God And Ben

Start surfing late: say, in your twenties. Throw s-turns on 40-pound tankers. Teach yourself to shape. Invent the swallowtail. Invent the Sting. Build prototypes for Buttons and Bertlemann. Shape, carve, and coach relentlessly for 50 years. Boom! Overnight success. Ben Aipa—a man’s man to be sure—has been a powerful, albeit humble, presence in Hawaiian surfing since the days of the Makaha International Championships. Under sung in an almost criminal way for decades, it is our pleasure to drop this 8,000-word bomb.