Interesting. The first couple of boards I had in CA, that I had shaped new, I never put a tail pad on... After that, the following probably 20 boards I have gotten, I had a tail pad on every shortboard and hybrid. At the time, I didn't own a longboard at all. My wife had a 7'4" egg that was like a community board, but everything else I had was between 5'9" and 6'2" with various tails and slight design differences... So, all of them had tail pads. And also, at the time, I was obsessed with airs and that kind of surfing, so I did find tail pads VERY useful when trying to lay down radical turns, layback hacks, airs or anything like that... The tail pad is that one thing in the back of your mind, that you never focus on, but your heal finds it when it needs to...

That said, I still like having them all my shortboards. It's just like an invisible training wheel in a way. Whether you are adjusting your feel in a barrel, or kind of stall pumping on a face to speed check, my toes or heel hit those pads naturally and instantly my body knows that my weight distribution is solid....

Now, for the tail pads themselves: So, most of my boards from CA have similar tail pads. Same brand. Reason for this: In my neighborhood, there were 3 main surf shops. Only ONE shop in town was able to carry a certain brand: I.E. Quiksilver was only sold in South Coast Surf Shop.... Excel was only sold at OB Surf and Skate. So, I was always a OB Surf and Skate guy, so in order to spend money there, you would have to buy certain lines of products. So at the time, Creatures of Leisure was their brand, so most of my pads are that....

So, every shortboard from the 2003-2012 era, all had COL tail pads. And they have all held up for almost 20 years. Most of which were daily drivers. Beaten to shit.... Like, my step up board in the winter was a 6'2" and I would ride that board every day for like 2-3 months sometimes... The very edges of the tail pad (The two side pieces) have shaved off a little bit, but still works...

All the others are surprisingly in great shape and have held up. So, I am a tail pad guy, but mostly because i just really got used to them back in the day. 

I must admit though, at 46 years old, the only time I attempt an air is on a perfect HH+ day, when there are perfect conditions and it lines up that way, so it's once in a blue moon. I am also not trying to do aggressive layback hacks and shit...

So at this point in my surfing career, I could remove the tail pads, and it really wouldn't matter much.....

Final notes on Tailpads, from me anyway is: 

The key to the tail pad is the installation. You have to have that shit completely stripped. Like, perfectly. No wax. Maybe even a light scuff sand on it.... You only get one shot. And when done correctly, it is on there for life. 

Because to your point, I am not aware of any after market adhesive that can re attach them and hold up in salt water etc... Maybe there is something somewhere, but I don't know what it is.... 

I think most boards are way sexier without the tail pads, so I like it from an aesthetics perspective too.  

Speaking of tail pads.... So, Josh Kerr isn't on tour any more. Actually, his daughter is a shredder and she is a pro now. Anyway, Josh is from OZ, but he moved to California like 15-20 years ago. Not sure exactly when, but I have surfed with him a handful of times on San Diego, North County....

Anyway, about 10 years ago, he was posting some shit online in InstaGram.... He proposed a question that I happened to know the answer to, because he had told me this a while back.... So, basically, he said "Whoever answers this first, gets a hookup of board bags, and all this other shit from Prolite".... So, like 200 people had already chimed in. Nobody knew what the fuck he was talking about... So, I chime in with my answer. It's correct. Prolite hits me up and sends me a huge care package with board socks, board travel bags, leashes and a tail pad.....

So, anyway, I really only got one new shortboard hybrid shaped in the last 10 years. My other purchases had been longboards because I have a dozen potato chips in my quiver....

So, the last board I got shaped has a camo pattern with my kid's hand prints on them. So, I decided I wanted a Camo tail pad.. So I bought one...

Anyway, the Tail Pad that Josh Kerr sent me is still hanging in my garage, in the plastic wrap and packaging.... I just keep saying "next board I get, I am putting it on".....

