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Rapanui is an Eco-Fashion company from the Isle of Wight, that makes Organic, Ethical clothing using Renewable Energy with award-winning traceability. Rapanui is about making eco-fashion cool.

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Shambles Shenanigans

Category: Ambassadors

A message from our friend Shambles....

Its been a year now since i’ve been working with Rapanui and as their Irish ambassador I would like to tell you about my year.

Mostly, it looked like this....

The arrival of my first Rapanui stuff to the Emerald Isle coincided with the arrival of Aussie filmmaker Ryan Mattick and his Zion wetsuits team riders, last Autumn. Together we scored some epic surf on Irelands West coast – big wave spots like Rileys and Aileens – which Ryan included in his film covering the trip entitled 'The Viking'. Any surfers out there who own that video, spot the Rapnui tee!

Next a secret solo mission with filmmaker Peter Martin spawned the video that did the rounds 'Shambles - Day in the life' Vimeo. I suppose, me doing my things. It ended up catching the attention of Vodafone, who put my face on all their Irish mobile ads. Pretty funny, I havent stopped getting abuse from the lads yet. December was one of the coldest on record - the snow held back the surf a bit, but the first three months of the new year really was just a blur: it’s safe to say that January, February, and March 2011 were the best three months of surf I have ever seen in Ireland, full stop.

We had massive swell after swell combined with offshore winds and fair weather. All those fickle west coast spots came to life. During that time I became the first bodyboarder to tow into big wave spots Prowlers and Mullaghmore.

February saw a spectacular Billabong tow-in contest at Mullaghmore. I was invited to enter but lacked the required jetski. The day before the competition myself and number one Irish bodyboarder Shane Meehan did manage to whip into a few monsters. We both got a couple of warm-up ones but got smashed on the big ones and the session ended when the board we were using was lost. Shane actually got the worst wipeout i've ever seen a bodyboarder get in Ireland; He got whipped into a scary set wave behind the peak and as the beast reared up on the heaviest part of the reef the unthinkable happened, he nosed dived at top speed, bodysurfed to the bottom, got sucked up in the tube, got smashed and wore the rest of the set on the head.

Later on that day I got to surf PMPA point on 'The Day of Days' with Tom Lowe, Fergal Smith, and Greg Long with Mickey Smith shooting from the channel.

April and May were spent squeezing the last sessions out the big swell season before retiring to my local beach to teach beginners how to surf and perfect my longboarding all summer long.

I have just arrived back from Eurosurf 2011 where I spent two weeks as one of the team Ireland contest judges. The competition was amazing and the surf gods delivered the goods: contestable waves and good weather throughout with a couple of classic days at Bundoran's crown Jewel – the Peak – thrown in for good measure. Congratulations to team Ireland and their sixth place finish and Irish bodyboarder Ashleigh Smith for her second place: Ireland's best result in a Eurosurf for over 15 years.

Now the winter is here again and I am kept snug and warm in by doubling up on Rapanui t-shirts (pro tip).

I am geniunely stoked to have got involved with Rapanui, simply because I am quite eco-minded but it’s hard to do anything meaningful about the environment these days - so good on you lads, it's more than just the t-shirt. Right now I'm focusing on getting back to doing what I do best preparing for another winter of huge waves out in the warm and sunny Irish winter.

Hope you've enjoyed reading what's been going on over here,

back to you in the studio,

Shambles.