There were 8 boards registered with ISAF for use on the FW circuit. These included, the F2 FX-Z/FX-VI, Mike’s Lab L8, Starboard F162/Apollo, Gaastra Vapor, Lorch Thunderbird Formula F1 and the Exocet Warp Formula 100. We haven’t had access to all of these boards as some of them weren’t available in the countries we tested in or weren’t properly represented on the FW Pro Circuit during 2008, so for the purpose of this tuning guide we’ve only reviewed the more mainstream and widely available of the boards which included, Starboard F162, Gaastra Vapor, F2 FX-Z/FX-VI, Exocet Warp Formula 100.

The riders interviewed for this tuning guide include:

* right now, we haven’t been able to get access to any of the new F2 boards for measurement. If someone would like to supply these measurements, that would be great! Email them to Sean.

IMPORTANT NOTE:

We’ve supplied fin suggestions based on the fins the riders have previously tried with the boards. Its possibly that many different styles of fins will work with each board. We’re not suggesting you need have one of the suggested fins or you are wasting your time, merely that if you had already decided to buy a fin, here’s some helpful suggestions on model. We’ve tried to suggest a model from each brand but obviously not every fin was available to every rider. Consult your fin maker for more specifics before making a decision.

Mast-track settings and boom-height will change dramatically based on the fin you are using. We have given the settings as a ‘guide’ only. Start with our settings and then make adjustments to your own preferences and sailing styles.

Starboard F162 / FWOD

Starboard released two versions of their F162 board. The second version, released mid way through 2008, was an identical board given the graphics of FWOD (Formula Windsurfing One-Design, pictured left) as Starboard made a bid to create the new Olympic Windsurfing equipment for the 2012 Olympics. Although Starboard always maintained the shapes were identical, there was some speculation that the rocker lines were changed on the newer FWOD versions (weweren’t able to find this on the boards we measured however) to give them less flat towards the tail however, the main feature riders will notice is that the new F162′s or FWOD versions, sport a thicker grey paint and logo on the bottom of the board, either to stay with ISAF’s policies on Olympic equipment being difficult to modify by sanding or to help with early problems they had with the board with the veneer of the bottom of the boards weeping.

The F162 came under early criticism from the general public on the windsurfing forums that the board wasn’t performing well compared to its competitor’s boards, however, after a 12 months on the market it would appear now that it was just a case of sailors not realising how different this board was to its predecessors and not tuning the board correctly.

BOARD DESIGN / CHARACTERISTICS:

Compared to the F160/F161 Starboards, the new F162 is considerably wider in the tail and has a wider and thinner nose, with considerably less nose-rocker leading up to the front of the board. The concept behind the thinner and flatter nose, was to aid with the ‘sticking’ problems that the 160 and to some extent the 161 had downwind, whereby the big and bulky noses of these boards would catch each wave and slow the board down. This new nose has been quite successful in improving downwind speed on the F162 even with the wider tail, which although helps immensely with upwind ability, the wider the tail, the more wetted surface-area you are dragging downwind.

This board sails incredibly ‘flat’, meaning that the nose sticks to the water and the board feels very rigid and stiff under your feet.  Because of the flat nose-rocker, you need to be mindful of always trying to set up your gear to keep the nose clear of the water. Even with good rail pressure, without the nose lifting you can produce too much leeward rail engagement, which slows the board down. As a result, the best tuning settings are ones that free the nose and help to rail the board.

FINS:

No doubt, with the ‘flat’ characteristics this board has when it sails makes fin choice a lot more critical then previous Starboard boards. The F162 requires an extremely powerful fin to help rail the board and lift the nose to get the board to ‘free up’ and stop sticking to the water. Don’t mistake a powerful fin for simply just an ‘upright’ fin; these are two different things. What the board requires is a powerful fin and the best way to do this is to try fins with little to no ‘geometric twist’ and torsionally stiff. The best fins showing these characteristics are the Kashy XS/XXS, VMG Blades ‘K’ model and Hurricane FRB6 with ’0′ twist. During testing this board we found the Deboichet R20 not powerful enough to keep the nose of the board lifting.

The fins we recommended for this board are currently:
{column1}
Light Winds:

- Kashy 72/70 XS
- Ifju LWXS 70*
- VMG Blades K76/70
- Hurricane FRB6 ’680′ S- 72/70
{/column1}

{column2}
Strong Winds:

- Kashy 70cm XS
- Ifju LWXS 70
- VMG Blades K70
- Hurricane FRB6 ’680′ S- 70

{/column2}

*We hadn’t tried a cutdown Ifju at the time of testing. But presumably they would be as good as the 70.

In lightwinds, the tail width of this board will allow cutdown fins up to 72/76cm however most of the riders using this board used 72/74cm fins. The board requires a lot of power both from your fin and also from your sail, so it is recommended in light/medium winds to always use the biggest sail possible. Pro rider Jesper Vesterstrøm suggested he used his 11.8m sail up to 18 knots which is higher than other riders on other boards.  The extra power from your sail will help generate the lift the board needs to rail and also help power the bigger cutdown fins you are using.

MAST-TRACK and STRAP POSITIONS:

This board sails very flat, so to counteract this characteristic you need to get all the power and leverage towards the back of the board. Start with the mast-track all the way in the back (with your plate covering the serial number even) and straps in the back holes (front and back straps). Your boom height will depend on your style, however it is recommended to use as higher boom height as possible to help lift the nose of the board. Using larger cutdown fins, may cause the nose to sit lower in the water due to the amount of vertical-lift they produce; having a high boom, straps and mast-track back will help to counteract the fin and the boards insitence to keep sailing flat.

In stronger winds, the mast-track can be moved forward to aid with control, however it is not recommended to go much further than the middle of the track, even in hurricane conditions.

Overall, this is a very comfortable board to sail and the specified weights of the boards we measured were all within tolerances. It may require a little bit more tuning than other boards if you have been riding the previous Starboard FW boards as the F162 is a very different animal to its predecessors.

Gaastra Vapor Racing

Gaastra entered the Formula Board market quite late, with the Vapor Racing 2008 board their first ever FW board. Shaped by Tabou shaper Fabien Vollenweider and developed by Steve Allen (AUS-0) and Hubert Mokrzycki (POL-25), Gaastra were pretty quick to snag a good market share of the FW boards sold in 2008, even if it took them 10 months to acknowledge the board even existed on their website!

BOARD DESIGN / CHARACTERISTICS:

We’ve written a more in depth review of the Gaastra board which you can read here, however, the fins have changed immensely since that article was published and we recommend using the settings mentioned below rather than in the previous review.

The general characteristics of the Vapor board are that its got a nice amount of scoop-rocker, a very wide tail, similar (which we like!) cutouts to the F162 and a very well designed nose which has just the right amount of vee/concave and thin outline built in to it to make this board a real performer downwind, even in strong winds.

The board arguably feels similar under the feet to a Starboard F160, however, with the wider tail, the board feels much more ‘free’ even in light winds. It is a very ‘aggressive’ board, meaning that the nose rides high in the water and the board feels very twitchy and responsive under your feet. Although, there will be no problems with control, even in high winds, with this board, the general ride characteristics are that the board is extremely loose and ‘flighty’ with the nose being lifted easily and fin/rail pressure being generated easily. All the tuning settings for this board are to keep the nose tracking straight without bobbing up and down which is can do with the wrong mast-track position. This is one of the few boards that is not very fin specific, almost any fin will work and feel comfortable with the board, which is a great attribut to its design.

