-sized board, about 8 feet or longer.
- The kiko`o, larger than the alaia, but not as big as the biggest boards; between 12 and 18 feet; good for bigger surf, but requiring a high level of skill to handle.
- The olo (O-lo), a very long surfboard reserved for royalty that could be as long as 18-to-24 feet in length.

materials in surfboards

Materials Used In Surfboards

Foam Blank – Almost 100% of surfboards in the lineup today are made with polyurethane or polystyrene (Styrofoam) cores. The foam blank arrives to the shaper in the crude outline of a surfboard shape, including varying degrees of rocker. Your shaper then starts “mowing foam” as he shaves off the excess foam until he arrives at the shape of your next surfboard. Two forms of Polystyrene are the most common: Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) and Extruded Polystyrene (XPS). 

Fiberglass cloth - A shaped foam blank is too weak and porous to use in the water on its own. To strengthen the surfboard a layer or two of fiberglass cloth is applied to the entire length and width of the surfboard, both deck and bottom. The most common fiberglass used is 4oz and 6oz cloth. Shapers have started using alternative materials to strengthen a surfboard, such as Kevlar and carbon fiber or natural materials like hemp based cloth.

Resin – The glasser must use a resin to bond the cloth to the shaped foam surfboard design. The resin is poured onto the cloth and the board until the cloth is completely saturated. The polyester resin has been used since the 1950s and is still the most commonly used today. Epoxy resin has gained popularity over the last several years due to its increased strength and ability to create lighter boards.  Both epoxy and polyester resin may be used with polyurethane foam, but only epoxy may be used with polystyrene foam. Polyester will destroy the polystyrene structure at the point of contact.

Some epoxy surfboards have a plastic look. These boards do not allow you to see the foam blank, the fiberglass cloth, or the stringer beneath the exterior.  They are built with what is called a sandwich construction in which the shell is made and then filled with foam.  They tend to be stronger and better at resisting pressure dings that form by standing on the the deck, though the material also has an effect on the flex pattern.

Stringer - This wood structure typically runs down the center of a foam blank. It provides strength and flex memory for the surfboard. Some shapers will move the wood stringer from the board’s center to its rails, creating better flex memory. Common wood types used in stringers are bamboo, balsa, Basswood, Western Red Cedar, and Englemann Spruce.

Parts of a surfboard

Surfboard Design Guide

A Common Surfboard Design

Surfboard Design

Surfboard design is the art of hand shaping a surfboard from a foam blank or piece of wood and making it into a vehicle for riding waves.  The finished surfboard design is radically different from the crude materials it started as before a shaper begins to form the board.  Since surfboards are ridden at beaches all over the world a designer must create a board that will work well in specific conditions. 

In order to make the best surfboards, shapers spend countless hours honing their craft, becoming better surfboard builders one board at a time.  Luckily for us, their passion and commitment result in surfboards that will enhance our skills and increase enjoyment in the water.  Here are some of the elements a surfboard shaper keeps in mind while designing a new board. 

The three main aspects of surfboard design are:

1. Components of a surfboard

2. Types of surfboards

3. Materials used in surfboards

1. Components Of A Surfboard

Length – This is the measurement of a surfboard from nose to tail. A longer surfboard will offer more paddling power and stability . The large surface area allows the surfer to paddle faster and get into larger waves. Most shapers will want to know the surfer’s weight and ability before suggesting the right size board.

Width – This is the measurement of a surfboard at its widest point. A wider shape will allow the surfer to eliminate a few inches of length without sacrificing paddling or planing speed. The location of the surfboard’s wide point deserves careful consideration as it will affect riding style and turning radius.

Nose – This is the front tip of the surfboard. The shape will affect entry into the wave, paddling ability, and noseriding.

Tail – The surfboard tail is the back end of the surfboard. Its design significantly affects the performance of the finished product. It has various shapes, performance characteristics, and rockers.  Some examples are: square, pin, swallow, diamond and squash.

Rocker – This is the curvature of the surfboard profile. The foam blank comes with a particular rocker that the shaper can alter a bit, but not drastically. A more dramatic rocker will make it easier to handle steep drops, facilitate tighter turns, but also slow the board down if it is heading in a straight line.

