We have a couple of very similar days in a row this weekend, 10-14kts or so. On one day I ran the 725 front with +1 shim/115+ then I ran 900 front with +0.5 shim (same fuse) the next day.
It was a lot of touch and go, but just trying to keep speed up on the smaller wing with the same setup otherwise made the jibes the next day a lot faster. I was spending more time flying than any other session I remember, and on some jibes just touching a little. My best jibe was over 11kts the entire way. I've got to improve a little bit more and I should be flying through them pretty consistently without touching.
Any top five (or 4 or 5) pointers now looking back over the past couple of years?
Thanks so much for sharing your milestones with the rest of us struggling mugs. It's a hard maneuver to pull off with big gear but feels really fun. And jibing a 725 is no mean feat (it takes a lot of entry speed) - well done.
My biggest fault was definitely having a crappy carve on jibe entry. And poor sail handling. And either trying to force a flip way too soon or coming up too far upwind afterwards (causing the sail to power up immediately and then a blowup). But the failures of carving too hard upwind were rare due to how bad my carve and focus through the turn was. I carve a more consistent radius now at least on the entry. The exit carve varies depending on how good my footwork/sail handling is.
Other than that, some things have been clicking a lot lately. For a while I think I was sailing that gear with far too little outhaul. I've been very actively adjusting it and it makes a huge difference on comfort.
I think I need to go back and look at older videos of mine and see what else I changed. I feel confident enough now on the carve that I was trying to time it for little drag races in the small protected area here. Sometimes I pulled off the speed on exit, others not so much.
Also, the lightwind practice (slogging) on windsup and the IQFoil gear made a huge difference.
I don't know if I have good video of it recently as I only had time to grab a short clip for those videos but I noticed this:
I was having a very hard time keeping my front arm straight for a long time. What helps is sheeting in hard. For some reason I had a mental block with that on foil. When the wind lightened up after being pretty good 12-14kts for a while, I could start feeling the drag on the sail during the downwind portion until I really pulled in hard with the rear hand. I think I was skittish due to blowing up at some point in some awkward catapults or falls but it settles the foil and lets me extend my arm more.
It's not perfect but I see the path forward and now that I have enough on autopilot, I can notice things like drag on the sail before the flip.
Finally had some completely clean and dry foil jibes, and a bunch of jibes just touching after the sail flip.
Foilx 145, ptm 926, FG 7.0.
Only thing I changed was AGGRESSIVELY and EARLY, more so than seemed reasonable, going for the new front strap.
Was going into it somewhere before dead downwind and I felt it stabilize everything, making the carve and flip much much easier before turning back hard upwind. The flip felt a lot more like a slogging jibe flip, except totally free of the water. I had much much better height control instead of waiting longer in the old front. Saved some ugly flips and kept going.
Kept up with a couple of the better freeride foilers here, timing my jibes with them and staying upwind so wouldn't crash into them. Felt soooo good to have a few reaches of clean jibes before eventually biffing one.
Looking forward to a race foil session as I find the jibes on that more stable and easier, and more consistent.
Interesting. I can exit fine on the smaller board and put a foot in but I'm not doing it that early. I'll give it a go next time. Sounds like you had a fun time chaining jibes together
Yeah it was great. I think I only got about 3 in a row before sticking or crashing, but chaining a few is great.
I was tapped out and cramping up bad when this pic was taken. He set up the camera about 3 hours after I started, but I was taking multiple steps to get to the new strap. Once I get it down I think I can go straight in.
Interesting to watch. The fellow with the red and white board kept waiting a bit to flip the sail and finally around 2:55 or so flipped it a touch earlier and nailed a good one. Also seems he has a pretty big wing because he hovered on a few the way a bigger wing does. (Which means he was probably on the 800 just to prove me wrong ) You had a nice one right after that.
That repetition is such good practice and watching it is great feedback. It would be great to do something like that here but would take a 70 ft pool. Also, great that the water is so flat. Primo conditions for a session like that. Happy you scored a great day.
Yes that's his homebuilt board. I think he's riding his suplerflyer. We swapped gear one day (handing him my iq) and I rode it. It's like a bigger foilx.
