Foiling Magazine #2

OVER THE EDGE IN INDO

LAIRD HAMILTON AT CLOUDBREAK

FOILING THE SEVEN GHOSTS

FORESIGHT WITH KODY KERBOX

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KEEP RISING Building from the success of the Thrust Surf Foil, the all new Jet Surf foil continues to push the bar in developing the most versatile and modular foils in the world. This year our surf wings produce the same or better lift, size-for-size, than previous models and are faster, tighter turning and easier to control. Built on a modular platform, the Jet Surf foils easily change components like the wings, masts and base plates and can be tuned for surf, SUP, wake, downwind, kite and windsurf foiling making it the most versatile foil platform in the world. Experience the next dimension in surfing with Naish Foils.

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Surf Foil Jet 1650 Complete-Abracadabra, Hover Surf Comet PU

Melanie Lochhead enjoying some downtime from the day job at the Rip Curl School of Surf in Bali.

Photo Charlotte Pert

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OVER THE EDGE

THE BLUFF

South African big wave nomad Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker took a flight into the Mentawais to meet up with an old friend and the promise of solid, incoming Indo swell. Forsaking the standard tow-in option that he is so used to in his better-known big wave pursuits, he took the opportunity to test his own limits on a foil, as well as the limits of paddle in foiling itself…

On a stopover in Australia, Chilean rider ­Rafael Tapia got talked into a quick dash to Tasmania to ride the infamous Shipstern Bluff. After battling jetlag and seasickness as they approached the spot by boat, hesitation took hold. What’s a man to do in that situation? Well Rafael took a quick snooze right there in the line-up… then woke up, and took on some of the gnarliest waves we’ve seen tackled on a foil…

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GLIDERS: ANDREW COTTON

THE CALL OF THE WILD

Arguably the UK’s answer to Evel Knievel when it comes to big wave riding, Andrew Cotton, one of the tight-knit and seemingly fearless Nazaré crew, has the scars to show for his commitment to riding the biggest waves on the planet. As part of his long-term rehab and big-swell-season fitness training, he tried a bit of foiling and – you guessed it – is now a true addict. He tells us why it works for him...

On the invitation of Clinton Filen, Zane Schweitzer snapped up the offer of a trip to South Africa to live out his Endless Summer fantasies. Hooking up with Kyle Cabano and others in the AK crew, they plotted out a road trip that would take them up the wild east coast from Cape Town toward iconic Jeffrey’s Bay, encountering plenty of epic foil spots and awesome local wildlife on the way…

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18 EXPOSURE / 46 UPLOADED: SURF FOILING BONO / 52 RISING UP: BOBO GALLAGHER 54 SECRET SPOT / 56 THE OUTER BANKS: CLOUDBREAK AND THE NETHERLANDS 66 DYNAMICS: TUNING YOUR HYDROFOIL / 72 THE GOOD STUFF / 98 IT’S A WING THING: KEN

WINNER / 120 BACKSTORY: FLITEBOARD / 126 THE 101: BOAT FOILING / 128 WING COMMANDER: TONY LOGOSZ / 134 THE TEST TEAM: MEET YOUR TESTERS! / 136 TESTED / 144 INBOUND 152 FORESIGHT: KODY KERBOX / 154 STATE OF PLAY: JALOU LANGEREE

9

Hydrofoils provide a unique connection to the ocean.

OUR FEELINGS GOT STRONGER, OUR PLAYGROUND GOT BIGGER.

Join the #foilculture. f.onefoil

fonefoil

Photo Vincent Bergeron

EDITORIAL What is the promise that lies in ­ater, when we were clearly built w for land? What is it that draws us to the sea before sunrise when we should still be asleep in our beds?

Take the shot opposite. Ride Engine’s Coleman Buckley (left) and Fred Hope (right), up and out early on the Californian coastline. Beyond what it is they’re carrying (and perhaps being a color photo) this could just as easily be the 1920s, 30s, 40s or onward. Two guys (as easily could be girls) shooting the breeze, walking toward the line-up, reveling in their mutual reasoning for being on these chilly shores before the sun’s come up. Timeless isn’t it? Under those arms could be longboards, shortboards, bodyboards... any kind of surf craft. The buzz would be much the same, right? Except – and I’d wager you’d agree – there’s that little extra zing for the average hydrofoiler. That’s because our winged pursuits still sit very much at the frontier level of water sports, and every time we cross that beach and enter the water, we do so in the knowledge that this is still a diversifying sport in its relative infancy. People stop and look, and they ask questions. We ride, and we learn new things. In the R&D backrooms of foil brands the world over, innovation is constant.

So, although the timelessness of getting out and riding with our friends is just that, it’s also exciting to know that we’re moving forward with this sport, on so many levels. And that brings me quite neatly back to the magazine… Quite honestly, we had no real, tangible idea as to how well issue #1 was going to be received by the foiling community worldwide. We knew there was a market, and a growing one at that when considering the number of brands and solo outfits who were bringing foils into the consumer-sphere. But was it the right time for a whole magazine about it? Would it chime? We held our nerve, pushed on, and it seems we were right to do so, judging by all the kind words and positive feedback we received when the first issue dropped. Stoked, of course, but it’s also now upon us to represent this fast-developing sport as best we can, in all its nuances and niches, as it grows and diversifies, and hopefully that’s something we’ve managed to achieve here in issue #2 of Foiling Magazine. From wing surfing to big waves, from pumping past windmills to dropping into Indo pits… it sure is fun out here on the frontier.

Enjoy the issue.

Cai Waggett Editor

O N T H E C OV E R Grant 'Twiggy' Baker drops into some timeless Indo glory.

Photo Luke Baker

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MODULAR SONAR F O I L

S Y S T E M

Feel at one.

Engineered. Refined. Intuitive.

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R I D E R : J A LO U LA N G E R E E / P H O TO G R A P H E R : S C O TT S I N TO N

PRODUCTION TEAM Editor: Cai Waggett Editor-in-Chief: Alex Hapgood Art Director: Katharina Godbersen Technical Editor: Richard Boughton Contributing Editor (US): Kjell Issey van Sice CONTRIBUTORS Adrian Geislinger, Amandina Manns, Andre Silva, Andrew Cotton, Antoine Badin, Alex Schwarz, Beau Pilgrim, Benny Ferris, Bobo Gallagher, Bruno Sroka, Casper Steinfath, Cecile van Sice, Clinton Filen, Daniel Dingerkus, David Trewern, Derek Hama, Dr George Hradil, Evan Mavridoglou, fishbowldiaries, Georgia Schofield, Grant Baker, Jalou Langeree, Jeff McKee, Jennifer Stenglein, João Vidinha, John Amundson, John Bilderback, José Denis-Robichaud, Julien Fillion, Kane de Wilde, Ken Winner, Kim Hans­ kamp, Kody Kerbox, Kyle Cabano, Luke Williams, Marc Jacobs, Martin Letourneur, Mathieu Fouliard, Michael Berger, Moana Jones, Patrice Chanzy, Rafael Tapia, Rémi Quique, Ryan Collins, Sam Scadgell, Scott Trudon, Shakira Westdorp, Sky Rama, Steven Akkersdijk, Stu Gibson, Stu Johnson, Stuart Boliter, Titouan Galea, Tom Court, Tom Servais, Tony ­Logosz, Victor Dutra, Vincent Bergeron, Ydwer van der Heide, Zane Schweitzer A DV E R T I S I N G All advertising enquiries can be sent to advertising@thefoilingmagazine.com SUBMISSIONS We’re always on the hunt for foil adventurers who can write and/or take a good photo. Please send your pitch or previous examples of articles/ photography to hello@thefoilingmagazine.com COPYRIG HT All material in Foiling Magazine is subject to copy­ right. Reproduction without the express permission of the publishers will result in prosecution.

PUBLISHER Foiling Magazine is published by Water Born Media Limited in Hayle, Cornwall. United Kingdom E N V I R O N M E N TA L This magazine is printed on paper sourced from responsibly managed sources using vegetable based inks. Both the paper used in the production and the manufacturing process are FCS ® ­certified.

The printers are also accredited to ISO14001, the internationally recognized environmental standard.

FIND US HERE @foilingmagazine

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Since 2010

CREATORS OF THE ORIGINAL eFOIL

R I D E R Steven Akkersdijk P H O T O G R A P H E R JosĂŠ Denis-Robichaud L O C AT I O N Le Morne, Mauritius

Steven: So amazed by the possibilities of the bigger wings.

Riding the Shaka L made the little waves breaking inside the reef at Le Morne Mauritius into super long powder runs!

R I D E R Patrice Chanzy P H O T O G R A P H E R Stuart Boliter L O C AT I O N Tahiti

Patrice: It was a big day on the Westside of Tahiti and the swell direction was really westerly too, with a long swell period. I got towed into a couple. I tried to make the drop, but the wave was going too fast, and that spot is really shallow. That's why it hollows out so quick and looks so heavy. So I decided to fly close to the ledge of the wave. I was going so fast on the F-ONE R ­ ocket Surf 4'2 and Mirage wing and was so scared of going over the falls that I had to stay focused. It's so exciting to ride that way. It's a new experience. There is so much energy u ­ nderneath, you can really feel it… The view was just amazing from up there too, it was water so clear that you could see the sharp corals waiting for you if you fell.

R I D E R Titouan Galea P H O T O G R A P H E R Ydwer van der Heide L O C AT I O N Nosy Ankao, Madagascar

Titouan: Last July we went to a new spot in the northeast of Madagascar with the F-ONE team. The conditions were not ideal for kiting, but it turned out to be an exceptional spot for wing foiling. It was one of my first sessions using a small board and straps and it was really nice to experience this next to my boss, RaphaĂŤl!

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R I D E R Kai Lenny P H O T O G R A P H E R Tom Servais L O C AT I O N Southside, Maui

Tom: This was at a spot just down the road from Lahaina. Conditions looked a bit iffy for photos this late afternoon, but Kai always makes something happen, whether through pure talent or just some good luck… A photographer’s dream subject. Everyone on Maui knows Kai (I guess that’s true most everywhere now), and the locals are always stoked to see him and get inspired by his antics. He might just be the friendliest guy in the parking lot, always happy to pose for selfies and answer questions… he just loves to share the aloha. There were quite a few foilers out this day, and a few dads with their kids. This girl had no idea that she would be sharing a wave with Kai Lenny, and by the look on her face, no idea that she would get to see him so up close and personal!

R I D E R Casper Steinfath P H O T O G R A P H E R frankiebees L O C AT I O N West Maui

Casper: Sometimes the cold Danish winters just become too much even for this Viking! So when the Naish design team asked me to come try the new line of foils in warm water earlier this year, I did not have to think twice. It turned out that the west coast of Maui had a few hidden gems on high tide that I was lucky enough to score with the Naish team. It never ceases to amaze me how simple, yet magical, the feeling of soaring above the water is. The perfect off-season cocktail for SUP racing.

R I D E R Martin Letourneur P H O T O G R A P H E R Bruno Sroka L O C AT I O N Porspoder, Brittany, France

Martin: The Beach of Penfoul in Porspoder has quickly become one of the surf foiling hotspots in Brittany. This was a nice morning ­s ession trying out the larger Sroka wings in the surf. The spot works at high tide when there is enough water to cover the sandbar, ­turning it into a foiling paradise with waves that barely break and keep on going into the lagoon. Definitely a good leg burner with plenty of sections for carves and a classic Brittany scenery with rocks, dunes and horses. There is a cool ‘family’ ambience amongst riders too, no matter what type of board you ride.

R I D E R Daniel Dingerkus P H O T O G R A P H E R Michael Berger L O C AT I O N Eisbach Garden, Munich

Daniel: The river wave at Eisbach Munich is no secret spot anymore. Every year more people start surfing it and every year the level of riding increases. There’s no particular good or bad time for riding here… sometimes it’s rubbish, and then other days it can be quite fun. In that way it's similar to the ocean, where you have changing wave conditions. It’s not possible to surf foil the Eisbach wave, but pump foiling in the river is super fun. When riding against the current it makes it easier to pump, and then when you turn and start going downstream you go pretty fast.

The spectators love that, and I do too.

R I D E R Derek Hama P H O T O G R A P H E R Ryan Collins L O C AT I O N Kaisers, Waikiki

Derek: This was a fun little session at Kaisers with a few foiling friends, young and old alike. It was a nice, clean, sunny evening, high tide with some a ­ verage size waves maybe in the waist to chest high range breaking from the peak and rolling over the reef all the way to the inside. The best feeling was sharing waves with a bunch of friends and fellow surfers, and watching the sunset slowly drop into the ocean.

Good times, great crew, awesome scenery and a phenomenal photographer!

R I D E R Kai Lenny P H O T O G R A P H E R Tom Servais L O C AT I O N Sugar Cove

Tom: If you know how wind and water interact, and noticing the water surface coagulating, you can probably tell that the wind was blowing about 30+ knots when this photo was taken.

There were absolutely no waves, but Kai can still work his way 'high into the sky' through his technique. A friend asked what wing to buy, Kai said the Ozone 4.0 would be a good choice and the only wing he’d need. When the friend asked what happens when it gets really windy (suggesting a smaller wing might be needed), Kai’s response was, “you just go higher”! You can bet that this winter on Maui, Kai is going to surprise us again with something crazy we never thought possible.

R I D E R Julien Fillion P H O T O G R A P H E R Vincent Bergeron L O C AT I O N Montreal, Canada

Julien: For the past couple of years, I've been ultra-involved in the kite foil scene.

This year though, I'm challenging myself while exploring all types of foiling: prone surf foiling, wake foiling, wing foiling, pump foiling. The learning curve and the fun is endless. In this photo I’m perfecting the controlled wing breach! Thanks to my friend Vincent Bergeron for risking flash electrocution to get the shot.

R I D E R Tom Court P H O T O G R A P H E R Sam Scadgell L O C AT I O N Isle of Wight (@theactiveisland)

Tom: After meeting the guys behind the design and development of Fliteboard at an event earlier in the year, I managed to get the opportunity to have one for a week to test out. This was taken in the River Yar on the Isle of Wight, miles inland after silently gliding up the butter flat waters through the boats and into the river. Cranking turns, grabbing rails, finding the limits of speed and maneuverability was my main objective and I have to say that it did not disappoint. One battery tired six of us out as we whiled away the afternoon blasting powder’esque turns on the butter flat water. This is a toy for boundless exploration that I can’t wait to have in my garage for regular use!

R I D E R Shakira Westdorp P H O T O G R A P H E R Georgia Schofield L O C AT I O N Gisborne, New Zealand

Shakira: This shot was taken in New Zealand and I was there with the Starboard dream team to shoot for the 2020 board range. We had been in Gisborne a couple of days but this particular afternoon the conditions were epic! No wind, and some nice ocean swells rolling into a large bay. We had Jeremy Stephenson with his Jet Ski and he was towing us into these never-ending lumps. I hadn’t had such nice conditions to foil in before, so it was awesome to feel the full effects. I had a smile from ear-to-ear and legs too sore to walk with. It was such a beautiful afternoon, flying through the crisp autumn air with an amazing back drop and a great crew. I think we were out there for four hours. New Zealand is so amazing with epic surf and foil setups. Can’t wait to go back there!

R I D E R Evan Mavridoglou P H O T O G R A P H E R Kim Hanskamp L O C AT I O N Kao Lak, Thailand

Evan: Last April the AXIS crew took a trip to Thailand and met with a number of our team riders from around the world. The conditions were incredible. We got to ride every day, clear warm water (in the 80s), and tested all kinds of AXIS foil goodies. The day of this shot, I was riding the 1000 High Aspect front wing for the first time.

I was blown away by the speed and stability of this kit. Kim was right there with her camera capturing the moment.

R I D E R Kjell Issey van Sice P H O T O G R A P H E R Cecile van Sice L O C AT I O N Lake Tahoe

Kjell Issey: Since I did my first beach start on a foil, I haven’t looked at water the same way. Getting that surfing feeling on flat water, totally under your own power, is incredible. I put together a very unusual surf trip, exploring inland waterways in California by foil, starting with Lake Tahoe in the dead of winter! On this sub-zero morning (12 feet of snow fell the night before), I explored potential beach start locations around the lake. Although I literally froze my hands and feet off and burnt my lungs from the icy air, flying silently above crystal clear lake water while surrounded by a rising sun and the stillness of a winter’s morning was unforgettable.

(Editor’s note: not only did we love this image as soon as we saw it… but we also thought it was a good way to introduce our new Contributing Editor. Welcome to the team, Kjell Issey!)

R I D E R Moana Jones P H O T O G R A P H E R John Bilderback L O C AT I O N Pua’ena Point

Moana: This session was amazing! It was a beautiful, tropical, picture perfect day in Hawai’i Nei. It was a Sunday morning.

The wind was light and there was not a single cloud in the sky.

The photo was taken at Pua’ena point and in the background you can see the beautiful Mount Ka’ala. Overall it was a great session with the Amundson foil crew (John Amundson, Matahi Drollet, Mala’e McElheny and Jack Ho). A day to remember!

R I D E R Mathieu Fouliard P H O T O G R A P H E R Amandina Manns L O C AT I O N West Coast Tahiti

Mathieu: The Wind Wing is definitely taking my foiling sessions into a new direction where the only frontiers are my own imagination. It’s like riding a spot in 3D, switching between using the wind to get to the peak, and coming back using the wave to surf foil. It’s also incredibly light, giving you plenty of control on the water with a real 100% depower. It’s a unique crossover between kitesurfing, windsurfing and foil surfing.

All you have to do is to take flight and enjoy the ride!

R I D E R Dylan Fish P H O T O G R A P H E R Scott Winer L O C AT I O N Restaurants, Tavarua

Dylan: It was my second day back in Fiji after a six month sabbatical, where I was recovering from a shattered foot and spiral fractured fibula from surfing Cloudbreak.

I started learning how to wing on Maui as part of my physical therapy, trying to get back my atrophied leg muscles. I don’t think anyone had used a wing on Tavarua before but the wind was nuking and the boys were all laughing at me as I walked down the beach with my gear. I chuckled and said, “Watch this… I’m going to go ride waves at Restaurants while you all sit here waiting for the wind to die”. It was low tide and I had to walk and then swim the gear off the reef - then sailed down to check out the wind angle and waves. I rode three waves and sailed back into the channel – so fun!

