A-frame

Aaberg, Denny

Aaberg, Kemp

Abberton, Koby

Abbruzzi, Sid

Abellira, Reno

Abubo, Megan

academia and surfing

Adler, Tom

advertising and surfing

Aeder, Erik

aerial

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Aichner, Scott

Aikau, Clyde

Aikau, Eddie

Aipa, Ben

air-drop

airbrush

Airshow

Ala Moana

Alabama

alaia board

Alaska

alcohol and surfing

Alexander, Kala

Allen, Chuck

Alms, Paige

aloha shirt

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Alvarez, Pepe

Ancell, Kevin

Andaman Islands

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Anderson, Craig

Anderson, Simon

Andino, Kolohe

Angel, Jose

angle

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Apocalypse Now

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Aragon, Janice

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Association of Surfing Professionals (ASP)

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August, Robert

Aurness, Rolf

Auster, Ken

Australia

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Azores

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backside

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Bain, Rob

Baja California

Baker, Bernie

Baker, Grant “Twiggy”

Baker, Tim

Bali

Ball, John “Doc”

Ballard, Bill

Ballard, Rochelle

balsa

Baltic Sea

Banks, Jim

Barbados

Barilotti, Steve

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Bay of Bengal

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Belgium

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Bennett, Barry

Benson, Becky

Benson, Blanche

Benson, Linda

Bermuda

Bertlemann, Larry

Well-scrubbed regularfoot pro surfer from Virginia Beach, Virginia; world-ranked #9 in 1983 and 1985. Laine was born (1960) in Fort Belvoir, Virginia, the son of a U.S. Marine colonel. He first surfed at age five, then spent nearly 10 years living with his family on military bases in Italy, Rhode Island, and North Carolina, before settling in Virginia Beach.

One of the East Coast's strongest amateur competitors in the mid- and late 1970s—winning the boys' division of the 1974 East Coast Surfing Championships, the juniors kneeboard division of the 1976 U.S. Championships, and the juniors division of the 1978 East Coast Surfing Championships—Laine turned pro in 1979, and joined the world tour in 1982, finishing the year ranked #22. He was the top-rated East Coast surfer for the next three years, finishing ninth in 1983, 11th in 1984, and ninth in 1985. Laine left the world tour after the 1989 season to concentrate on the East Coast pro circuit, and finished the 1993 tour rated fourth.

Laine had a functional and polished wave-riding style, connecting his turns smoothly and always keeping his long, thin limbs in balance. He was particularly skilled at frontside tuberiding, slotting his 6'4", 170-pound frame into the wide-open cylinders at Off the Wall and Backdoor in Hawaii, and neatly folding himself into three-footers at preferred East Coast breaks such as North Carolina's Cape Hatteras. Laine was one of the most brightly accoutered surfers of the period, with hallmark orange-decked boards and wetsuits in preschool color combinations, including a fullsuit in canary yellow and hot pink with black accents.

In his one and only brush with surfing politics, Laine said in a 1990 

 magazine interview that he didn't agree with a recently organized pro surfer boycott against South African surf contests to protest apartheid. "I'm not going to jeopardize my livelihood or miss out on a good surf trip for anything." Three months later, contest officials in the antiapartheid Caribbean country of Barbados prevented Laine from entering a pro event there. Laine responded by saying that he would organize a boycott against future contests in Barbados.

Laine appeared in about 20 surf movies and videos, including 

Older brother Randy Laine competed briefly on the world pro circuit in the mid-'70s; in the early '80s he was celebrated and reviled as one of the first surfers to ride waves on a jet ski.

Laine, Wes

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