FINS:

As we mentioned, this board works well with almost any from an old Deboichet R13 up to the latest Kashy/VMG etc super soft fins. With the very forgiving feeling this board has in high winds and the safety the nose of this board creates when sailing downwind in big swell, it will be possible to use much larger fins in higher winds with the Vapor board. We found the best fins suited to this board are the newer, much softer, swept-back fins such as Kashy, VMG Blades, Deboichet R20 and Hurricane FRB6 as these fins create a bit of vertical lift under the board which helps to keep the nose down a little and under control.

Different to the Starboard F162, you don’t need as much power from the fin to generate rail pressure with this board, so we recommend getting fins with maximum amount of twist in the tip which will help depower and settle the board down when the fin loads up in high winds and will also allow a much more comfortable and smooth ride downwind at deeper angles.

The fins we recommended for this board are currently:
{column1}
Light Winds:

- Kashy 74/70 XS
- Ifju LWXS
- VMG Blades K76/70 (Gaastra model)
- Hurricane FRB6 ’682′ S- 72/70
- Deboichet R20
{/column1}

{column2}

Strong Winds:

- Kashy 70cm XS
- Ifju LWXS
- VMG Blades K73 or K70 (Gaastra model)
- Hurricane FRB6 ’682′ S- 70
- Deboichet R20
{/column2}

MAST-TRACK and STRAP POSITIONS:

With a 12m sail, the mast-track should sit in the middle of the track. Any further back and you begin to stall the board as it does not require the track so far back to lift the nose, the shape of the board does this automatically. As it is quite an aggressive board, when the wind gets up you need to move the track forward to keep control of the nose. With the track 2-3cm further forward than centre, the board comes in to its own in strong winds, with a very comfortable and easy ride, despite how responsive the board feels under your feet. It might be possible to stay in the outside straps in strong winds much longer on this board compared with any other, due to its nose shape and wide tail. Straps should always be in the back holes on this board and boom height needs to be as high as comfortable.

We recommend running a higher boom and mast-track further forward to keep the nose at the optimum control level. If you were to move your mast-track further back than middle (to help lift the nose) and then run your boom lower to compensate, the board seems to ‘stall’ a little and be slower to get planing.

Overall, Gaastra have done a very good job providing one of the few boards this season that is as fast as it is easy to sail and tune. Any fin, any sail and any sized rider will suit this board.

Exocet Warp Formula 100

It was said that Exocet’s Patrice Belbeoch developed the Warp Formula 100 entirely on his own without testing against another rider or another board brand. Whether that is true or not, Patrice certainly came up with a very different board for the 2008 season, turning away from trends or copying other designs and creating one of the most talked about boards in 2008. With its slick carbon look and black paint, the new Exocet, aka the “Black Machine” turned a few heads this year when Argentinian rider Gonzalo Costa-Hoevel ended his long-term deal with F2 to ride the new Exocet.

BOARD DESIGN / CHARACTERISTICS:

The first thing to notice about this board is the weight. At its ISAF registered weight, the Warp Formula is nearly 1kg lighter than than any other board on the market and we’ve found by weighing a number of different boards the gap could even be more than 1kg.

Much like the F162, the Exocet sails extremely flat, with the nose sticking to the water, however this characteristic is due much more to the underside of the board’s shape. There is very little rocker and concave in this board and very little nose-rocker towards the front. Exocet have widened the tail of this board immensely and the Exocet has become the widest tailed board behind the new F2′s, with an extra 1cm over the F162 and 2cm over the Vapor at the 30cm off mark.

The board has a similar sailing feeling to the F162 upwind in that the board sails incredibly ‘flat’ with the nose sticking to the water, however it feels a lot more stiff and rigid under your feet than the F162, probably due to the wider tail and flatter rockerline. With the super light weight, the board planes up considerably earlier than other boards with an 11m sail and has extremely good upwind angles in lightwind with its flat bottom shape. The nose appears to stick a little downwind in stronger breezes however this can be fine-tuned with the right fins and setup.

FINS:

Much like the Vapor board, the Exocet’s strengths are that it appears to suit a variety of fins. Everything from older R13 fins up to the latest Kashy/VMG etc super soft fins. The extra width in the tail allows the rider to use a big fin in stronger breezes however the fin must be working to help lift the nose of the board otherwise it could be counter-productive. Different fins give this board a different riding style. Using more traditional fins such as the R13, the board feels incredibly stiff under your feet and generates a lot of lift and speed upwind. As the R13 is a fin that generates a lot of ‘railing’ very easily downwind, we found this fin to give almost the best performance downwind in a variety of windstrengths as it helped rail the board which could clear the ‘sucking’ nose of swells and also reduce the wetted surface area of the board downwind; decreasing drag.

Despite what fin you decide to use, the fin needs to have considerably less rake than other board models. A fin that is less upright will help to lift the nose of the board and may also generate a little more geometric twist in the fin which can help with speed downwind and giving the board a more comfortable ride downwind.

The fins we recommended for this board are currently:
{column1}
Light Winds:

- Kashy 72/70 XS (rake 4.5 deg)
- VMG Blades K73/70 (rake 5 deg)
- Deboichet R13 S– 70 (rake +4)
- Deboichet R20 70 (rake +4)
{/column1}

{column2}

Strong Winds:

- Kashy 72/70 XS (rake 4.5 deg)
- VMG Blades K70 or K68 (rake 5 deg)
- Deboichet R13 S– 70 (rake +4)
- Deboichet R20 70 (rake +4)
{/column2}

MAST-TRACK and STRAP POSITIONS:

The mast-track on this board needs to be run as far back as possible at all times; even in strong winds. The same goes for the footstraps. The reason being, upwind you need to release the nose of the board and having your setup all in the back with maximum pressure on your fin will help to generate the rail pressure needed to lift the nose of the board. Downwind, this board is susceptible to the nose catching waves and slowing down. To counteract this you must get your weight centralised over the back of the board and aggresively rail the board with your feet. Hitting the swell at an angle, whilst the board is extremely railed, will help reduce drag and improve your speed downwind. Fin choice will help with this and one of the main reasons we’ve included the R13 fin with this board is that it is arguably the best fin to generate the rail pressure needed to rail this board downwind and ‘fly the fin’.

On another note, there has been mixed responses as to whether this smaller, lighter board can handle a 12m. The Exocet feels lower on volume than other boards on the market (even though on paper, it is even bigger than some of the other baords) because the overall thickness of the board is less at the the tail and the flatter rockline makes the board appear to sit lower in the water. Although, Gonzalo has been using 12m successfully in light winds in the early part of this season, some heavier riders might find this board a little harder to get planing with the bigger rigs because the board will stall when the nose is pushed down during pumping.

Overall, Exocet have done a great job with this board and provided an interesting competitor to the F162, Vapor and F2 boards. This board, might have more advantages for lighter riders as it ‘may’ have more potential for early planing used with an 11m sail in lighter winds. It is a very easy board to sail/trim upwind however might require a bit more tuning downwind to get the best speed out of the board.

