VANCOUVER ISLAND WINDTALK

My Kona has got as far as Sidney; should have it later today. The weather doesn't look good for a weekend sail down south. With even a bit of wind I will be out, since I'd hope to stay dry on the big board in light wind anyway, and I don't have to worry any more about swimming it in if the wind drops


Someone has been doing stupidly big backloops on very big waves on a Kona Surf:
http://www.watershot.fr/pages/photo.php

Looks like an invitation to broken legs to me, a 15 kg board in the air doesn't seem right somehow. THere are some nice waveriding shots there too if you click though.

And the speeds people are getting on the regular Kona are closing in on 30 knots average, 35 knots vmax, this in only 15-25 knot wind. It is clearly capable of going fast, though I don't expect as early planing as a formula or big freeride in marginal wind:

http://www.gps-speedsurfing.com/gps.asp ... 40&uid=984

Lets hope for some wind so I can try it out soon! I might be persuaded to let others hop on for a try too (no attempted loops on it, please).

put me down I have loop phobia now anyway still daydream about it tho

did you order a s.u.paddle? send me an email if you feel like building one, i still have the port blade from the kayak paddle i butchered last summer (someone else will have to "give you the shaft")..

Yep, I'm now officially on the lookout for an RDM top (broken). It has arrived in my work basement, I haven't unpacked it yet. It is ENORMOUSEEEEELYLLLLOOOONNNNGGGGGGG. DOn't know if it will even go on a roofrack!

[edit] I've unpacked it now. I thought perhaps they had sent two boards, packed end-to-end, by mistake. THere was only one inside, and it did come nearly to the ends. It was so long that even after I'd split the wrapping boxes in three and looked in each one, I thought they'd forgotten the footstraps. They were there, it was just really dark from being so far from the light even the 1/3 bit! Footstraps look OK, fin and dagger look good. I'll have a bigger fin to go with the 7.5 on the Freeride 266 now, that board/sail should work better. I've got it beside my old seemingly huge Bic Astro Rock, 130 L, and it, well, makes it look like a short board again. Its at least 15 cm wider, should be very easy to balance on. I don't know why they needed to make it so thick though; they could have had it half a thick and cut down the volume and made the rails less boxy. It has quite a lot of rocker.

I can't see ever carrying it down the stairs at Cook Street, but we'll see. Its heavy, but not particularly given its size. Maybe it will sail round from the beach like Bobson does on his FW sometimes! Should go to windward like a 12-metre boat, anyway.

Looks like it'll be a lot of fun. Your pushies might be a little slower than you're used to though Looking forward to seeing it!

I'm used to pushies????? I wish.

Isn't that a pushie the guy is doing on a Kona in photo 49 if you go "suivant" on the link I posted above?

Now I've seen how big the damn thing is, the backloops are even more impressive (he's way up there if the board is twice as long as your used to seeing in photos!).

49's a longboard version of a shuvit/backside hit. Super impressive sailing by these guys on such an enormous beast. Got to admit, it's piqued my interest in LBng/SUPing for the non cranking days. Wish I'd kept my One Design! Hm... maybe not.

Oh. I get pushies and shovits mixed up. The (shortened) names are too close!

started to put the footstraps on - they look like they will be a weird shape, maybe just cause their new. Needed a better screwdriver, so didn't get them tight to try the foot.

Maiden voyage and first test impressions. Not too heavy getting it off the truck, DWD! I could also carry it with a footstrap and the 7.5 without wrecking my back, I was worried about that, but it seems no problem.

There was more wind than there looked, so I never got to try the dagger, the 40 cm fin was plenty. I'd forgotten what glide was like - beach start even with almost no wind, and you are instantly up to 5 knots, sheet in to 8 or 10, no turning head to wind or just stopping if you mess up slightly. And even at a slog, its very close to get out beyond Cattle Point, I remember it being much further on a smaller board! Got out a bit and found the footstraps way too narrow and high, feet were in bear traps for a while; somewhat disconcerting as I had the beast in the air a few times on stb tack, and a catapault would have meant a busted ankle. The only time I stalled the fin was frantically trying to wiggle my foot loose.

Didn't like the footstraps it comes with much, you'll see on pics of it they always look narrow and high, thats what they are like if you set them in the logical holes - but they are nice and stiff and have a non-twist plate that may work. You have to set the screws in odd positions to get the footstraps the right shape. To start I had them one to two holes back from the front, and spanning the inside/outside holes for the front strap, and back 2-4 holes on the inside at the back.

Starboard tack was almost head to chop, would have been very nice ramps with a smaller board. The Kona has a long, slow feel to head-on chop, kind of like being on a big horse if you've been used to an Arab or quarterhorse. It slaps on the biggest waves, but not as badly as I thought it would. After getting air a couple of times, I decided to do a better job steering around the steepest faces. Thats more fun and leads to better technique anyway I think!

My non-Nitinat jibe success rate just went WAY up. Bear off for speed and it can carve a surprisingly tight arc. I fell a couple of times when I stuffed the inside rail in when not going fast enough, or when I ran completely out of wind on the inside and needed wind to balance. But I also nearly planed out of a couple even with the big 7.5 sail. I timed one right to turn with the swell and surfed on a big whitecap while I did my flip, that was nice! And even the pivot jibes were so much easier - if I messed up the flip, I could grab the uphaul for a moment and swing the rig into my hands - and with the long waterline, I was still doing a reasonble speed and it felt smooth.