Rails – These are the outer edges of the surfboard. They impact tube riding, planing speed, and turning.

Fins – Surfboard fins are the engines that make sure your board moves forward. They dictate turning radius, drive, hold in a wave’s face, drag vs. speed, and overall performance. Typical setups are single fin, twin fin, tri fin (thruster), quad fin, and the rarely seen five-fin setup.

  

Bottom Contour – The surfboard bottom contour contributes to the speed, turning ability, and style of ride. A convex bottom, sometimes called a hull, will sit low in the wave, move slowly, and offer the surfer a smooth ride. A concave bottom will skip on top of the water, creating lift and shooting water out the back of the board toward the fins. This makes for a very fast and maneuverable ride. Concave designs will vary.

Foil – Foil refers to the distribution of surfboard foam from nose to tail. The thickness of the nose, middle, and tail weigh heavily in the overall performance of the surfboard.

Deck – The deck is the top of the surfboard. The surfboard rails often impact the deck design. The most common are domed, flat, and step decks. Each has its own benefits, performance characteristics, and feel. A number of companies now offer soft top surfboards. These lower the chance of injury and are incredibly durable without sacrificing too much performance.

Kelly slater

Kelly Slater – Biography

by ADMIN on APRIL 6, 2011

Kelly Slater – Biography

There will not be another professional surfer in your lifetime the likes of Kelly Slater. That’s a fact. Let’s run down the basics: Shattering every competitive record imaginable and redefining the sport in every possible condition and venue, Slater has exalted competitive surfing to performance art and served as catalyst for shifts in popular board design since he was a teenager. All the while, the right coast regular footer did some 10 episodes of Baywatch and dated Hollywood sex bombs. Easily dodging influences that might derail his infinite ascent, Slater has defied both age and odds to somehow remain not just relevant but dominant for two decades. Hell, he made winning the world title seem almost easy by achieving 10 times what most see as pure fantasy and even in his “off” years finishing in the top 5. While average surfers continue to marvel at his mastery, 3 generations of pro surfers have scrambled to play catch up to the boy, man, and now veteran Kelly Slater.

An inauspicious start, Robert Kelly Slater began his grommet hood amid both the drifty mush of Cocoa Beach, Florida and the friction of a fracturing family, but difficulty often breeds creativity and ambition. Thus, once he began surfing at age 5, Slater showed promise quickly with a gangly but functional style. ESA contest organizers might as well have penciled him into every final at the start of each season as he racked up 6 Eastern Surfing Championships and 4 national titles. With clean-cut boyish looks that made him a magazine darling, a phenomenal amateur contest record, and unprecedented industry support, Slater would quickly outgrow the East Coast Surfer label.

He beat Rob Machado to win the OP Junior at Huntington Beach in 1989, and by age 18, Slater was poised for the pro ranks with a ground breaking performance at the Body Glove Bout at Trestles. Knowing a good investment, sponsors lined up to court the would-be king. Slater signed with Quiksilver (for a rumored 6-figure salary) who subsequently released a short promo film called Kelly Slater in Black and White.

Those spare 30 minutes of footage put the world on notice that the skinny Floridian was poised to eclipse his media hype. Slater’s fin slipping mastery of Trestles made it obvious that his approach was something new. He peppered the carving flow of Curren with nuanced sideslips and aerial acrobatics. Matt Warshaw writes, “He would never match Curren for fluidity, but his legs has more spring, his body was more limber, his approach was more innovative, and he had matchless coordination and reflexes.” Moreover, he adhered to the integrity of the wave without wasted movement or energy. Old or young, no one could deny that his surfing was the next bar…mind surfing at its best. By 1992, Kelly Slater was the youngest world champ in history at 21 years old.

Slater had quickly dispatched the status quo, and stalwarts complained that judges were rewarding slips and slides over power and commitment. But surfing’s transformation was swift and definite, and soon it was televised by way of the seminal surf porn extravaganza Momentum, Taylor Steele’s video vehicle highlighting the New School generation. Young surfers like Rob Machado and Shane Dorian pushed boundaries in and above the wave to the din of high octane punk rock. But the video footage made it clear. Slater was light years ahead of his peers.

