Which CT Surfer Just Signed A Six-Figure Deal With An Obscure Fin Brand?

Carlos Muñoz will be rocking some very curious rudders for his rookie debut tomorrow at Pipeline.

The Costa Rican just signed a two-year, six-figure deal with a boutique fin manufacturer from Dana Point, California: AU Fins.

Invented by former competitive surfer Brad Pierce, AU Fins feature exaggerated contours through the core of the skeg, as if a small wave had rolled through the mold when it was being set.

If it ain’t broke don’t fix it is the average punter’s mantra when it comes to fins. But according to Pierce, the big fin companies don’t have any incentive to innovate from their traditional designs, as the cost of creating new, non-straight molds is very high.

In other words, it takes a newcomer — somebody with nothing to lose — to come in and revolutionize the fin design game.

And Brad isn’t just a random kook with a fin kink. He’s got science to back up his spiral propulsion tech™, which you can see below.

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A post shared by Brad Pierce (@au_fins)

Whether or not this data actually translates to the Average Joe’s roundhouse improving, we’ve yet to see. But here’s Carlos Munoz’s take, which is potentially influenced by the fact that AU is now his number one sponsor:

“The first time I heard about it, I was kind of curious but skeptical. But after trying for the first time riding them, I said, ‘Ohhh, this is fast!’ And that was it, we had everything we needed to make the decision [to join AU], and now we feel we are very well equipped for the CT!”

We’ll always back people (and brands) who back themselves, and dropping six figures to get their product on surfing’s biggest stage is a huge splash for small company like AU.

And who knows, maybe Carlos will go off, and we’ll have another Stu Kennedy/Sci-Fi moment on our hands.