Rig recovery was surprisingly easy, its nice to be able to drag the boom over either the nose or tail to get the sail flying. The daggerboard knob interfers with sail handling till you get the mast high enough. Never tried uphauling because there was lots of wind the whole time.

Downwind blasts with the waves were really fun. It felt a tiny bit sticky, I think the mast track could have gone back a bit, and the board starts to sing and a little water jets out of the daggerboard, but it motors right along. No GPS with me but I'd guess 20- almost 25 knots max. It also turns really quickly so you can wriggle on waves a bit.

By the end the wind was dropping a bit and planing wasn't instant anymore. I found you can stay in the straps even at non-planing speed by leaning way forward, then pump on a little gust and get planing again. The nice thing was I could go way downwind and not worry about doing a walk of shame, with the daggerboard ready to drop if I wanted to go seriously to weather.

I think the board will do just what I wanted - get me out on marginal days to a windline where I can get planing. I can I can use the 7.5 without worry that I can't uphaul it if the wind drops, so I should be able to go out more often. I can go out in side-off wind and not worry about not being able to go to windward. And the board is stable enough to put beginners on at Nitinat - again, with the dagger as a mean of getting them back upwind.

I kind of with I'd got the Surf though - I'm sure it would have been plenty floaty for me, and I'd gladly have it smaller.

Continued test results - 2nd day, lighter wind.

When the kites couldn't stay upwind, I was able to point very high with the daggerboard down and go against wind and tide very easily. But when the wind picked up a bit more, the daggerboard wanted to rail the board up, rail pressure could counteract this until all of a sudden it twisted right up uncontrollably. Time to put the dagger away, then I think! Uphauling the sail was hard (7.5) but do-able even in the big chop. The problem was just the big sail, the board had plenty of float to make it easy as possible.

With just a little more wind, combined with the biggish chop/swell, the board climbed onto a plane. Some pumping of the fin & sail got it going fast enough to coast through most lulls. I was planing fast in about 12-15 knots of wind. I managed a couple of reasonable jibes, stuffed a few more, and got dry around a number of tacks - I'm way out of practice, hardly ever try them on my short boards.

I found the dagger very hard to deploy if it was fully retracted. The first time, I needed to sit on the board and use both hands. The next time I managed with my foot, when I hadn't been able to do it at all on the beach or floating in the beach break. It eased up with sailing for some reason.

Ditto putting the dagger up. I tried and tried when I found the board railing up, just couldn't get it to move. THen I tried sheeting right out and flogging for a second - it went easily. Still, it would be nice to be able to do this while actually sailing. I think there is a lubricant that will help this, I'll have to search forums.

Here is a link for others wondering what MF4 has been up to. http://www.kona-windsurfing.com/theboar ... mahalo.asp

Jl, that the "Mahalo" board you have linked - the Kona for Bubba and his big sister. Also runs a tandem rig if the person in front is small. The links to the regular Kona and the Kona Surf are on the page I think. The Exocet website is weird, you can get into a subarea and never find your way to the main page.

I pasted my review above to the Exocet forum - someone responded to my 'I think I might have liked a Surf even better" comment with saying the Surf was far too specialized , and anyway he was sailing his Kona Style in all kinds of light wind wave days, to overhead. Dunno if he's BSing with his cutbacks and bottom turns galore, but I was surprised by what I could do with it in the way of turning, so maybe. When Tim gets his K.Surf in we'll be able to do a comparison test or two in different conditions maybe!

It certainly is a very different board!

Kona: http://www.kona-windsurfing.com/theboards/kona.asp Reminds me of the Mistral Malibu, Tarifa & Superlight. http://img.2dehands.nl/f/normal/16235497.jpg The F2 Comet, Strato & lightening were fun as well.& lets not forget the classic 'One design' it doubles as a tandem surf board !!!.. Those modern fin boxes & thick tails with the cut away must help !!!

Is superwide(Barndoor style) a thing of the past? These look like a more traditional shape.

Penguin:
The barndoors maybe best for complete first-timers, but they are really no good at sub-planing speed and get boring very quickly. I think something like the Kona is going to go from maybe 2nd or 3rd time on the water onwards.

On more advanced boards, I think the barndoors pushed the quest for early planing to as far as they would go, but it won't displace the serious racers - the Formula are very pricey with board structure, huge fins, and huge rigs. THe Kona idea sacrifices a few knots of early planing speed for much faster, more interesting sub-planing, much more fun gybing, and much cheaper price and robustness. THey are so much cheaper than FW that more people might be enticed to race one-design, which is really where the sub-planing fun is anyway. Kona class rules are also prohibiting pumping, ending the 'air rowing' for extreme athletes silly stuff the Olympic types do, and bringing back skills like reading wind shifts into the winning equasion.

There is a big overlap between the Kona line and what larger freeride boards - 130-150 litre or so - will do, and they are just small enough to be quite fun planing and turning. I think as soon as you add big chop, though, the Kona may have the edge. Most of these big wide boards get scary quickly in chop; the Kona slices and smooths even at planing speed, and is so damn heavy and long that when it is in the air, it maintains its heading/orientation!

The Kona has its mast track much further back, along with better fin and dagger, etc, so there is a lot of improvement compared to older longboards. The duck tail step seems to be brilliant. It adds a bit of drag till you are planing, but the long tail is still fast non-planing. And once planing, you may as well have unneeded board in the air at both ends. It really helps the balance and feel of the board.

I don't think the modern widish-short boards under about 120 litres are going to be affected at all - although the Kona may replace my 108 litre.