Velzy |
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Asking Velzy who his shaping influences are is like asking God what the Universe was like before the Universe began: "No one. My dad, I guess, because he was a woodworker." Velzy’s first board was a balsa redwood shaped in Hermosa Beach around 1943. "I saw the boards the older guys were riding and they were heavy and didn’t work too good. I was a little guy and all those boards were too big and heavy so I sawed about two feet off the things and reshaped the bottom until I found one that worked. I liked what I had done and just kept going."
Velzy was one of the first people to shape surfboards both personally and commercially and he was also one of the first to consider mass production. "I was doing pop-outs way back in 1959" Velzy said. "I worked with Chuck Fosse of Fosse Foam and we were on the borderline of having a success with them. Our goal was to do away with all the bulk and get a good design that worked and make a lot of moulds. But I needed a little engineering in my brain and I didn’t have enough back then for the conditions of the resin and the glass in those days. I was ahead of the progress, I guess."
Velzy says the number of boards he has shaped is in "the thousands and thousands and thousands. No idea. Never wanted to think about it." His favorite board was a foam board with two layers of 10 ounce glass he made in 1958, at a time when he had a dozen Hawaiians working for him. "But then Duke Brown borrowed it at San Clemente Pier and broke it under the Pier."
When Velzy opened a surfboard shop at Manhattan Beach Pier in 1949 the bureaucracy that issued resale licenses had to start a new designation: Surf Shop. He produced surfboards through the balsa years and into the plastic revolution. Velzy's most important board was The Pig, introduced in 1954. It was shorter and had a wider tail and let surfers turn easier. When asked if he made a lot of money on The Pig, Velzy said, "Yes."
In the late 60s the shortboard revolution inspired Velzy to take off to Arizona to "do some cowboying" and when he got back to Orange County he ran into Hobie Alter while riding motorcycles at Saddleback Park. "Hobie said, 'What are you doing now?' and I said. 'Nothing. Cowboying a little bit.' And Hobie said, 'Why don’t you come and shape for me? I need some shapers.' And that was fun. I worked for Hobie and then Frank Petrillo and Jack’s Surf Shop."
These days Velzy lives in San Clemente and has a nice, steady business turning out recreations of classic surfboards in the hardwoods he began with. He makes beautiful, hand-crafted boards in balsa, redwood and some mahogany and sells them for "quite a bit. This was stuff has slowed things down lately, but I’ve been doing four and five a month."
For SurfTech, Velzy is making five different models in a variety of plastic and wood materials. "These SurfTech boards are all very traditional. You can take them out for a Sunday surf and go out and have a good time all day long. They paddle easy and turn easy and are good for noseriding. There are no downrailers and not high tech stuff. These are comfortable boards." Velzy’s SurfTech boards are meant to be ridden but are suitable for collectors. For the rider the 9'0," 9'6" 10'0" and 10'10" models are available in TUFLITE or wood veneer construction. Veneer models are built to the perfect weight in our stock light woods, fitted with a fin box and leash plug ready to surf. TUFLITE models combine Dale's classic shape with an equally impressive aerospace technology construction. For the collector, the 10'0" model is produced in a variety of exotic and specialty woods, with a nose and tail block and a glassed on wood fin. These are limited editions, signed and numbered by Dale. "I love what the SurfTech guys do. I'm proud of the boards they make. Wonderful quality."