As competitive juggernaut, Slater’s approach was one of totality. He dominated the professional tour from 1992 to 1998 with a combination of raw talent, ruthless heat strategy, and mental intimidation. After a 6^th place finish in 93, he won 5 straight world titles to quickly erase Mark Richard’s seemingly insurmountable record of 4 tour wins. But maybe it was all too easy. Slater drifted into a quasi-retirement at the ripe old age of 26.

Even with good intentions of traveling and spending time with family, Slater didn’t fare well away from the action. He stepped back in to win at both Pipe and Teahupo during the next few years, but the thrill of real competition was fast becoming a memory until Kauai firebrand Andy Irons found his mojo. By 2003, Slater was back in the fray, and the two regular footers became embroiled in the sport’s most riveting rivalry. Presented by the press as epic conflict between good and evil, the two locked horns all year until a last second win at Pipe gave Irons his second world title. Slater was devastated as chronicled in his post contest breakdown. He flirted with the top 3 for two years until wrestling back the title in 2005 and again in 2006…and still again in 2008.

That year, he took the season ending Pipe Masters on a chubby 5’11” quad nicknamed “The Wizard Sleeve,” as part of a design arc began 2 decades earlier as a teenager riding paper thin boards. As always, the surfing world followed, although this time, the buoyant, versatile design made more sense for the average surfer.

At this point, the wonder kid was long gone, replaced by a seasoned veteran. He told Surfer Magazine’s Sean Doherty, “I think it’s kind of hard for a lot of guys on Tour to relate to the era I first started on Tour, simply because they were literally in single digits, if alive at all.” Putting it in perspective, Slater had dominated Curren, Carroll, and Pottz; blew away Machado, Knox, and Dorian; bested Irons, Parkinson, and Fanning. And in 2008 and 2010, he had cleaned up the likes of Dane Reynolds and Jordy Smith with two more titles. But 9 was not enough, and in 2011, Kelly Slater achieved the impossible by winning his 10^th world title, thus cementing his place as the most dominant athlete ever. The Jordan, Woods, and Armstrong analogies suddenly sounded weak.

Upon looking back, the metaphorical trophy chest looms large: Slater won the prestigious Pipe Masters 6 times and took the Quiksilver in Memory of Eddie Aikau. He was the youngest and the oldest ever world champ. He won the Hawaiian Triple Crown twice and holds the record for most WCT event wins (while amassing well over 2 million dollars in contest winnings) with the highest two-wave total (20 points). But while contest wins and point totals constitute much of his Slater-ness, there is a cultural impact to be considered as well.

No other surfer has crossed over to the mainstream so seamlessly. As fodder for tabloid gossip, Slater went from Baywatch “actor” (as teenage hunk Jimmy Slade) to jet-setting bachelor sporting some of the world’s hottest arm candy from Pamela Anderson to Gisele Buchan. He was voted one of People Magazine’s “50 Most Beautiful People,” rode the extreme sports wave right into a signature video game and eventual 3-D Imax event: The Ultimate Wave Tahiti. He loaned his voice to the animated film Surf’s Up, has hosted a show on Sirius Radio, played guitar for The Surfers (including Rob Machado and Peter King), whose album Songs from the Pipe was produced by T Bone Burnett, and often hops on stage with the likes of Ben Harper and Eddie Vedder.  As musician, actor, occasional surfboard cartoon scribbler, and co-author of his autobiography Pipe Dreams, Kelly Slater has all but cornered every conceivable medium.

After the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bipartisan resolution in May 2010 recognizing Slater’s “outstanding and unprecedented achievements in the world of surfing and for being an ambassador of the sport and excellent role model,” his launching of The Kelly Slater Foundation to further philanthropic causes and the Kelly Slater Wave Company (with intent to build futuristic artificial wave parks), it would seem impossible that anyone can guess what’s next. Slater holds 10 world titles and is surfing at 38 better than anyone on tour. He has changed the way we ride waves through his aerial innovation and ethereal approach to tube riding. His name has soaked into the very fabric of American culture, reaching far beyond the world of surfing. It might seem the space shuttle exploding off the launch pad near Slater’s boyhood home of Cocoa Beach would serve a fitting metaphor for his career. One problem. He ain’t coming back to Earth.

