What would you say if you were asked to fill a void on your high school surf team long board division but you really didn’t long board much?

Travis Riley was asked and he said OK. This was for the 06-07 ISF season. Travis had surfed long boards but didn’t consider himself a longboarder. Not being a longboarder got him started after the first surf meet at tied for 35^th, or dead last.

It seems that didn’t affect Travis to much because he continued surfing in the meets and continued to advance and rise in the standings. And come June there was one last surf meet to be held for the final standings and a surf off between the two rival teams Santa Barbara High and Ventura High.

Travis had his pick of boards to ride and at first he was going to ride my new prototype quad long board. The event was held at Pipe in Ventura and the surf… as usual for a surf meet… was not looking that great. So, Travis decided to ride an Imperial, thinking it to be the right equipment for small and somewhat sloppy surf and, his plan paid off.

Travis surfed in 3 heats. The first one was the team heat where Santa Barbara and Ventura went head to head. Travis took first place. The second heat Travis won as well which advanced him to the finals. Then he went on to take first place in the final beating out the leagues 1^st, 2^nd and 3rd place contenders and putting himself at number 4 in the over all standings for the season. From 35^th to 4^th and winning the final event! Way to go Travis, and doing it on a D.R.