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Seat or Waist harness for hydrofoil ?

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Peter_Frank
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Seat or Waist harness for hydrofoil ?

Postby Peter_Frank » Mon Apr 28, 2014 9:10 pm

Hi

If you have no preferences for one over the other, before starting to foil - what do you prefer then ?

I have mostly ridden waist, as I ride waves mostly, so just use the same when switching board.
In the start I used a seat a couple of times - but that was last year and before I came up on the board riding, so useless info, and still not sufficiently experienced to tell what works best when doing (practising) foiling jibes and tacks :roll:

But the ability to hold down more power which a seat can, is not an issue it seems.

Your upper body is more free with a seat, giving you the ability to turn and look around, when riding - great :thumb:

The waist harness seem to be easier to handle without the risk of getting the foil/wings into your lines IMO, as they are up higher.
But maybe not important ? Dont know, but have had two occasions where the foil or board got caught in my lines/leaderlines :o

You can depower a longer stroke, when leaning forward, on a seat indeed.
But as I tune my trim down instead, it actually seem to work with quite a short depower for some reason ?
Meaning, your powerdive when starting in light wind, is better (faster and more powerfull) when the kite is trimmed slightly down.
And when up, you dont need the "TT" sheeted in mode for anything.
You go better upwind sheeted slightly more out, and downwind you can pull the bar towards you.
But indeed, you need the kite powered quite a lot up on downwind legs, true :wink:

For learning to tack and jibe (foiling) I feel I have better freedom with a waist - but I am still learning and not confident yet, and have not tried a seat lately :roll:

I could understand Johnny Heiniken used a seat for (non foil) raceboards and a waist for foilboards ?

What are the experiences and thoughts from others ?

It could be that it is simply individual likings.

But it could also be, that there are more factual differences, just like waist versus seat regarding TT and Race and Waveboards :naughty:

8) PF

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Re: Seat or Waist harness for hydrofoil ?

Postby ChristoffM » Tue Apr 29, 2014 3:00 pm

For speed riding (with TT or with specific assymetrical speed board) a seat harness is much better. The lower point from which the kite pulls makes balancing at 45+ knots much much easier. I suspect that it is also for the lower attachment point, making control/balance easier that some racers use a seat harnes for raceboards.

But will it help on foilboards? I suspect lowering the center of pull might help a bit if you ride a foilboard really hard and start going over 30 knots (which I cannot do yet on a foilboard). But I find that a waist harness more comfortable for tacking/jibing and riding toeside. I think I will take out my seat harness next time and see if it helps with balancing when going very fast.


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