Reason I mention this is because I have like 12 boards with tail pads. Every shorty I ride has one. And in the 10 years that the Kerr Tailpad has been sitting in my garage, I have never needed to replace one of my other ones. They are on their like flies on shit. 

But, all of that said: Now, not only am I "that guy" that takes his longboard to the beach in a board bag, I guess I am also "that guy" that is the tailpad whore.... 

0 for 2 for me I guess. I might fuck around and get my soul surfer card revoked if I'm not careful. 

i generally try to put them on every board under 7' I own.  I feel like they really aid in my rear foot placement, finding the rear foot sweet spot, but they have to be spot-on with location. Boards I plan to ride as a quad the pad will be about an inch forward of where you would put it for a thruster. clean the board THOROUGHLY, light sandpaper scuff with maybe 150 to 220. Acetone wipe.  let dry.  BONE dry.  Not a bit of moisture or sandpaper dust.  Apply the pad in a very warm place like inside the house if it winter.  It will be stuck for life.

100%. Another random side note: I have not had this issue on recent boards, but pretty much all of my boards from CA. (I had Plus One shape most of my boards, and my buddy started Addict Surfboards, at which point, I transitioned to those)... Either way, both guys used FCS fin boxes. Standard at the time.... Also, the thing in those days was light glass, potato chip shapes. Airs and all that.... So, I guess you could say that I have a "heavy back foot"... So, I would stomp down and do a lot of damage around the FCS fin boxes on the top of the board. I did thursters only, so the fin placement was damn near identical on all of my boards.... 

So anyway, I figured out that when installed the stomp pads and follow the outline and stuff, a lot of times, the corners of the tail pad are not ON TOP of the FCS boxes. And because of that, I would usually stomp out FCS boxes on the back of my boards.... 

Most of these boards were so thin, that if you look at the board, you can see the boxes underneath, from a top view.....

So, at any rate, to piggy back off of what mitchell said, my last bit of advice, is to look at the position of your fin boxes from under the board. Most boards these days, at least mine, you can't see where they are.... But make SURE that you position at least some of not all of those side rails on the tail pad (Most come in three pieces so you can center the main pad and fan the other two out at a prefered angle).... I am just saying, make SURE that you position the tail pad over those spots. It will give extended life to your board, especially if you have a heavy back foot, like I do apparently. 

But, no shit, if you look at every board from my 5'7" fish to any of my CA shortboard, almost all of them have fin box repairs on top from me stomping airs or floaters or whatever, leaving a lot of weight on that back foot.....

Cover them boxes. 

On a side note. When I repaired my quad fish's fin boxes (only non thruster I own) the same way a few years ago. I had to shave down, sand down and reglass over the upper two fin boxes... Anyway, after I did it, I called my shaper in CA and asked him: "Remember the Great White" fish you shaped me back in the day? He pauses and pulls it up in his notes... Yeah, I got it...

Well, that is a quad fish. I love the board, but I have never l like the quad part of it.... Do you think I could install a 5th FCS plug on the bottom, and make the thing a 5 fin or a 4 + 1???? He chuckled and replied: No man, flip the board over. I positioned the leash plug on top of the board, in the exact spot where you would have to install the fin... It's a quad for life. 

It depends on the board for me, I have traction pads on my thrusters, which are the 6ft Coil M-80, and the 6'2" Lost Mayhem Quiver Killer. Both boards can be ridden as quads also but I don't really. For my twin fins / fish, I do NOT have traction pads, those are 5'8" Orion and 6'6" Chris Birch. I like the classic old school style and appeal of these kind of boards and don't think they should be ridden with a traction pad, and I love how they feel without so I wouldn't change a thing. Same with the LB's obviously, I feel it's a kook move to put one on a log of any kind. Mid lengths 7-8' range, I would probably not use a traction pad either. With longer boards, your feet need to move a lot more, so kinda pointless anyways. 