FLY OVER WATER

INNOVATION EFFICIENCY DESIGN levitaz.com

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SURF FOILING BONO

UPLOADED On a recent downtime sojourn into YouTube, one video popped up on our screen that immediately caught our attention and then had us locked in for the duration. French rider Rémi Quique journeying into the Sumatran jungle to foil the infamous Bono wave, originally put onto the surf world’s radar in 2011 with the Rip Curl film ‘Seven Ghosts’. Well we do love a bit of adventure here at Foiling Magazine, so we threw some questions Rémi’s way…

PHOTOS VICTOR DUTRA

Hey Remi, so firstly for those who haven’t watched the ‘Seven Ghosts’ film or heard of the ‘Bono wave’, can you give us a little background to where it is and why it’s so special?

Seven Ghosts is a bore wave in Indonesia, in the Kampar River on the island of Sumatra, and like all bore waves it works around the full moon. ‘The Bono’ is situated along one of the last remaining peat swamp forests in Indonesia. Access is quite difficult, and it takes a lot of travel time to get there. This wave is rarely surfed, and it’s never been surfed with a foil before our trip there, so that was really special to me to be the first to ride it on a surf foil.

So how did it get the name ‘Bono’? We can’t imagine the U2 lead singer having much to do with an Indonesian tidal bore…

Bono is the Indonesian term for a tidal bore. The waves are formed due to the collision of three currents from the Strait of Malacca, the South China Sea, and the Kampar River. Because of the impact of these currents, the waves in the Kampar River estuary can reach up to 4-5 meters in height and sound like thunder. Local people have their own legends about that Bono wave, and the many stories and myths from local people make this superb phenomenon even more appealing…

How did the trip out there come about in the first place?

I heard about these waves in 2011 after I saw a short clip of Tom Curren surfing there. It was amazing, so many perfect waves and barrels. Its surfing potential was first realized in September 2010 by Antony Colas, the World Stormrider Guide mastermind, together with

a group of French bore riders. Antony happens to be a good friend of mine, and back in 2016 we were two of the first people to surf foil a tidal bore in France. He told me a lot about the wave before we headed out there.

Tell us about the journey to the line-up and how dynamic do you have to be to find sections that are working?

The wave started at 11am on the first day and we left the village at 12pm to go further downstream. After a 50-minute drive on the Jet Ski, we sat on the shore drinking from coconuts, and waited for the wave to appear. Then in the distance I could see the white water coming from really far away. At this point my heart was pounding, lots of adrenaline, and full of anxiety that I was going to lose the wave because taking on powerful white water with a foil is not easy!

Where do you take off from?

Our guide Eddie drove me into the middle of the river, which is the easiest spot for a take-off. I paddled like never before, took off in the white water and enjoyed a five minute ride before I fell.

Then the Jet Ski picked me up, outran the wave, and dropped me in a ­p osition to catch it again. The second ride was perfect. I was more confident and able to do some solid turns. In total there are 10 d ­ ifferent sections on the Bono, but for foiling you only have the choice of seven as three are too shallow to foil. I rode all seven sections. Riding a bore is totally different to normal waves because you have so much space and time for the ride... it's like the wave will never end. •

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TOP Rémi heading into yet another open section...

LEFT By anyone's measurements... it's a big river.

S U R F F O I L I N G B O N O 5 1

How long did you stick around?

We stayed and rode it for three days. The bore happens just after the low tide, when the tide is rising. There’s only one wave during the day and one at night, and at night we were woken up by the wave shaking our room, which was in a cabin that sat on stilts just above the water.

The river seems super wide… what’s the distance across?

It depends on which part of the river you’re in, but some parts are over 150 meters wide. The sensation when you are riding the wave in the middle is amazing. So much space and freedom!

“At night we were woken up by the wave shaking our room, which was in a cabin that sat on stilts just above the water.”

It’s a river, and it looks like a classic river color… is it the kind of water you want to be drinking?

It was brown like the majority of the rivers in the area, but for sure you don't want to drink that water… every toilet in the village drains directly into the river!

And just to freak out potential visitors, what else lurks underneath?

Put it this way… when our guide and Jet Ski driver Eddie isn’t leading us on an expedition into the bore waves, he organizes crocodile sightseeing trips for Asian tourists…

Did Eddie get a chance to ride too?

He rides the waves, but on a normal surfboard. He tried my foil, but just being towed behind the Jet Ski and not on the wave. He did have one great ride though!

And finally, make us all jealous… What was the longest ride you had?

My GPS watch recorded a 10km ride. But you can ride further, I just had to stop because my legs were burning! The wave travels down the river for 50km… •

LEFT What lurks beneath: thankfully just a stick this time, and not a croc.

BOT TOM CLOCK WISE Village life on the edge of the river; Rémi finds one of the shallower spots in the Bono; The river also provides a way of life for many inhabitants.

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T H E F U T U R E FAC E S O F F O I L I N G

BOBO GALLAGHER Another name is emerging from the foiling crucible that is Maui, and one that many on the scene may already be familiar with, not least because A: he’s just got a name you’re not gonna forget, and B: he’s already an accomplished waterman in his own ­ right despite only being 11-years-old. Meet Bobo Gallagher…

Hey Bobo, so tell us, what’s your favorite foil discipline right now, and your preferred set up? I’m riding the Fanatic 150 Sky SUP and the Fanatic Back Wing 255. I am really into the Wing Foil right now.

Next month, it will probably be kiting. Pretty much all disciplines are my favorites!

Where are your regular foil spots on Maui? My regular spots are Guardrails, Mysteries, Launiupoko, S-Turns, D.T. Fleming and Kanaha.

Have you traveled elsewhere to foil? Yeah, to the Hood River Gorge Paddle Challenge, this year I did the first leg of the downwind race there. And Oahu, where I traveled with Archie Kalepa and got to foil.

Tell us how you balance out your life of schoolwork and water time? School work comes first obviously, but I wish it was the opposite! During this season, in the late afternoon when it’s windy, I get in the water. On weekends, if we are home, I try to get in three sessions per day if I can.

Maui is an epicenter of foiling, and for good reason. Do you think you’d be into it if you lived somewhere with less optimum conditions? Having people to take me out helps me become a better foiler, and the people that I am in the water with, like Suzie Coony and Archie, have introduced me to many of my sponsors. I might not have met them if I lived somewhere else. But yeah I would totally foil if I didn’t live in Maui. I may have started later and been behind a bit on the technology, but I would still be in on foiling. I would find a way to do it because I love it so much.

At 10 years old you completed the 26-mile Maui to Molokai downwind paddle solo in less than 4 hours. That’s nuts. Does this make you the youngest person to have completed it? And if so, do you plan to break any more records anytime soon? I think I am from

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what I can find. It was 3 hours and 37 minutes. Foiling is so new and you can go so far on it. I would like to do the M2O next year and break the record for being the youngest to do it solo. Right now, they say I have to wait till I'm 13, but we'll see…

Who do you tend to ride with on a session? My dad and I go out.

Josh Riccio trained with me for the Maui to Molokai, and Johnny Kahakaloha and Suzie Cooney are pretty fun to surf with.

We understand you have some pretty experienced mentors around you. Tell us about them, and who inspires you the most…

Well there are a few. Kai Lenny for starters – seeing how he has broken so many records – is pretty inspiring. He took me out on my second downwind foil run, and Kathy Shipman took me out on my first foil run. Then there is Archie Kalepa who asked me to be a part of a video and he told me, ‘foiling is going to be the next big thing.’ We went to Oahu together for one of the first foil contests at Queens and that was pretty cool.

As well as those guys there is Johnny Kahakaloha who takes me surfing and always makes me laugh; Zane Schweitzer escorted me on my first race, the Olukai, and he pretty much helped introduce me to several of my surf competition breaks like Sunset and Steamer Lane, there is Zane really encourages me and finally Suzie Cooney who has trained me and always shows up for me. She even surprised me in Molokai at the finish line!

Kai Lenny inspires me the most. He is an amazingly diverse foiler, he can do all kinds of things… He kites, surfs, windsurfs, and he’s amazing in big waves. He tries new things. It’s cool I have been able to foil with him.

And finally, who is Bobo Gallagher in 2029? I want to be an allaround waterman. A professional, all-around SUP surfer, SUP racer, kiter, windsurfer, wing foiler. Basically a multi-sport athlete! •

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P H O T O G R A P H E R Alex Graydon This particular Lake in Florida is a rad spot because the depth goes from about 10 feet down to three or four where the ­c ypress trees rise out of the darkness.

It creates a one-of-a-kind surf wave that several of my buddies have been wakesurfing on longboards. Basically, plowing the boat in circles around the small sunken island and creating a wave that goes WAY back. I couldn’t help but be tempted to give it a rip on the foil after seeing this first-hand. Dodging and weaving through the trees, reconnecting with the wave, and chasing the boat rollers around this small island was a treat.

The cypress trees stain the water such a dark brown that you can’t see the foil in the water at all – keeping you on your toes when it comes to knowing how much mast is left below the surface!

Jeff

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A few shots landed in the Foiling Magazine inbox that we just couldn’t ignore for two good reasons… 1) It’s Cloudbreak firing, which is never anything less than a lovely sight to behold, and 2) It’s got the big man in…

Laird Hamilton helped put hydrofoiling on the water sports agenda, and arguably kickstarted the levels of uptake that we’ve seen exponentially grow ever since the surf film Step Into Liquid was released. Laird was mid-travels when we tried to get in touch to talk about this session, so his tow partner Benny Ferris was kind enough to give us some insight into the session instead…

Had you chased this swell down? Or was it just a 'right place, right time' session? We came specifically because of the forecast.

There wasn’t an extraordinary swell, but it was a week of solid surf with some nice conditions, so it was a good chance to suss out the area and get acquainted to the place from a foiling perspective. Not to mention it was mid-summer for the northern hemisphere and we were in need of a little excitement.

Was this the biggest day? This was a ‘day after the swell had peaked’ session. The size was down and there were more people in the water, so we rode a couple of waves each and moved on. Small swell and lots of people isn’t the best combo…

Tell us about the Lift foil setup you guys were riding out there...

We were both on the same setup essentially. We had the Lift 100 surf wing with the 36” mast. I really can’t say enough good things about the Lift stuff. The performance, control, and range of conditions they work in is unbelievable. We used the 100 wing in head high surf in Peru, and in triple overhead surf in Fiji and it worked very well in both. Truly amazing.

And what board is that? Those are tow-specific boards made by Terry Chung. Terry is a master shaper and legend in all ocean disciplines. He’s Laird’s real tow partner. I just fill in when given the chance!

TOP LEFT Benny Ferris, very much in ‘the zone’.

BOT TOM LEFT Yeah, we'd happily sit ion the shoulder and watch too.

We've seen some footage from this session, and there's a moment where you're pretty close to the barrel... Where are we at with foil barrel riding? It will happen at some point. The quality of the equipment has definitely brought us closer than ever. That said I don’t think it will be commonplace for a long time. We’re all still learning how to ride straight!

A B OV E Laird takes the reigns ready to swoop into another Cloudbreak bomb.

So who gets more waves on an average session... you or Laird?!

On average it’s about the same. Ride till you break the handle. Ha! •

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Note the boil of the reef. This is why it pays to know this wave as well as Laird does‌

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A slightly different take on Outer Banks here, more ‘Inner Riverbanks’ if anything, but still an adventure nonetheless when Adrian Geislinger, founder of Levitaz Hydro­ foils, recently found himself in the heart of Dutch country on the Flysurfer/Levitaz ‘We are Trippin’ global tour. A chance mention of an iconic spot right in the heart of the Netherlands couldn’t be passed up, so the crew woke early and the mission began…

So firstly Adrian, tell us where this is and how you came to be here with a foil? This was the last stop of the ‘We are Trippin’’ project in the Netherlands. Before arriving, we’d already checked some spots to kite or surf along the coast. But what you realize after a quick look on the map is that this whole country is full of water. Canals everywhere. In my mind I just thought: “This is a pumping paradise!”

So how did you find out about this sport? Wherever we went I saw an option to take my foil out and start pumping. Houseboats, bridges and docks were all fair game for either a takeoff or a fly by on the water. After our first session at Brouwersdam, we heard about this iconic Dutch place with several old windmills lined up next to a canal. The water was supposed to be super calm and deep enough for a foil. It almost sounded too good to be true, but we were determined to check it out and make something happen.

How did the day unfold? We made it an early morning mission and got up with the sunrise. We parked up by a long bike path that ran along the canal, and we could see the windmills on the horizon, so we decided to take out our skateboards and ride down to the spot.

We arrived at a pumping playground! Super calm water, docks, draw bridges, houseboats, all located in front of these stunning windmills.

Who’s this guy watching you from his houseboat? It’s the owner of the boat, who was probably wondering what the hell was flying past his living room. We tried not to disturb him. But he was pretty stoked and wanted to give it a try himself.

Were there any challenging moments? I was a bit nervous if I would make the jump onto the board. There were a lot of plants in the water so a traditional dock start would have been difficult. But the We are Trippin’ crew helped me out. Michael Leitner was holding the board, so I was able to take off perfectly. I’ve never pumped for that long. We checked the footage and it was over a minute and twenty.

So who was there with you? The We are Trippin’ crew helped me through the shoot and we actually planned out the session together.

They got me in the right mindset and no mistakes were allowed during that pumping shoot! Moreover, they made sure that everything went down smoothly.

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And finally, who took the shots? That was Alex Schwarz. We’ve been working together for quite a while now. I love to do shoots like that with him because we are a well-drilled team. No words needed – we know that each of us will deliver and we usually get some nice photos out of it too, which of course is helpful! •

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Have foil, will trundle: Adrian, post-session.

BOT TOM Probably not his average morning view...

The only way this could get get more quintessentially Dutch is if Adrian was pumping in clogs. Which is probably not out of the realms of possibility.

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BY DR. GEORGE HRADIL

TUNING YOUR HYDROFOIL FOR OPTIMAL PERFORMANCE AND SAFETY

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Delta Hydrofoil's Dr George takes us through the science of waterflow across your wing and why it pays to keep your foil silky smooth...

Hydrofoils suffer a lot of abuse. They run aground; they strike objects in the water, they get dropped in the parking lot… All of this can lead to scratches and dents, which degrades the foil’s performance.

Most hydro­foils also arrive from the manufacturer with a less than perfect surface finish, and significant performance improvements can be achieved by sanding and maintaining your foil’s surface finish. In short: You need to show your foil some love! The difference you can make is significant and can easily be felt on the water. Plus maintaining the trailing edges of your wing, stabilizer, and strut is also important for safety, and will help prevent you from being cut by your foil.

WHAT WATER DOES AT A SURFACE AND WHY IT MATTERS When water slides past a solid surface, two types of flow are possible – laminar and turbulent. Turbulent flow has about five times the drag (resistance to movement through water) than a laminar flow.

That is a huge difference. During laminar flow, water layers near the surface are stable and slide over each other like a deck of cards being spread out on a table. The layers don’t mix. In a turbulent flow, the layers aren’t stable, and do intermix. Hydrofoils are streamlined objects; the flow over a smooth streamlined object begins as laminar flow and at some point transitions to turbulent flow. Laminar flow can usually be maintained over the first third of the wing, where the wing gets thicker. At the point of maximum thickness, the wing starts to get thinner, and the flow typically transitions to turbulent.

Any imperfections on the surface of the first third of the wing can cause a premature transition to turbulent flow – and greatly increase drag, and drag is what slows you down. Therefore, it is important that the first third of the wing, as well as the strut and stabilizer, be very smooth and free of defects. The first third of the wing is the most critical, but I recommend smoothing the entire foil. •

Essential tools of the trade for the average foil surface tinkerer...

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MAKING IT HAPPEN First, fill any dents or scratches. For large dents, I use an epoxy like JB weld. Avoid fast set epoxy glue, like five-minute epoxy, as these fast set glues are too soft and don’t sand well. Pinholes and tiny scratches can be filled with glazing putty from an auto supply store, and while you’re there, buy some wet and dry sandpaper in 320, 600 and 1200 grit. You’ll also need hard and medium density sanding blocks. For the hard block, a wood paint stirrer can be used; for the medium block, I use a piece of EVA floor tile.

I always sand using water to provide lubrication and to eliminate dust. Start with 320 sandpaper and wrap it around a hard block.

Sand any filler that you applied until the excess is gone and only the filler in the dents or scratches remain. Then start to sand the entire surface. Work in a clean, well lit area, making sure there is no sand anywhere, and place the wing on an old towel so it doesn’t slide around. Sand in diagonal strokes, alternating direction occasionally.

The goal is to get a flat, defect-free surface. Wet your wing and sand paper frequently.

Most wings come with a sprayed finish, which has some orange peel surface or other defects. Decals will also cause surface irregularities, and you want to sand these irregularities out. Work in small sections, occasionally drying the surface and inspecting it. You may sand into the graphics if you are not careful, so be aware. Change your sandpaper often, as it wears out. Be patient, this takes some time.

Once you have the surface flat, you can begin to smooth it by sanding with the medium density block with 600. The purpose of this step is to sand away the scratches made by the 320. Dry the surface occasionally with a clean rag to check your progress, and when you no longer see scratches from the 320, switch to the 1200 with the medium block. Now you are eliminating the 600 scratches.

When you’re done, the surface will be reflective at a raking angle (looking along the surface).

Now it’s time to give the trailing edges some attention. You’re working to square, and then slightly round, the trailing edge. Take your hard block with 320 paper and sand the trailing edge with the block perpendicular to the edge. You are squaring this edge. Be careful and wear protective gloves to prevent cutting yourself on the trailing edge. The goal is to eliminate any nicks or roughness in the edge… If the edge is rough, it is like a serrated knife, and it can cut. If the edge is smooth, the chances of being cut are greatly reduced. Once the edge is smoothed with 320, proceed with the medium block and 600 and 1200 paper. You’ll know you’re done when the edge is smooth and slightly rounded over. Never sharpen the edges of your foil! Sharp edges are dangerous and have no performance benefits at all. Again, the trailing edge should be squared, and then slightly rounded over.

