Monday, October 8, 2012

from John Courter, describing his day windsurfing on 9/30/12:

When I started rigging there was a very light wind in the bay.  I decided it was time to take advantage of Kirill's offer to try his Serenity.  The Serenity is designed for light air, is pointy on both ends, has a roundish bottom and is only 24 inches wide.   By the time I had finished rigging it was glassy on the bay.   No ripples on the water and I'm gliding around in the bay.  It feels like there's no drag on this board.  On flat water it wasn't too bad to stand on, throw a few boat wakes in and it definitely felt tippy.  Later the wind starts to build and the long narrow bow starts slicing through the water. Now that is has some speed it feels stable.  The wind picked up to maybe 10 kts, the board climbs onto a plane with no transition, it just speeds up above hull speed and the front 3-4 feet of the board is no longer in the water.  Off the wind you're doing a pretty good balancing act to stay on this board.

I had also sailed Giovanni's Crit D2 earlier this summer, another version of a light air, round bottom board.  It also pushes through the water pretty effortlessly and goes upwind like it's on train tracks, but I think the Serenity has it beat for that gliding through the water feeling.  2 things about the Crit D2 that I think could have been done differently are that there is almost no rocker and the bow could have come more to a point.  The Crit 630 I have shares these characteristics. The 630 is another round bottomed board, but it has flat sections aft as opposed to the D2 staying round all the way back.  

The club's Surfsprint is another round bottomed board in the front that transitions to flat sections aft.  It has a lot more rocker and has a much pointier bow than the Crits.  It is also a good light air sailer.  I like the pointier bows and some rocker, but 30 years of sailing on my own Surfsprint might have something to do with it.

John  

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