Well-written and dynamic. McCoy offers up quite a challenge to “state of the art” surfboards! Thanks for sharing an excellent read.
To funny.
Just came across this article on Coastalwatch and thought gotta post up this link as Noel (Solo) will love this one.
Waaayyy tooo slooowww.
I bought that issue of SW for that article because Geoff and Cheyne were amongst my grommethood influences. Back in the days of winged, little- swallowtail single fins, Geoff was a king.
I’ve got problems with that article…
I read it and it made me wary:- I’ve had my share of involvement with people with the kind of pervasive opinions that Bruce Channon attributes to Geoff:-
“Cheyne was totally under Geoff’s spell. He’s a very overpowering person. If he gets his hooks into you he’ll convert you.”
And you know, they fall in the end.
At least, off the pedestal as one of my grommethood heroes. He has become a bitter old git in my opinion from here on…He won’t give a fuck, but:-
Is Geoff really believing what he says about the modern surfboard and the people that make them?
For example, I have to question the bit about edges and hold…
Geoff is portrayed as suggesting that just about everyone else is ignorant of the function of soft rails in a barrel:-
"Perhaps McCoy’s most contentious design theory is that soft, thick, curved rails provide more hold than hard edges. For decades, shapers have operated on the exact opposite principle - that hard edges create hold. Geoff says it was when he was shaping Cheyne’s boards for Hawaii that he studied Gerry Lopez’s designs and noticed their full, soft rails. At the time, Cheyne was complaining that he was falling off deep in the barrel because of a lack of hold. Lopez turned Geoff on to the idea of soft rails holding in the barrel. He tried it, Cheyne rode them and they worked. Hard edges, he argues, break water flow and so create release, rather than hold, causing boards to spin out. “How can a hard edge hold? "
Like…ummm, Geoff…any “modern” shaper who has made more than a few accidentally functional surfboards has used a combination of edge and soft. In fact, I cannot recall ever meeting an experienced shaper who did not hold the same the viewpoint on edge that the author says is so contentious:-
“Perhaps McCoy’s most contentious design theory is that soft, thick, curved rails provide more hold than hard edges.”
WTF!
“ For decades, shapers have operated on the exact opposite principle - that hard edges create hold.”
**Again - WTF??? **What decades, what shapers!? Thats laughable!
Where has this journo been? Is that statement made out of ignorance, or is Geoff being pumped up to look like he knows more than all the other shapers ???
I don’t think the article is aimed at an informed audience. If it is aimed at a bunch of newbies who know less about rails and edge, then WHY?
Geoff is quoted with a number of statements I consider to be inflated generalisations, Like:-
"I just think most of what’s going on is a hoax. I’ve been seeking the truth. Without really realising it, I’ve been pursuing the purity of it,” says McCoy. “So many people get put down the wrong shoot on equipment.”
Any responsible surfboard shaper will advise and suggest to a customer. I have seen chunkier, rounder more forgiving versions of the contempory favourite design offered to bigger or novice surfers since day one of my involvement in the industry, through no fewer than 15 manufacturers. Thats a pretty good over-view of the market over 25 years. Recent so-called moves toward the “sensible” surfboard is a myth…its always been there.
Some retailers would be guilty of selling little wafer 6’2’s to the wrong people just to get a buck, but if you buy from that kind of retailer, you are a sucker anyway.
And…
“The modern shortboard is a hoax. It is the biggest distraction to surfing that we’ve experienced in 20 years,” he claims. “It’s a dysfunctional object … It doesn’t want to bottom turn, it doesn’t want to turn in general. What they’ve done to compensate is make smaller fins so it can skid and slide. They don’t know that the hard edges are making it release and skid as well. The balance is all wrong. Everyone is on their front foot because the only support is in the middle of the board, and you’ve got to be such an elite talent to get them going … There’s a small percentage of people who can do it.”
**BULLSHIT. **
There is a percentage of surfers who WANT to skid and slide, and there are boards that allow it.
I am “straight talking” here. Last I saw, a good percentage of guys were holding out pretty well in the water. “The modern shortboard” Geoff adamantly writes off comes in so many forms now, I can only concede that its actually Geoff who has his head up his arse.
If he is specifically refering to particular designers or brands, he has a duty-of-intelligence to say so. I for one cannot accept his grandiously generalised opinion about current surfboard design.
The number of people who are on undersized or over-refined equipment is declining. Everyone I speak to about boards is past the influence of a handful of pros who can ride 6" shorter than everyone else.
Geoff gets total props from some of the very same people whose designs he would write off, apart from anybody who shapes a rail he does’nt like.
Simon and MR. Yes…Geoff deserves cred, but look at it closely:- They are crediting him for a time prior to the nugget.
