Creed McTaggart And Alex Knost Hit The Tenterfield Rodeo

Photos by Jack Lynch.

With bright, long days in the north, dark, frigid days in the south, and all the pivotal governmental elections across all the countries that take up the major news channels, this feels like a time ripe for change. 

Change to the way you dress, for one. It’s either literally too hot or too cold to high now to wear anything else other than a pair of very short shorts and a billowing button-up or a sweater, hoodie, and coat combo. Change to your routine, maybe. Mindfulness in both the long and short months is good and that’s why you sort of stopped doing that thing where you wake up and immediately look at your phone for twenty minutes, in this order: Twitter (don’t call it ‘X’ unless you want to get, rightfully, bullied), Instagram, Tik Tok, Surfline, Twitter and Tik Tok again. Instead, you only do it for ten minutes now, because you’re also now reading ten pages of a book while your morning coffee is brewing and that makes you feel like a better person. Change to the way you work, too, perhaps? You’re putting all your pens on the left side of your desk now, actually, aren't you? ‘This is better for my productivity,’ you’re saying to yourself as you look at only the two used drink cups on your desk now, instead of the usual four.

And a change in your rating on how entertaining Creed McTaggart keeps things, for sure. We’re not saying your Creed barometer was reading low before, no. That’s not true for any of us. We’re just saying that indicator needle’s going to start crawling ever further clockwise now, especially after you read what he’s been up to lately. Creed recently shot an incredible flick where he’s surfing one board the entire time over multiple, incredible sessions that was shaped and gifted by Alex Knost after Mr Knost went to a hot piece of fibreglass in the sand with a coconut and threw himself into a Tenterfield rodeo. Oh, yes, and he also knows how to put on a meaningful pot of soup. 

See? You’re hooked. There’s all that and more, here:

Creed! What are you up to?

Honestly did a big food shop too and going to put on a Mexican soup. We’ve got a bit of a rainy day here so just going to slow cook it. But yeah just cruising for now. I’m heading to the Mentawais in the next couple of days so not trying to do too much before I do all that.

How was everything with the premiere on Friday? Looked like a very packed, very solid time.

 It was fun! I just cooked up some sausages and had some beer and everyone said it was nice. It was in the industrial area of Byron, and most brands and companies are there so we just do the sort of after-work Friday beers and, yeah, it was a little cramped. It was good attendance for sure. It’s cool to see people are still keen to go to little, independent shindigs to watch a movie or whatever. It’s always good.  who were there look like I mean they look like so fun. 

I’m sure it certainly helps when the movie is as good as it is too (laughs).

Yeah, it turned out pretty good. I mean I just shot the video of Alex shaping that board for me for my birthday in January and it just sat there for a while and then I surfed it and we sort of filmed for about four or five sessions around April. And then I went away for a month to Japan. I went to West Oz and Japan and then came back, and then we had a little week of waves again so it all happened abruptly and spontaneously. It wasn’t really planned to put anything together but I was really enjoying the board and we got a good flurry of waves so, yeah, we put the clip out, me and Jack Lynch. It’s funny, I’ve always loved being part of editing videos. It’s fun to sit down and start editing and thinking about songs and all the other little things you do. It’s not rocket science but it's a lot of fun.

I find there are more shortcuts these days like with keyframing, which used to be really hard and now it’s pretty simple. And if you’re stuck you can Google it or YouTube it and figure it out pretty quickly. 

For sure, brave new world with all the right tech. So are you surfing the one, same board the entire flick then? What’s the setup on that like?

Oh, yes just the one board. It’s a twinzer so it’s got these twin fins in it and these two little guitar kick fins that sit in front of the primary twins. And then there’s this channel that goes out through the tail on the inside of the fins and then there’s another sort of channel, a belly channel, just up from there. It’s quite a bizarre-looking board. The first I saw it I was surprised with it, just because I’ve never seen a board like it before. There’s a lot going on and I’ve never ridden a twin as if it were a pin tail or a twinzer with that tail. So, yeah, I was quite surprised at how performance-related it was. I don’t know, I felt like I was on my normal board, though.

It definitely has a lot of areas up in the nose a round nose so that felt a little different. But throughout the tail… the tail is really thin so it’s quite maneuverable and it has a lot of drive. You can kinda see in the clip there are a few close-up shots there’s a squirt at the tail where it just takes off. It’s always driving and never really slides out and sometimes it has a little rift but you can easily control it. It doesn’t feel unpredictable in any way. It sort of stays in the lane but has a nice little drift and wildcard effect to it that’s a lot of fun getting into these positions with. You know, the ones that you feel like you know exactly what a board will do but it has this unpredictable factor and drift to it that’s really fun.

From the clips I’ve seen on Instagram at least you’re definitely still in the pocket and just keeping everything tight right there but still whipping it around and adding a bit of flair to the end of each turn. It looks great. 

I kind of thought it was going to be slow-paced or something, and it was the complete opposite of that. The dimensions are 6’4” 19 5/8, 2 1/2. In the clip, it goes on for about fourteen minutes, and it goes through a phone call I had with Al followed by two surf sections. But he sort of talks about how he came up with the idea of the board. Originally it was a single fin and he’d done a couple of trips with Derrick Disney and he was using twinzers so Al sort of adopted that into the Experimental Dental shape. And he’s had that outline out for a few years but he’s been working on it and it just gave it a little bit more control. He talks about it in the clip. 

