SB-issue59_digital

gear
Whilst chasing a career on the pro junior
and QS (Qualifying Series) surf circuit, Dan
McManus came to realise that his true passion
lay in not just riding surfboards, but making
them. His then relentless pursuit of a shaping
career culminated in the formation of Mana
Surfboards, based on the Central Coast of New
South Wales. Dan’s focus is acutely honed in
on crafting contemporary, high-performance
custom blades, mixed equally with alternate
performance designs.
We recently caught up with Dan to discuss his former competitive days and
how he first got his hands on a planer. Dan picks up the story.
“I originally set out to be a pro surfer. I was doing the pro juniors for a
while and then when it came to moving on to the QS level stuff, I came to
the honest realisation that I was a terrible contest surfer. I just didn’t have
the right mindset for top level competition. I competed from ’97 through
to about 2004. So instead of continuing to pursue a career in surfing, I
reluctantly headed off to university.”
Dan undertook a degree in physical education. During this time, funnily
enough, his surfing career underwent a resurgence, albeit in the world of
free surfing and not in the competitive arena.
“I ended up travelling a lot more. I got some sponsors and was surfing a
lot in some amazing places. I was still doing regional boardriders, but the
contest stuff took a back seat to free surfing.”
Dan ended up finishing his university degree and starting his own traction
pad company not long after, but the call of surfboard shaping was everpresent.
“I was always shaping on and off. In the mid-90s, like a lot of groms, I
was sweeping the factory floor of my surfboard shaper at the time — my
sponsor, Karl Hassel at HPS Surfboards. I started there in late 1996, maybe
‘97. I think I would have been about 13 years old.
“I was the annoying grom who just wouldn’t leave him alone until he gave
me a job. One day he just said, ‘Okay, well, here’s a broom.’ The place
probably hadn’t been swept in about five years. So, I cleaned the entire
factory forensic-style from top to bottom until I couldn’t clean anymore.
I guess he thought to himself, ‘Okay, this kid is not going to go away, so
here’s a whole room of rescue boards that are just absolutely destroyed.’”
As Dan explained, those boards are big enough that, once you get your
head around using epoxy, they’re pretty hard to make a mistake with. So,
he became the ‘rescue board ding guy’ for a while.
“Once I got through all those, Karl showed me another door with all of
his ding repairs. The room was full of hundreds of them. I guess that was
the start of really understanding board building. I had to reconstruct and
reshape a lot of damaged boards. I saw a lot of curves, foils, and outlines,
and exposed myself to a world of different shapers and designs.”
With such a volume of work, Dan honed his skills in surfboard ding repair
quite rapidly, but he was still chomping at the bit to shape.
“Karl was a master craftsman, and he was one of the most sought-after
contract glassers in the late 90s and early 2000s. We were doing a lot of
boards for guys like Rex Marechal (RMS) and Justice Surfboards from
Japan, and I just wanted to progress my skills. So, I was always bugging
Karl to shape, but he insisted I needed to develop all the skills of board
building first. He was like Mr Miyagi.”
Dan progressed from dings to inserting leash and fin plugs, filler coats, and
lamination, which are all part of the surfboard construction process. The
missing ingredient, however, continued to be his holy grail of mowing foam
— learning how to shape a surfboard blank.
“It was really funny. He was always like, ‘No, no, no, I’ve got to get through
this last bit for you first.’ And, being an impatient kid, I just didn’t want a
bar of it. I think I had been there for two and a bit years by that stage.
“I ended up finishing with Karl, but I really appreciated the start that he
gave me. Anyhow, the work side of things took a back seat for a little bit
while I focused on competitive surfing.”
# 59 // smorgasboarder //
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