F2 FX-Z

F2 did something unusual in response to the IFWC’s two-year board design lock; they registered two boards, with the FX-VI being produced early on for the 2008 season and the FX-Z only being made available to the ‘general’ consumer much later in the 2008 season. Although the boards share some common characteristics, they are two different boards, with F2 shaper Patrik Diethelm working with Gonzalo Costa-Hoevel on the boards before Gonzalo switched to the Exocet team halfway through 2008. The boards appear to have followed two completely different development paths, each following on from the 2006 and the 2007 F2 boards, which were very different in concept.

For the purpose of describing the general characteristics, we will describe both the FX-Z and FX-VI at once.

BOARD DESIGN / CHARACTERISTICS:

Compared to the other boards on the market, the major design feature of the F2′s is their incredibly wide tails, with the Z being slightly wider than the VI and both being almost 5cm wider than any other board at the one foot off mark. Both boards sport a very rounded outline in their tail and a lower overall scoop-rocker than previous F2 boards which allows them to have good early planing ability despite the drag of the extra tail width.

Looking at both the boards, they appear very square as the tail is almost the width of the nose, but on the water is where they show their abilities. Both boards have a very ‘aggressive’ sailing style which is a little bit more technical to sail comfortably than other boards on the market. The F2 boards are easily railed with their flat vee section in the tail and very sharp rails in the middle however this can also make the boards feel very ‘flighty’ in stronger winds and chop and more mast-track forward pressure is needed to keep the nose down.

It is probably a fair comment that these are both ‘lightwind’ specialist boards. With the added tail width, it’s possible to run fins bigger than ever before (Pro Rider Dennis Littel used an 83cm cutdown Kashy fin in light winds with the FX-Z in 2008) as the added leverage from the board’s tail width allows greater control. The majority of riders will be using much larger cutdown fins in 2009 as large (+76cm) cutdowns are still relatively new on the market. To some extent, the F2 boards have helped drive the need for bigger cutdown fins in other boards on the market.

In stronger winds these boards can become a little more difficult to sail as they require a taller and heavier rider who can use their height to leverage over the board to keep control and stop the board from flying the nose; especially downwind. Of course, the wider the tail the more leverage you get against the fin but also more drag you get whilst sailing. It is a tough comprimise with these F2 boards as they definitely have the best lightwind abilities of any board on the market this year but at the expense of being more difficult in stronger winds and a little more technical to keep the speed up downwind as the tail seems to suck a little on the downwind legs.

F2 recommends the VI as the choice for lighter sailors and the Z for heavier/taller sailors. This is a good recommendation as generally speaking, most of the taller, heavier riders on the tour used the Z versus the smaller guys using the VI when they had both to choose from.

BOOSTER PIPES / CUTOUT PLATES:

As usual, the F2′s sport the booster pipes and adjustable cutout plates to help with the tuning difficulties downwind. The concept behind the booster pipes and cutout plates have always generated a lot of discussion in the FW world and many theories are out there as to their effectiveness. Originally, when the pipes were brought in to their FW and slalom range in 2006, F2 stated that the pipes were to eliminate the vacuum created in the large tail cutouts while travelling at speed. From testing the boards in the past seasons that have used the pipes, its been more apparent that the pipes play a better role in reducing the vacuum at low speeds especially when trying to pump on to the plane. The same can be said for the current boards, as the tail width does have the propencity to ‘suck’ to the water whilst trying to initiate planing.

The cutout plates, give the rider four options (with plastic ringed spacers allowing the adjustments) by either using no plates, or putting 1-3 rings in between them to make the cutout depth smaller. All of our test riders found the board performed best with 2 rings in on both boards; in either strong or light winds, upwind or downwind.

FINS:

No doubt, with the insane tail width of these boards, it’s possible to use bigger fins than ever before. We had tested a smaller amount of fins out with these boards so there may be many more options available, but for tuning purposes, fins that work with the VI will work in the Z. Softer tipped and fins with a little bit more ‘geometric twist’ are a must with these boards to help release the board a little bit from the water and help it to rail. The fins need to be fast to generate the best lift but also to be powerful to help rail the board downwind. The best fins showing these characteristics are the Kashy XS/XXS, VMG Blades ‘K’ and ‘B’ models, the R20 and Ifju LW models.

The fins we recommended for this board are currently:
{column1}
Light Winds:

- Kashy 78-80/70 XS
- Ifju LWXS 70*
- VMG Blades K78/70, B78/70
- Deboichet R20
{/column1}

{column2}
Strong Winds:

- Kashy 70cm XS
- Ifju LWXS 70
- VMG Blades K70
- Deboichet R20

{/column2}

F2 FX-Z

F2 FX-VI

We hope you are able to use this guide to better tune your boards in 2009. CarbonSugar would like to stress that it is actually a ‘guide’ and not a definitive tuning methodology. Everyone is different and we only sampled a small number of fins, so please our recommendations as a basis to begin tuning and try your own settings to see if they are faster.

Feel free to post your comments/suggestions and personal experiences about the boards in the comments so the discussion can be built on.

First and foremost, it is important to clarify a few aspects of terminology used when people talk about fins, as scouring the popular windsurfing forums over the past few years you will find a plethora of information where people are using terms incorrectly and are only adding to the confusion. Here are a few of the key terms used in fin-ology.

Rake:

Rake is simply the angle of the leading edge of the fin, relative to a line perpendicular to the bottom of the board. Everyone started thinking about modifying the rake of their fins in a more mainstream sense around the 2003 FW Worlds. As Deboichet represented about 95% of the fin market at that time, the ‘rake’ scale became popularised under a number system only applicable to Deboichet fins.

Deboichet uses a scale such as +4cm, +6cm, +8cm etc (where +11cm is vertical). Both Kashy and Hurricane use a scale such as 2 degrees, 3 degrees etc (where 0 degrees is vertical).

Deboichet: +8cm = 2.5 degrees = 30mm back from vertical.

Ps. Remember that MORE rake, means the fin is LESS upright (more swept-back at the tip). Because Deboichet’s scale is counting up as you decrease the rake, a lot of people have mistakenly written on forums about more rake when they are actually talking about moving fins from +6cm to +8cm, which is LESS rake.

Generally speaking, the more upright your fin is, the more lift it generates at the expense of induced drag. In light winds, people usually have relatively upright fins and in strong winds, some may have their fins with a little more rake to keep control of the board. Another important point to understand about rake is that by changing the rake of a fin, you are also influencing the twist.

Twist:

Twist is probably one of the least well understood characteristics of a fin. It is most commonly mistaken as being ‘torsional-stiffness’, when it is in fact, something completely different. When sailing, the righting moment of the sailor is countered by the side-force (or lateral resistance) of the board and the lift provided by the fin. Twist (or in aerodynamic terminology, “geometric twist”) is the result of the lift developed by the fin acting very close to 1/4 of the chord, back from the leading edge, while the neutral axis for bending is about 40% back from the leading edge; so there is a torsional moment when the fin bends. Simply put, as you flex a fin when you sail, this causes the fin to twist.

The geometric twist is more pronounced if you have a fin that is more swept-back (raked). So you will probably get more twist with an R13 at +4cm than you would with an identical R13 at +8cm.

Twist is important for the performance of a fin both upwind and downwind. Having no twist in a fin allows you to generate a better upwind angle but at the expense of becoming uncomfortable (or difficult) to sail downwind. This is probably because twist reduces the induced drag of a fin (or vortex drag from the tip) which is a significant portion of the total drag of a fin at the speeds a windsurfer travels. The induced drag is reduced when the angle of attack [aoa] at the tip of the fin is less than the aoa at the root of the fin (particularly for a fin with a planform of a tapered leading edge, such as an R13).

