A day at Cheyne Horan's surf exhibition sees the past, present, and future linked together in a continuum of surf craft.

Cheyne Horan's origin story as a surf star is a classic.

Kingpin boardmaker Geoff McCoy had just been delivered the devastating news by Ray Richards, father of four-time champion Mark, that MR would be going out on his own and severing his existing relationship with Geoff. Not one to dwell in despair, Geoff immediately got on the phone to Victor Ford, his pal and surfboard stockist in Bondi, and gave Ford instructions to find the hottest kid on the beach and bring him to Geoff.

The following Friday, Vic dragged a zinked up blonde-haired fourteen-year old Cheyne out of the surf to meet with Geoff and the rest is history.

Fourteen! What were the odds? Getting ditched by the future-best surfer on the planet and immediately replacing him with the second-best surfer on the planet.

The most intense, innovative, and arguably productive surfer-shaper relationship the sport has ever seen followed.

History records Mark Richards with the four consecutive World Titles with Cheyne runner-up but any reasonable reading of history, which accounts for the chummy, amateur sport with conflicts of interest built in from top to bottom, would consider a high likelihood at least one or two of those titles could have been awarded to Cheyne. Judging decisions were opaque, rules arbitrarily enforced, a complete lack of oversight or accountability from the nascent surf media all played their part. So it goes.

From left to right, Cheyne holding a colloboration with Matt Biolos called the Rad Zapper, the classic double flyer singley from McCoy, and with Glen Casey holding a bulbous tail Zap from '81. That same year, MR was riding forward-weighted twinnies, and Simon had just launched his Thruster with three equal-sized fins and a planshape somewhere between the two. It's no stretch to say surfing will never see that level of experimentation again.

Post-career pro surfers drift into real estate or sales repping - when there was an industry to rep for - or form surf schools and parlay their personal brand into making a living. Cheyne took the latter path, dividing his time between his eponymous Gold Coast surf school in the heart of Surfers Paradise and long stints in Hawaii, maintaining a status as an elite surfer involved in paddle and tow-surfing giant waves for at least a decade after retiring.

In a pre-internet world that phase of his surfing life went largely undocumented. I saw some of it first-hand whilst dirt-bagging seasons on the North Shore. Witnessed Cheyne's sessionsat huge Haliewa, Sunset, and Waimea whilst he ran his small Rainbow Rock surf shop at Haliewa. He gave mind-blowing big wave performances at a time when the media lens was fully focussed on Slater and the Momentum generation at Pipe. History may yet pay that era the attention it deserves.

The relationship between Geoff and Cheyne ended up a complex one, fractious to say the least, although respectful to the end. Now that Geoff has passed there's a greater freedom for Cheyne to step out of the shadow of his famous mentor.

For a few years, Cheyne has been shaping boards under his own label out of a shed in an industrial estate behind Currumbin. They incorporate the familiar DNA of McCoy's, along with influences from yacht designer Ben Lexcen, and other shapers who have been influences along the way, including (according to Cheyne) Chris Brock, George Greenough, Ben Aipa, Al Merrick, Glenn Minami, and Terry Fitzgerald.

Cheyne ain't no Johnny-come-lately when it comes to mowing foam. When I asked, he explained his history went right back to the age of thirteen, then shaping boards with fellow Bondi-ite Greg Webber between '75-'77 before a long stint with underground Hawaiian shaper Johnny Orr over the preceding three decades.

Not just the underdog, but always fighting for the underdog too.

I caught up with Cheyne recently as he opened up the shed for an exhibit featuring the latest works, as well as a dazzling array of Lazor Zaps and other single fins from the 70's and 80's.

This was a reinvigorated Horan. Back down to fighting weight with the cheeky grin still intact and happy to talk over the past, present, and future as being linked together by what have always been innovative and singular surf crafts. As per McCoy, the understanding is of a surfboard as a dual-functioning water craft. When paddling it is essentially a displacement hull subject to hydrostatic forces, buoyancy being chief among them. On a wave the surfboard transforms into a planing hull, subject now to the vastly more complex array of hydrodynamic forces, primarily lift and drag.

It's the distribution of planing area that Cheyne is discussing with Byron Bay local and McCoy acolyte Neil 'Fredo' Cameron. Cameron, fit as fuck in his 60's and an absolute weapon, is musing over going longer on the recommendation of shaping legend Rob 'Gypo' Fenech.

Horan becomes animated: “You don't have to go longer! Otherwise you get all that nose up there flapping around. It's up to you and how you grew up. I grew up on 5'8”'s. I'm still on 5'8”'s!" He grabs a board off the rack and feels up the shoulders.

“Board widths up front, I started going wider. As we get older, keeping this measurement going wider,” he points to the shoulders of the board, “is key”.

“It's so it holds you up the front. This is Geoff's style of thinking but you know when you see guys riding along and when they get to the end of the wave and they fall in? You see it all the time. After thirty years of seeing it I was wondering: Why are they doing that? What's happening is the boards are so narrow the front is giving up on them and sinking. When that happens they just do this clown fall off the side."

"I started to widen them so the front is carrying, the middle is carrying, and you adjust the width of the tail pod according to what sort of waves you are riding."

"When you widen the front it paddles better! It's all a balance and it's how you want to surf as you get older. I want to paddle in easy and not blow any valves...hahahaha. I wanna go fast and if I want to come around the corner and go vertical I can. I talked about that a lot with Brewer, getting boards to go around the corners fast and increasing the turning circle. If a guy wants to surf more vertical I just increase that tail curve [tail rocker]. It's not rocket science, it's just common sense."

Clean lines, double concave: the advanced single fin is a Cheyne specialty.

There are single fins galore, plus old sparring partners from Bells in the 80's, and Cheyne continues to walk around, stopping to address questions, holding court over a design here, a new idea there. He shows me a collaboration between himself and Matt Biolos called a Rad Zapper. A double-flyer squash tail with four fin boxes that looks about the most fun board ever.

I have to ask him about single fins. I finally manage to buttonhole him amongst the throng.

Swellnet: Does the single fin have any relevance for a modern surfer? I ask.
Cheyne Horan: Today?

Yeah.
I reckon the single fin is such a great design. It's versatile, it reacts - you've always got pressure on the fin, so it's not going from fin to fin. Since I've got out of competitions and I don't have to surf a certain style, I love 'em even more.

You can surf the way you wanna surf, whereas on thrusters it's more of a predetermined routine, which works great but a single fin has more freedom. They are faster. I have boards with quads, thruster, single fin set-ups and the single fin is much faster. There's just less drag. I'm never stretched to get to the corner of the wave.

So you're still an advocate of the single fin?
I'm everything. I'm bodysurfing, whatever. I'm not an advocate of any one style of design, or shaper or anything. I believe people should get an array of shapes from different shapers and ride the board the way the board wants to be ridden. That's what I'm an advocate for.

64-years old and still pushing the limits of design whilst avoiding the trap of falling into close-minded ways of thinking - Cheyne is still a force of nature. I text him later, tell him how much I enjoyed the show and how good the boards looked.

Quick as a flash he shot back with the old Horan confidence and chutzpah fully intact.

“Next level...always."

//STEVE SHEARER