Other guy is in an alien 125 i think he usually rides that with the sb 800 or 725, but he's also a flyweight, somewhere around 135lbs. I was able to jibe with him and keep up.
Bunch of good jibes in Noah and Alex's video below. The thumbnail shows how much they open their sail in the middle of the jibe. If you are getting backwinded, take note. They REALLY open the sail
First, a shout out to the OP in this thread, Gene, who's been banging them lately. So fun to see! Gene, you need to do a recap for the rest of us when you get the chance.
Dominique showing how it's done at the Olympic trials. No T-Rex from this lady.
Banged a bunch of light air ones yesterday afternoon after the water cleared off in front of the LLSC.
A few thoughts - it sometimes takes a while to find the groove especially in light air. For the first couple of hours the wind was either super light or gusty, I was awful. Eventually the wind steadied out to mostly an 8-12 so it was a great day to practice and the water was pretty flat. However, it was definitely a day where I was going to enter most jibes faster than the wind speed.
Things really clicked again when I focused on two things: exit "downhill" and flip dead downwind. If I didn't exit at 4:30/7:30 (ie broad reach), there just wasn't enough energy/time to stay on the foil. And, the early flip meant I had less backwind against the sail and could get the power on immediately. Often, I had to push the sail through (even when pivoting off the backhand) to make it happen quickly enough. There wasn't the time to allow the sail to flip itself. As soon as the sail is flipped I could begin pumping if necessary to stay on foil or at least maintain enough speed to pump back up if I came down.
In light air, carve quickly and keep everything compact. When it works, it's an exhilarating feeling.
Another shout out, this time to Chris V. Although he was on a longboard yesterday, in the last few sessions up, he's been cranking through a bunch. Very cool to see.
We have a couple of very similar days in a row this weekend, 10-14kts or so. On one day I ran the 725 front with +1 shim/115+ then I ran 900 front with +0.5 shim (same fuse) the next day.
It was a lot of touch and go, but just trying to keep speed up on the smaller wing with the same setup otherwise made the jibes the next day a lot faster. I was spending more time flying than any other session I remember, and on some jibes just touching a little. My best jibe was over 11kts the entire way. I've got to improve a little bit more and I should be flying through them pretty consistently without touching.
It only took a couple of years...hah!
Wow - impressive and so, so very happy for you!
Any top five (or 4 or 5) pointers now looking back over the past couple of years?
Thanks so much for sharing your milestones with the rest of us struggling mugs. It's a hard maneuver to pull off with big gear but feels really fun. And jibing a 725 is no mean feat (it takes a lot of entry speed) - well done.
Thank you!
My biggest fault was definitely having a crappy carve on jibe entry. And poor sail handling. And either trying to force a flip way too soon or coming up too far upwind afterwards (causing the sail to power up immediately and then a blowup). But the failures of carving too hard upwind were rare due to how bad my carve and focus through the turn was. I carve a more consistent radius now at least on the entry. The exit carve varies depending on how good my footwork/sail handling is.
Other than that, some things have been clicking a lot lately. For a while I think I was sailing that gear with far too little outhaul. I've been very actively adjusting it and it makes a huge difference on comfort.
I think I need to go back and look at older videos of mine and see what else I changed. I feel confident enough now on the carve that I was trying to time it for little drag races in the small protected area here. Sometimes I pulled off the speed on exit, others not so much.
Also, the lightwind practice (slogging) on windsup and the IQFoil gear made a huge difference.
I don't know if I have good video of it recently as I only had time to grab a short clip for those videos but I noticed this:
I was having a very hard time keeping my front arm straight for a long time. What helps is sheeting in hard. For some reason I had a mental block with that on foil. When the wind lightened up after being pretty good 12-14kts for a while, I could start feeling the drag on the sail during the downwind portion until I really pulled in hard with the rear hand. I think I was skittish due to blowing up at some point in some awkward catapults or falls but it settles the foil and lets me extend my arm more.
It's not perfect but I see the path forward and now that I have enough on autopilot, I can notice things like drag on the sail before the flip.
