Lightning Bolt- The true story.

Just a heads up on the Lightning Bolts. They were licensed out to a variety of individuals, with "Pure Source Certified" licensees making them in California, South Africa, Australia and Brazil.
This is one of the California made ones, as it has the signature by Danny Brawner, who worked for Hobie, who had the license for the USA mainland and was most likely shaped by Mickey Munoz or Terry Martin. It is very rare to find an actual Gerry Lopez shaped one, and even in Hawaii, there were others shaping them under the authorization of Gerry and Jack Shipley who owned the Bolt label in the early formative days. During it's hey day of the mid to later 70's, over 30 different shapers pumped out Bolts: "The Most Frequently Tubed Surfboards in the World". They had three distinct categories at one stage, known as "Units", with the "name" surfer/shapers at the top category, the reliable shapers in the next category and the up-and-coming or journeymen shapers in the third category.

Unit 1: Gerry Lopez, Reno Abellira, Barry Kanaiaupuni, Tom Parrish, Jeff Hakman, Owl Chapman, Don Koplein Price: $190.

Unit 2: Rory Russel, Brian Hamilton, Tom Eberly, Peter Trombly, Wayne Santos, Robbie Burns, Cowan Chang, Bill Barnfield, Mark Angel Price: $175

Unit 3: Steve Walden, Russel Kim, Tom Nellis, Brian Hinde, Joe Blair, Bill Stonebraker, Tony Anjo, John Carper, Price $160

So, there are a lot of Bolts floating around out there and while everyone claims it is a "real" Gerry Lopez, only those in the know, really know!


Randy Rarick
Hawaii Surfing Promotions



Randy Rarick with a pile of vintage surfboards to be
auctioned at the International Hawaii Surf Auction- photo by FL Morris.