Hobie Race board VS. Starboard Whopper

[greatdane]

Bad, bad, bad idea.  The wind was blowin' about 25 knots and my friend wanted to do his first downwinder on his new Hobie.  The trip was to be across Bellingham Bay, about 5 miles.  I decided to level the playing field so I took my 34" wide Whopper.  Again; bad, bad idea.  As soon as we fought our way out to line up our course straight down wind... he pointed toward the finish line and dropped me like a bad habit.  In about 5 minutes he probably put close to 1/4 mile between us.  He with 6 months SUP experience and no down wind experience & me with about 3 years experience. 

I knew I'd be slower on my wave hog, but damn... that was impressive.  As we approached the finish, I jumped in to cool off and realized my leash had come off my leg at some point and was dragging about 5 pounds of eel grass behind me.  Not that that I could have kept up anyway

So, the most fun wave board I have owned is apparently not a very good downwinder... duh!!!