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Tip of board getting stuck on landing

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topofan
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Tip of board getting stuck on landing

Postby topofan » Fri Sep 09, 2022 9:17 pm

Tried looking for this - but could not find anyone else having this problem. I had about 7-8 kitefoiling sessions so far (after about 30 days (1-2 hours per day only due to knee recovery/surgery) of directional surboard this year - and 2 years (around 40 days per year) on a twintip) but whenever I breach/or jump and then come down the nose of my board simply gets stuck so I fly off forwards.. I sometimes can prevent it by lots of backfoot pressure quickly after re-entering the water - which just gives me a very hard landing then - but mostly nose goes in water and I fly off.

Is this a board problem? I tried a board from a friend (very long but very flexible low volume board) and that board would just dive in 10-30cm flex, and then go up again. I know I have pretty shitty equipment as I just bought a used hydroifl board for 400€ (the full set) and in Cyprus kitefoiling is not very common so had to take what I could get - which is a Dutone Speedster Combo foil on a Airush Core v2 Foil 145x47cm (high volume and pretty big) board. Mast is 90cm.

I think it's quite a good setup for the first few days learning, but not really good for anything more? At around 30-35km/h the foil gets very unstable/vibrates so it's not much fun trying to go full speed even at 15 knots of wind only. And yeah landings/landings from breaching suck even more with my problem. Do I need to change gear or are there ways to learn to handle it? I guess both the board and the foil are rubbish? The speedster foil is beginner friendly, but as it's so smal are - with high lift - when landing a jump it will not give a nice landing vs a foil with bigger wings that produce the same lift. As it's so soft it doesn't work for high speed riding either. As kite I either use 8m or 10.5m RRD Religion MK7, or 12m Reeding Supermodel v2. Wind 10-20knots (none of my kites is relaunchable swimming below 10 knots - so I cannot go if lower than 10). We don't get nice waves except for storm days, so it's little choppy in light winds to very choppy most of the time (if above 20knots I take the surfboard)

I had a knee cartilage surgery last November (8cm of cartilage implanted) so don't to just try what happens if I force the board on entry as I 'm afraid I will then hurt my knee again. That's the reason this season I didn't use yet my twintip - as on a twintip for me it's all about boosting, and have to wait for next year to do that again. But yeah some smaller jumps on the hydrofoil my knee should be able to take if the board isn't getting stuck on touchdown. Or is this common for high volume boards? I'm not good yet on the hydrofil, happy if I can link some gybes together, still do footswitch in taxi, and haven't even tried a tack yet (did manage ski stance quite easily, that's also the only way for me to switch feet without taxi).

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Peter_Frank
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Re: Tip of board getting stuck on landing

Postby Peter_Frank » Sat Sep 10, 2022 7:17 am

I am a bit confused, but will give my view on this:

You are pretty new to hydrofoiling, have knee problems, and you are jumping?
Maning using straps, but that is understandable as you need this for the first learning.

On the same note you say you breach a lot - this doesnt make much sense, that you taxi jibe and breach often, and still allready do jumps???
If so, you are progressing too fast, and thats the reason why your board (any board) will stick the nose in the landing, especially with such a small wing it is really difficult and require a lot of practice.

Regarding breaching, that is the same for all of us, if we breach (I prefer the word ventilate, but not used much anymore) we almost always get a hard crash nose sticking in the water - thats normal :thumb:

I dont assume you are using a short mast?
As these are made for "nose not sticking in the water" when breaching and makes things a lot easier the first times when learning.

You can ride some now it seems, so having knee problems, what about NOT jumping, and go strapless instead?

Then any breaching will just make you slide off the board, or fall forward off the board, no harm done to feet nor knees.

My short version is - you are aiming too high too early, when you are jumping with straps and bad knees, at your semi-beginner level.
And using a shorter mast makes no sense now, as you are too experienced for these.

I would learn to ride strapless now, and IF your main desire is to jump, use straps later when experienced so you dont breach nor nose-dive (m)any landings :D

8) Peter

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Re: Tip of board getting stuck on landing

Postby leeuwen » Sat Sep 10, 2022 7:45 am

Agree with Peter,
There are lots of things you can work on without risking your knees yet.
Learn to do tacks, footswitches, strapless, sitting on the board etc

Also note that jumping without touching down the board on landing takes a LOT of skill. Most of the people I know always touchdown on the board.
So I would argue that it is unlikely you will landing softer on a hydrofoil compared to a twintip.
Probably harder landings because you are likely to be on a smaller kite.

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Re: Tip of board getting stuck on landing

Postby windmaker » Sat Sep 10, 2022 10:52 am

35 km/h (20 knts) is pretty good on a beginner foil ! Have an experienced kite foiler try your setup and trim it for you. There are many in Cyprus. Mixing brands can sometimes lead to certain problems, ie different board rocker line change mast to deck angle.

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Re: Tip of board getting stuck on landing

Postby topofan » Sat Sep 10, 2022 11:17 am

Well breaching/ventilating happens like twice per hour of riding to me right now (tracking with Fenix 6x, but taking the speed from Strava because the Fenix 6x sometimes has outliers - on my strapless surfboard my avg as well as maxspeeds are a bit higher - but then I use it in stronger winds). I only have problems with breaching when I try to go as fast as possible or when I get tired/lose concentration.
My problem is not that I touch down on landing a small jump (talking 1m here max so far) - the problem is that the board instanty gets stuck. On my friends setup the board would just dive but continue with forward speed submerged - so landings are very soft and only problem was loosing so much that it sinks. Mast on my friends board is even a 100cm while my one only has a 90cm - and yes for a future board I would definitely go 100 or 110cm instead of 90cm to have some more margin riding fast in chop. My friends board is a bit special in general however, as both his wings create lift


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