High Aspect Foil Surfing – Video Ride Report
This is a video ride report on my first half dozen sessions surfing a high aspect foil wing. I talk about the benefits and challenges of riding a high aspect foil wing, and the similarities and differences with a low aspect wing of similar surface area. For me the focus is on the shape or ride feeling of the wing regardless of brand or who designs the wing. I find this most useful when deciding what wing to buy or what conditions are a good match for which wing. In this video I am riding Axis 900 and 1000 foil wings with the 420 tail (YouTube preview).
Video 1 = 8:37
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Once I progressed and moved down to a smaller wing foil board I needed to learn how to knee start. In this video series I show and explain how to go from kneeling to flying, on both low aspect foil wings and high aspect foil wings. The windier it is usually the rougher the water is and the harder it is to stand up. The first four videos are with a high aspect wing at different locations around the San Francisco Bay in 12 to 40mph winds. The fifth video shows my beginner setup: giant board, foil, and wing and how I bypassed the knee start on such stable and easy to fly gear. The sixth video shows how I moved down to a smaller low aspect foil, boards, and wing and explains how I did both standing and knee starts. Both heel side and toe side starts are shown and explained in close up detail so you can see what my feet, hands, and body are doing to stay balanced and get flying.
Foil wings of the same shape often come in two or three different sizes, and each larger size is usually several inches wider. I created a vector graphics file to allow me to calculate mast height for each wing size AND keep the lean over angle the same. As an example I have two F4 surf wings size 1250 (27.5" span) and 1700 (33.5" span), when using the same 28" mast on the larger wing I need to ease up on my turns to keep the tips in the water. So I want a taller mast that will allow me to lean over by the same degree and carve the same tight turns. This vector graphics file showed me how tall the mast needs to be to do the same turns.
Life is Good.
A simple, easy, and cheap ($20) to make foil mast extension. Allowed me to lengthen my carbon mast giving me more height clearance and tighter turning ability. Carbon masts are expensive and often only available in one or two fixed lengths. Custom carbon masts are also expensive and even more so if I were to guess wrong on the length. So my goal here is to get the extra length I need to do tighter turns, and figure out what length mast is the sweet spot for me. As in long enough to do the turns I want without being so long that it's hard to ride.
Really fun swell and conditions made for a foil party.
I have been re-discovering well known beaches as foil spots and I am having a blast! Surf foiling is so fun, and even if I get bored a simple change to my foil changes everything and I am excited again! Fall swell has been sparse to non existent so far, and I am so glad I have a foil to help me make lemonade out of these lemon conditions.
The first summer of winging, in a year of deep sorrow, brought me great joy. Uncertainty, chaos, fear, AND super super stoked! Riding the wind has been around forever, and yet this is the first year I really dedicated myself to learning how, or winging is so appealing the only choice for me, was YES! Seeing all my friends either join me in wing foiling or show a palpable curiosity in this new winging adventure, is proof for me that this is special. Who says "no thanks" to endless waves?
After 6 months of Wing Foiling I can noticeably feel and see an improvement in my surf foiling. Ballpark this spring and summer of 100 wing sessions averaging 10 miles each is at least 1000 miles of foiling! Best guess is that the previous 3 years of surf foiling I had around 500 miles on the foil. The old saying, "Time on the water...", well time on the foil is huge for skills and mastery.
This series has many videos showing how to handle the wing for foil winging. Starting with the basics, on land and then in the water, of picking up the wing and turning it right side up and finishing at the point of ready to get up on the foil. I show and explain various ways of holding the wing, flipping the wing over, and moving forward and turning around without catching the wingtips. I show a few knee starts of getting up on the foil, focusing mainly on the wing handling (I will make a more in depth series on knee starts and getting up on the foil).