The wing is by far the most important part of the foil to sand, but it is worth sanding the stabilizer as well. The strut should also be done if it’s composite (carbon) but I don’t recommend sanding an aluminum strut. A properly sanded foil feels entirely different and much improved. Ideally, you’ll be a lot more careful with it, now that you know how much work goes into smoothing it.

If you’re not confident doing this yourself or don’t have an appropriate work space, a local board builder may be able to do it for you and you can check Delta Hydrofoils on YouTube for more tips.

Happy foiling, and keep it smooth! •

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RIGHT Smoother the wing, smoother the ride...

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F-ONE GRAVITY 2200

MFC TRACTION PAD SETS

STARBOARD FOIL SURF V2

LEVITAZ SHAKA

The new big boy in the F-ONE Grav-

If you want to be a surf foiling

The second incarnation of Star-

Levitaz’s primary Surf/SUP foil

ity range, ideal for the larger rider or

legend then you’re going to be

board’s Foil Surf range is tested and

setup is the Shaka, which got its test

anyone using boards above 7ft, it’s a

doing lot pumping and carving and

developed with AK Durable Supply

run in issue #1. Both the M (bigger

pumping machine and is designed to

generally keeping your feet busy.

Co's Clinton Filen, and has seen

waves, higher speeds) and the L

ride the smallest waves, while also

With that in mind, you need to

tweaks to improve paddle speed,

(smaller waves, flatwater pumping)

being a true glider on downwinders.

be confident that nothing’s going

as well as increased stability and

enjoy a consistent, reliable lift and

Also ideal for anyone hooked on

to slip out at the wrong moment.

smoother touch downs. Their use of

are both supremely accessible foils.

flying with a surf wing.

Thankfully MFC have got his… Their

‘Blue Carbon’ means it has a suitably

So good that the test team haven’t

new Traction Pads are the thinnest

‘tropical water’ aesthetic, as well as

quite found the time to ship it back

on the market at just 3mm thick and

giving it an epic weight to strength

to Levitaz yet…

come in three size options to suit

ratio.

your set-up.

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RIDE ENGINE STRIKE

SLINGSHOT HOVER GLIDE CARBON

NORTH SONAR SURF

AK SURF FOIL

5mm of foam padding and a TPU

These two new carbon wings from

The FM team had a preview of

This new AK Surf Foil has the 1600

coated nylon ripstop means these

Slingshot work with their well-­

North’s new Sonar Surf Edition mul-

Surf front wing and a surf style rear

5’ Strike Foil board bags from Ride

received Hover Glide platform and

ti-discipline foil, and even watched

wing with performance optimized

Engine are safe bets for keeping

offer two distinct variations, with

on as designer Uli Sommerlatt

for small to medium swells. Also a

your board snug and secure on your

the smaller of the two being a feisty

attached it to a wall and hung off it –

great foil for the heavier set amongst

journey to the beach and, with a

little beast, very fast, and well up

proving that their GeoLock tapered

us, it has plenty of lift under its hood,

Velcro mast channel, if you’ve got

for solid surf and boosting big when

geometry locking system between

and sits in a happy spot between

the space you can keep your foil

­r iding wake. The 99 is the largest in

mast and fuselage is about as strong

speed, maneuverability and pumping

attached as well…

the HG range, and is the sensible,

as it gets…

ability. Also just as happy cruising

sturdy and reliable daddy of the

behind a boat if the waves aren’t up

bunch, highly dependable and per-

to scratch…

fect for bigger boards and riders.

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A BOV E TH E REST

2.5 kg

We de sign e d a s urf fo i l fo r a dva n c e d r ide rs lo o k i n g t o p us h their spe e d a nd m a n e uve ra b i li t y to the n ext l eve l.

O u r foi ls are m ade wi th P re- Preg C ar bon Fi ber whi ch i s i ncredi bl y l ig h t and s ti ff.

O u r u ni q u ely thi n hydrofoi l wi ng p rof il e creates les s dr ag, m ore s p eed , a nd m ore li ft.

w w w. d e l t a hyd rofo i l . c o m

@d el t asurf foi l s

f ac ebook .c om /d el t asurf foi l s/

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AXIS 1010 DOWNWIND WING

RRD WIND WING

ARMSTRONG HS232

NAISH HA WINGS

AXIS Foils new high-aspect 1010

Behold! Here’s RRD’s entry into

Fresh out of the Armstrong work-

Hot off the production line, Naish’s

front wing (the larger of three in

the handheld Wing market, with a

shops is this high speed (that’s

new HA (high aspect) series of

their Downwind wing series, with a

chunky leading edge for stiffness,

the HS bit) 232 tail wing, a lively

wings come in sizes 1240, 1400, 1800,

competition-focused wing coming

power and control, and soft handles

little upgrade that’s built to work

covering a range of rider weight,

soon) has been designed for the

on the middle for solid grip and

hand-in-hand with the rest of the

wave size and wind strengths. Pitched

small to medium downwinder market,

less strain when the gusts come

Armstrong HS range and is fully

to the surf, wing surf and SUP market,

and also translates nicely for those

in. And with RRD’s stealthy orange

compatible with the CF range too.

these wings are interchangeable with

wanting to take it out for some fun

and black aesthetic, you’ll look the

Enhanced acceleration, turns on a

the existing Naish Jet range, enjoy

times in small to medium surf. It is

absolute business too.

dime, and should probably be at

excellent pumpability and, we’re told

lightning fast, super-stable, with

the top of any half-decent foil riders

(we plan to have these tested by the

plenty of early lift and amazing

Christmas stocking this year…

next issue) they’re fast…

pumping abilities… Then you can combine it with their 460 rear wing for an even speedier package.

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OVER THE EDGE W O R D S GRANT BAKER P H O T O S LUKE WILLIAMS

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No shrinking violet from sizeable surf, South African Grant ‘Twiggy’ Baker took up the offer of a trip to the Mentawais to meet up with an old friend on the promise of a solid incoming Indo swell, and the lure of both epic surfing and surf foiling conditions in a paradise spot. It was also a chance for him to test his own limits on a foil. It turned into an unforgettable trip…

HERE I AM, watching a ten wave set steam down the reef towards me and I’m doing exactly what I told myself not to do a hundred times before my arrival in Indonesia, I’m waiting to drop into a 6ft low tide reef break on a chunky 5’10 foil board made for extra paddle power. I’m praying nothing goes wrong and ends my holiday before it even starts.

I’ve been foiling for a number of years now and the progression has always been towards bigger, heavier waves but I’m beginning to have my doubts. Towing into bigger waves is one thing but it's basically cheating. The ultimate test of the foil and its place in the surfing world is how big a wave we can paddle into, make the drop and ride out onto the flats. So the time has come to test my limits, and my equipment’s level of performance.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves, so let's start at the beginning and why I'm on a foil in 6ft waves in Indonesia anyway…

I was always an avid kitesurfer and have been sponsored by F-ONE for many years and had played around with a foil and a kite a few times over the years, as well as the boot scene, but neither resonated with me and after a few attempts at both, I decided I wasn’t too keen on the sport after all. What changed it for me was seeing the first few Hawaiians starting to foil on a regular

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type surfboard without straps. As soon as I saw the first few clips, I knew the game was on and immediately contacted F-ONE and we started to work on a foil/board combo that would work for us. It was tough initially as the kite foils weren’t ideal for the waves but we persevered and used all their knowledge from kiting to eventually come up with some awesome foils, and I was away.

Things moved fast and before I knew it I had a bunch of boards and foils to test and suddenly we were ripping around on wind swells, then little waves and soon enough proper waves. The evolution of the surf foil was fast and exciting and it was an amazing time to be involved in the sport and helping move it forward.

Around the same time as I felt we had some great equipment that worked well, I received an invite from an old friend, Gideon Malherbe, who had just opened a new surf camp, deep in the heart of the Mentawais. He had fallen in love with a particular part of the Indonesian archipelago, and most nights would anchor in a protected spot behind a beautiful sandspit on the southern end of Awera Island whenever passing through the area on his old charter boat, the Indies Explorer. I wonder if one can ever truly say that you have found your little place in the world? Because in the end he sold his boat, swallowed the anchor, and settled on that very sandspit. •

RIGHT Twig in 'full send' mode on a tasty little Indo peeler.

Another distinctly uncrowded day in the Ments. It's a tough life...

“ALL PRECONCEIVED IDEAS ABOUT HOW PACKED THE MENTAWAIS ARE WERE QUICKLY DISPELLED AS WE HARDLY SURFED OR FOILED WITH ANYONE ELSE.”

“I HAD THE REALIZATION THAT THIS IS TRULY THE FUTURE OF SURFING, AND WE HAVE ONLY JUST TOUCHED ON WHAT IS POSSIBLE.”

Twiggy far too focused at this critical point to pinch himself and check it's all for real...

“IN HIS MAIL HE RAVED ABOUT THIS WAVE HE THOUGHT WOULD BE PERFECT FOR THE FOIL AND IT TOOK ALL OF THREE SECONDS TO CONVINCE ME.”

LEFT Above or below, there's very little that's unattractive about the Mentawais...

A B OV E R I G H T Enjoying a well-earned rest...

Apart from all the well-known Mentawai gems in the area, he had found a few waves that get big, and are seldom ridden. So when the charts lit up with one of the biggest swells of the season, he got hold of me and reached out to come over. In his mail he raved about this wave he thought would be perfect for the foil and it took all of three seconds to convince me. The plan was to surf two big swells a week apart, and foil on the downtime in between and afterwards, basically a perfect holiday situation and it shows the incredible versatility of the area around Bilou Villas. Perfect long reef passes and big outer bombies for surfing backed up by ideal runners on the insides for the foil.

For two weeks we surfed and foiled our brains out with the two major highlights being surfing a massive outer reef righthander – just two of us out, with 12 to 15ft Bawa-style A-frame bombs horseshoeing onto the reef, and a tucked away roping 3-6ft foil wave that ended in deep water and then swelled towards the beach for the perfect surf foil setup. These waves, coupled with some epic lefts for both surf and foil – as well as some death defying shallow right hand barrels – confirmed that this was the place for anyone looking for a truly epic surf and foil holiday destination.. All in all it was one of the most memorable surf trips of my life and what the foil

has done for us is offer so much variety to what we are doing. Big bombing barrels on the surfboard followed by fun, fun, fun on the foil in long, perfect, clean waves.

No more downtime, sitting around waiting for waves.

You can take advantage of every moment in paradise to ride whatever is available. This amazing area is perfect for just such a trip and is also particularly uncrowded, and all preconceived ideas about how packed the Mentawais are were quickly dispelled as we hardly surfed or foiled with anyone else, and our favorite saying when approaching another empty line-up was: “Jeez, it’s crowded in the Ments!”

So all this takes me back to the aforementioned wave. A solid 6 footer that I had no right to be paddling into on a foil. But I had been building up to it for a few years, then a couple months and finally the last two weeks, and now the moment had arrived… I lined it up, paddled as hard as I could, felt the wave lift the tail, jumped to my feet, drove hard over my front foot, and felt the power and energy of the wave come through the foil and shoot me at maximum speed down the steep drop, off the bottom and out onto the shoulder…

Then I had the realization that this is truly the future of surfing, and we have only just touched on what is truly possible. It's a good time to be alive. •

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Rafael Tapia is known for his big wave prowess and ­nomadic lifestyle of chasing watery monsters around the globe. So after bumping into a big wave filmmaker on a stopover in Australia, and with a foil in his suitcase, fate got in the way and he found h ­ imself on a boat in Tasmania, motoring through a solid dawn swell ­heading toward the notoriously sketchy point at Shipstern Bluff.

We had to hear the rest of the story…

PHOTOS STU GIBSON

So first tell us about your time in Tasmania. Were you out there just to surf?

I was actually on my way to Bali from Chile where I was on a ski trip. I had a stopover in Sydney where I met with Tim Bonython, who shoots big wave surfing. I've been with him in Teahupoo and Nazaré a bunch of times, and he was trying to persuade me to go to Tasmania. I was super jetlagged and coming out of an injury, so I wasn’t very keen. Anyway, long story short, he did manage to talk me into it! I like giant waves, but Shipsterns hadn’t been on my list of waves that I wanted to surf.

You look pretty comfortable on that foil. How long have you been foiling?

Well I don’t know if I look too comfortable! But I’ve been foiling for around 10 years, from back when we were using snowboard boots and steel masts, and we could only tow-in. Back then the foils would only work in pretty big waves where you had a lot of speed. I made the transition to normal paddle foiling as it developed, and I love trying to get on some bigger waves as well. I’ve ridden a foil a couple times at Nazaré and Mavericks, and I’ve had a few sessions foiling on some heavy slabs in Chile and in Galicia in Spain, so I felt pretty comfortable with the wave at Shipsterns.

What were your thoughts about Shipsterns?

Well, it's not a wave that really appealed to me too much before this trip. I'm not the best backside barrel rider at all. I'm very comfortable frontside barrel riding, but Shipsterns is a very gnarly wave, with that big step, and there's not that many people who surf it backside. So it wasn’t really on my radar, but I was stoked to get to foil it and surf it!

So how did the session begin?

The trip started very early in the morning, we got into a boat and it's an hour to get there and it was pretty rough, even at dawn. Once we arrived there were some big waves coming through. I didn't think

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it was that big until Justin ‘Jughead’ Allport went out and just shredded a huge one, and took a gnarly wipeout that ended up being pretty serious, although we didn't really know that at the time.

Were you keen to get in there?

Well I was so seasick from the rolling of the boat and with the jetlag that I couldn't really move. My friends were trying to psyche me out to go foiling as everyone knew I had a foil with me! I just didn't feel like it, and I was making peace with myself that I wasn't going to surf this time. I'm coming out of some very gnarly shoulder surgery, so I didn't want to risk myself with Nazaré season starting soon. This hadn’t been on my list, and I said to myself, "Ok, I came to Tasmania, and I'm not gonna surf.” Then, with all the movement of the boat, I just kind of passed out! Once I woke up from that power nap I felt like myself again, and then I was like, "Ok, it's game on!"

And you were straight in the water?

Yeah, I started rigging up the foil which made me feel more seasick! Then I paddled out there with Zeb Critchlow, a super nice guy, and he talked me into some crazy waves. We kind of didn't find the right waves at the start but then we started getting into it. On one of the bigger ones, local backsider Danny Griffiths was inside the barrel while I was riding the shoulder and that was pretty sick. Then I got another foil wave with Kipp Caddy who was also in the barrel.

There was lots more sharing and everyone was super happy, saying I was the first person to ever foil Shipsterns. That was enough for me, so then I got on a surfboard and had about eight more waves and a couple of barrels. I was super happy.

Then it turned out that things weren’t great for Jughead?

The ride back in was super heavy. Jughead didn’t know this at the time but he had perforated a lung, broken his vertebrae and had seven broken ribs, and it was an hour to get back in against 40 knot winds, and the boat was jumping up and down. Yeah, it was pretty gnarly. •

BEFORE

“MY FRIENDS WERE TRYING TO PSYCHE ME OUT TO GO FOILING AS EVERYONE KNEW I HAD A FOIL WITH ME...”

AFTER

This session doesn’t look like the absolute biggest we’ve seen it, but it has to be one of the world’s heavier spots, right?

It's definitely not the biggest waves you've ever seen at Shipsterns, but it was pretty solid. It's definitely one of the heaviest waves I've surfed. Fortunately enough, I didn't get the Shipsterns flogging, so I'm pretty happy about that! But yeah, there's a couple of really gnarly spots up in Ireland, and Nazaré has to be up there as one of the gnarliest places in the world. But with a foil you can kind of play it a little bit safe if you know what you're doing. I was pretty happy I didn't get hurt.

How are the challenges of ‘regular’ surfing Shipsterns different to foil surfing it?

Well you still have to go over the step, and you’re still only looking for the bigger waves. It’s definitely different. I think foil surfing it is pretty safe because you can get away from it easier, but then again, if you make a big mistake with a foil, it can be lethal…

Which do you think is scarier?!

I think they’re both scary you know? Like when you’re foiling and up on the top of a big ass wave and you’re trying to control your speed coming down, it’s pretty scary! Same as when you’re hitting those crazy ledges, and you know that mistakes can break bones.

So I don’t know, I would say both of them are pretty scary, I wouldn’t pick one as any worse!

We’ve got quite a bit of big wave coverage this issue. Do you think big wave foiling is going to be a big part of the sport?

Well, to be honest, big wave foiling is still developing. I’m into bigger waves so I’m always at the front and center of it, and talking to a lot of the boys, we’re all out there trying to get bigger waves.

We had one crazy session last year on some outer, outer, outer bank, close to Mavericks, and that was pretty heavy. But I think we’re still getting the gear to work better for bigger waves, so that we can ride steeper and deeper. I hate to be running to the shoulder, but sometimes you have to because of the amount of lift these bigger waves have, and then if you fall it’s pretty heavy too. So I don’t think it’s for everyone, but it’s nice to know that with big wave foiling we can be surfing the same waves with other people and not create wake or cause any problems, so that’s pretty fun. •

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A B OV E A N D R I G H T Where most humans would be focused on making it out alive, Rafael shares a wave, a laugh, and some stoke with local rider Danny Griffiths.

“YOU REALLY NEED TO BE A LITTLE BIT NUTS TO SURF THAT WAVE ALL THE TIME. I’LL BE HAPPY TO SURF IT MAYBE A COUPLE TIMES IN MY LIFE AND THEN I’M GOOD…”

Yeah this session looked pretty fun with lots of smiles!

For sure, the vibe and the local people are insane. The Tazzy lads are interesting people, they’re all friendly, and they charge really hard, so yeah, they became friends right away! Full respect to those boys… You really need to be a little bit nuts to surf that wave all the time. I’ll be happy to surf it maybe a couple times in my life and then I’m good…

Can you talk us through the set up you were riding?

