Was out for the third time today, just before the sunset and half and hour after.
Wind came over some hills far to windward, and there was chop on the surface today.
Used my 12m2 Takoon Chrono kite, and was perfectly powered, not too much, nor underpowered.
I cut some of the longer upwind legs out of the gps track, as it is confusing with the full track, to show a typical average upwind with a big kite in not perfect conditions, and with the (small) standard fins :
I was really impressed by these "real life" freeride setup upwind angles with medium/small fins, going with speed OR slow (both worked), with a big kite
When going on a broad reach speed was about 50km/h (48-51), so not that bad - and I havent even fully adapted to the new board yet.
Going deep downwind was really easy - I was surprised to find how easy it was, and not bumpy nor scary - the nose do not catch anything either, so you can just let it run over the chop waves.
About 60 degree downwind gave me the max vmg downwind today it seemed - but I could easily go 75-80 degree if I wanted to, not quite as fast but not that far from the max (not speed but vmg), working the kite and very relaxed/gentle because of less planing speed.
Jumping gave insane lifts and hangtime in these conditions, so had a good session today, especially good to see how high you point upwind, even in this chop !
Somehow chop and waves dont seem to disturb these wonderboards much - so a pleasure.
The reason why the raceboard twintips died almost 2 years ago (bigger fins, longer tt's specially for racing), was because they did not work in chop at all, only if the water was really flat - where the directionals can master both upwind and downwind in chop so the windrange is a huge margin bigger both the low end, but especially the high end in fact, because of this.
So on flat water the tt's were faster downwind, but slower upwind, and only worked well in flat conditions - so no future here.
I am really stoked about the possibilities with this board (and these kind of boards), for light wind and touring.
Havent even tried the low end yet really, but as it can only be better than the 2009, which were excellent - I see a fun and exciting spring and summer coming up - if the weather is awesome and it is hot, but low winds - and then you can still ride if you want to, jump, or take on surf safaris with other raceboard kitesurfers !
At first a board like this might feel big and clumsy, and to some extent it is.
BUT, as it is very freeride orientated in size and design and fin size - it is really a great overall raceboard board for "anything", especially when you get more hours on these.
It seems that a lot of brands are experimenting with raceboards, but has held back because of the "being behind the fast development rate", which is very understandable
But I can see a freeride raceboard market in fact - for example me as a "non-racer", as I hate just cruising, or just going fast, or just going fourth and back, but still find great fun and possibilities in the freeride raceboard for light wind especially
Peter
PS: I am using the GT31 doppler GPS as someone asked about earlier in this thread.