*I’ve tried to keep this article relatively simple, but if you’d like to read some more about induced drag and geometric twist, try these:

• http://www.auf.asn.au/groundschool/umodule4.html
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_drag

Many top sailors will talk about the performance of their fins downwind, as much as they talk about it upwind. To be fast around the course you generally want a fin that performs downwind just as well as it did upwind. If you talk to some of the Pro’s on the circuit about downwind performance in fins you might hear them say that their fin is ‘working’ for them off the wind and allowing them to ‘drive’ off the fin to go extra deep. Most likely they are referring to the twist in their fin, as the twist allows the fin to ‘depower’ to some extent and let you drive off it, deeper downwind, whereas some fins with no twist are creating too much lift downwind and force you to head upwind, giving you that ‘uncomfortable’ feeling downwind.

Similarly, it’s been said by some Pro’s that soft fins that twist are actually faster upwind in high-winds (despite what’s in your mind about stiffer fins being better in high winds). The twist in the fin can help it depower when you’ve generated too much lift in a gust and help to settle the board down. Having a board with a very wide tail (+81cm) will help with the control in high winds also.

Torsional-Stiffness:

Put a fin in your board and then grip the tip of the fin with your thumb and index finger. Twist the fin tip like you are unscrewing the lid of a Coke bottle. What you are witnessing is ‘torsional stiffness’ and although it is related, it is NOT ‘twist’ in the sense of how a fin manufacturer will be measuring it.

High torsional stiffness has been recently receiving more focus with the popularity of the Kashy fins on the market. Most of the better Kashy fins I have seen are more torsionally stiff than the majority of Deboichet/Hurricane fins and I believe this helps the Kashy fins retain a constant angle of attack which helps increase lift whilst maintaining good upwind speed.

The confusing thing about twist vs torsional-stiffness is probably because some people may assume that a softer fin is always going to have less torsional-stiffness and therefore more twist, but in actual fact that is not true. Both twist and torsional-stiffness are dependent on the planform, rake and most importantly, the fibre directions when the fin is layed-up during manufacture. As a result, a fin with extremely high torsional-stiffness can be built to twist a lot, or it can be built to have no twist at all. It is not possible to check twist with your fingers using the method above; it is possible however, to gauge torsional-stiffness with your fingers using this method.

Flex-Stiffness:

This is the stiffness you generally hear referred to when you buy a fin. A soft fin, a S–, an XXS, a 651; or so the lingo goes. Choosing the right stiffness of fin for the conditions you are sailing is very important, however the choices are about as individual as they come and depends heavily on your technique, sail brand, board brand and wind/wave conditions.

In flat water (eg. a lake), you put a more constant load on your fin when sailing upwind whereas on the ocean with swell and wind blown chop on the swell, the load on the fin is spiking as you go over waves or if you get slightly airborne over a chop. The other thing to consider is rider weight and sail size. A 90kg rider holding his 11m in 25 knots is most likely putting a considerable amount more load on his fin than a 72kg rider on his 9.8m in the same wind.

Selecting A New Fin

So you are going to go and buy yourself a nice new shiny fin. First, you should ask yourself a few questions about what you want the fin for.

• Light winds? You most likely want a soft, powerful fin.
• Light winds in shifty/flukey conditions (ie, if you sail on an inland lake, with fresh water or in off-shore winds)? You most likely want a fin that points super high, even if it is slow; pointing high allows you to get into the new wind quicker.
• Medium-strong winds on the ocean? It’s possible you might want a fin that travels faster, even at the expense of a little height, to be able to dodge between swells and help with your downwind speed.

Now What? Some Ideas on Fin Tuning

Now that we’ve covered a little bit of terminology and some super basic ideas to think about when selecting a fin to buy, it’s time to move over to how to tune a fin and what to think about when you are testing fins against other fins. It is quite difficult to explain what you are looking for when you tune any aspect of your gear, let alone fins. Tuning fins is about an intuitive feeling for going fast, pointing high or going deep downwind and this key skill that the Pro’s possess is something that mere mortals find difficult to grasp. Notwithstanding what I have just said, I still believe it is important that someone at least makes an attempt to explain what this feeling is, because that knowledge is one of the most sought after pieces of information in competitive windsurfing and probably something that most Pro’s will not want to give away.

On that note… here goes…

The approach I suggest you use when testing fins involves 3 stages:

1. Trying the new fin; understanding and learning its ’effect’ on the board
2. Testing the fin against the best fin you already have
3. Testing against a training partner

Stage 1: The “Effect”

The first thing you should think about when you try a new fin is its “effect” on the board; paying most of your attention to the ‘trim’ of the board. Most boards, generally speaking, like to be sailed with the nose riding high (lifting a little) and railing well upwind with even pressure between the front and back legs (or a little more pressure on your back leg if necessary). Some fins do this naturally (like a standard R13), but with other fins (even some that may be faster than an R13) you may need to work hard to develop this response from the fin.

There is no substitute for time-on-water. Just go sailing and get used to the feeling off your new fin. Forget about changing settings at this stage. Just sail your new fin.

Stage 2: Test the Best

To test any fin, you should always test it against the best fin you already have. Go for a run on your current best fin and find the setup that gets the most out of that fin in the conditions you are currently sailing (boom height, mast-track position etc). Now without changing any gear settings, go for a run on the new fin and pay close attention to how this fin effects the trim of the board (does the board feel stickier? sluggish? more responsive? lifting the nose too much and losing control?). If there is a difference, the first thing to try is moving your mast-track. I always suggest moving your mast-track in larger movements; 3cm at a time can sometimes be good to get a first impression on trim. When you are more dialled in to the feeling you can start moving it 1cm at a time.

If there is no difference in how the board sails/rails upwind then try moving your mast-track around anyhow. It’s possible, this new fin, even though it hasn’t changed the trim of your board, could have more control at the top end and allow you to run the mast-track further back than your best fin, which may be a faster setting on your fw board.

Downwind, mostly you want to find a fin that helps fly-the-fin, which is, excessively railing to reduce the wetted surface-area of the board. Traditional tapered leading-edge fins with a little twist such as an R13 or Hurricane 4a will rail the board almost with no concentration necessary. Some of the newer, softer fins with more torsional-stiffness, (such as a new Select R07 or some model Kashy’s) might require a slightly more upright stance or different mast-track position to fly-the-fin more efficiently. The fins that will do this the best will depend on the board/sail combination being used.

Stage 3: Race Your Buddy

Now that you’ve tuned your gear to compliment your new fin, go and test it against your training partner to check its performance. It’s important in this stage to have a consistent training partner of a similar speed and one who appreciates the rules of ’2-boat tuning’ and doesn’t just put you in the hopeless position all the time. You need to swap positions regularly when you run to make sure your position isn’t affecting the other sailor’s performance and it is likely, with two sailors, that one sailor might point higher and the other might go faster on their current setups. Every so often on the run upwind, change positions from windward to leeward boat, to see if you can judge whether one fin is going better than the other.

