John Perry - JVP Surfboards

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About John Perry

John Perry is one of our favorite frequent visitors we get in the shop... full of life, passion for designing surfboards, and intellectually critical about his fin setups. Here is John speaking about their initial conception and discovery of what we now generally refer to as the 2+1 setup... "The conception of the ”Threedom” fin configuration came over us, myself and one of my best mates Dave Lambertson of Carpinteria, in a garage relaxing over a couple of games of billiards. In 1980, we had a circus of board designs to choose from; single fins, twinnies and now the thruster. Dave, a sagey kind of thinker, proceeded to analyze the thruster.... Apparently he said he had had an earlier epiphany before he went to sleep one night about making the side fins smaller and the back fin taller to alleviate the tension on your back foot that never seems to allow you to stray too far from the cluster.  I was now mind surfing his epiphany and senses. At that time I had a shaping bay inside the surf shop called “Ocean Rhythms” and couldn’t wait until morning to draw one up.  I had some outlines in mind already that might fit this new fin array and found the fin size; shape and placement had to be placed properly to meet this vision. Since the wave prospects in Santa Barbara in the summer are rare, we ventured deep into mainland Mexico for some testing. I approached it with no expectation, just go for it and see where it wanted to take me. Well, it did the opposite!I took it where I wanted to go, kind of like surfing where your eyes lead you.  Wow!  My feet weren’t always over the fins and I could trim forward like a single fin. Cutbacks were smooth and drifted controllably, pulling verticals without losing speed and almost at will due to the side fins that are placed higher up on the rail line.  Because the side fins are toe in slightly and the fins spread further apart from one another, there is low drag and lots of carried speed throughout the tail section.  Needless to say, that is where we both agreed to characteristically call it “Threedom” (freedom!)." The Performer fin is the result of John's testing and discoveries, try it out if you're searching for the perfect center fin to complement your 2+1.