Giveaway: Julian Wilson’s winning Stab In The Dark board

A couple of weeks back, Stab dropped Stab in the Dark, a project that involved Julian Wilson and 11 of the world’s best shapers going on a blind date. ICYMI, Stab met Jules in West Oz with a quiver of 11 completely blank surfboards – no logos, no clues. The shapers didn’t know who the boards were for, and Jules didn’t know who’d made them. What followed was 10 days of testing in varied conditions – minus any preconceived notions or bias. And, all to find either whether it’s possible to call a surfboard the best in the world…

At the end of the project, one board stood above all others: #99, shaped by Darren Handley (DHD). And now, Stab and Swell.com want to give the board to one lucky reader. To win, just fill out the entry form:

ENTER HERE

About the board:
Dims: 6’0” x 19” x 2 3/8”
V: 28.5L

Photo: Ryan Miller/Redbull.com/surfing

Said Julian: “Before surfing this board it just looked fast. I wasn’t sure how it’d feel backside but I knew it’d be a dream frontside. And it was. It was really fast and responsive. Frontside, it’s got a real spark to it. I’d take off and it gave me plenty of time to decide where I wanted it to go, which is something I’m always looking for in my boards. I never had to force it.
I called it as a Darren Handley. I’ve only ever ridden one when I was younger, but I’ve picked up a lot of Mick Fanning’s boards, and a couple of Jack Freestone’s boards and I just feel like it had a pretty clean outline. There’s not too many fancy design tweaks going on. A good all-round board, which performed the best.”

After the reveal: “I knew this board was going to work! It felt the best under my arm out of the batch and was always going to be a dream going frontside. It was fast, super responsive, exciting and definitely the best board. It felt pretty money!”

From the shaper: “I was in two minds which model to base the shape on between the Mick Fanning model, and Jack Freestone’s DX-1. Because of all the work I’d been doing with Jack, and how well he’d been going, I thought that was the best board to use because it was more user-friendly than Mick’s model. I asked Mick who he thought the surfer was, and he put forward Julian. But I didn’t think the stats added up, I thought it was Dion Atkinson.
“I toned the size down, because Jack is 87 kilos. So I went a 1/4 of an inch narrower, and an 1/8 of an inch thinner. The board would work well for a QS, beach-break, aerial based surfer. Its a lot flatter than my typical, Snapper or Kirra board, which is what Mick’s is like, this one was a lot more all-round. It’d struggle in bigger, hollower waves be- cause it’d be too flat and too wide in the nose.”