With course racing becoming more popular, I was interested to hear the competitive view on this.

I notice people saying that depending on whether the race is downwind, upwind or crosswind it suits different boards.

Does this effectively mean that for someone to compete at higher levels, they'd need to have a selection of boards for light and strong winds, and then a variety of boards for different course angles?

I don't know about the rest of you but i would just ride a surf board.
if the winds to light to kite its gay, go sink some beers.

my mates 82L JP quad worked pretty good.

went up wind like a truck.

saffer i started doing the local race series this season, its a lot of fun light or strong wind!

like all equipment there are trade offs, some of the race boards point higher than others but dont do the reaches as fast eg. it does even out around the course if your doing a triangle and sausage. i dont think you need a bunch of different boards maybe two at most even if your wanting to go pro. choose a good kite that goes well upwind, im riding my Fluid EGO which is good on the TT and surfboard, it seems to work well with my naish venturi. the main thing is practice, practice and more practice..... the only issue i have is the race board ruins your TT riding for a while, sitting low in the water after the raceboard takes a bit of getting used too.

Any free ride or CR reace board will be super fast in all directions, they will smoke all other boards on day easy. Never seen an guy racers at my patch in lite winds ...

The reason I asked was this thread

www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/Kitesurfing/General/Cabrinha-rules-the-L2L/?SearchTerms=cross,wind,race

The gist of the thread was that the particular race was a cross wind race and therefore suited different styles of boards.

... in my opinion, if your in control you'll go faster, and the freeride/race boards are supirior in this area so can be fast and compedative (Sector for example) such as the results in the L2L race with the Cab board!