Types of wetsuits

Wetsuit Vest

The vest provides a little bit of neoprene coverage, giving protection from wind chill. The wetsuit vest is ideal to keep you more comfortable on a summers day surf. The image on the left shows it looks just like (depending where you come from) a vest, tank top, or singlet. The vest is normally either 2mm or 3mm thick. Wearing something on your bottom half is optional (but advised).

Pros: Shows off your tattoos, muscles, underarm hair. Does not impede paddling. No more surf wax matting your chest hair. 
Cons: Shows off your anchor tattoo, lack of muscles, underarm hair.

Wetsuit Jacket

A slight step up in the warmth stakes when compared to the vest. Jackets have full length arms and offer additional warmth for the top half of the body. You'll be more protected against the elements, and your unsightly underarm hair can remain hidden. Jackets are normally constructed from 2mm/1mm thick material. Beware a full length chest zip at the front, these can be quite uncomfortable for a surfer while paddling.

Pros: Warm arms, no shaving of underarm stubble required in order to look good in the lineup.
Cons: Your ripped arms, new quicksilver watch, and your prison tattoos will be covered.

Short John Wetsuit

We're back to the exposed arms with the Short John wetsuit. Your torso down to your thighs are now covered, giving you core warmth. Ideal for taking the chill off during a dawn patrol surf, while not becoming too hot as the sun gets higher. (Authors opinion: I think the short and long john wetsuits look a little silly).

Pros: Your arms are back on show again, and with the additional neoprene between stomach and knees, you can dispense with board short. No more impromptu inner thigh waxing.
Cons: No more impromptu inner thigh waxing. (no pain no gain and all that!)

Long John Wetsuit

The Long John gives you full body coverage, while leaving your arms uncovered. Great for easy paddling, you can flail your arms around with no neoprene resistance. The Long John is ideal in conditions where the air temperature is warm but the water temperature is a little chilly.

Pros: Your knees are now covered, no more chafing while working out how to pop-up properly. 
Cons: People will think you are just too cheap to buy a wettie with sleeves.

The Springsuit

The springsuit has arm and leg coverage, at least in part. It comes with short legs, and can have both short and long arms. (Not at the same time, or with one short and one long arm, obviously)

Pros: Ideal for summer surfing, long arms and full body keeps the sun off your skin, and your body core temperature increased.
Cons: If everyone else is in boardies, you'll look like a lightweight.

The Short Arm Steamer

This design looks like it's built for warmth, and that's the point. The Short Arm Steamer is normally made with a mix of 3mm and 2mm neoprene, and covers the trunk and legs. It also covers the upper arms, while leaving the forearms exposed. Your paddling should not be affected, unless you choose a suit that's a couple of sized too small, or you've overindulged over the weekend.

Pros: Much warmer, still easy to paddle, no waxy thighs or chaffed knees.
Cons: Your skinny little forearms are still exposed. Your comical knobbly knees no longer make you the life and soul of your local break.

The Fullsuit

The range is complete with the Fullsuit, or Long Arm Steamer. This wetsuit if for the cold water surfer, and comes in a range of wetsuit thicknesses, depending on the level of warmth required. For cooler temperatures, you would choose a 3mm/2mm wetsuit. For very cold weather you would need a 6mm/5mm/4mm wetsuit to allow you to stay in the water for longer. Some even come with hoods attached. A 6mm fullsuit with attached hood, wetsuit booties,wetsuit gloves, and heated rash guard, will see you stay in the water longer than all your mates!

Pros: Warmth, what more of a "Pro" do you need.( seehow wetsuits work for more info) 
Cons: A thicker suit is harder to paddle. The fullsuit is the most expensive type of wetsuit available (learn aboutwetsuit care to protect your investment).

Your choice of wetsuit will depend on the temperature of the water you will be surfing in. The main wetsuit brands all produce a range of shapes and types to suit every need. If it's something to keep you warm, or just to look good, there's plenty of choice.