There’s a picture of Cheyne there, driving a low hard square bottom turn…its magnificent, its a turn anyone would envy, but its not on a nugget.
Admittedly Geoff states without doubt that his current designs are directed to the recreational surfer. There are indeed numerous passionate adherents to the nugget principle. They suit a sector of the market, even if those big ones with the almost parallell mid-section and huge wide round-tail do look fugly.
I lived in Byron Bay, Geoff’s current home-town, for two years, I saw many a nugget in the water. I even watched Geoff surfing at the Pass. I felt them up in his retail outlet…
And the only guy I ever saw surfing really well on one was Darren Rodgers, Geoff’s Ghost shaper. Everybody else I ever saw surfing a nugget was tonking along in a straight line. I do not see the nugget as high performance surfing equipment.
I would have tried one, really I would, but now its more likely to be Geoff’s attitude that has me not going there, than an aversion to the design differences.
Josh
I remember when Cheyne Horan won at Sunset a few years back people were saying he’s finally riding decent equipment. No star fins or rudders or whatever he usually rode. As for short boards being a hoax, in some ways I’m inclined to agree. Take a look a the photo above and ask yourself when was the last time you saw someone on a “modern” short board lay into a bottom turn like that on a same size wave. There are other reasons why I think the short board has much to answer for but back to Geoff Mccoy.
hey josh i dont exactly know what geoff is saying
but i agree whith him about the current economic crisis
** it sure as shit is gona sort a few out. big is not always best**
**as for leaving the industry behind haaaaa i got 40 yrs on him
**
…Speedneedle, do you say that a hard edge holds better?
hard edges is for release not hold
s 50/50 longboard rail holds very fine and is very smooth to draw lines and cutbacks in comparison with the 60/40s
what about this? hard rails, soft rails…
if your hard rail release the water, then your board planes easier, goes faster, skatier.
plus i think that at that point where you start to skate, the rocker and fins take over giving you direction…
or?
I have personally heard Geoff say no one can shape a nugget. I would say no one can shape anything from anyone 100%. However, I ride Mccoys and my entire board company is built around this philosophy. I think we get as close as anyone. I have sold a bunch. Some of which own nuggets from Oz. also.
I ike Geoff’s uniqueness and I obviously respect his contributins, but it does not mean I agree with ever single thing he says. I thought the article stil tried to paint Geoff and Cheyne as radicals rather than valid contriubutors. I think M.R. and Simon had it right. I am glad they used their comments. over all I think it was and ok write up
Hi reverb,
No, read again…My comment is that Geoff is portrayed to be saying that other shapers don’t understand the soft rail hold versus hard rail release thing…
Josh
He gave credit to Gerry Lopez for the soft rails. I don’t think he believes they don’t understand. I would bet he simply thinks they follow the fads and do what is popular. Which most do. The modern Shortboard is a joke for anyone other than elites, kiddies or lighter surfers. I like thrusters, but the best ones were in the early eighties IMO. Not the so called low float modern thrusters. Not for the average surfer. Also…if those shapers do understand this, then why do many not use it? I have seen square hard rails the last eight inches on some thrusters. The bottom line is and has always been…everything works. How do you want to surf is the question.
I disagree with Geoff on a couple of things on this article also. I think he should have mentioned his association with Greg Pautsh in the early eighties. Those guys were a force in Newport back then. I also don’t think he should crack on the big industry even though he is 100% correct while he still has surftech models.
Thing is about magazines articles. You never can tell what someone " really" says. Writers take liberties when dealing with surfing. Always have.
When you have been around as long as Geoff and done as much ( and believe me, there is so much more that this article failed to even touch on) All of this must get frustrating. You still must play the game to a certain degree to make your living, but it must get really old.
Also…on the Nugget. I have never heard Mccoy call them high performance. I think he would laugh at that description since the average surfer who lays claim to that are not even high performance surfers themselves, but average. Kelly Slater and Cheyne Horan are high performance. The local end of the street surfer that the nugget was designed for just wants to have fun. That is where the nuggets do well. Not that they can’t be used by pros. Only that they were not designed for that.
Hi Solo,
“Thing is about magazines articles. You never can tell what someone " really” says. Writers take liberties when dealing with surfing. Always have."
Too true…this is why, you will notice, I say “Geoff is portrayed as saying…” and ask “Does Geoff really beleve that…”
My own experience with the media is that even a sympathetic writer can twist stuff around unintentionally.
I’m dead certain there’s never the whole story. Geoff gets the benefit of the doubt. I have the right however, to be wary when he writes off the “Surfboard Industry” and the “Modern Shortboard”…such statements need to have a quantifying example, or else it must include, and wrongly, everyone who makes a surfboard, and every surfboard made recently.