And is that your first board from Alex?

This is the first shape I’ve got from him. So, Jack Lynch helps him out in Australia and we were just hanging and he was like, ‘Oh! We should get you on the BMT’And I was like, ‘Yeah, that’d be cool.’ I didn’t think much of it though but Alex happened to be coming to Australia and he shaped me on for my 30th birthday and we went out to a rodeo out in Tenterfield, like two or three hours inland from the coast. We were all dressed up as cowboys.  

What on earth is a rodeo in Tenterfield like? 

Oh, we stuck out like a sore thumb. We're all dressed up and the core rodeo crew was looking at us, like, ‘Who are these fairies?’ So that was pretty funny. But we ended up having a few drinks with the local crew or, you know, the travellers or whatever and it was a really good time. It was just watching people go crazy on bulls and the little kids who do it are insane! They’re like twelve years old and get flipped upside down and it looks so brutal but they just love it. It’s what they were born into. If you grew up on a farm or something it does look pretty fun. There’s pretty crazy energy and it’s pretty entertaining. 

Photos courtesy of Creed’s iPhone gallery

I mean I know it’s a stereotype because I’m American but I love a proper rodeo. They’re so wild and fun. I’ve been to a good handful in central and eastern California and, yeah, they totally sniff you out on the spot if you’re out of town but it’s a pretty great time.

Yeah, I love being in those situations I don’t expect myself to be in. And it was actually really funny, we were there and randomly this dude was like, ‘…Alex?’ And Alex was like,’“Oh! Hey man!’ With some guy, he hadn’t seen in eight to ten years. We’re in the middle of nowhere and Alex is bro’ing down with someone from Sydney or something. 

Where’s Alex these days? Is he helping out with the release of all this?

We’re probably just putting it on the BMT YouTube. He’s got a bunch of models that he does with BMT and the Experimental Dental is just one of them and I’m sure he’s got more that he’s working on. He’s a pretty busy guy. I think he’s in Mexico or something right now at the moment. I’m super keen to try to do it, and we’ve been talking about it for the last couple of weeks, just trying to figure out a time we can line up our schedules and go on a surf trip and bring a bunch of his boards. 

I don’t know, just go somewhere like Nicaragua or Mexico or Indo where we can bunk down for ten days and get a million waves. I remember him saying with the channels originally, he was down in Mexico and I think he said the board was initially really flat-ish on the bottom. He said it really wasn’t working so he left it in the sun and got a coconut and just carved in the channels on the bottom. With a coconut. But it got heaps better. That’s just something he told me one night and I’m sure if you spoke to him he’d break it down a bit better but he told me that and I thought that was pretty cool. 

Is there such a thing as a dream board you’d want to have Alex shape for you? 

I’m pretty open to trying any of the models that he’s got going. I haven’t really ridden too many alternative boards, or whatever you want to call them.

He says in the clip about this board, and it is kind of true, he wanted to make a Swiss Army Knife that you can ride in small point breaks and punchy beach breaks and still be able to utilize the board and not feel like you’re riding something crazy. And I surfed it in a bunch of different waves and it held together really well and in bigger and smaller waves and basically really surprised me. I spoke to Alex about it actually and basically he was just, like, ‘I told ‘yah! I told ‘yah!’

I have to jump here in a sec but before I go tell me a bit about those soup you got on.

It’s kind of like mince and tomatoes and onion and corn and you just put it in this big pot, slow cook it for a few hours and then nibble on this for a few days. Good comfort food. But, I mean, it’s pretty healthy.

So just soup on the agenda for the rest of the day then?

Just cruising. Trying to get my boards ready for an Indo trip and I’ve just sort of finished up a couple of paintings I’ve been doing since I’ve been home. 

You paint? Is that something you’ve done for a while now?

I’ve been doing little landscapes lately of mountains and stuff. I’ve been painting for maybe two years now but I haven’t done too much with it though. I’m just trying to get better at it. But I have a little art show coming up with James Kates. He’s going to do some photos and I’ve got a couple paintings and we’ll do that down in Wollongong in August. 

I don’t know, where I live is pretty quiet when the waves aren’t that good and there’s not a lot to do. I’m running, fishing, or golfing or just get in the garage and start squishing some paint around some canvases and see what happens. It’s fun, I like spending time by myself and in my own head, listening to music and seeing what colours work with whatever is going on in my head. 

Do you look towards any particular influences for painting or do you vibe with just whatever you've been seeing or feeling then?

Not really. When I was in Japan I went to a few museums over there and it was really cool to see a Francis Bacon in real life and Henri Matisse and these insane, insane, insane paintings like that. People like that have been around and those paintings have been around for so long now. But when I am painting, I guess I have all these ideas in my head and they go just right out the window. It’ll turn into something completely different. I think just trying to get lost in it and not have any sort of plans on where it's heading and submit to the emotions that are coming out. It’s normally pretty emotional. Most of the influence comes from emotion. I don’t know, where I live is pretty quiet when the waves aren’t that good and there’s not a lot to do. I’m running, fishing, or golfing or just get in the garage and start squishing some paint around some canvases and see what happens. It’s fun, I like spending time by myself and in my own head, listening to music and seeing what colours work with whatever is going on in my head. 

Well, we’re going to have to make the show in Wollongong, aren’t we? Thanks Creed!

Yes, later!