Surfboard craftsman Ron Heavyside dies at 69

He matured from novice to legendary surfboard shaper. And along the way Ron Heavyside built and grew Nomad from a corner in his father’s Briny Breezes TV repair shop into a business, a brand and a store that has dominated the east coast world of surf for 50 years.

Heavyside was a master craftsman whose surfboards not only won championships for their riders but also qualified as works of art. He died Saturday after checking into the hospital with stomach pains. He was 69.

Founded in 1968, Nomad Surf Shop still makes its home at State Road A1A and Briny Breezes Boulevard. It was one of the East Coast’s first surf shops and is Florida’s oldest running one. It turns 50 this year.

“He was an artist and a real individual; he didn’t follow the crowd,” said Tom Warnke, executive director of the Palm Beach County Surfing History Project for the Florida Surfing Museum. “He did what he wanted, when he wanted.”

Friends since they were sophomores at Seacrest High School, now Atlantic Community High, in Delray Beach, Warnke remembers when Heavyside shaped and built a 10-foot hollow wooden surfboard in woodworking class. The teacher was a surfer.

Born in Montreal, Heavyside moved to California when he was 2. His family relocated to Ocean Ridge when he was 14. Before Nomad, Heavyside first worked at Caribbean Surfboards on Atlantic Avenue in Delray Beach.

While many shapers copied from others, Heavyside was often who they were copying, Warnke said. And as local surfers started winning championships on Heavyside boards, Heavyside used them as test pilots to refine his designs.

“He was producing champions because of the shape of his surfboards,” Warnke said. “He