Well, because this wasn't meant to be a trip to foil surf big waves, I just had my prone foil with me that has inserts to put straps on. I've been riding AXIS foils for quite a bit now, I really like the way they handle any kind of surf. I actually didn’t have a long enough mast with me, I only had a 75cm mast and I would usually use something a little bit larger for bigger waves. But I'm really comfortable on the 75, which is the one I use the most. I was riding an AXIS prone board that was developed in conjunction with Adrian Roper [lead designer at AXIS] and I was using a 680 wing, a long fuselage and a 400 back wing. I really like the way you can change the setup on AXIS foils, so I travel with that all the time.

So what’s up next?

Well, I finally made it to Bali. I've been foiling and surfing a bunch here and trying to get healthy for Nazaré when the big wave season starts over there, and I’ll be setting up camp there and then doing trips to Hawaii or anywhere where big waves pop up.

And will you always be taking a foil?!

That's a very good question. Right now I pretty much only take a foil with me! I already have friends and boards stashed around the world as it’s so hard to travel with everything. So basically my luggage consists of a foil, a prone foil board, and a kite, and then I have friends around the world who have boards that I can use when I need to…

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AND FROM THE PHOTOGRAPHER’S PERSPECTIVE… Hey Stu, so is Shipsterns a regular subject for you?

Yes, I’ve been shooting Shippies for a long time now. I think I first made the trek there in 2001.

How do you prepare and what’s the plan of action for you when shooting there?

It comes pretty natural these days. We have a great group of mates that surf the place, we have skis and boats, and everyone is very confident in wild seas and big waves, so we all look out for each other. The camera tech side of things is just like a normal day shooting, I like to shoot water pics down there, so I either go by boat or walk in and swim for most of the day.

Looks like there was a lot of camaraderie in the water that day?

It was a fairly busy day, but we are all friends and happy to share the place with anyone, everyone was stoked to share some waves with Rafael on the foil.

When shooting foiling over regular surfing, is there any difference in how you’d shoot?

Yeah sometimes I like to watch the person or get to know them a bit before I’ll jump in the water with them. I shoot a lot of foiling in Fiji with some great surfers, it’s pretty freaky at first when shooting in the water with a wide angle, there is a lot of trust in the person flying past your legs!

What’s your take on the future of big wave foiling?

I’m pretty new to foiling but every year I see the foilers going bigger and faster, so hopefully it keeps improving. It certainly unlocks plenty of different wave zones… •

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IT’S A WING THING Against many peoples’ expectations, handheld wings have very quickly become a must-have accoutrement for any self-respecting foiler, and the market for these increasingly technically refined toys is growing quicker than anyone could have imagined. Duotone’s Ken Winner was one of the first few wing design pioneers, and he knows exactly why demand is growing so fast.

We got his take on it…

So firstly Tony, tell us a little about your background in design?

I have been building toys since I was old enough to remember. There were a few other kids in my neighborhood, so I spent a lot of time building kites and ­coaster carts and zip lines, etc. I also helped my father with boating and construction projects. In windsurfing I evolved over time from competing to designing. I studied books like ‘Aero-Hydrodynamics of Sailing’ by C.A Marchaj, and worked with established board and sail designers for quite a few years.

When kiting came along in the late nineties, I was reluctant to take on the design role, but it was such a new sport there were nearly no knowledgeable designers. The only way for us to get a good kite was to dive in and make as many mistakes as possible as quickly as possible, which is what I did. We got lucky and were up to speed in the state of the art with our first model.

Ralf, our other kite designer, and I have been going at it hard for nearly 20 years, so we have a massive base of knowledge in design. •

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“There’s a lot of windsurfing knowledge that feeds into Foil Wing design, so it’s good that I have 44 years of experience in windsurfing and kitesurfing to put into it.”

LEFT Ken Winner, a man who's clearly held a lot of sails in a lot of strong winds through his time...

A B OV E The Duotone Foil Wing on a field test.

TOP RIGHT Ken and Sky Solbach talk shop.

Where does the wing concept originate from and when did you begin looking into its viability?

For me it started with my first hand-held wings for SUP riding. Sky Solbach and I tested the first one in the fall of 2010 and then another a few months later. We didn’t see the potential at that time, but Ralf turned the idea into a really ingenious, award-winning inflatable sail for windsurfing. I think we started producing that in 2015. The idea of an inflatable wing reignited in my mind in May of 2018, when I saw a video of Flash Austin wing foiling on a wing that he had built from, I guess, sail battens and ripstop. I immediately thought I could build something like it with inflatable construction, so threw together a design and sent the patterns to our factory. A week later I had a very primitive proto in hand.

I started foiling within probably 10 meters of the beach and continued out to the surf line. I had been trying to SUP foil downwind and my shoulder was sore from it, so I saw this wing as a way for me to do downwind foiling a little more successfully without hurting my shoulder.

So onto the Duotone Foil Wing itself. How did you sell it to the company?

Well, I started it with the first protos, and Sky quickly saw that it was a fun sport. When Sky went to a Duotone dealer meeting in June of 2018, I asked him to take a Foil Wing proto. He came back saying no one took any interest. However, I still thought it was a lot of fun to do, so I kept riding and designing protos. I took another

proto to a meeting in Hood River in August. There was a little more interest there, but no real enthusiasm still.

Then in November of 2018, Till, our CEO, tried it. He was up and foiling in minutes (granted, he’s a good athlete) and that convinced him the sport had potential. I think perhaps initially it was held back by the fact that it looks more difficult to do than it is.

Were you aware that other brands and designers were also looking at wing design?

I rode wings all summer of 2018, all fall, all winter, and as far as I knew, the only people taking interest were my colleagues at Duotone and my neighbor, Alan Cadiz.

What was that one big fist-pump moment?

The first time I tried it! I knew it would be a fun sport straight away. I could immediately see that, as a minimum, it was a good way to get flying on the foil and doing foil downwinders. And since downwinding feels a lot like snowboarding in powder, I knew other people would like it.

Duotone have a solid lineage with their kites. How much does 'kite design' feed into the Foil Wing?

We use many of the same materials. We also use the same software, but we use it in a different way. There’s also a lot of windsurfing knowledge that feeds into Foil Wing design, so it’s good that I have 44 years of experience in windsurfing and kitesurfing to put into it. •

K E N W I N N E R 1 0 3

The main difference in your wing is the boom – why did you go down this route and what did you feel the advantages were?

Handles were for sure the quick and easy place to start and they required no tooling, no upfront expense or learning. However, I almost immediately went away from soft handles and started using hybrid struts – inflated struts with a rigid bar attached. I felt that the bar was a superior user interface – much more comfortable and intuitive. With a bar there is no looking to see where the handles are when tacking or jibing. No letting go of one handle in a gust to move to another handle. There’s the ability to easily slide hands to the perfect position for equal loading of both arms. The stiff, rigid bar for a user interface permits smooth, seamless wing handling.

Soft handles can never match this. There are also some interesting variations on this user interface in the pipeline that we will introduced over time, after proper testing and refinement.

“It’s great to see recreational riders so stoked on a new sport and it’s exciting to see the pros taking it to levels I could not have imagined.”

There are clear extra variables for anyone using a Foil Wing. How easy is it to learn to ride with one?

Windsurfing and kitesurfing are great, addictive sports, but wing foiling is not only addictive but it’s easier, so people can learn it more quickly. Riders with the right background and experience can do it immediately.

Riders with no wind sports experience can do it on a big windsurfing board in a matter of minutes.

Do you think wings might outgrow kitesurfing and windsurfing in terms of sales?

First, I have to say that kitesurfing is the most amazingly powerful and versatile water sport on the planet.

That said, the fact that wing foiling is easier than kitesurfing means it has the potential to be big. Add a big, floaty board to the ‘wing’ and you have a fun afternoon for the whole family. Add a hydrofoil and you have a ride guaranteed to keep you smiling…

Have you been surprised by how quickly they are being adopted?

Yes, I’ve been surprised. It’s great to see recreational riders so stoked on a new sport and it’s exciting to see the pros taking it to levels I could not have imagined.

Name the biggest single reason why a foil rider should pick one up for the first time…

It’s a sensation like no other in watersports. The nearest analog is snowboarding in powder, but without the cost of a helicopter. •

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A B OV E Bobo Gallagher takes the wing for an open ocean spin...

RIGHT No paddle-power required…

ANDREW COTTON P H OTO A N D R E S I LVA

G

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P R O F I L E S O F T H E P R O S

Photo João Vidinha

As the European big wave season is now under way, the focus of the world shifts to one of the most infamous big wave spots on the planet, Nazaré in Portugal, where a hardcore international crew of chargers sit and wait patiently for big red, purple and black blobs to appear on the swell charts. There’s one rider who’s certainly paid his dues in this place, not least with his well-documented and very dramatic back injury which almost ended his big wave career. But now, he’s back, he’s in top form, and has been getting in plenty of foil action between the nuttier sized swells.

Hey Andrew, so first up tell us what made you first pick up a foil and how your first few sessions were?

Probably like most people I’d watched the likes of Laird then Kai flying effortlessly across waves and linking lumps of ocean energy and I definitely wanted a try. Unfortunately, reality hit hard and my first few sessions were non-starters: it was beyond me and I couldn’t believe how hard it was!

You’ve used foiling as part of your rehab plan after your infamous back injury, a knee injury late last year, and then the follow up surgery on your ACL. For those not in the know, how did you get these injuries?

Both injuries were from surfing, the back injury where I fractured my L2 vertebrae was at big Nazaré where I faded on a pretty solid section and misread the wave, I ended up bailing and the impact from the fall broke my back. The ACL injury was pretty much 12 months later at the Punta Galea Big Wave Challenge contest, I took off deep on a heavy section and just got clipped. It pushed me into my board and unfortunately my knee was the weakest link. Cue knee surgery and another solid stint of rehab!

Ouch. So do you believe there are tangible benefits in rehab from foiling over regular surfing? Or is it just plain ol’ watertime hours?

The great thing about foiling or wake foiling behind the ski is that once you’re up and on the foil there’s no impact on the body, yet all the muscles are firing and working super hard. It’s a great

way to get in the water and train without feeling like you’re actually training. You still have to put the hours in in the gym, but it’s definitely a great way to mix it up and keep it fun.

Does injury anxiety sit on your mind despite all the planning and preparation?

Yeah of course it does, no-one wants to get injured and when you’re dealing with the unpredictability of the ocean and giant waves, the chances are pretty high. But to be 100% honest as soon as I’m in the sea actually surfing I don’t think about it at all. All those thoughts leave my mind, and I just focus on surfing and the moment.

That’s the great thing about it.

Have you taken the foil out in any ‘serious’ Nazaré swell yet?

Not yet, although that was another motivation to start foiling, being able to ride giant ocean swells and waves without all the bumps and chop you experience on a normal tow board. I’ve got a big wave foil from Slingshot which is suitable but I’ve yet to properly test it at giant Nazaré. I’m sure it will happen though.

Out of the Nazaré big wave riders, are there many others who’ve caught the foil bug? We have Rafael Tapia in this issue too who we know is one…

Yeah, pretty sure anyone who’s tried it is hooked. There’s Rafael, and there’s also Sebastian Steudtner who has been foiling loads, as has Maya Gabeira, Glynn Ovens… •

A N D R E W C OT TO N 1 0 7

There’s some debate as to where surf foiling sits as it gets more and more popular and finds its place in the world. In issue #1, Caio Ibelli described it as just a part of a “waterman” lifestyle, rather than something we should be looking at for tricks and competitiveness. What’s your take on where it sits and where it’s headed?

Wow, great question. I have no idea where it’s best placed and I totally get the concerns about foils in crowded line ups. I think Caio is right though, and maybe it’s part of the waterman lifestyle, although I know whoever takes the time to try it gets totally addicted and then adds one to their quiver! For me I’m no way near doing tricks, I can just about do a cutty but for me it just totally opens up options and maximizes water time, helping you keep fitter for when the waves are good.

You’ve recently returned from a trip to Indo. How was that, and did you get any foil action while there?

Yeah Indo was epic, I haven’t been for years so was great to be back. I just took normal boards and left the foil at home, my main focus was to get paddle fit and the knee moving before the start of the Euro big wave season. Which I managed to do, so I was stoked.

You have had a crack at foiling the Severn Bore in the UK. We’ve heard stories of people getting their foil caught up in tree roots… how was it for you?

The bore was epic, I spoke to a few locals before heading up and got their input. We ended up towing into a couple stretches of river where the bore surges more than breaks really, so the water is deeper. It was a really surreal experience and great fun, I definitely want to go back now I’m a bit more experienced.

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A B OV E Definitely a 'smaller' day at Nazaré...

Photo João Vidinha RIGHT Cotty in the day job as hesweeps into another Nazaré bomb. This hasn't been done on a foil... yet.

Photo Hugo Silva / Red Bull FA R R I G H T Back home in the UK, Andrew gets in some pre-Portugal practice.

Photos Andre Silva

“The great thing about foiling or wake foiling ­behind the ski is that once you’re up and on the foil there’s no impact on the body, yet all the muscles are firing and working super hard.

It’s a great way to get in the water and train without feeling like you’re actually training.”

And you’re from North Devon, just down the road from the bore.

That part of the Atlantic coastline is notoriously rugged. Do you get many opportunities to foil at home?

Yeah there’s a couple of great spots close to home, I often cheat and take the ski out and tow around the Bideford bar area. It’s out of the way and has some great waves to practice on but also Saunton Sands offers loads of space and good foiling waves to paddle into.

You just have to walk down the beach a bit and find your own peak.

Does the scene seem to be growing in the UK? How’s it being received?

It’s still really limited at home, a few of my mates have got into it but only because we use the ski and I have the kit, I haven’t actually seen that many people paddle foiling at home although I know there are a few guys getting into it. Like anything new I think other surfers are wary of it, especially if they’re being used in crowed line ups and rightly so. It’s all about finding your own space and surfing the unsurfable.

A surfer reads this interview and off the back of it goes foil shop­ ping. What’s the first piece of Andrew Cotton advice to this person?

Give it time, speak to and get advice from as many different foilers as possible. If you have the possibility of learning behind a boat or ski first it might save you some frustrating sessions, but as soon as you get the first feeling of glide you’ll be hooked.

And what are you up to now and over the next few months?

It’s the start of the big wave season so just keeping my eyes on the swell charts and keeping focused. Definitely be spending some time on the foil and keep my personal progression going. I’m hooked. •

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THE CALL OF THE WILD WORDS ZANE SCHWEITZER PHOTOS K YLE CABANO

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FOR HAWAIIAN ZANE SCHWEITZER , AN EPIC SOUTH AFRICAN EAST COAST ROAD TRIP WITH THE AK DUR ABLESUPPLY CO CREW TURNED INTO AN EYE- OPENING JOURNEY OF NATUR AL DISCOVERIES, NEW ENVIRONMENTS, FIRM FRIENDSHIPS AND GNARLY FOIL SESSIONS .

SAFE TO SAY, HE LOVED EVERY MOMENT…

THE ARRIVAL After 30 hours of travel, I finally arrived in Cape Town. As we drove away from the airport leaving the densely populated town behind, we approached what appeared to be a great white cloud or a storm cell. As we got closer, I had to rub my eyes to realize that just ahead were the steep cliffs of a ‘deep south’ mountain face, a sandstone wonder…

I checked into the homestead where I would be based for the next few days. Still buzzing from the travel, excitement of meeting the team and seeing Cape Town in the daylight, it left me pretty restless until about 3am – where I found myself watching the surf in the moonlight that was reflecting off the ocean, and “mind-surfing” with the help of the sounds from the crashing waves. I also allowed myself to reflect back on the events that got me here… Surfing in Bali a few months back and being invited by my friend and host Clinton Filen to join the Airush/AK Durable Supply Co team in Cape Town. Filled with gratitude for my good fortune, I finally fell asleep, practically as dawn was breaking.

met me early that morning and we went straight to Muizenberg – the birthplace of surfing in South Africa – for my first session in the South African ocean. After getting past the cold shock of slipping into a wetsuit still damp from the APP Stand Up World Tour events in New York, I couldn’t help but reflect upon the past as I walked into the water with my hydrofoil, and the new evolution of surfing that it represents. I was thinking about the first surfers here in the 1920s and about scenes from ‘The Endless Summer’. The then-unknown break off Cape St. Francis in South Africa became one of the world's most famous surfing spots thanks to that film. Jumping into the ocean and being immersed by the water, my daze from travel, anxiety and monkey-mind thoughts were cleansed and I was solidly back to the present moment… •

TOP RIGHT On the road: South Africa is a land

THE TRIP BEGINS

of big spaces and big contrasts.

As morning broke, I could finally see my surroundings. I was situated at the foot of the sandstone mountain, only a stone’s throw from the ocean and across from a surf spot known locally as ‘Dangers’. Clinton

BOT TOM RIGHT

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Pre-session tune ups in full swing...

DAY 2 Special trips aren’t always those with the most air-time or the best barrels. Most often I have found the most special moments are those shared with others. On day two I met with James Theron and Jacques Terblanche, two big wave surfing pioneers and the early adopters of the waterman lifestyle here in Cape Town, and they’d now caught the foil bug too. We hit Melkbos at sunrise, where we met up with the AK team. With damp wetsuits, the sun coming up, and an epic foil session ahead of us, it was time to jump in. We had an extra surprise when Nathan van Vuuren, one of my good buddies, turned up and joined in for the foil session. I’d met Nathan a few years ago when we were competing in some of the greatest channel crossing championships on a hydrofoil.

After our morning foil session in Melkbos, we went back to Muizenberg. I love that travels and adventures always hold some sort of surprise. My plans usually don’t go too far beyond my airport arrival destination, and I’m open to flow and willing to adapt with the local motion and lifestyle… and this is where the idea to chase an incoming swell up the east coast and do some exploration began.

By this point I’d already started to get familiar with the AK team and my new friends, Kyle Cabano and Dale Staples, who became the champions behind the steering wheel on this trip. Kyle and Dale generously shared their home with me while introducing me to their friends and family (and surf spots) along the way. Between shooting the shit and telling stories, I started to get an idea of just how big this country is and how familiar and comfortable the locals are with moving around the coastline. They’ll drive for hours on end for an adventure. Which worked out perfectly, as it was time to pack for our mission up the coast. With J-Bay, Bruce’s Beauties and some other iconic South African waves ahead of us, we packed everything from shortboard and longboard surfboards, to hydrofoils, SUPs and kites!