Oh, I prefer Dakine products mostly when it comes to leash / traction pads. Once they start coming off it's usually better to clean off completely and start over with a new one, but make sure it's perfectly clean of all residue before putting the new one on obviously, Mitchell and others have given some great tips on prepping the board. I have also used Goo Gone stuff to help get it clean too, but it takes some work getting the board completely ready to lay down the new pad. I do know people have reapplied old pads with success to some degree before, I don't know the trick but I think 3M adhesive was involved but I am not 100%.

Yeah DP, I am with you on pretty much all of that. And the "Fish" shape is from San Diego, so I can't tell you how many damn fish I used to see out there. I hated them for a long time, but I ultimately gave in and had my Shaper in San Diego make me one. BUT, it's not a "Retro" style fish or a traditional twinny or anything. It has a huge swallow tail on it, but it tapers pretty heavily before you get to the tail, and the nose is wider than my normal shortboards, but it's tighter than a retro fish would be... So, my shaper called this a "performance" Fish kind of thing... So, the board is also only 5'7"... So that particular board DOES have a tail pad on it... And with that particular fish, it works for me. Because I had it shaped and designed as more of a small wave shortboard for points and what not.... So, with that board so short to begin with, I like having the tail pad, because on that board specifically, if you are riding bigger waves, which I typically do with it now... It has more foam than a lot of my other boards, so that is the hyrbid I will take out in some hurricanes.... But anyway, if you aren't lined up with perfect foot positioning to begin with on a wave with power, you are fucked. It's not simple little ankle tweaks like a regular shortboard. You really have to slide your feet and shift your weight and stuff, so on that particular board, I like having the tail pad, because I slide that foot back and link in and I know I am exactly where I need to be....

All the retro fish I have surfed out there or seen, all are without tail pads. To your point, the style of a retro fish is cruisy, and the bigger fish reward frontward footplacement in a lot of scenarios....

So yeah, I agree that retros in general should not have tail pads. Especially mid length single fins and retro fish. Those aren't meant to be powered by the backfooted surfer, which I happen to be, from what people tell me. And obviously on midlegnths and longboards, there is no need.

But any shorter board, regardless of shape really, that is designed or geared to be taken out in good conditions, and that you intend to change angles with dramatically, or if you plan on doing any kind of radical maneuvers on it, you should rock a tail pad. You don't "need" to, but it helps, 100%. 

So on boards that I am describing, I guess the better question for anyone out there would be: Why would you not want a tail pad on a board that is 6'2" or shorter? I understand if you don't like the look, but to me, there are nothing but positive reasons why to have one...

But again, take that with a grain of salt, because I often take my board from my truck to the beach in a board bag. So yeah, I am that guy anyway =)

And DP, yes, I also really like Dakine. Always have. Like I said, I was just loyal to my one surf shop, so I would just support them by getting my stuff from there. That shop carried "Plus One" surfboards, which at the time was my shaper, and if you were an up and coming pro surfer from OB or sunset cliffs, that is what you rode. Period. Every grom was on one. Every local kid was sponsored by them. Lane Harrison and all the local pros were on them.... The shapers, George and Joe were born and raised in OB. You would paddle out and surf with them, on their boards, in their waves.... They were the TITS.... So, when they shaped for me, I would only really get shit out of that shop. And Dakine was not on that list. Neither were any of the major wetsuit retailers outside of Excel, but it is what it is. 

Now, there are no real surf shops here. So whatever I buy is from Amazon, Ebay or on a trip to JAX.... I have no ties any longer. So, I just buy what I like.

Only other thing I will say, is that I FULLY support a small company called Prolite. They make mostly board travel bags, but any time I need a new board bag or accessory, I check them first, because as I mentioned before, they sponsored Josh Kerr back in the day, and Josh had them send me a giant pallet of boards bags and all this shit a handful of years ago. I had never even heard of them at the time. But they have been around for a while and make really good shit. So anyone that send me a pallet of surfing shit for no apparent reason, for free.... Uh, yeah, you got my business bro. 

Not for me, wax only…