Finally had some completely clean and dry foil jibes, and a bunch of jibes just touching after the sail flip.
Foilx 145, ptm 926, FG 7.0.
Only thing I changed was AGGRESSIVELY and EARLY, more so than seemed reasonable, going for the new front strap.
Was going into it somewhere before dead downwind and I felt it stabilize everything, making the carve and flip much much easier before turning back hard upwind. The flip felt a lot more like a slogging jibe flip, except totally free of the water. I had much much better height control instead of waiting longer in the old front. Saved some ugly flips and kept going.
Kept up with a couple of the better freeride foilers here, timing my jibes with them and staying upwind so wouldn't crash into them. Felt soooo good to have a few reaches of clean jibes before eventually biffing one.
Looking forward to a race foil session as I find the jibes on that more stable and easier, and more consistent.
Interesting. I can exit fine on the smaller board and put a foot in but I'm not doing it that early. I'll give it a go next time. Sounds like you had a fun time chaining jibes together
Yeah it was great. I think I only got about 3 in a row before sticking or crashing, but chaining a few is great.
I was tapped out and cramping up bad when this pic was taken. He set up the camera about 3 hours after I started, but I was taking multiple steps to get to the new strap. Once I get it down I think I can go straight in.
He put up a video. He had a pole stuck in a deeper part of Scenic with a 360 camera mounted to it. My best on-cam jibe starting at 0:40sec:
Interesting to watch. The fellow with the red and white board kept waiting a bit to flip the sail and finally around 2:55 or so flipped it a touch earlier and nailed a good one. Also seems he has a pretty big wing because he hovered on a few the way a bigger wing does. (Which means he was probably on the 800 just to prove me wrong
) You had a nice one right after that.
That repetition is such good practice and watching it is great feedback. It would be great to do something like that here but would take a 70 ft pool. Also, great that the water is so flat. Primo conditions for a session like that. Happy you scored a great day.
Yes that's his homebuilt board. I think he's riding his suplerflyer. We swapped gear one day (handing him my iq) and I rode it. It's like a bigger foilx.
Other guy is in an alien 125 i think he usually rides that with the sb 800 or 725, but he's also a flyweight, somewhere around 135lbs. I was able to jibe with him and keep up.
Bunch of good jibes in Noah and Alex's video below. The thumbnail shows how much they open their sail in the middle of the jibe. If you are getting backwinded, take note. They REALLY open the sail
The video
FoilDodo
Whoa, thanks. Didn't know Skyway Scott was posting on Youtube now. Looks like he also has the foil tacking video.
Also: notice how hard they are carving and dropping the sail over before opening it, more like on a laydown jibe in the video you posted.
webguy
First, a shout out to the OP in this thread, Gene, who's been banging them lately. So fun to see! Gene, you need to do a recap for the rest of us when you get the chance.
Dominique showing how it's done at the Olympic trials. No T-Rex from this lady.
link: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=913731647087177&set=pcb.913737713753237
Banged a bunch of light air ones yesterday afternoon after the water cleared off in front of the LLSC.
A few thoughts - it sometimes takes a while to find the groove especially in light air. For the first couple of hours the wind was either super light or gusty, I was awful. Eventually the wind steadied out to mostly an 8-12 so it was a great day to practice and the water was pretty flat. However, it was definitely a day where I was going to enter most jibes faster than the wind speed.
Things really clicked again when I focused on two things: exit "downhill" and flip dead downwind. If I didn't exit at 4:30/7:30 (ie broad reach), there just wasn't enough energy/time to stay on the foil. And, the early flip meant I had less backwind against the sail and could get the power on immediately. Often, I had to push the sail through (even when pivoting off the backhand) to make it happen quickly enough. There wasn't the time to allow the sail to flip itself. As soon as the sail is flipped I could begin pumping if necessary to stay on foil or at least maintain enough speed to pump back up if I came down.
In light air, carve quickly and keep everything compact. When it works, it's an exhilarating feeling.
Another shout out, this time to Chris V. Although he was on a longboard yesterday, in the last few sessions up, he's been cranking through a bunch. Very cool to see.
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