Classic Hand Shapes Meet Futuristic Construction
We have been honored to work with our longtime friend and surfer/snowboarder shaper Alex Lopez. Alex shapes his boards by hand with his favorite Skil planer and combines a magical set of templates with his modern perspective on good surfing and shapes. Based out of Oceanside he has been inspired by some of San Diego’s finest shapers including legendary philosophical Rich Pavel and functional futurist Ryan Burch. When he’s not at home Alex travels the world with his tools and templates shaping and surfing with his talented surfer test pilot partner Leah Dawson… depending on the time of year you can find him building boards out of Japan, Hawaii, France and Bali. You can order custom boards from Alex at alexlopezsurfboards.com.
For our Alex collection we started with his favorite mid-size the 7′ 4” Terrapin. A modern classic wide point forward beak nosed, down rail, mid-size single fin intended for what Alex calls “smooth surfing”. The Terrapin has proven to be incredibly versatile and fun excelling in clean larger surf, medium sized everyday surf and performing as an amazing “session saving” longboard substitute in smaller lower energy surf. Rare are the days when the beloved Terry is not in the van and it’s a great one to pack on a long distance trip where you will run into a wide range of conditions.
The second board Alex shaped for us is his vision of a performance shortboard the 6′ 8” LT “shy performance” Long Twin. Perfected during the lockdown the LT features a streamlined template, a pulled in swallow tail, plenty of rocker, foam under your chest for paddle /glide and is designed for days when the waves have good shape and some push. The LT walks the line between a short board and a twin step up. The performance rockered narrow swallow tail twin hangs on steep energized walls, races through extended high lines and wraps through speedy redirections. We have pushed it into larger clean surf with great results and had plenty of good times at our local alternately dumpy/ flat-faced beachies. The LT really hits its stride in a good overhead running point wave… don’t we all.
The third board in our collection is still cooking but we are very close to dropping the 6′ 10” Terratwin, which is an exciting twin version of the original smooth surfing widepoint forward Terry. The slightly shorter size makes it a duck-dive friendly mid-size in bigger surf or short period swell beat down beachie sessions. The twin fin set up keeps it loose through the turns and allows it to hang high on the face of steeper waves. A beautiful beaked nose and soft smooth user friendly rails make the Terratwin a very easy surfing forgiving board that allows you to push your mid-size surfing into high performance places. Our crew has fallen in love with the this one during our test sessions… you will too… stay tuned for release date and let us know what you want to us work with Alex on next!
There is something special and synergistic about Alex’s modern classic shapes in our rugged environmentally friendly construction. Boards like the Terrapin and Terratwin have a 70’s asthetic where style mattered most and leashes didn’t exist but they offer modern performance and leash plugs so you don’t hurt anyone on a busy day. If you do lose one on the rocks or bang it loading it in the truck no worries… The 6′ 8” Long Twin in our construction is ready to take on powerful grinding / slabby surf around the world and come home in one piece. Relax and take a few risks, it’s a Lib Tech.
