Tributes have poured in for legendary and innovative shaper Geoff McCoy who has passed at the age of 79.
Born in Gosford on the Central Coast of NSW, Geoff grew up around surfing with his father the captain of the local Killcare Surf Club. He was also successful at athletics and learnt to ride horses – a tradition which dated back generations in his family.
Geoff decided to take up shaping surfboards after completing a pattern-making apprenticeship in the early 1960’s. After working under various shapers, he eventually decided to open McCoy surfboards at his own factory in Brookvale on the Northern Beaches of Sydney in 1970.
McCoy was known for his innovative and experimental designs including the ‘Lazor Zap’, which was a wide tail, tear drop shaped single fin that was ridden by Cheyne Horan during two world title campaigns where he finished runner up on both occasions.
He was also famous for his ‘nugget’ model, a round nose and round tail thruster which was designed to sit neutrally in the water and be practical for any surfing ability.
Alongside Cheyne, a number of professionals from the same era all rode for McCoy. Including former women’s world champion Pam Burridge, who paid her respects to Geoff in an Instagram post. She said: ‘Very sad to hear that Geoff McCoy died today. He was a powerful figure in surfing and that McCoy team was where all the hot shots seemed to be. Many thanks for those early years and launching me on that dream of a life of surfing. RIP’
Surf historian Matt Warshaw described Geoff’s lazor-zap design as ‘sexy and futuristic but was skittish and high-floating and drive-free and more or less impossible to ride unless you were Cheyne Horan.’
Geoff’s success came to a devastating halt in 1984. He lost everything when his business manager ran off after racking up an extreme amount of debt for the company.
In 1991 he returned to shaping and more recently had been working out of a factory in Tweed Heads, shaping for passion and not for profit.
Riding one of his boards is described as: ‘To ride a Geoff McCoy designed and personally shaped surfboard is to be on a vehicle, which has taken years of knowledge to produce. This vehicle which has been brought into being, is at the very cutting edge of design through development and will perform for each individual in a way that they could never before even dare to conceive possible.’