Our drive started late in the afternoon but that still gave us enough time to hit a novelty wave that Kyle thought might be rideable. After a few hours of driving we pulled off the side of the highway. Boards and foils in hand, we jumped over the guard rail where Kyle had spotted a potential trail and made our way down the rough cliff. We then caught sight of the water – the setup was crazy. The bay was long and narrow with a rocky point, sat under a bridge and ending at a river mouth. There was a wave breaking along the rocks, but tons of boiling and exposed obstacles were scattered throughout this small area. No complaints from me! It was a blast to foil there, perfect for rock starts and pumping around the rocks toward the waves breaking off the point, banking turns and gliding with the swells funneling in under the bridge.

We continued our road trip through the beautiful mountains and rolling hills. Many sections were covered with flowers or crops for as far as the eyes could see and in other areas we got glimpses of the coastline and ocean. Clinton and Julia got on the road shortly after we did from Muizenberg, but due to our foil session they were well ahead and giving us a surf report from Buffalo Bay. We pulled the

location up on the map and determined that we’d be able to make it before dark. We arrived with enough sunlight for one more solid session to close out the day. The swell we were chasing to Jeffery’s Bay had not yet hit, so the surf was still small, but perfect for foiling.

Dale, Clinton and I shared some epic flight time, playing ping-pong with waves from one peak to the next while Kyle was posted up on the beach capturing the action. You could see him itching to join the session.

As evening closed in on our first full day of adventuring, we arrived at Dale’s family home in St Francis Bay. First to welcome us was the family dog, Nala, and then – coming squawking and waddling from around the corner – came Bondi the duck, followed shortly after by Daryl and Ingrid, Dale’s parents, who warmly invited us into their home. Once again, I found myself pondering in the present moment about how fortunate I am to be able to not only travel and follow my passions, but to be welcomed by local families like this. What a gift. We stayed up and talked stories, before our beds finally called… •

LEFT Cutting in a tight carve amongst the many obstacles in Kyle's secret bay...

TOP Zane and Bondi, bonding.

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“Between shooting the shit and telling stories, I started to get an idea of just how big this country is and how familiar and comfortable the locals are with moving around the coastline.

They’ll drive for hours on end for an adventure.”

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DAY 3 Kyle woke us up before sunrise with his need for coffee. We got our morning buzz on, then started our surf check from the front of the house that overlooked Hullett’s and Bruce’s Beauties. With the light barely breaking over the horizon, I ungracefully slid into my wetsuit, still cold and damp from the day before. I then had a decision to make… what to ride? With the small and clean waves peeling down the coast, and the vision of Endless Summer in my head, I decided to trim and ride the nose on a log and pay my respects to this historical wave.

As dawn’s muted colors turned into beaming daylight, I headed in to switch crafts. I always like to keep a balance. Learn from the past, live in the present and manifest your future is a value I try to live by. Honoring the past with that dreamy longboard session had me present in the moment, but there was a tickle inside of me that was hungry for innovation and the urge to step it up a notch by drawing some lines that were not possible on a traditional board.

Time to bust out the latest innovation in surfing, the hydrofoil. Let’s see what this thing can do…

That day could have never ended, and I wouldn’t have noticed.

Days like those on the ocean are what it’s all about. I felt like I was creating a genuine relationship with this environment and tapping into the energy of the area by not only experiencing the community and its people, but also by appreciating and observing the nature around me. Reality set in with a stunning sunset to mark the end of the day, while a shoal of fish had approached the lineup at around the same time, attracting hundreds of birds. Every minute more flocks of birds joined in on this feeding frenzy, and we witnessed fish boiling the surface of the water. Pumping back out to the next wave, I decided I wanted to have a closer look. I pumped my hydrofoil straight into the middle of this bird and fish pile. Indignant birds squawked furiously, and as I split the fish pile into two it felt as though I was starting to foil through peanut butter, and the birds’

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vortex around me as I looped back around towards the lineup was like the cherry on top to finish the day.

That night we barbecued (or a ‘Braai’ in South African terminology) with the Staples family and two old school waterman legends, Graham Hynes and Johnny Paarman. They shared history and insight on the transforming culture and area. I shared my appreciation and gratitude for having experienced the natural beauty in South Africa and to have had a chance to see the thriving life in the ocean first hand. They laughed and asked me, “Haven’t you seen that before?”

Of course, I have. But it’s encouraging to continue to see it in new places what with all the craziness that is negatively affecting our oceans and reefs. With my travels to over 60 countries I’ve felt I’ve seen the best and the worst, but mostly signs of the worst. It’s refreshing to see wildlife thriving. But I guess I hadn’t seen real wildlife yet, not until I ventured off to the South African grasslands… •

A B OV E We may never know, but let's hope Kyle Cabano's elephant impression was kept above the waist only.

TOP RIGHT Zane pops himself up into some South African gold.

RIGHT We're not quite sure how Zane got himself here, but 10/10 for commitment.

DAY 4 The next day we drove to a nearby wildlife nature reserve where we could check out some ‘real’ wildlife. Within the first hour in the Addo Reserve I was on the edge of my seat. Like a child I was giggling and geeking out as we approached zebra, elephants, ostriches, muddy wart hogs and much more. I didn’t really think that there were still animals like this around, living so close to human civilization. After a few hours though I felt like a fish out of water, and it was time to get wet. We found some surf that fit the criteria for shortboarding and later on a sketchy slab that grinded along the rocks that I had to SUP, despite warnings about the rocks and proximity to the cliff.

DAY 5 With two days left in our trip, we were still waiting patiently for that Jeffery’s Bay swell to arrive. It seemed to be lining up well and we took the last chance we could to ride this iconic wave. There were crowds but the wave stretched such a long way that there were a few zones to ride with no-one out. I was thinking how perfect it would be for the longboard, but Dale was quick to suggest the foil. I wasn’t so sure as I normally like to ride the foil far from other ocean goers, utilizing waves that aren’t great for other surf sports. But my host was local to the area and pushing for me to give it a go.

I ran as far up the beach as I could to the top of the point. There was a gnarly slab of reef along the edge. It was pretty sketchy to navigate my way through the shallow impact zone with the foil. I jumped off when I thought there was a good enough break in the surf to make it out. Not quite! I got pounded for 10 minutes, pushed up against the slab with my hydrofoil dragging on the bottom. I had to turn it upside down and try to make it into deeper water to flip it and duck-dive under the next wave before it smashed me. Once I made it out, I quickly realized the wave was a lot hollower and bigger than it had looked from the beach. The bottom of the wave dropped out on my first take off, and the wave doubled up, catapulting me from top to bottom while I tried to avoid the foil. Turns out foils aren’t quite made for late air drops into the pocket!

Humbled from my first attempt, I gave it another go on a smaller one, and was able to paddle in and get up before the foil had a chance to hit the bottom. I kicked out with speed and pumped out and wide to the next one where I found myself in a much sweeter zone. As I was speeding down the line on a wave towards Super-

tubes, I realized the wave behind it was even bigger. So, I kicked out and pumped to the one behind. Looks on the surfers’ faces I passed were baffled and nervous. Eyes were wide open trying to anticipate my next move…

The wave just kept screaming down the coast. I’m used to getting rides for miles on end with my downwind and open ocean channel crossings on the foil, but riding a wave I’ve dreamed about on such an adventure was something else entirely…

To top it off, many locals, including Dale, were calling it the longest wave ever ridden at J-Bay… My first wave ever at Jefferey’s and it was a screamer, stretching the entire line-up. What a way to experience it! •

TOP It's safe to say that Zane scored it on this surf trip...

LEFT Zane gets a better angle on anything possibly lurking beneath...

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The Wizard of Merimbula Not so long ago, many unfortunate individuals were sent to their maker for doing little more than owning a mildly suspicious-looking black cat. So imagine how the local village elders would have reacted to the sight of Fliteboard founder David Trewern gliding around the local lake on one of his high profile premium products... We think it’s safe to say he’d be up on a hot stake in no time. Luckily for David (and all eFoil riders generally) we’ve moved on a bit since then, and the potential for gliding around open oceans and inland waterways is becoming increasingly accessible thanks to the likes of Fliteboard, part of the vanguard in new electric foiling. We sought out the story from the man behind the black magic…

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Photo Jennifer Stenglein

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RIGHT There are worse ways to wind down at the end of a day...

Photo Jennifer Stenglein

admits there was still a long way to go. After all, creating a new product from scratch was never going to be easy. Although a Fliteboard looks simple and might be simple to use, under the surface there are hundreds of custom parts, premium materials and components... “Once I got a system working, there were constant challenges of dealing with temperature, sealing, pressure and corrosion.

We had to invent new ways of doing things to create a product that would exceed people’s expectations, justify the price tag, and last for years in the harshest environment on earth: the sea.”

TRIED AND TESTED ince he was a grommet growing up in Merimbula Australia, Fliteboard founder David Trewern has been obsessed with surf sports.

Surf, windsurf, kite, SUP, foil; he’s had a crack at them all, and way back in 2005, the now 47-year-old was the GPS kitesurfing world record speed holder with a 500m average speed of 44.8knots. David even visited Richard Branson at Necker Island in 2015 where he showed off his kitefoiling skills to the bearded entrepreneur. It was around this time that the eFoil idea struck him. “I was at an event with no wind, and a simple idea struck me: ‘What if I could attach a motor to my kitefoil board?’”

With a background in design and passion for engineering, David realized an opportunity when he saw one, visualizing something he could bring to the world that would be in the mold of Porsche, Apple and Tesla. He was resolute… “I decided that if I was going to do this I was going to go all out, and create the product that I would want to buy.” Fliteboard was born.

FROM SCRATCH From that point, David arced onto a steep learning curve to get the first prototype flying. He taught himself CAD, bought a 3D printer from ALDI and made his own parts, learning about batteries, electric motors, propellers, sealing and electronics on the fly. “There were no benchmarks for what I was trying to do, so there was endless trial and error. With a mix of custom and off-the-shelf parts I finally got a prototype working. After the first ride, I knew this was something very special.”

The first prototype cost about $20,000 to build. David then assembled a team of industrial designers, hydrodynamicists, electronics and software engineers and battery experts. The second (and vastly more sophisticated) prototype cost about $2 million. But David

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The development project took about three years from the original idea to production, with teams across Australia, Thailand, the USA and China working around the clock. David insisted on the motor being inside the fuselage for less drag, more efficiency and balance.

But making such a system strong, light and waterproof meant creating a custom extrusion then post machining from a large block of aluminum. Each motor housing required six hours of machine time to create.

Fliteboard’s wings then also utilize several custom sections and went through months of parametric design and iteration, with digital wind tunnel and tank testing. David admits the process was a constant challenge. Fliteboard has dozens of custom designed components that all needed to be run as their own project and which all presented their own issues for David and the team. He explains, “Something as simple as the board lid and sealing system went through around 15 iterations before we got it right. We thought we had the motor pod sealed, and then found that three months later it would fail. We had unexplained battery cutouts that required endless tests riding at top speed until the moment of a sudden shutoff, with logging equipment attached. I was often the crash test dummy!”. In total, seven different battery designs were developed to advanced prototype stage, until David and his team were satisfied with their production battery.

The entire project took David and the team lot of self-belief and perseverance, not to mention investment... “At times it was a struggle to see light at the end of the tunnel, and to maintain belief that all of this work would come together to form the perfect experience that we were seeking to create.” But the finished product is now out there for everyone to see (and fly) and it has already won major design awards in Australia, the USA and Germany. •

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“We had to invent new ways of doing things to create a product that would exceed people’s expectations, justify the price tag, and last for years in the harshest environment on earth – the surf.”

LEFT The real magic happens beneath the surface...

Photo Beau Pilgrim (top), Jennifer Stenglein (bottom) TOP RIGHT Keahi de Aboitiz laying down electric carves...

Photo Stu Gibson BOT TOM RIGHT Moona Whyte, dancing amongst the coral reefs on her Fliteboard.

Photo Stu Gibson

THE ‘MAGIC CARPET RIDE’ Since May, 500 Fliteboards have been shipped to customers in over 30 countries. Despite its sophisticated appearance, it’s not hard to master. People with little watersports experience can start ‘flying’ within an hour with proper coaching, and professional watermen like Keahi de Aboitz and Laird Hamilton also expressed surprise at just how easy it was to pick up. David says he gets out and rides his Fliteboard at least three or four times per week, encouraging everyone on his team to do the same, “Foiling offers that feeling of presence in nature, with time standing still. Everything is in perfect balance, yet you are on the edge of control, so there is an adrenalin factor. To be able to do this continuously for an hour and a half on a Fliteboard is quite magical. It’s both serene and exciting at the same time.”

A ‘MILLIONAIRE’S TOY’?

Like any electric vehicle, eFoils are not cheap to build, and a water-­ based vehicle needs more power than a road-based vehicle, while the strength, weight, waterproofing and corrosion challenges bring their own reasons to make sure the materials involved are of high quality. Unsurprisingly, Fliteboard has a lot of customers for whom the price tag is not such a concern. Fliteboards have been delivered to over a dozen billionaires, oligarchs and even the odd member of royalty. “The most magical gadget on the planet” is how Tobias Lukte, the founder of Shopify, described his Fliteboard.

But David is quick to point out that it’s not just for the elite…

“Yes, we have a lot of superyacht customers, but we also have plenty

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of customers who are just total frothers, who love having a new way to get out on the water without needing a boat or ski to tow them.

We have a local guy who paid us in monthly cash instalments before delivery of his board and we have a night-shift worker in Germany who Fliteboards (and sleeps) by day. There are people here in Byron Bay who are out exploring new breaks almost daily on their boards.”

FLITEBOARD INTO THE FUTURE The boundaries for eFoiling are already being expanded, not least by the boss himself, and his team. “We’ve had a couple of race events which are great fun,” says David. “Some of our team have been experimenting with strapped freestyle in the surf, backflipping off waves and trying other tricks. I spend most of my time riding a mellow local point break, getting back to back 700m rides.”

And to the present: David says right now the team are working hard to keep up with an increasing demand. They have an app launching soon, and – you heard it here first – there are plans afoot to make a more accessibly priced product, which David maintains will employ new ideas rather than scrimping on quality, “We have had such amazing feedback about Fliteboard. The riding experience will continue to evolve for our customers via software updates over the next 12-18 months. We are also excited about the possibilities of expanding our range to include an even more premium model in the future, and further down the track - a higher volume model that employs new ideas to allow for a quality experience at a lower price point. These new models will sit alongside our core Fliteboard product.” •

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You know you've gotten pretty comfortable on the foil when you can wave at your buddies across the water...

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GET A BOAT… Let’s face it, without much insight or help from your friends, learning to foil is a daunting prospect… If this is your world, then here’s Jeff McKee to fill you in on a few secrets guaranteed to maximise your success in as few tries as possible…

It’s simple… to turbo charge your progression, get yourself out behind a boat before you go paddling off the beach expecting to fly.

The beauty of the boat is there are many constants, with the most crucial being speed. With a hydrofoil, speed equates to lift, so if you can control your speed, you can theoretically control the amount of lift you are getting before you go paddling into a wave and leaving the rest up to the foil gods…

Long rope, short mast, slow speed: these are the most crucial guidelines for learning behind a boat. Why?

THE ROPE. A full-length ski or wakeboard rope or a dock line will work. Basically, whatever you’ve got and as lengthy as you can get it will do the trick. The reason that being further back behind the boat is best is because there is less wake to deal with and less turbulence / prop wash to combat. Flat and smooth water is preferred as, after all, you’re learning to fly an underwater airplane with your feet!

THE SPEED. Staying directly behind the boat ensures that you remain at the same speed as the boat. Ideally you start the boat at around 5mph, just enough to get you riding across the surface of the water. From there the boat driver can slowly accelerate from 5mph up to a maximum of 10mph. The boat driver plays a huge role in the success of the session, so choose him or her wisely. If the foiler is rising out of the water too fast or ‘riding the bull’ as we call it (bobbing up and down), the boat driver can slow down to stabilize the rider. On the other hand, if the foiler isn’t getting any lift, the boat driver should apply more speed.

Once you get flying and get the hang of things, the boat is a great place to progress quickly. Try riding at various speeds, working on slow turns, and even letting go of the rope and surfing the second roller (behind the wake). The more time you spend behind the boat in the early stages of your foil-riding career, the more it will pay off when it’s time to start riding real waves. •

THE MAST. The shorter the mast you can get, the better, as when most people are learning to foil they tend to lean back too much, resulting in a rise to the top of the mast until the wing breaches the surface, and then it’s a drop from the top down. Obviously falling out of the sky from 18-24 inches (for example) is a whole lot more graceful than dropping from the top of your buddy’s 40-inch kiteboarding race foil. At a height of around 24 inches or less you can even recover and continue riding till you master your weight distribution!

A B OV E L E F T The obligatory 'I'm on a boat' selfie.

A B OV E R I G H T Hitting those second rollers...

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TONY LOGOSZ

An established legend in the world of kiteboarding, Slingshot co-founder Tony Logosz has for a while now also been focusing his efforts and engineering prowess into the world of hydrofoils. We got in touch to talk about the past, the present, and the pretty exciting future…

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Hi Tony, so firstly give our readers a little introduction on who you are and what you do.

I'm the chief designer at Slingshot Sports, and I wear a lot of different hats. I design foils, kites, boards… I've had my hand in pretty much everything in the Slingshot line up. I'm lucky to have a pretty good design team underneath me too.

In 1999, you started Slingshot Sports with your brother Jeff. Talk to us about those early days and how the company developed…

We founded the company in 1999. Slingshot did exist before that, but it was just my little project at that time. I had Logosz Works, the windsurfing brand, which was kind of a high-end boutique custom windsurf board building company, and kiteboarding was just coming onto the scene. I was just getting into kiteboarding along with a handful of other people who were doing it, and I would build custom boards for them. There was a lot of tension between windsurfing and kiteboarding in those early days, so I decided to put Slingshot on the kiteboards instead of Logosz Works. I kind of separated it, and over the following years it became more and more popular. We then stole my brother Jeff from Outside Sports and brought him in, and we launched as Slingshot officially in 1999, with Chris Wyman, myself, Jeff, Breff McLaughlin, and Scot Jarvis.

