The Depth Test Thrust: The Simon Anderson Story

In: The Depth Test by Stu Nettle 46 Comments Thu 23rd Jun '11

Tags: simon anderson , thrust , brian whitty , geoff mccoy , 3 crown media group , NIck Carroll

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Before I get into this I oughta say that three fins on a board look entirely normal to me. Always have. And I guess by saying that I reveal myself as a child of the revolution. You see, I started surfing a few years after Simon Anderson unveiled the Thruster to the world. He'd already proven the design thrice over, and in the most spectacular of fashions, before I ever set foot on one.

By the time I came along every board had three fins, including my own. Normality, it's said, is just consensus of opinion, and everyone – save MR and Cheyne – agreed the Thruster was a winner. So to us newcomers it appeared normal, and we – that is, all the children of the revolution - never bothered with single fins or twinnies: we reaped the benefits without ever understanding the struggle.

Thrust is the biography of Simon Anderson, written by Anderson and edited by Tim Baker. As you'd expect from the fellow responsible for the greatest design breakthrough of our time it shoots just a bit higher than a straight bio. The goal is to place events in historical context and allow the readers - especially the younger readers – a chance to time travel. In this case to comprehend how ingrained single fins and twins were in surfing and how groundbreaking the Thruster design was. To this end Thrust mostly hits its target.

Baker's narrative style is to intersperse Simon's words with timely anecdotes from his contemporaries, many of whom comment upon the Thruster's left-field oddness and how it was received. Simon's Narrabeen mate, Brian Whitty, in a typical quote:

"It was the weirdest look having those three fins on the tail. All who first saw the board had the same thought going through their heads. Comments from leading surfers and shapers were: 'Back Heavy,' 'How can you turn a surfboard with an anchor attached?'"

It's a theme reinforced by repetition and helps to appreciate the design upheavals wrought by the Thruster. Nick Carroll manages to put another twist on the improbable design breakthrough, one that says more about the designer:

"The thing that most struck me at the time was how completely unlikely it all seemed. Like, Simon Anderson coming up with a radical new surfboard design idea? Not that he wasn't capable of extraordinary shit...but busting out wacky ideas and sticking 'em into the pro milieu? Fuck no. That was Geoff McCoy's job."

Beyond board design Simon recounts his life and he proves to be a laconic and understated storyteller. Understated to the point where I occasionally had to read back over lines to understand if the humour was intended or not (I have to assume it was). Contrast this with Rabbit's biography Bustin' Down The Door, also edited by Baker, which was full of colourful, animated stories, and you've got a dry, congenial read. Entertaining but contained. The high points come in chapters written by Phil Jarratt and Andrew Kidman, and also the various anecdotes, especially those of Shaun Tomson, who provides amusing and sometimes astute insights:

"Dane (Reynolds) is like a modern day Simon Anderson, without the revolutionary shaping vision, but that kind of, aw shucks, that whole Bukowski, don't try too hard thing. He comes from a very similar environment, a blue collar, working class environment that's not too dissimilar to Narrabeen."

Unlike Bustin' Down The Door, and also unlike Baker's last book, Occy, Thrust is the full hard-cover, gloss paper production. The type of book that's too good to dog ear – let bookmarks guide the way! The photographic vaults have been thrown open and many classic shots from the late-70's and early-80's - a high water point in Australian surfing – are accorded full colour reruns. Plus all Anderson's landmark boards are given close scrutiny under Kidman's lens, hanging like mediaeval swords backlit against a black background. It's a stunning effect.

The publishers of Thrust, 3 Crown Media Group, have been putting together some of the better surfing books of recent times, catering to the groups that the magazines don't and producing works to endure. The story of Simon Anderson and the Thruster is one of Australian surfing's greatest stories and so deserves an expansive account - one that can give those of us that weren't present an idea of its enormity. And that is something that Thrust manages to do.

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