This is to sort the major failing of the otherwise excellent sport of surfing, namely the increased chance of being eaten by a shark.
To do this the surfboard would have to be made out of the highly specialized material that is McCowans Original Highland Toffee, a little known confection from Scotland. For those of you out there who have not had the pleasure of eating a piece, it is perhaps best described as the ultimate stress test tool for dental fillings. One piece will shut up a noisy kid for up to an hour, not because they see being quiet results in a reward, but because it is impossible to speak when eating a piece of this stuff. It is in fact quite difficult to breathe.
Using this results in a disposable board that would entirely prevent sharks being able to eat the surfer, assuming they had first attacked the board. McCowans is hard enough to make a board from, and dissolves slowly enough to get a good days surfing out of a piece eight feet long. Also the surfboard would now have a natural tackiness to help the surfer's grip.-- mcscotland, Jan 15 2002 Surfboard Blanks http://www.homeblown.co.uk/Not as easy as it looks to make a homemade surfboard, but still [thumbwax, Jan 15 2002, last modified Oct 05 2004] IF it floats high enough in the water to use as a surfboard, you could just coat it with a thin layer of something to prevent dissolving, else you'll also have to have a foam center.
(sugar by itself sinks)-- seal, Jan 15 2002 Do you mean a foam centre like a Twinkie?-- Aristotle, Jan 15 2002 As well as the crunchy (non-dissolving) exterior and the chewy (MOH toffee) interior, the surfboard could have a hidden compartment of offal as a 'reward' for the shark who'd then think that they'd got something for their trouble.One problem with this idea is that I seem to remember that sharks' teeth are fairly 'disposable' - i.e. they can drop out and the shark then uses the set that's growing up behind them. Thus, sharks might just shed their toffee-congealed teeth and go after the hapless surfer with a new set of shiny razor-sharp teeth.-- hippo, Jan 15 2002 hippo: Here is where the particular brand of toffee becomes essential: it adheres to EVERYTHING, teeth, gums, palate, lips (if sharks had any) etc. Eating this stuff can only be compared to chewing very tasty glue. The shark would still have problems even if it shed its front layer of teeth.
I like the offal idea - it might make the shark more persistant and therefore more entangled.-- mcscotland, Jan 15 2002 Encase some fibers in the toffee board so that the sharks get stuck in that too. Just be careful not to get stuck swimming away...-- spew, Jan 15 2002 Bakeable - Coat Surfboard foam with McCowans.-- thumbwax, Jan 15 2002 Umm surely the ability of this toffee to hinder breathing will not be appreciated much by the sharks? <News reporter> An odd phenomenon has been plauging the worlds sharks recently, thousands of them have been washed up on popular surfing beaches around the globe with what appears to be toffee stuck between their teeth. Authorities are tracing this environmental tragedy to "the halfbakery", several arrests have been made including mysterious characters calling themselves "UnaBubba", "PeterSealey", and the supposed ringleader and founder of the cult "Jutta". We now go live to Bondai beach where.......<News reporter>-- kaz, Jan 15 2002 I just realised, sharks have gills don't they?-- kaz, Jan 15 2002 Yes, but the water still enters through their mouths. The gills are used to vent the used water.-- mephisto, Jan 15 2002 How about rapidly expanding foam that fills shark mouth when board is bitten?-- subflower, Oct 14 2005 one sticky, tacky (belated) toffee bun, [mcscottie]. +-- k_sra, Aug 06 2007 Brings back memories (McCowans-related, not shark-related). That stuff is every bit as glue-riffic as [mcscotland] says. A definite [+] for you, sir.-- imaginality, Aug 06 2007 random, halfbakery