Kai Lenny Downwind SUP Foil

[Admin]

I like the thought of drilling a mast foot a foot in front of the front straps, moving the foil forward 6 inches and windsurfing that thing as is.  I like the no volume thing for waterstarts in the straps in normal wind like 20-22 with a 5.0.  Seems like it could work. 

[headmount]

F&*king Brilliant!

You know one never knows if something is going to work for them and Piros's idea is a great way to find out.  Pretty damn cool.  Plus like SUP sports wrote, you can dial in the best location for placement.  Love this.

[Piros]

A bit more very physical R&D today. We cleaned up the tape job for paddling in but the waves were just too small and choppy. We managed a couple of paddle in and launch on the foil but nothing worth filming , so we were back in the river today practising our foil riding , that's me upside down. For those that are thinking of trying this we are all full of cuts and bruises , no stitches yet but pretty close. I copped the foil mast in the head a couple of times so be careful . When you have the foil on the Sup it rolls when you loose balance and comes straight back at you. We’ll keep toughing it out I know it will work.

[Dwight (DW)]

I can't recall ever seeing a kiter learn without a helmet. I've seen tons of kiters learning too. They love my windsurf spot for learning to foil. What the heck were you thinking?

BTW, Slingshots newest aluminum foil is so dam heavy it will knock you out cold.

[Bean]

I saw that DW, 2x the weight for aluminum; there is a significant cost benefit there.

A+ on the tape job, but why not just install two tracks and use T head bolts?

[blueplanetsurf]

Interesting that Kai introduced the Go Foil but now Starboards is bringing them to market while Naish makes their own version:

http://www.naishsurfing.com/2017-malolo-sup-foilboard-hydrofoil/

[noa]

Interesting that Kai introduced the Go Foil but now Starboards is bringing them to market while Naish makes their own version:

http://www.naishsurfing.com/2017-malolo-sup-foilboard-hydrofoil/

Who knows what negotiations went on with then all behind the scene.
One thing is for sure, once they saw the response, both companies raced to be in on it and produce their version.
I had anticipated that this would now catch on fast, but not this fast. It will be interesting to see the market response to the production gear.
This is certainly again a whole new page to the sport. And it's anybody's guess how it will unfold...

[Dwight (DW)]

I tried down winding in 20 with my foil on my 7'10 windsurf board. No chance in hell of getting up on the foil.

I came away thinking it might take conditions similar to what's required to make a 14 footer sporadically plane on a run. If you don't have good downwinding where you live, the foil doesn't seem like the answer in the same way it turns poor kiting or windsurfing conditions into great ones.

Hope I'm wrong.

[magentawave]

I strapped a kite foil board to my Sup and shot this yesterday . Amazing result.

 Hah hah, so cool! Good song in that video too.

[headmount]

I tried down winding in 20 with my foil on my 7'10 windsurf board. No chance in hell of getting up on the foil.

I came away thinking it might take conditions similar to what's required to make a 14 footer sporadically plane on a run. If you don't have good downwinding where you live, the foil doesn't seem like the answer in the same way it turns poor kiting or windsurfing conditions into great ones.

Hope I'm wrong.

That's a bit small.  Covesurfer and I saw the super stud that has made this so popular in his vid yesterday.  He was tooling around Kahului harbor on his rig, still a go foil despite company changes.  His board was a chopped down race board that ended up around 10'6" and super light.  As he is arguably among the fastest paddlers in the world, one might also suggest that your 7'10" might have been a a bridge too far as far as shortness.  You need to get up to around 6-7 for lift.  His board while ugly, sports a wide tail that gets up to speed fast.  The way he described liftoff sounded like a bush plane lifting off on a zero runway.  He was riding very small pulses that were entering into the harbor.   

[tautologies]

I can't recall ever seeing a kiter learn without a helmet. I've seen tons of kiters learning too. They love my windsurf spot for learning to foil. What the heck were you thinking?

BTW, Slingshots newest aluminum foil is so dam heavy it will knock you out cold.

So I used to kite foil board way back..like 2003 or so..and then had a second coming maybe 6-7 years ago. I got kind of bored with it. I always wanted to make a SUP foil, but didn't want to cut my boards, so I think this is great news.

Kiteboard with a foil is actually pretty easy..I was upwind in about 20-40 mins. Good fun for short sessions, but I had a low AR foil that once you started getting some speed on it, it was a bit harder to control. On a SUP that is exactly what you want, only I think the foil needs to be bigger than a kiting foil. It gives you lift early, and turns on a dime, and easy to control.

For training I would definitely recommend using a helmet. Once you lose control on a foil (if you use boots or straps), you will collapse over the board, and your face will invariably come down right by the wing. Strapless that is not as much of an issue IMO.

[Off-Shore]

[Beasho]

More, more, more give us MORE 

I mentioned I called Stretch.  I am thinking a 13' that would double as a MAV charging BOMB machine but also be able to SUP foil and maybe even downwind.  Worse case I get my big, huge, wave gun with an extra box in it.

I am hesitant looking at the chopped off tail.  Then again Kai's board is 10 '6" in that configuration.  He weighs what?  145 lbs??  There is also the issue of strength to weight, which Kai likely has the advantage on (compared to many of the older dudes in this forum).

[Beasho]

This shows a lot more speed than people are talking about e.g. 10 - 15 mph vs 6 - 8 mph.  However he is lightly using his finger tips at the end implying a pretty low drag scenario:

[Dwight (DW)]

Food for thought Beasho.....

In my lame attempt at using my windsurf foil to SUP downwind, an issue popped up I hadn't thought about until I tried it.

Where I was standing to paddle the board, was not where I need to be standing to pop the foil up and make it go airborne. There was no way I could get to the right spot paddling. Where I was standing and paddling was probably causing the AOA on the foil to dive and it made more drag.

So when you and Stretch brain storm, you'll need to solve this.

I think a chopped tail is required to solve this.