Getting into foils, you’re now responsible for designing foils for no less than five foil disciplines. I guess there’s a lot of natural crossover?

Yeah, that's an understatement for sure! In fact, I think we're at six now. First there's kiteboarding. We started out kiteboarding and foiling, and that's what really launched foiling for us. Then we pushed into SUP… I was developing SUP foils but it was hard to get the right conditions for wing development. So, being a windsurfer, I finally figured out that I could test big wings in windsurfing easier than in kiteboarding and it does cross right into SUP. So I started

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windsurfing to develop the SUP wings instead – basically because I could just put more time on them. So that brought windsurfing into it. Then at a trade show I foiled behind Jeff McKee, our wake brand manager's boat, and I was like, "Hey, this is going to be big!". So now you have kite, SUP, windsurfing, and wake. Then along comes surf.

All these bigger wings cross right into surfing, because you want the efficiency as well as the performance and the maneuverability, a lot of the efficiencies of which cross right over from SUP and windsurf wings. Now we’re into the SlingWing too, so that’s six, and we haven’t even mentioned dock-start pumping or the open ocean SUP foiling yet…

Busy times then! So tell us about the Slingshot foil platforms…

We have the Hover Glide platform, which is our standard aluminum / carbon platform. Coming soon is the Phantasm Dream Line Series, which is a new state of the art, cutting edge carbon design.

It’s top-secret and we think it is going to be the worldwide carbon foil leader! The Phantasm crosses all genres and all the niche, fringe sports and will be able to cover all bases. If you want to go fast, you can go fast. If you want to go slow, you can go slow. It's going to be at the top of its level in all conditions and all riding styles, and then it’ll co-pollinate and cross over into all these different sports. It’ll become not what I say you should ride, it'll be more like: pick something, build your own combination that works for you and for what you want to do with it… That's where the kids might invent a whole new sport. They're going to take a wing that's not really designed for what we thought it was designed for, and they're going to push it into a whole new genre.

Does the current world of non-wind foiling owe much to the r­ apid evolution of kite foiling and who's been a big part of that?

Well kite foiling was around a long time before non-wind foiling became popular. In Europe there’s always been a kind of a little •

“IT’LL BECOME NOT WHAT I SAY YOU SHOULD RIDE, IT'LL BE MORE LIKE: PICK SOMETHING, BUILD YOUR OWN COMBINATION THAT WORKS FOR YOU AND FOR WHAT YOU WANT TO DO WITH IT…”

LEFT It's adapted slightly since he started, but windsurfing is still Tony's first love...

TOP RIGHT Brothers Slingshot: Tony and Jeff Logosz.

BOT TOM RIGHT Tony and Fred Hope blurring the lines between work and play in the Gorge.

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fringe group of people doing it for a long time, and then it also dates back to the Maui crew like Laird Hamilton and Dave Kalama. I got into foiling in that period, but it was a mission then because you needed all this support to do it. It wasn't until Nick Leason from Lift approached me at a trade show saying “Hey, yeah, we're riding foot straps and we're starting to ride strapless”. That for me was the launching point of development, and then it's just an addiction you pour yourself into.

Fred Hope has been a big part of the current transition. He’s like a star in our group and there's so much to be learned from him because he pushes the limits every day. I mean the problem with Fred is he pushes these limits and makes it look so easy that you think you can do it! But he also shows what's possible on a hydrofoil and then those coming up beneath him, they all get sucked into that. So these kids are getting better and better and Fred's pushing that movement. Around the world now you have these kids that are the Fred Hopes, they are pushing the limits, coming up, and they're getting better and better and it's just great for the sport in general.

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Speaking of Fred, you have also developed a Foil Academy which we know he's really involved in. What can you tell us about this?

So the Foil Academy is currently set up for five sports… kite, wake, SUP, Surf, windsurf and wing surfing on deck. We're working on the SlingWing Foil Academy now, and Fred is an instrumental part of this. It’s a very informative and free tool and if we can use it as a platform to teach people then great. Foiling can be intimidating when you get into it. It's an awkward piece of kit to handle and it's got a mind of its own when you're learning. Yet if you look at Fred ride, or anyone else who's super good at it, they make it look so easy! But when you're learning there’s a lot of questions, so many ways to set up your gear and it's so unique to your personal preference. Like learning how to tune your hydrofoil for the best results, because that's the hardest part. You might adapt and learn yourself by other means, but you might not be getting it right or progressing correctly. You might have had it set up by some guy at the beach, and it'll be wrong and your muscle memory might get skewed. Then two years later you’ve got one leg bigger than the other! The Foil Academy is set up to give any level of rider a few tips and help them progress, and we recommend if you are a foiler that you head over to foilacademy.com as we just dropped five new advanced lessons featuring Fred Hope.

You've got in nice and early in the Wing foil side of the sport, which seems to be accelerating almost as fast as foiling. Did you think it was a discipline that was going to take off when you first came across it?

Well the SlingWing was developed in 2011, starting as a kind of delta wing design and then it went through a lot of different configurations and was launched in 2011 as a product for SUP originally.

They could put that SlingWing up instead of paddling in 12 knots of wind, and now they're sailing, going faster than they've ever paddled in their life. Essentially what SlingWing brought to the table

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was an inflatable version of that which had come before. Easier to build, something you can pump up, more kite-like. So I took it to SUP, because it worked great, but the submarket didn't really ever gravitate to it. The downwinders might have wanted to play with it, but the shops that were selling SUP didn't really like windsports, so it was a hard sell at that point in time. Then in 2015, I was still playing around with them because it was just fun, riding on a skateboard, playing on the water. I happened to be riding with Alex Bloechinger one day who had his camera, and he took a bunch of pictures of me riding the surfboard with the Wing and I posted a shot on my Instagram, and people were like “Wow, that's interesting...”. Then that same year I went foiling with it and did the same thing, and that's when that picture went viral. Sailing Anarchy picked it up and it just went all over the world. Then the phone started ringing off the hook.

But at that point, there was only a handful of foilers that had the skillset to do it. It was 2015, there were some good kite foilers, but even they were still in the 'early adoption' stages, and it wasn't quite mainstream enough even in kiting. It worked, but it just wasn't ready for the market. But now, big Wings and surfing is really blowing up.

The kids and the surfers gravitate to it because it's not kiting, it's not windsurfing and what they want to do is ride waves, figure out their own disciplines, of which I have no doubt there is going to be a lot. Meanwhile the downwinder guys realized they no longer need to paddle and use up all that energy. I can go downwind now and smoke those guys that are paddling, and use very little effort in the process.

You’ve described yourself as a human CNC machine... How has technology developed since you got into the game?

Yeah I was a human CNC machine back in the day! I was shaping like eight surfboards a day with a Skill 100 planer, always walking around in circles with the planer in my hands. I just wanted to build

“AROUND THE WORLD NOW YOU HAVE THESE KIDS THAT ARE THE FRED HOPES, THEY ARE PUSHING THE LIMITS, COMING UP, AND THEY'RE GETTING BETTER AND BETTER AND IT'S JUST GREAT FOR THE SPORT IN GENERAL..”

A B OV E Tony has had a hand in pretty much every bit of Slingshot kit that's ever been developed.

something with my hands. Shaping like that is kind of becoming a lost art, but you get better results with a CNC'd blank built in the computer, and if you want to make a refinement or tune the rocker, you can still calibrate it and hand tune it. But the technology, where we're at now or even 10 years ago is crazy, and it's getting better and better. 20 years ago, there weren't these options, and I hand-shaped all the kiteboards. When we launched Slingshot, I was shaping 25 boards a weekend! On Friday, I would go outline them and hand cut them all out, on Saturday I'd start them, and on Sunday they'd all be done, and then we'd have a glassing crew take it from there, but I still had all these other design responsibilities with Slingshot, as well as with Logosz Works. So I would keep on pushing through. Now, times have changed and thank God. We're using our brains for other things now!

You’re an on-hand resource for the Ride Engine design team too. How is the dynamic in working with Coleman Buckley (Ride Engine founder)?

Coleman’s awesome. We get on great, he's kind of like a mini-me for me, so far as bouncing ideas off goes. He's always thinking outside the box and bringing great ideas to the table and he's got the computer skill set for shaping. But he also likes to build stuff with his hands; be creative. He's just charging full speed ahead with great ideas. I'm learning stuff as well… my CAD skillset was developed 20 to 25 years ago and back then it was like pulling teeth. He's so much further ahead with all that technology than I am, and he has the technology mindset to really look outside the box. So hes a great resource for me to bounce stuff off of, and he comes up with so many great ideas. He's in the weeds with us, developing, trying to solve problems, and bring stuff to market that are gonna make things better. •

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THE TEST TEAM

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We’ve been very lucky, in these nascent days of Foiling Magazine, to have already brought into the fold some top-level testers who have an exceptional amount of hydrofoiling experience both on the water and in the backrooms too. Here’s the core team right now…

NAME: KJELL VAN SICE @KJELLISSEY LOCATION: SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA

Born in Belgium and raised between Hawaii and the African island of Mauritius, Kjell van Sice’s life and career have been transglobal and shaped by the ocean which he clearly loves. An internationally published ocean photographer, university professor in design, and competitive water athlete (and now a Contributing Editor for us), Kjell added surf foiling to his pretty loaded repertoire in 2018.

Although Kjell foils daily in the kelp-filled, rocky waters of the central California coast, he lives for towing into fast, open-faced lines of energy south of the Equator. Where the waves end, Kjell finds foiling potential too, and he loves exploring California’s alpine lakes and rivers on leg power alone.

NAME: SKY RAMA @SKY.RAMA LOCATION: MAUI, HAWAII Maui born and bred, and with 20 years in Bali under his belt, Sky has been foiling for over 14 months now and loves every second of it. Having borrowed a foil in Bali, on his second wave ever he managed to ride it all the way to the beach, and from that point on he was hooked. After buying himself a cheap aluminum foil from China, he then graduated to better gear and has never looked back.

His favorite conditions for foiling are sheet glass waters with a nice mix of soft and vertical waves, and he loves to push the limits of both himself and the foil he’s riding, and his favorite spots are all contained within West Maui… The undoubted king of foiling social media thanks to his Soloshot set up, he’s guaranteed to ruin any afternoon in the office when he drops another dreamy clip.

NAME: ANTOINE MALOLO BADIN @TONIOOVERTHERE LOCATION: ALJEZUR, PORTUGAL Antoine is a 33-year-old Frenchman living in Portugal. The day job as a surf coach means he has the chance to be at the beach every day, with plenty of opportunity to go foiling on the Algarve’s west coast. He’s been foiling for four years with experience in all disci-

plines (kite, SUP, surf, wing, tow-in) and his favorite test spot is a small bay on a rivermouth that offers long, reforming waves with plenty of sections and works with all kind of swells and gets zero crowds (hence he’s keeping it hush!). Antoine conducts his tests both in the surf and open ocean swells, but when the north winds kick in and the Algarve coast becomes a foiling paradise, he can be found at the end of rope enjoying some tow-in sessions…

NAME: KANE DE WILDE @KDMAUI LOCATION: MAUI, HAWAII Born and raised on Maui, Kane has been in and around the water from a very young age, doing everything from skimboarding to sailing, and most recently of course, foiling. Kane enjoys riding weird and unusual surfcraft and is constantly tinkering with his gear and striving to improve it. On any day with solid north swell he is usually found testing at Kahului Harbor, with the smooth water and consistent wave shape making it the perfect spot to test and compare new gear. Kane has experience in designing, testing, and giving detailed feedback on foils and foil, SUP, and finless boards. This experience helps him look at a foil from a more technical and theoretical perspective and we’re stoked to have him on the team.

NAME: RICHARD BOUGHTON @RICH_BOUGHTON LOCATION: BANTHAM, UK

Richard, our Technical Editor here at Foiling Magazine, has been in and around the water sports industry for the best part of 18 years.

He’s traveled internationally for many years coaching kitesurfing, runs his own sail loft in the UK, and is an avid paddle boarder. Rich fell in love with foiling in 2015, initially shaping his own boards and foils before equipment was commercially available. He’s a genuine multi-sport foil user… Be it propelled by a wing or kite, paddling or prone, he’s very adaptive, and gets out in all conditions, whenever possible. Now permanently based in the wild southwest of the UK, Rich has perfect ‘real world’ conditions for testing prone and SUP foils on his doorstep. His favorite spot is a bit of a secret apparently, but involves an empty reef break which requires a lengthy paddle and nerves of steel, but rewards with minute-plus rides... •

T H E T E S T T E A M 1 3 7

Tested Editor’s note: So stuff got real with our testing for this issue, it’s something we take pretty seriously, and this sets the standard we’re going to hit every time: thorough tests, by a thoroughly experienced test team. One thing to note here, we loves stats as much as the next guy, but we didn't want to overload you with them so we have only given stats for one wing size per test. Please refer to the test for an indication of how the other wings perform in relation to this, and if you have a specific question please feel free to send it over to us at testteam@thefoilingmagazine.com – we're always happy to help!

RIDE ENGINE FUTURA Out of the box, Ride Engine’s packaging is well conceived and executed. The brand’s signature black and blue design language is displayed throughout and each part has its own zippered, padded pocket, keeping it from springing loose. The front wing and stabilizer, also within their own zippered compartments, are further sheathed in neoprene socks. The Futura foil is held together by nine titanium bolts, and the kit comes with three different size Allen keys and a tub of lanolin for maintenance/lubrication. Depending on which of two assembly settings the rider chooses, the foil mates to the strut with bolts of different sizes, requiring separate tooling.

Setting 1 places the strut directly over the front wing, while Setting 2, approximately three inches aft, places it over the fuselage. Parts slot into each other tightly enough for a performance fit, but not so tightly as to be laborious or quirky to assemble. With an aluminum strut and fuselage and composite flight surfaces, the entire foil is generally stiff. The wing itself is a thin, low aspect, ‘inverted gullwing’ shape with a 1534sq/cm area. The 314sq/cm horizontal stabilizer has a sizable wingspan of 42cm and is high aspect with upturned winglets. The stabilizer sits atop the fuselage and is bolted through a piece which doubles as a fuselage endcap. The fuselage itself is a solid block of aluminum with an octagonal cross section.

The 28in/71cm strut is also aluminum. The foil mates to the board via an aluminum baseplate with eight bolt holes for adjustability. At nearly 11lbs/5kg, the Futura 76 is slightly above-average weight but results in its below-average price point and also ensures it is pretty much bombproof and a sound investment.

The test was conducted on a 25L, 3’6 board with a rider weight of 145lbs/65kg. Conditions varied between three and six foot and no shims were used. It is important to emphasize that the two strut settings on the Futura dramatically change its riding characteristics to the point of feeling like two different foils. In Setting 1 (with the mast forward), the Futura is all-around user friendly and neutral in its front-rear foot bias. When dropping into a wave, the foil lifts gently and progressively, making it easy to manage and excellent for beginners or for tackling bigger conditions. In Setting 2, lift is great-

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ly increased at lower speed, requiring heavy front foot pressure to control. Ride Engine recommends moving the entire foil back in the board box when using Setting 2 to mitigate this increased front foot bias. Even so, Setting 2 primarily rides off the front foot. Down the line, the foil carries glide nicely in Setting 1, and the impression of glide is extended slightly in Setting 2. The Futura has a moderate top speed, and is confidence-inspiring at the top end. As a rough generalization, Setting 1 is better suited to larger waves, and Setting 2 is preferable in smaller conditions. Stability in both settings is impressive, although riders who prefer riding off their back foot may find Setting 2 less stable. In Setting 1, the foil banks predictably and progressively, but Setting 2 demands significantly more front pressure and can be hard work.

Overall, Ride Engine’s Futura is a great foil for newer riders when in Setting 1, with predictable lift and stability throughout all maneuvers. Should it be preferable, Setting 2 provides a more front foot-biased feel, which has potential for downwinding where glide and tracking are especially desirable. These assembly options do make the Futura time consuming to adjust, and perhaps more complicated than it needs to be but, regardless, with many wings to choose from within a fully modular lineup, Ride Engine is well positioned to give riders a platform upon which they can upgrade and develop their foiling styles into the future.

STATS FOR SETTING 1 CONFIGURATION GLIDE

STALL DROP

PITCH STABILITY

TRACKING

YAW STABILITY

CARVING STABILITY

PUMPING

TURN RADIUS

Tested

SIGNATURE ALBATROSS RANGE The Signature Albatross range of foils are the original high aspect downwind/pumping surf foils. Designed by Clifford Coetzer in collaboration with the Signature R&D team, these wings have been finely tuned for maximum efficiency and high speed. After seeing the success of the original 175 in downwind racing, Signature realized they could bring the speed, pump, and glide to normal riders too and have since expanded the line to fit different riding styles and rider weights. Currently there are four sizes: 165, 175, 210, and 250. These all have unique feels and excel in different conditions.

The first thing one notices about the Albatross line is the very high aspect ratio. All sizes are very flat, straight, thin, and wide which is what makes them so fast and efficient. Connections are simple, solid, and reliable and the foil is very easy to put together. The wings come with all required hardware in a small tool bag (two mast bolts, two tail wing bolts, and four nuts and bolts for the mast tracks) as well as the tools needed to assemble it. No anti seize is needed, and during testing, there was no corrosion or binding between parts.

