Surfing's Mad Scientist

Written by John Grissim · Photographs by John Grissim

Excerpted from John Grissim's 1982 book "Pure Stoke" and republished by Henry Knapp at Shred Sledz. The sun lies low in Rincon's evening sky, saturating the view from the beach with a glare that all but obscures the surfers in the water. Conditions are typical for this classic California break: three- to four-foot sets, a slight onshore, and textured peeling rights made to order for the resident longboard specialists.

Out near the Indicator a kneeboarder takes off on an off-size five footer, streaks to the bottom, and disappears in the trough. Two seconds later he reappears high on a long wall, tracking much faster than anything out there, then abruptly drives for the bottom as a section pitches out. In the flat well, away from the white water, the figure leans sharply into a turn, sweeps around the section, accelerating high onto a feathering wall that grows a translucent green in the setting sun. Nearing the lip, he jams hard against the face, shifts to the outside rail, and carves a huge arc, slicing thirty feet off the top of the wave, sending skyward a rainbow rooster tail of spray.

The track on the wave and its rooster tail flourish are the signature of George Greenough, one of the world's premier watermen, wave explorers, and, in the eyes of many, surfing's mad scientist. He's not mad, of course, nor is he much given to science, at least its fastidious, academic side. Yet to see him in his workshop — barefooted, staring intently at the disemboweled movement of a war surplus camera, surrounded by machine tools, electrical gadgetry, and assorted potentially useful junk gathered over a decade of eclectic browsing — one can easily understand from whence the mad scientist reputation springs.

Not coincidentally George is one of the best and most respected surfers in the world — this despite the fact that he has never entered a surfing contest, is never seen at big-time, crowded public surf spots like Pipeline, and doesn't ride surfboards. He doesn't cultivate mystique; rather, he's simply not interested in anything that distracts him from a pursuit of the direct experience of water and waves.

Greenough's stellar status in the surfing world derives from his pioneer experimentation with the dynamics of boards, fins, and foils, the results of which went a long way in advancing the development of modern surfboard design. His short, lightweight, dished-out kneeboards — known as spoons — with their flexible bottom configurations and high-aspect fins enabled him to crank out performances on the most powerful waves that nobody else could approach. His ability, which puts him in the ranks of the ten all-time great surfers, led to his making The Innermost Limits of Pure Fun — the first film to show wave riding from a surfer's in-the-tube perspective.

“One of the problems I think professional surfers have is they don't seem to know a whole lot about board design. I see mismatches of boards and fins that to me are pretty obvious. It's like setting up a race car. You can have it understeer or oversteer or be neutral.”

In 1965, acting on tales of the perfect breaks of Australia's subtropical Queensland, Greenough flew to Brisbane. Two weeks later he had met Bob McTavish and was blowing minds with spectacular rides at Noosa Head — imparting fresh ideas on board design that led to the shortboard revolution. By 1970 he had perfected the high-aspect, laminar-flow fin, a development which made him literally the fastest man in the water.

“Laminar flow basically is over a very narrow range. Look at any high-performance fish — marlin, swordfish, tuna — and you'll notice their tail is very narrow and quite high. With that kind of fin, by the time the turbulence shows up in the water the fin has already left it behind. Hence no turbulence to affect performance.”

George spent thousands of hours experimenting. Often he would tie prototype fins to a surf matt anchored to the kelp outside the surf break, enabling him to make quick fin changes during a session. The objective, naturally, was the enhancement of pure stoke.

“I was reaching for the feeling of speed, especially the high speed turn. I really get a rush off that. There's nothing I like better than just flattening it, just putting your foot to the floor and leaving it there.”

In 1971, Greenough shot a sequence of rides using a high-speed 16mm camera mounted on specially designed brackets on the front of his spoon. The parameters were ridiculously far-fetched: the board was less than five feet long and weighed under five pounds; the camera weighed a whopping twenty-three pounds; and the wave he tackled was a big, clean, cranking classic Aussie monster — the biggest day of the year, and he was the only one out.

The results were spectacular — a 23-minute sequence called "Echoes" (after a Pink Floyd track) that carries the viewer beyond the level of hoot and into a sublime realm that is spiritual as well as ecstatic. One slow-motion tube ride alone lasts 55 seconds. Debuting in 1974 at the Odeon Theatre in London's West End, the documentary Crystal Voyager became an instant cult hit, breaking the theater's previous box office record within weeks.

George also built his own fiberglass 37-foot ketch, equipped it with a homemade wind generator, and sailed to Australia — spending nearly a year surfing unpopulated breaks in Tahitian waters en route. He successfully navigated the Pacific using a plastic sextant with lousy optics, sighting stars with the naked eye when the lens system failed after dusk. When a navy friend said it was impossible, George shrugged: "It worked."

“I tend to go where the most energy is. I look for the spot with the most power and the least number of people. I don't care about shape. And bumps aren't going to worry me.”

George's singular lifestyle is characterized by movement from project to project, with an absorption and lack of self-awareness that is in some ways innocent but certainly refreshing. In the months following Grissim's visit, Greenough completed sensational in-the-tube footage with a 35mm camera; returned to Australia to begin building a pyramid-shaped home of his own design; and discovered board sailing, immediately launching into the design and construction of high-performance graphite hulls. He also turned forty — and looked ten years younger.

"If there's a good twenty-five mile an hour wind roaring down the beach at Rincon tomorrow," he said as the evening wound down, "I'll be stoked."