Gerry Lopez has a lifetime of learning under his belt, and he’s not done learning yet. Photos: YouTube//Screenshot
Gerry Lopez is an inspiring guy. He’s a quiet man who thinks before he speaks. One gets the idea that he’s truly interested in people and truly interested in helping them connect with the ocean. It’s an attempt, I think, to pass on some of the joy he’s found in the water. And in recent years, he’s been finding that joy with foils.
“I’ve always been interested in different ways to ride waves,” the surfing icon says. “In surfing — or any motion sport — it’s that gliding feeling that touches a person down deep somewhere. It stimulates something inside that is not only appealing and very attractive, but it’s compelling in a way. It makes you want to do more of it.”
No one who has ever ridden a wave will disagree with that sentiment. We’re all addicts, from the newest of noobs to Kelly Slater. Gerry Lopez has spent a lifetime chasing that dragon, and now he calls Baja California home for part of the year. It’s a wonderful place where life moves slowly and often revolves around the waves.
“I think this is my last hurrah,” he says with a smile. “The surf’s great and surfing’s been my life and it’s what I love to do.”
“You know, I’ve always felt in my life that I was the last guy to try everything. I started foiling here almost 10 years ago. You know, paddle, prone-foiling, the hard way; everybody said go behind a boat or a Jet Ski or something like that. Well, no one had a boat or a Jet Ski.”
So Gerry put in the work. Now, foiling is a regular way for him to get waves, and he can often be found buzzing around East Cape lineups.
“There’s something about foiling that’s pretty special,” he continues. “I remember people going, ‘it’s like riding powder on a snowboard.’ And in a way, it is. All you hear is that hiss of the foil going through the water and it’s mostly silent, you know? Even if it’s choppy, you’re above that chop. It’s a beautiful thing.”
Gerry uses a foil drive, which makes things easier, to say the least. But he’s put in his time, proved everything he could ever prove, and became one of surfing’s greatest icons in the process.
“A lot of people try it and go — especially if they have a foil drive, or they see us with a foil drive getting 50 waves to their one — and go, ‘okay, I want to try that.’ When they try it, they learn quick.”
Gerry has been around the block a time or two. He’s seen surfing change immeasurably — and played a starring role in much of the change — and to him, the rise in foiling’s prevalence is just another evolution of surfing.
“It’s been continually getting more complicated,” he says. “First, boogie boards started showing up in the lineups. Then everything went to shortboards, and then the longboards came back. The shortboarders were having a hard time because they had to be in a certain place to catch the wave and the longboarders could catch the waves. Then windsurfers started showing up in the lineups… there’s always been this kind of friction in sharing the lineups with different sports.”
We try and be respectful of the surfers because they’re the ones having the hardest time. I got a motor, you know? I can catch any wave. They can’t. I’m always encouraging them: ‘if you can catch the wave, catch it.'”
As always, Gerry espouses wisdom only learned by the passage of time.
