The wind was forecasted to come up to brisk levels from the SW starting around noon. It was actually blowing at wingable strength from early in the morning.
I picked up Roland and we headed to Hickam to meet up with Prayot (Kalani was on a plane with his family for a trip to Vegas).
When we got to the beach around noon, Arvin was out and he was coming in to switch out to a larger wing. I took that que and pumped up the SW2 4.7 (it was still blowing hard - just from the SW and that has different flow patterns - usually stronger on the outside).
I got in two separate runs.
The first was to try winging with the AFS Silk 850.
I set the mast forward of where I would have had the Spitfire 840 (with the Advance + Crazy Short fuselage). And I actually didn't have to adjust it.
Getting started was a bit tough - I hadn't winged at Hickam for a while and certainly not during these SW wind runs that we've been having - so figuring out the lines took a little bit initially.
After I got up on foil, the Silk 850 was just like its name - smooth, plenty of lift and rips turns hard. Looking at the track below, there was a lot of consistency in it as well.
I threw in a heel-toe tack in (one of the first since the SW wind run begun - I've been reluctant to do these because everything looks backwards and I didn't want to have to deal with getting back up in breaking swell). The tack is the furthest out to the left of the image.
I headed out to Firsts to see what the Silk could do. Super fun turns in pretty chaotic conditions - and the pattern was pretty tight.
I didn't want to hog that foil so I headed back in and swapped out to the Spitfire 960/375P and the Cedrus Wind mast.
This setup was perfect for the conditions out at First. With the length in this mast (87.5cm + 4cm) I didn't have to worry about breaching. And the design criteria held up again - no ventilation.
Even though it doesn't look like it, there was some consistency in the Firsts runs also. The wobbles in the tracks are me surfing the non-breaking wind swells.
I caught tons of waves and with the Spitfire 960 I was destroying them! The Silk, the SK8, the Kujira 980 - the all surf really well and they are great foils in their own right - but the Spitfire is the most visceral surfing foil for winging in waves that I have used to date. Turning this foil is just too much fun!!!
I have some errands to run tomorrow - but I'll try to get a session in. Winds should be good again.
W:7/F:13/S:4
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