Next SUP

General Discussion
1

Aloha all,

After 6 mos. surfing my 11’6" SUP in less than perfect small to medium eastern N.C. waves (and having a ridiculous amount of fun I must admit) I am downsizing to a more “high performance” (an oxymoron?) SUP. Mind you, I never go through the pack- what lineup there is in the winter here, and it’s generally a solitary pursuit, catching waves that would have gone unridden.

Anyhow, my excellent shaper friend David D. and I have almost solidified plans for a 10’2" x 28" x 4 1/4".What I keep vacillating on is the tail shape; been from diamond to wing swallow to pin and keep coming back to the old squash. I keep imagining a midget surfing a board that is (necessarily) to big for him- what tail shape would work the best? The bottom turn is not a problem, but cranking that beast hard off the top is the trick. Some things that have seemed to work in small waves are a generous vee in the tail, and a “cluster” type fin setup with a relatively small center fin. I’m thinking of putting in five boxes so multiple fin configurations (including quad) can be tried. Maybe the tail shape isn’t all that important, and just having a board barely big enough to paddle will be the thing (I’m 165 lb).

Any thoughts? This is my first post; hope it comes through.

                                                                                          Thanks, FR
2

Hey man, what part of nc are you in, I am in Wilmington and I have been riding a 12’0, 29, 4.75 as a quad and love it, and I would like to go to a 9’6 or 10’0 SUP board really high performance with a concave all the way throught. Right now my bigboard has a vee through the whole bottom with chine rails and those rails are sick, when onthe face of the wave it really likes to sit on the rail and fly especially with the quad. But your suggestoin of a 4 1/4 thick high performance board is that thick enough for a board smaller? I am also 165 lbs, so the board will float the same for both of us, but to me a smaller board towards the 9’6 range would seem to have to go closer to 5 inches thick.

3

makahiki,

I’m from up the road in Morehead City/AB. Have had a couple good sessions at WB recently when the wind was W/NW. My friend Dave has that computer program that can figure out a board’s volume, and I’m guessing I can go maybe 10% less than my current 11’6" and still be able to paddle it. It seems that width is almost more important than length for stability. I guess I’ll find out- can’t wait to try.

                                                                                                                          Cheers, see you out on the water  FR