Josh
Geoff sure comes across as a grumpy old man. But then he has been swimming against the stream most of his life. My limited contact with Geoff was ordering a custom from him by e-mail and he gave me plenty of assistance and really listened to what I was saying. So reading between the lines of the article and my own experience I think his ethos seems to be to help the average surfer and enjoy the many many e-mails, phone calls and letters saying how much his boards changed their surfing lives. Not that he couldn’t shape for the CT, he’s been there , done that and it ultimately didn’t make him happy.
As for Nuggets. They are very different. However they made me give up shaping. From my experience and from the experience of friends they deliver an improvement in your performance that’s not incremental but such an order of magnitude of improvement that nothing even come close. Other boards I have, Campell bros, Pavel, Sunova,takayama all improved my surfing incrementally. When I got my first off the rack nugget it was such a leap. Now my custom 6’2" stumpy makes me feel like I’m on the CT on a good day!
So no more shaping for me nothing comes close to a nugget, I’m not going to even try.
I have completely fallen under his spell even though I’ve never met him and It scares the crap out of me when he says he is the only one that can shape the dome. He is a genuine genius, and as such he is entitled to his idiosynchrasies in my opinion.
Now anyone want to buy a Campell bros/ Pavel/Sunova
As for Nuggets. They are very different. However they made me give up shaping. From my experience and from the experience of friends they deliver an improvement in your performance that’s not incremental but such an order of magnitude of improvement that nothing even come close. Other boards I have, Campell bros, Pavel, Sunova,takayama all improved my surfing incrementally. When I got my first off the rack nugget it was such a leap. Now my custom 6’2" stumpy makes me feel like I’m on the CT on a good day!
Why do you say things like that?? You’re killing me!! I have always wanted to at least try one. I like high volume boards. For me they work. The local shop has a loner 7’’ S/T nugget, but shit, that’d be a boat, even for an 87kg intermediate like me. I have no idea why they don’t have the 6’6’’ as a loaner. I mean, they have 30 6’2-6’6’’ shorties on loan, So why not the 6’6’'?? Idiots!.
My 7’10’’ midlength has a bit of a nugget look to it. Widepoint pulled back, wider tail than nose ( not much difference though ). Trims great, but also turns awesome for such a long wide board.
Im off for a few weeks, so i think you’ve got me keen to go and hire the 7’'er anyway. Not much to lose!
geoff comes across as a realist to me. great article . love what he says about the industry and surfing as a whole. speedneedle is way off track imo
…I think that THE POINT here is that a true innovative shaper/designer/surfer is in exposure to the new generations of clons (shapers and surfers)
and like almost all here known, the media mags, etc only “show” the same 3 brands and some others that go with them…
No doubt. I have had conversations with Geoff about this. I think he is dead on about the over all picture. I will go out on a limb and say this also, the so called new era of shapers are not innovators for the most part with a few exceptions. They simply refine and regurgitate what has been the accepted norm for far too long. Even some of the old masters have begun to follow the fads because those with the money and recognition buy them off with their own model or cash. It’s hard to figure out in today’s world what is real inovation and what is complete B.S.
Why don’t you think some of the so called leaders of Surfboard design are hesitant to try new products? Because it makes them have to change what is already a money maker. Why change the machine if it’s a proven money maker. They don’t want anything to change unless it’s them that gets to control it. Hence Geoff’s remark about Slater riding nuggety looking things. I see things the major board manufactures come up with all the time that is supposed to be new, when it’s really just someone else’s design that doesn’t have the money or recognition to promote. Like referencing Rob Machado, Tom Curren and Joel Tudor as single fin innovators when Cheyne never left them and rode them better than most anyone.
Thruster and multi fin surfing is not the standard of all surfing. It’s only one style. A style and attitude that has been sown and cultivated by magazines and those who know of little else. Thruster surfing is more rail to rail…because that’s the only way those boards work. Period.
Well said.
Esp about “refine and regurgitate”, “proven money-maker” and the “single fin innovators”.
Props to you.
Absolutely. One of the things that makes forums and the internet way better than magazines is folks can come on and articulate a point of view as you have done. Others can read all the points of view and make a better decision on what to believe or not having read many different points.
With magazines…you only get a writers point of view and unfortunately, these people have been looked at as something special and having some special knowledge. I read way more interesting things on the net than in most magazines. In fact, this article is a perfect example. It’s about two to four years too late. This stuff has all been discussed on the internet in detail. Magazine writers for the most part are told the parameters in which they can write an article. They are given a set amount of words and told not to piss off those that buy ads and etc.
That’s why some of the big companies come on swaylocks and ask folk to identify themselves rather than remain anonymous. They want to be able to use the same tactics to discredit what they say.
I think forum writing is much more interesting and much more bold.
from the description these sound like what hull’s would have evolved into if the hydroplane surfboard hadn’t taken root.