The wings come with covers for the front and back wings that help with scratch and small impact protection. Stiffness has been vastly improved over the 2019 foils, with the wings being very stiff and fuselage stiffer too. There was little flex felt while riding. The finish has also improved and the wings are now more accurate to the computer design and all trailing edges are very thin. Weight has increased slightly, but everything is still very light and it’s a good tradeoff for very durable, solid wings. One of the more unique aspects of the Signature foils is the one piece front wing and fuselage which allows a smaller front wing to fuselage connection that reduces drag, weight, and offers a nice controlled flex. The only downside of the one piece design is that it makes traveling tricky as foils won’t fit in normal luggage or board bags and need their own bag. The front and back wings are more geared towards pumping than other brands’ high aspect wings. This costs some top speed but makes pumping almost effortless and getting on foil downwind much easier. For the test we rode the Albatross 165, 210, and 250 using a 75cm mast. Tailwings used were the Sprint 18”, Apex 16”, and four custom

tailwings. No shimming was required on the stock tail wings but is easy to do if the rider wants a different ride. Conditions were mostly glassy and in the waist high to slightly overhead range. The foils were also tested with a handkite in light wind and waves with faces up to 15 feet (4.5m). Rider weight is 180lbs (81kg).

The Albatross range is most known for its controllable lift, crazy glide, and easy pump. While riding, it has tons of drive and it is easy to feel small changes in the wave’s power. Turning will be more challenging for beginner/intermediate riders but the more advanced rider will be able to manage hard turns with the wingtip breaking the surface on the 210 and 165. The wings are pumping machines, with massive drive out of every pump combined with the efficient glide sure to bring any rider’s pump game to the next level and, during testing, a few rides on the 210 and 250 were over 30 minutes!

Overall the Signature foils Albatross range is perfect for the intermediate and advanced rider looking to up their pump game, go super-fast downwind, use with a handkite, or just cruise around in weak waves. All sizes are well tuned for both prone and SUP boards and top riders from around the world will enjoy the efficiency and performance of the Albatross range.

STATS FOR 210 WING. GLIDE

STALL DROP

PITCH STABILITY

TRACKING

YAW STABILITY

CARVING STABILITY

PUMPING

TURN RADIUS

T E S T E D 1 3 9

Tested

LIFT SURF SERIES In a young sport like surf foiling, it’s not yet possible for anyone to consider themselves veterans, but if one brand stands out because of their longevity, it would be Lift. With over a decade of experience building surf foils, Nick Leason’s company produces high quality designs, premium construction, and innovations that expand the way we look at foiling. Lift has two product lines consisting of classic and powered electric foils, so it was exciting when we received a big, heavy box from their HQ in Puerto Rico… Although it’s now becoming more common across the industry, Lift were the first to apply single piece construction to surf foiling. This means the front wing, fuselage, and stabilizer are one strong, super light, molded piece.

Despite the strength and weight benefits of their Classic series, it’s exciting to see Lift introduce their next generation Surf series with interchangeable stabilizers, giving the range greater adaptability and providing easier transport. The Surf series consists of five wing sizes ranging from the 100 (645 sq/cm) to 250 (1612 sq/cm), and four mast lengths from 60cm to 90cm. The entire setup is assembled with just four bolts; two for joining the fuselage pieces, and two for attaching the unit to the mast. The 70cm carbon mast on test is impressively lightweight and extremely stiff at 1.25kgs, with a tapered trailing edge and molded top plate. For our test, Lift sent over their 170 and 200 wings paired with 34 and 40 tail stabilizers.

Both wings are low aspect with pronounced downward facing wingtips, giving them a more ‘traditional’ appearance as the foil market moves toward higher aspect shapes. These wings are fairly thin, but not excessively so. Lift’s stabilizers are quite flat and shaped like dolphin tails – very simple and clean. Due to the single piece construction, it’s not possible to shim these stabilizers. Lift provides fantastic, heavy duty covers that are ideal for both daily use and travel, and should last as long as the foils themselves. All parts slot together cleanly and snugly with a satisfying, engineered feel. Fully assembled, the 200 + 40 stabilizer comes in at about 3kgs with the 170 slightly lighter.

The test was conducted on a 25L, 3’6 board with a rider weight of 68kg. Wave conditions varied between 2 and 5 feet. The most immediate first impression when riding a Lift foil, regardless of size, is its light weight and stiffness. The ride is direct, lively, and sensitive without being twitchy. These characteristics don’t change much across the range, meaning that handling is predictable from one size to another. That being said, the 170 and 200 are still distinct

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from each other, most particularly in their glide distance and pumpability. The 200 blasts down waves smoothly and securely, thanks largely to its molded construction with the fuselage. It pumps nicely for its size, especially with the 40 stabilizer, but requires some more energy to keep it going than a higher aspect equivalent. This setup rides neutrally, and is excellent for knee to head high waves. Its little brother, the 170, has a slightly higher takeoff speed and increased banking sensitivity. Paired with the high performance 34 tail wing, this combo is a pleasure to surf, carving with very impressive speed and precision off the back foot. At only 1096 sq/cm, the 170 falls somewhat short in the pumping department, and catching multiple waves demands above average strength, stamina, and technique! Switching to the 40 stabilizer improves pumping somewhat, but doesn’t fully overcome the reduced lift of this small front wing.

Lift’s very flat stabilizers have a high degree of yaw sensitivity, a performance feature which can take a little getting used to when coming from more stable platforms. Especially when paired with a small front wing like the 170, these stabilizers make the setup loose, snappy, and shortboard-like. As a result, Lift’s smaller kits would not necessarily be the easiest to learn on. As for speed, the wing shapes and thin, flat stabilizers make Lift’s foils speedy, but not the fastest on the market. Additionally, both wings hum at higher speeds and in critical turns. They glide very smoothly and efficiently, and stall speed is about average relative to wing size. Overall, the 170 and 200 are a fantastic combo that cover a wide variety of wave conditions, and the new modular stabilizers allow for a quick and easy change to pitch sensitivity to fine tune your ride.

STATS FOR 200 WING. GLIDE

STALL DROP

PITCH STABILITY

TRACKING

YAW STABILITY

CARVING STABILITY

PUMPING

TURN RADIUS

Tested

MFC HYDROS 1250 + 1400 MFC (Maui Fin Company) was established in 1986. The company is world famous for its decade of windsurf fins engineering, designing fins for the finest athletes and brands. Today MFC Hawaii is focusing on developing big wave surfing fins with the best surfers in the world and is now applying its enviable R&D heritage to the world of hydrofoiling, and the HYDROS has been designed with one goal in mind: to make the most advanced surf foil to date. The design, the quality of construction and the ultra-light weight (less than 3kg) makes you feel that you have a high-end, state of the art piece of performance kit in your hands. Mast and fuselage are molded in carbon fiber and epoxy G33 bio resin. The mast is 70cm, has a really thin profile and is one solid piece with an integrated pedestal mount.

The fuselage has a ‘conic’ front wing and mast attachment (where the wing sits over the fuselage) to provide a precise fitting. Fuselage and mast are joined with two M6 screws with a hexagonal headset.

The front wings are molded with a PVC core/carbon and G33 epoxy bio resin, and the wings are designed with a compact delta outline and a V- double concave shape with a super narrow profile. They mount on the fuselage very satisfyingly with the conic attachment and are secured with two M6 bolts. The back wing is a full carbon V shape that is shimmed with one of the three shims included: Zero, 1.5 or 2.5.

We ran the test with a KT Drifter 4´10, 35 liter board in waves from 3 to 6 foot. Rider weight was 86kgs. For paddling, you feel like you’re on a surfboard. The foil has no drag at all in the water and you don’t feel that uncomfortable feeling of paddling with a fishing net that you get on thicker wing profiles. It moves smoothly in the water, and duck diving is predictable and easy. On the pop up, the foil is really gentle. You can take your time and adjust your trajectory easily, everything is stable and easy to control. In steeper surf you don’t get that horrible feeling of having to brace the nose like you can on other foils, and everything is impressively easy to control.

Once you are up and riding the lift is gradual and easy to control at speed. You can use your bodyweight naturally without forcing it to control the foil, which is really enjoyable and enables you to feel like the foil is a natural extension of your body. The HYDROS are predictable and there’s no need to adjust your position all the time as can be the case on other foils with more play, but it is clear as soon as you build speed that this this is a foil with obvious ‘performance pedigree’ as it generates huge acceleration and speed.

Despite the speed, however, the HYDROS stays relatively easy to adjust and carve with the foil entering easily into the curve, and you can push on it as hard as you want and it is instantly responsive.

Coming out of a carve and the foil feels comfortable and controlled: you can really focus on the next maneuver with flow and balance, instead of just ‘surviving’! The glide is really smooth and you can connect long flat sections without pumping at all. The drag is imperceptible, and the foil is 100% silent with the really thin wing profile keeping the foil really stable and easy to control, especially close to the surface. When the wing ventilates, the V shape concentrates the air streams through the concaves and sends it quickly to the trailing edge, keeping the glide going where many other foils would stall. It is really fun to carve this thing and recover angles you would never think about. Both of the wings we had on test could be pumped although the 1250 was (unsurprisingly) not so easy; you need to keep good speed but as soon as you have the right momentum it flies without effort. Then the 1400 is super nice to pump. Connecting the next wave is easy, and the distance of the glide will really save your legs…

We rode with all three shims over the course of the test and they made a significant difference to the performance characteristics of the foil. With the zero shim, the foil provides a really controllable lift and went really, really fast (we tried this with a kite too and it outperformed many kite-specific foils). On the 1.5 shim the foil is more responsive, easier to pump, enters the carve more comfortably and has more power on the front foot. Then the 2.5 shim provides tons lot of lift and responsiveness which was good for weak conditions and for impressively tight carves.

STATS FOR 1250 WING GLIDE

STALL DROP

PITCH STABILITY

TRACKING

YAW STABILITY

CARVING STABILITY

PUMPING

TURN RADIUS

T E S T E D 1 4 1

Tested

DELTA HYDROFOIL L + XL WINGS With a PhD in engineering and a decade of experience designing and racing ultra-high speed kite foils, George Hradil, the man behind Delta Foils, is uniquely positioned to design a surf foiling product with premium performance. We tested the L (1265) and XL (1660) wings with a 70cm mast. Wave conditions were 2-4’. The wing shape is mid-aspect, with pronounced tip sweep and curvature and it has the inherent, lively banking traits of a low aspect ratio and the glide and pitch responsiveness of a high aspect ratio. The foil’s ‘standout’ feature is its unusually thin prepreg carbon wing, a testament to its high-performance pedigree and George’s design philosophy that ‘faster is better’. Unlike many surf foils that derive their lift from a thick wing, George’s prowess with efficiency and glide distance (he sands each wing from the factory by hand) make Delta foils quick and smooth. By visual estimation, both the L and XL are about 1030% thinner compared to other brands’ wings of comparable surface areas. The rear stabilizer is mounted on top of the fuselage and has a similar sweep angle to the front wing with consistent dihedral throughout. Delta’s tapered carbon fuselage is shorter than most to improve pitch liveliness when pumping and carving ability when surfing. We tested the aluminum mast (carbon is an option in tuttle form) which is stiff and well-sealed, and comparable in weight to most carbon masts. There is then a carbon top plate which the strut mounts snugly and cleanly. Assembled with a total of nine screws, the largest XL setup comes in at well under three kilos. Overall it is an intelligently engineered and elegantly designed package.

On the water and you experience significant gliding distance, quick acceleration and stability at speed coupled with a lively feeling underfoot. A short fuselage combined with the smaller L front wing makes a fantastic surfing package that promotes a rear foot bias when laying into a big sweeping turn or a lightning fast hack off the top of the face. When pumping through flat sections or going back out for more waves, the setup’s high pitch sensitivity feels fan-

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tastic underfoot, while remaining stable and competent throughout the entire range of motion. With this set up Delta have managed to combine the best aspects of the foiling experience (glide and speed) with less of the drawbacks (heavy front foot pressure) when you really want to move. Even in small testing conditions, the Delta L is as easy to pump as other brands’ wings with larger surface areas. Although the XL is better oriented toward larger riders or distance pumping, it manages to carry many of its smaller sibling’s traits, with the exception of greater front foot pressure and a slightly reduced bank rate – something inherent to all wing shapes as they scale up in area. These are undoubtedly superb foils but do bear in mind that the thinner Delta wings only start to fly at higher speeds, requiring a later drop or more powerful wave. High pitch sensitivity is great for precise riders, but more difficult to learn on, and the Delta’s stall speeds are also higher and come more abruptly than they do for thicker wings. These drawbacks are only really relevant to beginner and intermediate foilers, though. For advanced to professional riders, Delta offers an extremely fun package which they can grow with as they push their level even further.

STATS FOR L WING GLIDE

STALL DROP

PITCH STABILITY

TRACKING

YAW STABILITY

CARVING STABILITY

PUMPING

TURN RADIUS

Tested

SLINGSHOT OUTWIT The Outwit is Slingshot’s latest hyper modern spaceship-shape SUP foil board, which has a strong application for wing surfing. Design focus has definitely been centered around a very early take off and it somehow manages to hide a generous 120L of volume distributed largely in the center of its compact length. The build is delightfully light, with the 6’6 weighing in at around seven and a half kilos and the brushed and sanded paint finish is minimal and seems fairly hard wearing. Not much shimming was required to adapt to other foils as the rear of the board has very little rocker in the track section. At 90kgs with the 6’6, the rounded outline shape, central volume distribution and lack of parallel rail makes the Outwit fairly challenging to paddle into a wave as a straight SUP foil, with the volume distribution promoting a coracle-like tendency to rotate quickly under heavy paddling and make tracking forward a little technical, but it is certainly possible to get into a wave. So stepping up to the larger sized 7’6 would be recommended for a pure paddling experience.

Where the 6’6 really shines is with a wing. We tested with various 1800-2000cm2 wings in wind ranging between 15 and 25 knots and found that there’s more than enough volume to clamber on and get planing on your knees – even with pretty heavy chop and white water. The defined chined rails and stepped rear section in the tail promote a very early take off and all the board wants to do is get straight up onto the foil. Once you’re up there you can achieve some decent angles upwind and roll the board right over with no chance of catching the rail. It feels nimble, and has low windage once flying, achieving noticeably better upwind angles than some other boards we have tested, and proved much easier to initiate turns back up into the wind. The Outwit is wonderfully gentle to touch down and exceptionally easy to jibe on the water or on the wing, and the convex deck provides a reassuring feel, connecting you into the board rather than feeling like you’re perched on it. The EVA deck pad is massive, comfortable and adds further practicality along with stur-

dy double leash points. The Outwit is perhaps a design that Tony Logosz has taken off on a wind-driven tangent and he’s made a good job of it. Whilst it is SUP foil-able, its happy place is definitely propelled by a wing surf. The super low resistance and early take off means you can downsize and head out with a smaller wing, reducing fatigue and extending your session. It’s an extremely fun and agile, super modern foil board design that looks very cool and performs immaculately on the wing surf stage.

STATS FOR 6'6 BOARD TAKEOFF

ROLL STABILITY

TOUCH DOWN

FORWARD/BACKWARD STABILITY

PUMPING

GENERAL PADDLING STABILITY

SURFACE TRACKING

DECK COMFORT

T E S T E D 1 4 3

Tested

F-ONE SWING The F-ONE Swing is the first inflatable surf wing from the well renowned French kite surf brand. The owner, Raphaël Salles, was sold on the concept after smuggling some prototypes on his family holiday to Corsica, where he would normally be landlocked on its rocky shores, with bad access and crowded beaches unsuitable for kitesurfing. With the Swing, he could launch off a pontoon and limp out into the wind blowing tantalizingly down the strait and blast around on his foil all afternoon. F-ONE now are now leading the way in terms of quality wing video content with a constant stream of impressive clips rolling out from their team. In terms of construction, in the current marketplace the Swing is relatively minimalist and lightweight in design. There are the essential control handles elegantly placed exactly where you need them, with three on the strut and one on the leading edge. The whole canopy of the sail is two core Teijin D2 ripstop, along with Teijin Dacron for the front tube and strut. There are no battens present in the sail at all, meaning a nice small pack down size. There’s also some subtle, well placed protection on the wingtips to cover potential scuff points. F-ONE quote an approximate wind range of 15 knots per size, which from our testing we’ve found a realistic figure. There are six sizes available starting at 2.2m through to 6.0m. The leading edge diameter is noticeably large, particularly if you’re used to looking at a kite, as the rigidity achieved here is essential to maintaining the wing shape and producing power. The wingtips taper off towards their ends and maintain a decent level of leech tension, minimizing flapping if the sail is engaged, even when extremely wet. The connection between the strut and the canopy is flexible and dynamic, and comprises of a piece of profiled ripstop allowing the sail to luff and breathe a little, enhancing gust resistance. This added canopy depth also allows plenty of grunt for getting up on the foil nice and early. The profiled section of canopy is deep in the center and flattens out towards the wingtips offering further stability and balance. There’s also a neoprene knuckle guard on the leading edge handle which stops your fingers being gently eroded by the Dacron, a luxury touch and no mistake. The thought and the attention to detail, particularly on

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weight saving, means that the Swing is a wonderfully agile wing in the hands. Compared to heavier offerings on the market, there’s a high degree of balance and control to the wing, and absolutely no rocking sensation when on the front handle. This is most noticeable in a wave situation where you can literally leave it in the neutral position with one hand on the leading edge handle. The Swing flies itself immaculately when disengaged, allowing you to head straight into the wind using the power of the wave with little resistance. The deep profile also means a nice, grunty power delivery when required, and an excellent ‘wobble free’ depower ability, particularly noticeable at the top of the wind range. The lack of handle choice eliminates any fumbling and catching the wrong handle, which can make or break the success of a maneuver, and the light weight also means when you’re in the beginner stages and catching the wingtips and having to right them, the Swing is very easy to flip over in the water from the center, without having to work your way down to the wingtip.

Wing surfing is a sport in its infancy and it’s fascinating to see the different design directions the manufacturers are taking. With F-ONE, the Swing is an exercise in simplicity and concise, functional design. There’s nothing unnecessary here, just a very stable, highly usable lightweight surf wing which is useable in all conditions and excels in the waves. Definitely right at the pinnacle of wing products currently available.

STATS FOR 4.2M WING POWER DEVELOPMENT

OVERALL STABILITY

DEPOWER ABILITY

UPWIND PERFORMANCE

RESTING STATE STABILITY

SETUP SPEED

AGILITY

DURABILITY

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F LOAT F LOW F LY The Sky Foil range is inspired by a true waterman, Sky Solbach. From riding rolling ocean swells to surfing long breaking waves, the Sky Surf and Sky SUP models transform poor conditions into awesome days.

