Robert August

Mark Martinson owes it all to Wingnut, he says, or maybe he owes half of it to Wingnut. Well he owes a lot to Wingnut one way or the other, anyway because it was Wingnut who pulled one of the 60's best surfers into the 21st Century. And now Martinson is returning the favor by shaping a variety of Wingnut models for SurfTech, and maybe just maybe he will bring you and other people into the future.

If the name Mark Martinson rings a bell you might remember him carving stylish turns at Honolua Bay to the tune of a Beatles' instrumental in The Performers, or surfing France with Bill Hamilton in Free and Easy. He was one of the guys shooting the Huntington Beach pier in a helmet at the United States Surf Championships (which he won). Martinson began as a production shaper for Harbour Surfboards, surfing as much as he could but also cranking out boards during the boom times. "I had a background in woodworking and milling, working at a lumber yard in Long Beach taking raw wood and making dimensional lumber out of it. My first job was with Harbour Surfboards and I learned good habits right from the start from Mike Marshall, John Gray and Dean Elliot. From working at the lumberyard I knew how to use all the tools so it was fairly easy to get into it."
Martinson worked for Harbour and Chuck Dent through the 60s and surfed as much as he could. The 6' 10" "foil thing" he shaped for himself in ??? got him onto the cover of SURFER Magazine in ???. Martinson was a figure all through the 60s but then along with Hap Jacobs and Dewey Weber, he went commercial fishing. "He was a swordfisherman," Wingnut said. "Kind of like the guys in Perfect Storm." Martinson worked with Bruce Brown as a swordfisherman aboard the 36-foot Chupu: "Chupu is a Chumash word for an Indian fishing God. We were harpooning swordfish out of Dana Point Harbor, pretty much sticking to the Channel Islands between San Clemente Island and Santa Cruz Island. It was great. I was with Bruce for three years and then with another partner, Dave Black in the same boat for another six years. I lived in Hawaii right in front of Pupukea and I would go back and forth from Hawaii to the mainland for the fishing season."
Martinson was still surfing through all this time but somewhat half-heartedly. After The Endless Summer II came out, Martinson took a trip down to Costa Rica with Robert August, Bob Barbour and the world famous Wingnut, and it was during that trip that Wingnut put the spark back into the guy who had sparked him. "We all went down together and while this wasn't the Mark Martinson I remembered from Free and Easy, when he took off it was like, 'Fuuuuu... this guy can surf.' Mark is like a silver-backed mountain gorilla with orangutan arms. The guy can surf."
When Wingnut Weaver likes someone they stay liked, and it was during that trip he teamed up with Mark Martinson: "I needed an equipment change and thought Mark Martinson might have some magic. Well he made me a new board and changed my equipment and he's been making my boards ever since." Martinson started shaping surfboards again and now is up to about 500 custom shapes a year, mostly for Robert August Surfboards. Martinson signed on with SurfTech at around the same time as Robert August, around three years ago. For SurfTech, the Martinson Wingnut models are a nine-foot noserider and a 10' 6". Martinson likes them: "They're real rideable. No three fins. No hard edges no concaves they are good shapes that go through the water petty good. The 10' 6" is the nicest one. I never used to ride a board that big, but after riding that one I changed my mind."
Martinson still lives in Hawaii and comes to California from time to time to shape for Robert August. We know how Wingnut feels about Martinson. What about vice versa? "He's my son," Martinson said. :The reason I got back into this. Wingnut talked me back into it. It is his fault."