It’s important to understand how much ‘better’ one fin is going in the scope of the original points that were mentioned “when selecting a new fin”. HIGHER is different to FASTER. Imagine those strengths/weaknesses if you were in a race. It’s not much good being excited your new fin is faster upwind than your friend’s if he is going higher than you - when you purchased this fin to sail in shifty offshore conditions on a fresh-water lake. He will most likely punish you around the course and you’ll be 300 euros poorer.

Don’t forget downwind performance!

That’s It, We’re Done!

This is a pretty ‘general’ write-up about tuning fins, simply because the variables in windsurfing are too great to write a decent article on this unless you are writing about using a particular sail-brand, on a particular board, for guys at a particular body weight sailing in particular conditions. What I hoped to achieve, is to create a reference point and lay-down a few important points about creating your own system to efficiently let you test fins (with or without a training partner/gps-unit analysis) and get people thinking more about “what fins do to your board trim”, rather than obsessing over what fin is Antoine using.

If you remember the few key pointers about fin testing and learn a little about the terminology of fins, it will help you get more out of the millions of forum posts out there on fins (ie, I suggest you Google anything that Boogie has written on a forum in the last 6 years).

Hopefully this article will help with the next fin purchase. Down the track we will attempt to write something more specific to boards as with the new 2-year lock on board shapes, we are stuck with the current gear for some time now … In the meantime, here are a few frequently asked questions on fins from various windsurfing forums around the world.

Frequently Asked Questions Regarding Fins.

Q > I’ve read some Pro’s now prefer softer fins for high-wind; I thought stiffer fins were better for high-winds?

• http://www.star-board.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3526

I think you will find that statement to have been true about 3-4 seasons ago, but it doesn’t apply to the current gear. Since 2006, with the Starboard 160 (and now 161, 162). The tail-widths of the FW boards have increased dramatically; the same for nearly all board brands, not just Starboards. As a result, with even more power from the tail of the board we can run bigger and more powerful fins than ever before.

Although cutdown fins have been around a long time, they probably weren’t as mainstream back in the Starboard 147/158 days, but now look at the R19 (as a 76cm cutdown), which is the “standard” foil to come with a 161/162 board.

If you want more power in a fin, generally speaking, you make it bigger (ie, a cutdown) or you make it softer. So now we are seeing more people using soft fins in all conditions, not just lightwinds. And some (myself included to some extent), using one fin for nearly all conditions – the lightwind fin that works great in highwinds.

So with the extra control we now have with our wider tail boards and everyone using softer and softer fins, the brands have worked on the nose shapes, making them thinner and more boat-like (specifically on the 162 and Gaastra Vapor), which has allowed us to control these soft powerful fins downwind, where before it was uncomfortable with such power under your feet.

Another aspect that I suspect that plays a role is the “twist” in these fins. Hard to know exactly what happens with a fin under your feet, but I suspect the extra twist in the softer fins allows them to depower as they flex when you sail downwind and help with control, whereas a Medium fin would be trickier downwind and a Hard fin even trickier again as they can’t release the power and so end up forcing you upwind instead of allowing you the control to drive downwind.

Q > This new fin I have is making the board sail very flat, is this slow?

Probably. Depends on your board. As mentioned above in the tuning section, you are most likely sailing with one of these newer, softer and more powerful fins (a good example is a Kashy or what Deboichet is most likely trying to replicate with an R20). These fins create a small amount of vertical lift which in a sense, lifts the tail of your board which in turn, drops the nose of your board. I’ve read on some forums that with these fins the boards need to be sailed very flat, but I think you’ll find the fin is making your board sail flat (in other words, you don’t need to work so hard to get the optimum trim out of the fin; it is doing it for you).

Now go windsurfing!

Frank Bethwaite was at the forefront of development of the 18ft Skiffs from the 1970′s through to the 1990′s. He suggested that the performance of boats that sail with the apparent wind forward of the beam at all times (as does a FW board) is governed by the ratio of the sail carrying power versus the total weight.

(See the above picture and read the full chapter, “The Quest for Speed”; pg 164 -High Performance Sailing)

This chapter was written about 18ft Skiffs. A modern FW’er emulates the performance of an 18ft Skiff. A good comparison was the Ronstan Bridge-to-Bridge race in San Francisco. Micah Buzianis (USA-34) and Kevin Pritchard (USA-3) competed against many top 18ft Skiff boats from Australia (including the World Champion from England) as well as the best of the best in kitesurfing. Micah narrowly beat the 18ft Skiff in this race highlighting their similarity in boatspeed:

• http://www.kiter.com/events/bridge2bridge.asp
• http://www.formulawindsurfing.org/news.php?id=587

The “sail carrying power/total weight” ratio for a sailor like Antoine Albeau on FW gear is in the vicinity of 55% compared with 61% that Bethwaite identifies for a modern 18ft Skiff. The total equipment weight of FW gear is around 26kg (unless you have the new Exocet board!). With the hydrodynamic lift that a FW board generates when planing, the “sail carrying power” is perhaps a better determining factor in going fast, rather than Bethwaite’s sail carrying power/total weight ratio.

SAIL CARRYING POWER =
Righting Moment / Distance between the centre of effort of the sail and the combined lateral resistance of the hull and fin.

Antoine, at 100kg has a sail carrying power which is 20% more than someone like Steve Allen at 82kg. With the development of the FW class, raceboards have become wider (up to 100.5cm now) and in the last two seasons, even wider in the tail. This allows for more sail carrying power which has been helped by the stability and handling of the newer wide-luff race sails.

All that being said, there’s more to winning a race than simply eating a few too many meat-pies before you go sailing, which is proved by a guy like Steve Allen coming 2nd overall at a relatively light weight of 82kg. So let’s focus less on what you can do physiologically and look at some things you can “actually” do to help you go faster around the course at whatever weight you are…

Have a look at this photo from the racing in Silvaplana, 2007. The lead boat is Alberto Menegatti (ITA-456), behind him Markus Bouman (NED-6) and 3rd in the line is myself (AUS-120). Notice our distinctly different techniques. With Alberto on the uphaul rope he can get his body much further hiked and still have the sail quite upright. Markus gets out a little further than me but isn’t sheeted in too well in this picture. I believe I am too upright in the photo and have since worked on my technique to improve my stance.

Now have a look at this photo gallery here; a few photos of some of the top guys in FW going to windward. Notice everyone’s technique is slightly different but most of them have the sail very upright and are very hiked out, getting their body as far from the sail as possible. My favourite is the photo of Kevin Pritchard (USA-3) from the 2002 FW Worlds in Germany. His sail could be a little more upright but check out how far hiked he is! No wonder he won two Worlds in a row!

It is hard to get the sail upright and keep sheeted in at the same time. The two things seem to contradict each other when you try it. Work on getting your body hiked and away from the sail first, as it’s the easiest to correct. When you do, you will most likely be sailing with the rig too far on top of yourself. Once you start to drag the sail on top of you, the lift forces you are generating from the fin begin to decrease, so the second part of your training should be to work on ways of getting the sail more upright whilst still keeping your body hiked out. Here’s some tips to get you started…

Feet:

Feet are VERY important in railing the board and positioning your body for a good stance. Make sure you are on the balls of your feet. In lighter winds you can use your front foot to pull up on the front strap and help rail the board – in the extremes you can even do this with your back foot. Keep light on the board as heavy pressure will only dig the winward rail in (that’s slow!). Keep light on your feet; think like a ballerina.

