Freestyle Board Upwind ability

[Monsterbirke]

Hey everyone,
I'm currently riding a 139x42 Duotone Jaime at a Bodyweight of 85kg and absolutly loving it.
The only downside of it is, that it's not Boot Proof and thats why I am looking for another Board.

I already tried the 142x42,5 Gambler and I didn't like it at all. Even in higher winds it always felt like a Truck. Quite slow and excepionally hard to go Upwind even with bigger Fins.

Based on that i narrowed down my Options to the following:

-A 142 Team Series in Addition to the Jaime
-A 142 North Foucs in Addition to the Jaime
-A 139 Eleveight Master as a replacement for the Jaime
-Maybe also a 141 Asylum but i guess its Upwind Ability ain't that much greater than the Gambler.

Especially for the Team Series i can't really find any information regarding its Rocker and Planing in comparison to the Jaime/Gambler.
The most important points for me are good Upwind Ability/Riding Speed (would like to ride my 12m Gts in 14-16 Knots of Wind)
Does anyone have some experience or recommendations with any of those Boards?


Cheers

[Ice101]

What about Lieuwe some Jamie riders preferred the Lieuwe?

[Frank82]

I wouldn't ride the Eleveight Master in boots for freestyle, it's a great freeride/big air board but it's not a boots/freestyle board. The commander is a pretty fast board as well, not as much rocker as some of the older wakestyle boards. Another option you could consider is the F-One WTF, quite fast for a board that's great for freestyle.

[Ludmil]

I wouldn't ride the Eleveight Master in boots for freestyle, it's a great freeride/big air board but it's not a boots/freestyle board. The commander is a pretty fast board as well, not as much rocker as some of the older wakestyle boards. Another option you could consider is the F-One WTF, quite fast for a board that's great for freestyle.

F-one’s WTF Definitely ticks the boxes

[dewwy]

I wouldn't ride the Eleveight Master in boots for freestyle, it's a great freeride/big air board but it's not a boots/freestyle board. The commander is a pretty fast board as well, not as much rocker as some of the older wakestyle boards. Another option you could consider is the F-One WTF, quite fast for a board that's great for freestyle.

F-one’s WTF Definitely ticks the boxes

Can confirm, WTF has quite a flat bottom compared to other 'freestyle/wakestyle' boards. Starts planing pretty early.

[edt]

I don't like any of the "boot proof" boards. I just ride the Jaime Textreme with boots anyway. If it breaks it breaks. I do know that if you put boots on the Raptor LTD it will break but the Jaime is pretty strong, and I've never broken one yet, as much as I have tried. The Gambler is an awful board, the Naish Monarch goes upwind better but feels like your teeth are going to come out from the vibration any time you hit chop. I have the 139 board same size as you, 93kg, and haven't broken my Jaime yet. Of course this is completely out of specs so if it breaks it breaks, and I am not recommending it. Just saying I hate all those stupid boots boards so much I have given up on finding one that goes up wind properly and doesn't kill you in chop.

The people that build boards for boots think that if you ride boots you must be unhooking in perfectly flat water. Nothing else is allowed! You, are you riding that boots board in chop? Illegal! You're a poser! Stuff like that.

To be honest though right now I mostly ride a home built board, one of a kind, great in chop, great unhooked, very strong. Heavy but I'm not doing board offs with it. If anyone made a board that worked properly with boots I would be the first to buy it but for now I just cross my fingers and ride one of the "non-boot" boards with boots. I'm thinking of buying a Naish Drive and putting boots on that. It feels like it's probably strong enough. You can't pay me to get back on the Gambler or Monarch.

[Keessie]

I fully agree with the issue of boot-capable boards tailored for perfect flatwater only. I would recommend testing the Shinn line-up. I have had good experiences with both the Shinn Supershinn and ADHD. To me, it seems to me that Shinn boards are tuned a bit more to less-than-ideal real world conditions compared to some of the competitors (overly stiff, bad upwind capability in favour for more rocker). Maybe because of the testing grounds at Tenerife, which definitely isn't flat.

Do keep in mind that heavy landings with very low rocker boards can give a fully flat board on impact. This can lead to broken boards or tips catching the water.

[skyte]

Don't boards designed for boots usually have more rocker which slows the board down, gives it more control but makes it harder to go upwind?

Also riding boots locks your riding position so you ride much more square on to the kite rather than back leg bent, front leg straight which seems to help point the board upwind better.

I think it comes down to: boots on flat water and you can get upwind no problem but most other riding conditions a twin tip with footstraps is going to go upwind much easier.

[Frank82]

Don't boards designed for boots usually have more rocker which slows the board down, gives it more control but makes it harder to go upwind?

Also riding boots locks your riding position so you ride much more square on to the kite rather than back leg bent, front leg straight which seems to help point the board upwind better.

I think it comes down to: boots on flat water and you can get upwind no problem but most other riding conditions a twin tip with footstraps is going to go upwind much easier.

You can still extend the front leg and bend the back leg, it's mostly that boards intended for boots have more rocker which slows them down.

Does anyone know how the Airush Livewire is? Is it a fast board for a wakestyle board?

[alex85]

Very interesting topic!!!

Maybe boots locks your riding position (I dont know because I dont use them) but to go upwind I changed my tech during years and now I increase more the edge to go upwind rather than "turn" the nose of the board, so I dont know if this is the "problem" with board for boots.
What I immagine is that with boots you can handle but at the same time needs more power and in this case board with more rocker helps a lot.

The real questions is about rocker (wich I think is the most important characteristic in a twin tip) and upwind ability.
The more rocker the more drag and less efficiency you have so more difficult to transform power of the kite in upwind course.
Of corse more rocker helps to control more power but I realise that often is simply beacuse you're not allowed to riding at a the same speed compared to a flatter board in the same wind/size of the kite.
And I realise also that happens beacuse you have more drag but also less grip with a high rocker board.

This opinion comes from one years where I rode back to back 2 boards: ozone torque v1 136x41 with 4.5cm of rocker and ss asylum 2020 138x42 with 5.7cm of rocker.
When I switch to the ozone in the same condition I feel a huge increase in line tension on the harness and viceversa: also if smaller the ozone starts earlier, this is an help if the kite is not lit but a problems on the opposite.
Also when jumping hooked in with Asylum my jumps tends to be lower and more downwind, instead with the ozone are always more vertical: I think it happens beacuse also if I edge with the same strength the grip on the board is less so I loose tension and upwind line.

I don't know if is something that is true for every board with a lot of rocker compared to a flatter one or just questions of this two specific boards...what do you think? I'm still searching for a board with more than 5 cm rocker but with a tons of grips, cause for riding in chop and for landings more rocker is unbeatable