Lost Mayhem Rnf Twinzer+ '96ER 5'6" Surfboard

Dimensions: 5'6" 19.75 x 2.40 x 29.5L

The RNF TWINZER ‘96er

The latest incarnation of our definitive fish design, the RNF ’96—enhanced with our TWINZER+ fin cluster.

Based off the RNF-’96, a 2021 re-vamped version of our original 5’5” Round Nose Fish (developed 30 years ago), it’s been our best-selling board of the past five years and arguably the best-selling “fish” model of all time. The TWINZER ‘96er combines all the proven performance design details of the RNF-’96 with the added grip, control, and drive of the TWINZER+ fin cluster.

All are descendants of the original hand-shaped boards, first ridden by teenaged Chris Ward and Cory Lopez 30 years ago and documented in the seminal surf flick 5’5” x 19 1/4—together making an indelible mark on the surfing universe.

The Roots of the TWINZER+

The impetus for the TWINZER+ has been building for over 25 years.

It goes back to 1999 and the Rusty Surfboards “C5 Challenge”—a surfing/shaper competition at our home break, Lower Trestles. Rusty had been creating and selling his own take on the Twinzer, using small canard fins strategically positioned on tri-fin/thruster boards. Thus the namesake “C-5,” because of the five-fin setup.

The C5 Challenge invited shapers and surfers to enter as teams, and “challenged” us to build boards using Rusty’s formula: five fins, with the forward Twinzer-esque canards being the unique element. We entered with Dino Andino and Shea Lopez on boards I shaped following Rusty’s C5 fin cluster. Dino made the final and finished as runner-up (to Jay Larson/Doc Surfboards). It was close, but we felt good about the boards we built and the performance.

A year later, in 2000, the event moved to Rusty’s home break, Blacks Beach in San Diego. We entered again—this time with Dean Randazzo. Dean ended up taking the win (and a $10,000 check for each of us) on our five-fin canard “Twinzer” version of Rusty’s C-5 design.

We were stoked and intrigued, but Rusty had developed and owned the concept, so we didn’t pursue it further. Even with competitive success, I never really thought of adding it to our fish designs… for nearly 20 years.