Legs:

The best technique involves having a straighter front leg than your back leg. It shouldn’t be dead straight, but just a slight bend to allow you to absorb chop with your legs (by bending them slightly over the swells) and be comfortable when you sail. The concept should be to apply more weight to your back leg and lifting your front foot to rail the board, which allows you to power the fin and still rail the board. Practice will help with this…

Arms:

There’s no right or wrong here but I personally believe you can get further away from the rig with a pronated grip (both hands over the boom, as opposed to having your front hand under the boom). Everyone has a personal preference and once you have a good technique down-pat, you can do it with either grip – but to help learn this technique quickly I would suggest trying the pronated grip. A pronated grip allows you to roll your shoulders forward and effectively lengthen your arms a few cm.

Body:

Try to avoid twisting your body to windward. The best sailors have a relatively straight stance if you look at them from directly upwind. Have a look at the photo in the gallery of Wojtek Brzozowski (POL-10), he stands very straight on the board which means he can keep the sail very upright and still hike out. Twisting your shoulder forward as some people do when they are overpowered can lead to dragging the sail on top of you more.

Breathing:

Believe it or not, breathing is important with this technique. When you breathe deeper, you open your diaphragm up and can relax your shoulders more to get them rolling forward to lengthen your armspan. Probably, it’s hard to remember your breathing in 25 knots, but give it a thought on that 10 knot day when you next go sailing.

Equipment:

Equipment plays a big role in helping you hike. Your boom height, harness lines, mast-track position and fin will change the way the sail feels in your hands and the pressures it allows you to apply to the fin. This is all personal preference. Try it all. Get a friend with a camera to take some photos of you sailing and see what setup helps you to get more hiked.

Uphaul Rope:

The jury is still out on this one. Many top sailors use it in light winds, many go the same speed without it. My personal opinion is that the theory behind it is good, because the guys using the uphaul are hiked out incredibly far whilst still having the sail upright. There are plenty of guys who can get their bodies out that far without the uphaul rope, so whatever works for you – works for you.

Take some time next time you race to have a look at the stance of the guy’s winning the races. If the fleet is at a decent level, then chances are the guys winning will have a great stance keeping the rig upright and hiking out far from their board to generate maximum lift. That is why they beat you around the course without forking out so much money for a new fin like you did. Now, imagine you’ve worked on your stance AS WELL as buying that new fin …

Background Development

Arriving in Poland in August 2007 to train before the Allegro Cup in Leba, I caught up with Steve Allen and his Polish training partner Hubert Mokrzycki (POL-25). I had heard whispers of Tabou bringing out a formula board for 2008 but I was still suprised to find Steve and Hubert with 2 prototypes of the new board out on the beach. Despite the Tabou footstraps, it was completely blank of graphics and from first view looked a lot like a Starboard 160. The cutouts being the only visual difference; one board with the Starboard cutouts and the other with some deep F2 looking cutouts.

Steve had been riding the Starboard 160 for most of the season (see here why he used the 160 and not a 161) and had wanted to make some improvements beginning with modifying the nose shape and also a slight difference in the bottom shape. Suprisingly enough, from what I could gather there were only these 2 prototypes made, which is a stark contrast to Starboard who usually boast an incredible amount of prototypes tested to come up with their new boards. They tried both cutout shapes but found the Starboard ones to be better than the F2 type. Also note that Steve and Hubert did the entire development on this board (Ross Williams wasn’t included in the development it seems).

From what I was told, Steve’s first use of the production version was during the FW World Championships in Brazil. Hubert informed me earlier that month in Poland that they had decided to brand it as a Gaastra board, to offer a full racing rig/board package and also a racing board as such didn’t fit with the brand-persona of Tabou.

Sailing with Steve earlier this week in Australia he tells me that in early testing with the new board in Brazil, it was faster on all points than the 160. He also volunteered that others who were testing the new 2008 162 had found it to be no faster than their 160′s. Take that with a grain of salt I should think…

Shape

Here are some measurements of the Gaastra Vapor, compared with a Starboard 161.

Gaastra Vapor:

• 30cm off (1ft off) – 5mm vee; 7mm concave
• 90cm off – 11.5mm vee; 5mm concave
• 120cm off – 13mm vee; 7mm concave
• 40cm from front – 14mm vee; 9mm concave

• Width at 30cm off – 813mm
• Mast-track (from back) – 1260mm
• Mast-track length – 170mm
• Finbox (from back) – 90mm
• Flat (from back) – 600mm
• Cutouts 14mm at centre

Starboard 161:

• 30cm off (1ft off) – 0mm vee; 1.5mm concave
• 90cm off – 4mm vee; 4.5mm concave
• 120cm off – 19mm vee; 4mm concave
• 40cm from front – 14mm vee; 1.5mm concave

• Width at 30cm off – 807mm
• Mast-track (from back) – 1267mm
• Mast-track length – 170mm
• Finbox (from back) – 90mm
• Cutouts 10mm at centre

So you can see quickly that the Vapor board is slightly wider in the tail and has a little more vee and concave towards the front – actually the concaves continue right into the nose of the board. The Vapor also has a little more rocker (about 10mm vs 7mm in the 161). The mast-tracks and fin position are exactly the same however.

Ride

This board is a very similar ride to the two previous Starboards (160, 161) in the sense that you can just jump on it, put any fin in, put the track anywhere and just go sailing. I always felt the F2 boards required a little more finesse in your trimming and technique which made them a more technical ride (although still very fast). This board is very “point and shoot” and doesn’t require constant rail pressure or footing off for speed to keep it trucking upwind; making it very easy to tune!

Initially, the new thinned out nose was something I was interested in really testing out when I sailed it for the first time in windy conditions (+25 knots) at Redcliffe, QLD. For those who don’t know where Redcliffe is, it is by far one of the most gnarliest spots I have ever sailed formula at and happens to be my home spot. Think 3-4m swells that are extremely close together and steep as well as few turtles, sharks, dolphins and crab-pots make this an interesting place to test gear – however it boasts some of the most consistent winds (direction/strength) on this side of Australia. I’m not a fan of chicken straps (as you’ll see below) so I took the board out on this particular day to try and see if I could catch the nose downwind!

About 7 waves in a row I lifted my back foot and kicked the board downwind off the top of a swell to try and dig it in (don’t try this at home kids!). I’ve done this a few times on a 161 and subsequently broken booms, fractured elbows and have had a NP boom logo imprinted into my shoulder as a result of catching its nose in +30 knot winds with big seas! The Vapor doesn’t even look like catching…

On the 8th wave I did manage to aggressively sink the nose under a swell but the board’s shallow entry and ‘boat-like’ V shape all the way to the bow allowed the board to pop out of the water very quickly and lose minimal speed. Downwind, I found the board railing very easily which allowed me to ‘fly-the-fin’ (thank Sam Ireland’s Pro Secrets DVD for that term) downwind keeping the speed and forgetting about the swells in front of me. I believe this board’s strength is its downwind controllability (that’s probably not a word!) and speed downwind.

My only negative in the ride of the board was the rail shape under the footstraps. It is a quite boxy board under your feet and as a result I had sore arches in my feet after 2 hours of hard sailing. Something to get used to I guess, but I never had this problem with the Starboards.

Tuning

I have been running my footstraps in the second back hole and mast-track in the middle or 1cm back for 90% of conditions. I don’t like to move my footstraps depending on wind conditions, but on other boards you can get away with raking your fins further upright by moving your footstraps 1-2 holes further forward to get your weight more centralised over the fin.