A D D I CT E D TO R I D E – B OA R D R I D I N G SI N CE 81 F O L LOW U S W W W. F A N A T I C . C O M / S U P P H OTO

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A E R O S U R F F O I L 1 5 0 0 / 2 00 0 / 2 50 0

S K Y S U R F 4’8” / 5’2” / 5’11”

S K Y S U P LT D 6’3” / 6’7” / 6’11” / 6’11” WS

The perfect match for these boards – the new Aero Foils – will blow your mind!

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INBOUND

AK SURF FOIL Here’s a new section for the magazine… one that should excite all the new-toy-fans out there, and one that will be just that little bit dangerous if you happen to pick this magazine up close to Christmas. Here we get the inside track on new gear that’s dropping onto the market and find out what makes it so special… First up is the new, redesigned Surf Foil range from AK Durable Supply Co., the hardware wing of Airush Kiteboarding.

Clinton Filen, Airush and AK’s Brand Manager, takes us through the goodies…

Hey Clinton. So firstly, tell us what’s just been released and why everyone should be excited about it?

We’re just dropping the new AK Surf Foil range, with a 1300 and a 1600 wing, which have both been redesigned from the ground up.

Let’s jump into the tech… tell us the practical difference ­b etween the medium and the large wing sizes?

The 1600 creates a lot more lift than the 1300, which makes it suitable for the heavier rider (80kg and up) in smaller waves. The 1300 has more top end, more suitable for bigger waves, crossover with kite, or the lighter rider.

And what makes it stand out from the pack?

Besides the flying characteristics I’ll cover later, the construction and build quality are major features for us. We focused on a system

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that is solid with quicker disassembly, and kept our trimmable rear wing system, which has been very popular. All the key connections are M8 Titanium bolts with a tapered front wing connection system that locks the front wing solidly into the fuselage. The new mast with a thicker side wall and a 50% increase in mast to fuselage connections also creates a very solid assembly. We have also reduced the weight of the front wings, staying with the prepreg carbon technology.

How does the new 1300 improve on last year's crossover foil we tested?

Besides the overall improvement in connections, the front wing has a new profile that carries more high-end speed. We’ve increased the aspect ratio from 4.0 to 4.6 to significantly improve the pumping.

The flatter constant arc creates a smoother turn, complimented by a similar profile in the new moustache tail wing.

And where’s the majority of the testing been happening?

Our primary development is done in Cape Town, after that Hawaii, and then Spain with other key riders. We also test in Bali with our friends at the Rip Curl Surf and Foil School, which gives us a great insight into what people getting into the sport are looking for, and it’s a lot of fun.

How is the scene in Cape Town and can you take us through some of the main spots?

The foil scene is still pretty small and fragmented, but every week you see a new rider ripping on the foil that you haven’t met before. I would say the scene is centered around Melkbos in the North, and Muizenberg in the South. Both of these spots have the space, and fun little waves. We’re still only scratching the surface of spots, Muizenberg is so convenient as it’s where our design center is, so we don’t explore enough! We recently did a trip up the east coast with

“There have been many eureka moments, that’s the fun in working to be on the cutting edge. The rate of change and learning is simply huge.”

the foil team and that was literally mind blowing, seeing the number of once mediocre surf spots that are simply perfect for foiling.

So tell us who’s been working hard behind the scenes on this...

I would say our Design Engineer, Dave Kay, and primary testers Jacques Theron and James Taylor. DK is the guy working late at night getting prototypes done, and then the test team are up at 5am to test a variety of configurations before the wind kicks in. We also develop the foil surfboards for Starboard and for our own foil testing, so Dave Stubbs has been critical behind the scenes helping make that happen. Once we have something workable, riders such as Zane Schweitzer, Alvaro Onieva, and Dale Staples will get more involved with testing the refinements and pushing the limits of the product.

Do you think AK Durable Supply Co. brand has found its own hardware niche in the few years since its formation?

It’s all pretty new, and we’ve seen it grow incredibly this year, but it’s still in its infancy. We are focused on the longer term and have some very different ideas that we would like to develop and share. It does have its challenges, as we are also focused on creating a very concise product line within the multisport space, so we’re saying no to a lot of things in order to focus our energy where we can bring something new to the rider. We’ve done a few great collaborations with other brands already (something generally not done in our industry) and developed ideas such as our non-exclusive athlete program that has really helped us connect with the right people.

I really enjoy brand building, and this is something I have done my whole life. It has been useful in communicating with a different group of riders with a different message. AK is about chasing the crossover, so it has taken some time to develop the nucleus of a group of engineers, designers, artists, free surfers, kiters, wakeboarders, and foil riders that we want to work with.

Have there been any dead ends or eureka moments during development?

I wouldn’t say there are many dead ends at such an early stage of a sports development, more moments where you try to answer a question or prove a hypothesis, and all you end up with are more questions! There have been many eureka moments, that’s the fun in working to be on the cutting edge. The rate of change and learning is simply huge. •

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AK SURF FOIL MEDIUM

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AMUNDSON FOIL BOARDS For anyone who's just coming 'on stream', tell us a little about John Amundson himself, and how you first got into building custom foil boards...

I have a very long history of building surfboards of every category: kiteboards, paddle boards, tow-in foil boards and now surf foil boards. I, along with my friends Guy Perre and Brendan Shea, built one of the first tow-in foil boards about 20 years ago, days after seeing Laird and some of the Maui guys create a new way to ride waves on the very first tow-in foil board. This was by far the most radical design I had ever made, we had a 25 pound aluminum foil, a 4’0 board and snowboard boots and bindings to keep us attached!

I lasted about a year on that thing, I couldn’t get used to the fact that I would eventually have to swim in snowboard boots in large surf. The following years I played with kite foil boards and design on and off. What really got me fired up was seeing the ‘modern’ surf foil that Alex Aguera built for Kai Lenny. I am sure everyone remembers that first video. With Alex’s design, he created a new sport in which a surfer could ride small waves or wind swell. Shortly after, my good friend Guy Perre again came to me to build him a new board, a modern surf foil board. From that point on I have been addicted to the sport, not only building the boards but riding them…

And congratulations, they're really fine looking boards!

Talk us through the three new models and their intended usage.

Thanks for the compliment! So first up we have the Fire Bolt. The Fire Bolt comes in three sizes: 4’0 (30l) 4’6 (33l) and 4’10 (37l).

The Fire Bolt was conceived by my friend Scot McNally who is an

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extremely gifted foiler here in Hawaii. Features include a narrower outline with a round pin which gives the board more clearance in hard turns, mast tracks pushed further forward, and a deeper kick tail which gives the board early lift and a very reactive feel. The Fire Bolt is built in my vacuum carbon construction which is very light, stiff and sensitive to rider input. This design is for the expert rider who wants the highest performing board possible under their feet.

Then we have the Nubby. The Nubby comes in five sizes: 3’10 (31l) 4’2 (33l) 4’6 (36l), 4’10 (39l) and 5’0 (44l). This has been my most popular design. It is easy to paddle, catches waves very well and surfs incredible. For 2020 I have pulled the tail in a bit for a more responsive feel and added the kick tail for earlier lift. As with all of my designs, the Nubby has my concave deck which gives the heel and toe of your foot total contact and total control. The Nubby is targeted at intermediate to advanced level riders Finally we have the Uncle Nubby. The Uncle Nubby comes in two sizes: 4’10 (54l) and 5’2 (58l). This design was inspired by my friend “Uncle” Byran Suratt. The idea initially was to give an older guy more volume to help out while paddling. As the original Uncle 4’10 was passed around amongst Bryan’s friends (some as heavy as 250 pounds) I soon realized this design works incredibly for larger people who want to ride a smaller board. As the Uncle Nubby got out in the world, I soon got great feedback from people who had been riding it with the wind wing.

So there is a Nubby for everyone!

Yeah, Uncle Bryan is not a particularly physically large guy, he just wanted the extra volume to move his 70-year-old bones along better. Not only did he love his 4’10, all of his 200+ pound friends that wanted to ride a smaller board loved it as well! It has been a great performance design for the larger riders. •

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“Uncle Bryan is not a particularly physically large guy, he just wanted the extra volume to move his 70-year-old bones along better.

Not only did he love his 4’10, all of his 200+ pound friends that wanted to ride a smaller board loved it as well!”

How important is the concave deck to your boards?

This has been a design feature that has added one of the most significant performance benefits to my boards: control. My concave decks are designed to give the rider’s heel and toes more contact with the board. When I first learned to surf foil, I converted one of my old 5’10 surfboards with a dome deck into a foil surfboard. I had no thoughts about my foot connection to the deck, it was all so new. With that dome deck, I would get these radical cramps in my feet. What I realized later is that my toes where reaching around the dome to get a grip on the deck, I called it ‘monkey grip’. The next board was a custom that I made with a flat deck, it was clear how much more control I had with a flat deck compared to a dome. The next sensible thought to me was the concave deck. The concave deck was noticeably better than the flat deck and became standard in all of my custom designs and then my production boards.

There’s a lot of hydrofoil systems on the market at the moment.

What brands of foils have you coupled your boards with, and have they needed any shimming or do they run pretty neutral?

I have had all of the major foils on my boards. I have spent quite a bit of time ‘shimming’ in the design of my boards. My first surf foil board had a touch of tail rocker which was by habit coming from years of surfboard design. What this did was angled the mast and wings back which resulted in the nose of the board pointing to the sky.

The next prototypes had flat tails (rockers) which gave the feeling that the nose was pointing down and it felt like there was very little

front foot control. Since then, I have tuned my tail rocker to give the perfect trim with most of the major surf foils without shimming.

Tell us about the ‘Lift Stick' function that comes with your boards...

The Lift Stick is a measuring stick to index where your foil is in the tracks. It also gives the user a ‘+’ and ‘-’ to indicate more lift (+ = move the mast forward) and less lift (- = move the mast back).

And can you tell us what’s up next now that this new range is out there?

I will continue to design, prototype, develop, ride, and promote the importance of the smile! •

TOP LEFT Coming in hot on the Fire Bolt.

BOT TOM LEFT When you've just ridden too many waves, Uncle Nubby's got your back.

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NAISH HA WINGS By the time you read this, Naish's new HA wings will most likely be 'out there'. We got hold of Scott Trudon at Naish HQ in Maui to find out more...

Hi Scott, can you give us a bit of an overview of the three new HA wings?

The HA wings are the perfect next step in speed and progression in your foiling. The 1240 is amazing for surfing and higher wind wing surfing, the 1400 is for someone over 180lbs for surfing and average wind speeds on the wing, the 1800 is great for the 200lbs+ big fella for surfing and provides amazing speed and stability on the wing in light winds. We feel the three cover a wide range of body weight, wave size and wind strengths.

So the series is mainly aimed at surf and wingsurfing – how have you been testing them?

Yeah, the HA series is aimed at surfing, wing surfing and also SUP surfing. Being a Maui based company we have the benefit of testing all of our products in about every condition imaginable, from small surf to big surf, and from light winds to 40+ knots.

What are the performance benefits of the HA designs?

The main performance benefit that riders will notice is the speed and acceleration, whether it’s on a wave or a gust of wind. In short, the HA is designed and built to be ridden at a higher speed, and

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that’s the zone where it performs and feels best. What you may sacrifice in your ability to turn like you would on a low aspect setup, you gain in increased speed and incredible improvement in your ability to pump, which will be next level. Lastly, higher lift speeds enable you to have a better ability to control the lift and turn it into drive at a higher speed.

What sort of speed are the HA wings topping out at?

On the wing we have been reaching speeds of 16-18 knots, and surfing has been in the 10-15 knots range, depending on the wave size and shape. One of the amazing elements of the HA series is whether you’re on a wave or on a wing the top end seems limitless.

What construction method are you using for the HA wings, and does it fit the same modular system as the existing Jet foil line up?

Yes, the Jet series and HA wings are all interchangeable, and all our Naish wings are carbon pre-preg molded. The HA wings are a great compliment to our Jet series. The Jet series has an amazingly low lift speed in both small waves and light wind, so for both learning to surf or wing surf on the Jet it’s amazingly forgiving, stable, and easy to turn. The HA series is perfect for the foiler that wants to experience the next level of speed and acceleration. Keep in mind that high aspect wings in general are not as forgiving as low aspect wings, and take a bit of time to adjust your technique and ­trimming reaction time. Surfing and cruising on a foil is amazing on the Jet, and if you have the need for increased speed, HA is your next step. •

A B OV E It's pretty clear why Maui works well for Naish's rigorous testing of all their new kit...

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FORESIGHT KODY KERBOX

Multi-talented Maui waterman Kody Kerbox jumps in on our regular section where those in the know speculate and ruminate upon where this fast-evolving sport is heading...

+ The evolution of foiling over the last twenty years has been so much fun to witness and be a part of here on Maui. From watching guys like Laird Hamilton and Rush Randle experiment with it back in the day, to seeing where Kai and the next generation have been able to take it is pretty amazing. I believe we are just starting to scratch the surface of what is capable while riding a hydrofoil. In my mind there is no limit to how big of a wave could be ridden, how many miles could be covered or how technical of a trick could be completed using a foil. There is guaranteed to be so much evolution over the next 5-10 years that would be hard to imagine at this point. It all comes down to improving equipment and having the right kind of people who want to take it to the next level.

+ I believe the advancements in foils will come in the form of smaller wings. I have had the chance to try some small wings that are extremely hard to ride, but allow you to reach much higher speeds than what is possible on a typical set up. Going fast and being in control is going to allow riders to surf bigger waves, glide downwind at higher speeds and get more air. The challenge will be getting used to this equipment.

+ In the future I believe foiling will be accepted in the mainstream, but I don’t think we will ever get to the point of seeing foils in every line up. Most good high-performance surf waves are not necessarily that good for foiling. There is a time and a place for every sport in the ocean, and the exciting part of foiling is that you can use it for adventure and exploring new locations which are typically untouched. When it is used in this way and not forced into crowded line ups, I think it will have a better reputation and be accepted by all.

+ I have no doubt we will see the competitive side of foiling continue to build. In Hawaii there have already been quite a few downwind races and wave riding events. I am sure these events will continue, and more will show up on the scene. I know there is already talk of wing foil races and along with that could obviously come a freestyle division as well. Just as with foiling, the competitive side is endless… On Maui we are already seeing quite a few kids ripping, so I would say the future for foiling superstars is bright. •

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“There is guaranteed to be so much evolution over the next 5-10 years that would be hard to imagine at this point.”

Photo Marc Jacobs

Photo @fishbowldiaries

Photo Marc Jacobs

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Professional kiteboarder and recent surf foil convert Jalou Langeree tells us how her love for the foil emerged out of the mushy North Sea, and how it has added an incredible new dimension to her water-time...

started surf foiling about a year ago. My brother Kevin got back from a trip to Maui, and he was all about the hydrofoiling. He picked it up very quickly (as he does with every sport!), and it completely fascinated me. I’m from Noordwijk a small coastal village in the Netherlands and the waves are very average North Sea mush. But foiling managed to bring back the stoke for these mushy waves! You can almost ride every wave, you just need to be aware of the shallow sandbars and time it right with the tides, as these factors affect the waves so much. Even in the time it takes to get into your wetsuit, the waves can already have gotten even better or worse. That’s how quickly it changes around here.

I found it very tricky when I started and it kind of felt like somewhat of a love and hate relationship. Out on the kite I picked it up relatively quickly, but just surfing on it… yeah that was a bit of a task. I’ve found the hardest part is dealing with the lift of the wing while getting on your feet. The wing creates so much lift that you literally take off! That in combination with the underwater turbulence… Well, put it this way, I swore quite a few times during the learning process. Plus shifting your weight onto your front leg is the direct opposite to how you kiteboard, and then once you get that you’ll need to read the wave and learn how to pump. Getting into the rhythm of swinging the arms while pumping was also something that didn’t look too charming on me to begin with… I looked like a new-born chick! Thankfully I’m pretty comfortable on it now.

What I find most addictive and fun about surf foiling is the silence and smoothness that the foil offers. The ‘Magic Carpet’ effect. You can legitimately get excited about small waves and you can catch countless waves in a row if your legs can keep up with the pumping. •

LEFT Jalou in the moment and clearly loving every second...

A B OV E One of those enjoyable days when there's more personal photographers in the line-up than other riders...

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Then when the wind’s up on flat summer days in the Netherlands, I’ll get the kite out to foil, and just spend some time cruising around. It’s nice to leave the busy packed beaches and just kite far out to sea and enjoy the view and the silence. I’m at the stage now where I probably enjoy the downwind foiling the most. I’ll be using the North Scoop 120, a Sonar 70 mast and the 1650 Sonar wing. I’ll get towed into some sea breeze chop by a kiter, and then connect one wave after the other, and just glide for miles. The sessions here in Cape Town hold the perfect conditions for that. The strong south easterly wind that blows here creates the most insane wind swell. Every evening there is a group of SUP riders and people on foils that join in on the downwinder. I used to join them on a race SUP but now I’d rather foil. I’m looking forward to getting to some sessions in Muizenberg (near Cape Town) this season too. It has long, slow waves which are perfect for surf foiling. It all definitely sits on my ‘wanna progress’ list for this coming winter season.

There are some real innovators in this sport. I think Kai Lenny is truly the man at this point, he keeps the sport evolving and he always comes up with something new. I also love seeing Annie Reickert as a female following in his footsteps but on her own terms. She is setting the tone for females and I find it very inspiring. I think the pace of innovation and evolution in the sport has to slow down at some point, but right now I don’t think it’s slowing. I think we are only at the beginning of the foil revolution… And if it does start to slow down, just wait for Kai, he always comes up with something new! •

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“I love seeing Annie Reickert as a female following in Kai's footsteps but on her own terms. She is setting the tone for females and I find it very inspiring.”

TOP Seen a bigger smile lately? Nor have we...

LEFT The 'new born chick' found her wings...

RideR: bevan gooch - 1200 Wing + 85 mast + 3’11 sUrf/Kite/toW phOtO: pete may

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