With the trades forecasted to come back nice, strong and steady, I passed on the dawn patrol and opted for a midday wing foiling session on this Easter Sunday. Brought out the NWFB, HS1850/chopped 300 rear stabilizer with the 85cm mast.
I was out from around 11:30 to 2:30. When I first got out, the wind was on the light side so I brought out the 6.0. Within 30 minutes the wind ramped up to what it was forecasted to be and I headed in to switch out the 6.0 for the 5.2. The wind was all over the place - super gusty at times, others you'd see big holes in the wind coming across the water with long fetch lines in between. I'm glad I switched to the 5.2 (and truthfully at times the 4.5 would have been good).
Prayot and Roland came out to practice some more - I tried to stay inside to give them some pointers. After a while they were staying up on foil on their strong side stance (regular footed so their outbound leg). I was in position to slot the channel markers so I headed out and hit Firsts for a couple of waves - it wasn't really breaking, but I did ride the traveling/shoaling waves. It was kinda shallow so I left and headed back to the inside to work on my turns
Hit a peak of 16.1 knots - but mostly hovered in the 14+ knot range (which is what the HS1850 is limited to based on the surface area - drag relationship). Towards the end of the session, I made three runs out and back and stayed on foil the whole time - tacks on the outside with strong wind on the exit, and switching on the inbound runs and ripping into the jibes - turning/transitioning is so much fun!!!
Here is a picture mid-tack
Making a run with the front foil just under the surface
Pictures from this angle were from port tack runs (outbound).
And this is just switching feet at the top of a tack.
I can't say this enough - this is so much fun!!!
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