• TIP: If you are raking your fin excessively forward (nearly upright etc), don’t move your mast-track forward too early. Despite what you might think, raking your fin more upright actually helps to keep the nose of your board down as it creates more vertical lift at the tail.

This board likes power and I felt comfortable using my 12m Gaastra Vapor up to 12-15 knots (although I would normally be on my 11m in 12 knots in racing conditions) and has a wide, powerful tail which allows you to really drive from your back foot upwind, instead of railing the board by pointing the toes of your front foot in the strap. In windy conditions you can keep the track back (still in the middle) if you have the control as the nose shape does not catch on the swells and rides nice and high downwind, allowing you to pick your lines through the swells and go for speed – rather than dodging the deep swells that look a little scary!

I also noticed upwind, the board kept flat in choppy conditions allowing you to really keep the power on the fin. This might mean there’s more potential to spin-out a fin in choppy conditions if you are not too careful, so the board might require a little more finesse in your sheeting/breathing technique over the swells. In flat water (we don’t have flat water where I live) the board should track nicely upwind.

I’ll deal with fins in a moment, but for tuning purposes the secret to getting the board to fly is to make sure to get the nose free and lifting upwind. Mast-track, boom-height and fin make a difference in this sense. Use a combination of mast-track back, boom higher (try one or the other first) to make sure you are getting the nose out of the water and you will notice the board feels lighter under your feet and more responsive. When using a new-style softer-tip fin (see below for what I am talking about), you will need to run the mast-track further back (1-2cm from middle) to keep the nose free as these fins generate more lift under the tail and seem to keep the nose down – which is slow!

You can trim this board by feel with a bit of practice. Go sailing and try and get your weight back towards the fin with mast-track/boom-height settings and when you feel the board is lighter under your feet and more responsive – that is the fast setting you are looking for (this could probably be said of ALL formula boards, but it was more noticeable to me on the Vapor). Try it. Go for a run with your track in the middle. Move it back 1cm and try again. Try 1cm more downhaul and boom up 2cm… I think you’ll notice the difference… try to keep the mast-track towards the middle even in windy conditions if you can handle it (the board needs the nose high to trim correctly).

Fins

The original prototypes were tested with Hubert’s R13 70 S and R19 70 S– fins and one would assume Steve would have tried his Kashy XXS which he had been using most of the year on the formula tour. I was a little disappointed to hear that the R19 was working well in the board as Hubert’s R19 is an early proto which of course was super-sweet and very soft whereas myself and (probably) everyone else in the world couldn’t get their R19′s to work. However, having a board that works perfectly with an R13 70 S is a great asset as this is by far the most popular fin on the market and one of the easiest to tune. So far I have tested the board with:

• R13 70 S
• R19 70 S-
• Select R07 S (2008 prototype – sorry!)
• Select R07 S- (2008 prototype)
• R13 66 S
• R13 73/70 M

Unfortunately for the point of this review, the Select fins were by far the best in this board. These fins aren’t available to the general public for a few months (my French friends tell me that these fins are now available to order from Select – thanks guys!) however the way these fins work is a good understanding of how this board works…

These Select fins are basically a copy of the Kashy fin’s concept in the sense that they are extremely soft in the middle/tip sections whilst having incredible tortional stiffness (no twisting) to create speed. I’m not entirely sure exactly how these fins work in relation to a standard Deb foil like an R13 (I have some ideas, and might write an article about it another day), however they seem to settle the board on the water a lot more than the standard Deb R13 does and help keep the board trimming nicely downwind. By “settle”, I mean that it keeps the board trimming nicely and prevents the side-to-side cantering that can happen with these modern boards that boast double-concaves. I remember Boogie used to talk about the Starboard boards tilting from side-to-side and that softer fins could help with this phenomenon.

So to summarise with the fins: this is another fantastically adaptable board that should be able to be tuned and get good speed/height out of a variety of fins. My recommendations would be that the best performance will be got out of the newer, softer-tip style fins such as Kashy’s, the new Deb R20 and the new Selects etc. Trimming is the key to getting this board to go fast and a powerful, soft fin will help keep the board railing and combined with a higher boom/track further back will help to lift the nose and reduce the wetted-surface area to go for maximum speed.

In higher winds, I still believe these new-style softer fins work far better and would suggest getting off big fins earlier, maybe down to a 68-66cm (depending on your weight) as this board creates rail pressure very easily and with the wide tail you can easily handle the power of these new fins without too much trouble. An R13 70 S/M will still be a great option in higher winds but I have found I can get better angle out of my R13 66 S in +20 knots as I can keep the mast-track towards the back with this smaller fin and keep the power on it at all times. A 95kg guy would probably do better justice with a 70cm fin in the board in high winds (I am 82kg at the moment).

OVERALL SUMMARY

Positives

• Easy to tune/trim
• Fast and safe downwind (probably due to the new nose and slightly deeper cutouts)
• Powerful tail shape allows use of more sail area and bigger fins in higher winds
• Quality construction and materials (although I’ve only owned the board for 3 weeks! – touch wood!)
• Rails easily upwind and trims very straight (no pitching or side-to-side cantering) with the correct settings used
• Gybes very easily

Negatives

• Full carbon might not be as resistant to heel/foot dents as the pine-wood on Starboard boards
• The name is the SAME as the Gaastra sails (c’mon guys, think of something NEW!)
• Slightly more sharp deck rails than the Starboards – may be a little harsher on your feet on the first ride
• Could’ve been slightly lighter considering the full-carbon construction

Overall I give the board 9/10 and (despite not actually being contracted to ride it whatsoever) it will be my board of choice this season for Formula racing. I’m excited to finally see another option on the market that’s a viable competitor to the Starboard as the F2 boards have not been readily available in Australia the past few seasons and it was starting to become a Starboard one-design class down here!

• Boat-end starboard start
• 1/4 way, middle and 3/4 down the line starboard start
• Pin-end starboard start
• Pin-end port start
• Boat-end port start

That last one might shock some people, but in actual fact its a very important start tactic to have in your toolbox as Devon Boulon proved, taking the first race of the 2005 Formula Worlds in Australia with this type of start. Now that you know there are different places to start on a line, lets look at why you would want to start in these places:

• Starboard; boat-end: courses with the top-mark to the right side of the course, and when the line is favoured at the boat-end.
• Starboard; pin-end: courses with the top-mark to the centre of the course or the left side, when the line is favoured at the pin end (usually, this means more sailors will try starting on port) or if there is light winds and you want to use the full length of the line to get clear from other sailors.
• Starboard; 1/4; middle; 3/4: when the top-mark is to the centre of the course and in larger fleets this can be a more effective place to start as you can cover sailors on all sides of the course as well as use the “transit-sag” to your advantage.
• Port; pin-end: courses with the top mark to the right side of the course, in larger fleets to get clear air, when the line is favoured at the pin end, if the wind shifts to the left in the pre-start.
• Port; boat-end: courses with the top mark markedly to the right side of the course, in light winds when the line is pin-end favoured you can get clear air and one less tack by starting at the boat (this is the most difficult start to do effectively).

