Holden great videos and explainations. I see you were using the s3 21m so what wind conditions were you riding in ? My first foil experience has been rough because I was underpowered and strong shorebreak made it hard to get out so I am going to try flat water next. Also when you first get on the board I notice that it seems like you immediately point the board downwind is that correct? I consider my first session not a failure since I didnt get hurt or break the board and was able to get out past the break but I can see its going to take a lot of practice and better conditions to get on the foil for more than a few sec. Thanks for the inspiration
@airsurfer: when you go out on your foilboard the first time, i think it is easier to have enough power in your kite. this helps to balance since it stabilizes your body. once you manage to go back and forth and you start to explore upwind and downwind try to reduce the kite size for the given wind, this makes going downwind easier.
pointing the board downwind after getting onto the board has two advantages. sometimes you do not have enough power to kite with the board in the water really so you need to build up speed downwind to get onto the foil. on the other hand you can also ride out a peak of power from a kiteloop this way.
waves make things harder.
i don't know the exact windrange of the 21 on the foilboard in knots. kind of from 'nothing' to 'a little bit'. since my new elf 11.3 has an even better low end than the s3 12 the 21 becomes almost obsolete for foilboarding. one thing you have to consider when out on such a large kite in almost no wind: if the wind drops another knot or two you might not only be not able to get onto the foil again after you crash or make a jibe but the kite might also just fall out of the sky.
even with a heavier 12m kite you might get into the situation where the wind is enough to go foilboarding but not enough for the kite to stay in the air.
Favorite Beaches: Crandon Beach, Hobbie Beach, Keys, St. Lucia, St. Marteen,
Style: Old School
Gear: Flysurfer15m and 21m Speed3 DLX RealWind Mutant 148 X 40 and Directional 190 X 48, F-One TT 128 X35, Dereck Semi Directional 143 X 38 and 177 X 46.
DrLightWind wrote:I like the wide yellow one
Looks like the wide boards are becoming a trend
DrLW
Nico used the yellow Aguera board to dominate the Defi Wind, winning all 3 races.
I think he said he chose the bigger board because if you have to touch down its faster to get going again.
Could be that foil boards would work well for handicapped riders in that they take the clattering out of going over chop at speed. I seem to remember that one of the problems was that even having your feet strapped to the front of the board, at speed the impacts could result in broken bones in the feet, which is maybe why the feet are usually supported above the board on the Handikite prototypes and they have suspension for the seat.