Welcome to Fight Club

Think about it, the bodyboarding fraternity is like a fight club. I"m breaking the first rule of Fight Club.

You do not talk about Fight Club. But i have to.

The popularity of this club, our club, which i like to romanticise as Fight Club, grow exponentially, each new day potentially uncovering a new member. I love fight club. It's one of the best thing about riding a bodyboard.

Want proof?

the corporate man and his cunning ways were having a field day with me. my computer, just a year old, has died and the tiny type on the warranty that some white-collar, white-beard man has written, states i'm not entitled to any free service. to fix this is gonna sting, he says, you should know that the perplexity of technology has subsequent costs. While i ponder my predicament  the nasty man moves onto the next customer. A younger man approaches. Let me see what i can do with this, he says. He grabs the computer. 45 minutes later, 'puter is fixed. Wallet hasn't been touched. Gave the beautiful man a mag, talked some shop how bullet's a crazy tuberider and how Stewart's still ripping, and... Payment cleared.

And then there's the time when us Movement monkeys were due to cough up over 500 skins for photo processing. that's almost a bali trip, yelped Murray. True but it's almost unavoidable in this game. so we gravely enter the lab. Cheque Book is thumping on the counter. Pen drawn from the pocket ready to sign on the line. What are you doing? says the new guy from behind the register. This one's on me. Some cool shots, he smiles. Kid rides a bodyboard.

Or picture this: Rick Bannister is waiting to check-in for a flight home from Perth. He's stalled up the back of a long line. Maybe 50-people long. Movement photog Phil Gallagher is next to him - he's ready to fight someone. but before Phil gets a chance to peal his sleeves back and flare his dukes, Rick has been pulled from he line and taken to a counter, opened by a young dude who works for the airline. He'd spotted Rick's boardbag.

How 'bout Ringa  and hist tax avoidance? It's not evasion, It's just a little dodging. And he's been dodging 'em for three years. He's been working as a construction worker as well as getting payed in sponsor green. A messy economical affair for Ryan come tax time. A dreamy situation for tax man though, he's gonna feast on this kid. Must have known i too, sent him an audit request. After getting wind of his son's situation, Ryan's old man drags him to the designated auditor to face the music. Auditor say's all will be fine. Tick all the right boxes. Done. Got any new boards you want to part with? asks the auditor.

There's loads more, like the time Simon Thornton ( worlds most non-financial bodyboarder) got upgraded to first class on a flight to Tahiti by the flight attendant who rode a bodyboard. Or the time a girl dated a bodyboarder and worked for a mobile phone giant, the same one that'd placed me on call barring for not paying my me bills, ay, lifted the bar without any monetary exchange. But you get the picture.

Essentially, it boils down to this: You have a relatively easy life. You go to school or work, water's clean, food's never a problem, at worst, Government pays you to do nothing ( though this isn't favored in Fight Club). Yet you feel emotionally and spiritually empty. You eventually find the comfort in riding a bodyboard. You warm to those who also ride a bodyboard. You read this magazine because you ride a bodyboard.

Bodyboarding is your Fight Club.

When the similarities between our little world and that of the original Fight Club end, however, is that we don't adhere to self-destructon, the collapse of society ( although it would be fucking brilliant if all our debts were annulled back to zero) and making dynamite from soap, at least we hope not.

And, one last thing: If this is you first time to Fight Club, you have to fight.

Jethro Lyons