Now that we have a few different start options in your mind, lets look at some other important factors to think about before starting. One of the most important factors is knowing the speed/angle of your opponents. The secret to a clean start is to not have better sailors in close proximity to you who can take your clean air and/or force you to tack early. If you sail in a regular fleet you should have a good idea of who the better sailors are and know their strongpoints. You might beat them around the course, but if someone can point higher than you off the startline, its important not to start directly behind them on the line. If you are sailing in an unknown international fleet, do some line-ups with some sailors before the pre-starts to get an idea of who the WORST sailors are – they are your targets on the startline.

The next factor is transits. Before the start, sit at the boat-end and line yourself up with the pin-end mark, looking through the flagpole on the boat. Imagine a piece of string between each end of the line and then extend this mental-string all the way to a clearly visible landmark on the horizon (not a moving cloud!). This is your transit line and will help you judge where you are on the line when you are starting. Now that you have that landmark, drift upwind/downwind a few metres and see where that landmark is in relation to your mental piece of string to get an idea of how far you are away from the line, this is important if you need to sail underneath (or over) someone on the line and want to get back to the startline level as you sail down it. Sometimes you will sail in the ocean on a cloudless day and there is nothing to line you up with on the horizon. I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to wing-it in that case…

The transit is VERY important because in large fleets there is always a “transit-sag” which is that the sailors in the middle of the line will drop 3-4m below the level of the line because they think they are over. This is what makes a middle of the line, starboard start quite famous as you can sail over the top of these sailors by 3-4m, taking their clean air and giving you a gap to accelerate into.

Make sure you are at the boat when the first time signal goes so you can sync your startwatch and prepare your starting tactic. Whether you sail under the ISAF 5-4-1 system or another combination of starttimes you will never get a good start if you don’t have a perfectly sync’d watch. I always like to have a pre-defined starting position in my mind but its important to watch out for changes in the wind and be in a position where you can change your start tactic quickly. If you are sailing on a course with other divisions who have already started, watch the leaders go around the top mark and see what side of the course appears to be favoured (that’s what end of the line you should start on). Look at visual indicators such as flags on boats, flags on the beach or rising smoke, cloud movements to see if the wind has changed direction during the pre-start. A 20 degree shift in breeze to the left noticed early could mean you have enough time to blast to the pin-end, tack onto port, clear the fleet and with one less tack go around the top mark in a clear first position!

Now, the start itself comes down to practice. The above information can serve as a guide and basic theory, but the start is really a test of mental ability and not being afraid of sailing in close proximity to other sailors.

Worried about getting OCS (on the ‘course-side’ of the line, before the start)?? A good international event will have race-directors who know how to apply the ISAF starting procedures. One of the ‘ideas’ that is used with pinging people for OCS is the mentality that the race-directors won’t get everyone for OCS in each race, but sooner or later, sometime in the event they will get that person who was OCS in the first race that they missed. To make sense of that, an example is on the international racing circuit, with +100 boards on the startline they will usually do general recalls if there is a large number of sailors OCS. They’ll be able to pick 4-5 sailors, who will be disqualified instantly (if its run under Black Flag) but there may have been a lot more that they missed, so they re-run the start (still under Black Flag) and again if there are a lot of people over, they will general recall again and ping more people for OCS. I have been to events where we have had up to 7-8 general recalls in a row – and about 25 sailors in total have been disqualified!

Formula Windsurfing boards travel at roughly 8m/second down a startline in medium winds so as you can imagine, at that speed it is incredibly difficult for people on the startboat to pick you as being OCS if you are over a few tenths of a second before the start. For that reason it’s good to make sure you start heading to windward at the 1-second to go mark on your watch (making sure its sync’d perfectly!). Despite what you might think, Formula Windsurfing boards aren’t very responsive to go from a broad reach to a tight upwind angle as you do when you are running the startline on starboard. It might take you as long as 3 seconds to get up to a good upwind angle out of the start and as long as 8 seconds to reach full speed. Don’t waste those precious few seconds as getting off the line right on 0 instead of +1 could be the difference between getting your nose in front of the guy behind you and giving him dirty air instead of him doing it to you!

There’s a few ideas to get you started on your starts. They are without a doubt, the most important aspect of your racing and a shiny new fin won’t help you beat the other sailors if you are simply starting terribly. There’s more to starts than just the points I’ve made (especially on the psychological and emotional side) but hopefully this will help get you started.

Let’s discuss some more ideas and make this article even more useful! See below to post a comment.

Is it because of the design of the masts? The shape of the sails? The materials and procedures used to construct the masts or just the incompetency of the sailors who leave them fully downhauled in the sun that is causing the slaughter of 100′s of masts a year?? My own personal opinion is that it’s a combination of all these factors but I believe that at least 50% of the breakages could be prevented by changing the construction methods of masts and also upgrading the materials used in the production of 100% carbon racing masts.

Looking at the masts I have used, broken, repaired and kept over the past few years and from discussions with my father who has done most of the repair-work on these masts, we have come to the conclusion that the general (as a general guide, there maybe slight differences between brands) construction of the majority of 100% carbon racing masts is:

• INTERNAL-LAYERS: uni-directional carbon wrapped circumferentially
• MID-LAYERS: uni-directional carbon running longitudinally
• OUTSIDE- LAYERS: uni-directional carbon wrapped circumferentially

Masts rigged in modern race sails receive high tension/compression forces on them through the application of downhaul, rather than simply being bent from the middle as in an IMCS test. The outside layers of the mast, which in the above construction have no carbon fibres running in the direction of the tension/compression forces, are susceptible to cracking, as the strands of the outside circumferential wrap can separate from the mid-layer longitudinal wrap, which causes the mast to solely rely on the mid-layers to take the full force of the tension/compression forces…. CRACK! BANG! SNAP!

In this construction there is nothing to handle torsional forces on the mast. When a mast is under load, there is tension on one side and compression on the other side; in addition to that there is torsional forces. The fibres usually aren’t constructed in the right direction to deal with the torsion!

If there was a different construction layup that used longitudinal threads on the surface, allowing the fibres to run in the same direction as the loads on the mast when it is fully downhauled inside a sail, the mast would be much stronger. This might cause the mast to be slightly stiffer, but superior in strength to the original construction. Surely there could be ways to deal with the extra stiffness or a different layup in the same concept which wasn’t as stiff?

There appears to be a general trend in windsurfing to use uni-directional carbon to build the carbon parts of our gear. Most likely because this type is cheaper, easier and more readily available. The more expensive cloths, such as 200g parallel weave (similarly used in Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner) aren’t popular in windsurfing product construction – probably because of the price increases occurred and also because when Boeing started building their planes there was a worldwide shortage of carbon (although this has somewhat subdued in the last 12 months). This product has also jumped in price by 300% most likely as a result of these new passenger plane’s coming into existence.

This construction idea might not be the perfect solution, but thinking about it is a start. I’m not naive enough to think that a simple design change will not make a considerable difference to the end consumer price of the masts and also play a role in further making manufacturing and distribution a little more difficult with an added price and the other costs/time involved with researching/designing/implementing/paying for/ a new design. Hey, I’m not a windsurfing company; just a person who hates reinforcing his BRAND-NEW masts all the time to stop them breaking.

I’m interested to hear what people in the community think. There is always going to be a two-way street with cost of manufacture (end price = $$$) versus material quality/reliability in any consumer product, but I am certainly a guy who would be happy to pay double for my masts if they had double the lifetime on the water.