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HeavyInt said...
Nice to know there are a few people in the same situation as me. Am learning on an El Stubbo with Zeeko Blue and White. Now two sessions in:

Session 1 (1.5 hours) - 10-20 knots - 13m Ozone Edge (I weigh 97kg)
First few runs lasted 2-4 seconds, I was following advice of putting weight on front foot and kept falling over the front of the board. Soon learned that I needed to get going first (with a bit more weight on the back foot for the first 1-2 seconds), then put weight forward. Ended up downwind 3 times and spent at least 30 minutes walking upwind. Finished the session wondering if I would ever get this f**kin thing sorted

Blitzed the online tutorials after this and tried to visualise myself getting up and going (which I think helped).

Session 2 (1.5 hours) - 10-15 knots - 13m Ozone Edge
First run I went 10m! Not bad compared to session 1. Then a few crashes later I was downwind again - decided to have one more run before the 10 min walk upwind. But then something just clicked (for me it was figuring how to turn the board upwind a bit without coming off). Found myself back upwind (300m run) - not foiling, but not falling either! After that I was able to go for as long as I wanted as long as I stay on the water. So now I just need to nail the foiling bit down, but stoked to no longer have to do the walk upwind. Fell on the foil once, took a chunk out of my leg, but could have been worse.

Will bring the foil one notch forward for the next session. Everyone's learning experience is different, but it is fun learning something new.

If anyone is considering the El Stubbo and/or Zeeko Blue and White, I would recommend this for learning. The board is not very floaty, but after the first session it doesn't really matter.

Any more tips on how to get on the foil and stay up would be good. Cheers.

Imagine your legs as shock absorbers and allow the rising board/foil to come up to you. Then concentrate on pushing it back down a little with your front foot.

On the zeeko, put your rear foot above the mast to start with. Then your front foot controls all up and down foil movements.

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cbulota said...
. Once you can ride with the board flat on the water (no edging) and the foil down in both directions, under control and upwind, you are ready for the second stage.

Christian

Thanks Christian, been trying to apply your advise on how to foil, been very helpful. I'm ready for stage 2. could you please explain stage 2.
Cheers

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lynxmo0 said..

Plummet said..

lynxmo0 said..
Just started 3 weeks ago. I almost have no experience in directional boards. So far I have been mostly riding with twintip and boots. Here is my experience so far:

First session (20-30 min - just to try the new toy): I went strapless. Wind less than 10 knots with a 12m kite. Tried a few water start but spent most of the time controlling the kite and eventually 20 min later, the wind dropped. Could not really practice anything.

Second session (2 hours - 15-20 knots - 9m): went strapless again. Managed to water start on both sides and managed to ride on one side for up to 50m and managed to foil for 4-5 seconds (could almost hear my brain screaming "whoooohooooo!")

Third session (2 hours - 15-20 knots - 9m): was advised to put a front strap and decided to try. It made a huge difference. On my first attempts, I managed to foil for over 100m and also learned to foil on the other side. While I was very stressed at the start of the session (so many things to think about) , I felt quite confident and comfortable at the end of the session and crashed only when trying something new. I could easily control the foil and even smile and wave at the sailors.

Fourth session (2 hours -20-25 knots - 9m - front strap): managed to jibe and change feets (with the board on the water), go downwind and ride toeside for about 10-20m. Need to be more consistent now... My objective is to try not to get wet to often :-)

What I love about foiling:
- ability to ride in low wind
- ability to enjoy a session on spots close to home with gusty/inconsistent wind (Melville riders will understand)
- speed + magic carpet feeling
- crazy upwind angles
- challenge

My tips for new starters:
- use a front strap and no back straps
- practice in normal wind (15-25 knots)
- big one if strapless: before water start, make sure the board is not flat on the water. The angle of the foil should be about 45 degrees pointing downwind.
- before the waterstart, already put your feet/weight forward to avoid going up as soon as you get speed. You want to first ride with the board flat on the water until you are stable/experienced enough to transfer weight at the back and start foiling.
- helmet and impact vest mandatory
- if you re about to crash, crash! don't try to resist
- when foiling, put the kite up when overpowered to avoid getting to much speed

Hope it helps.

thats some crazy fast progression. tell me what is your water conditions like?

Thanks

Conditions were not really good: choppy and gusty/inconsistent winds. However, when foiling, water and wind conditions have less impact compared to normal boards. Can feel the "current" generated by the choppy water though, it takes a bit of time to get used to it. I'm learning in Melville beach on the canning river in WA.

I am not buying it!

Some odd advice in here


You need:
1. enough power to be able to water start easy (get up over and on the board)
2. enough wind to be able to just sheet in and power up comfortably
3. a small enough kite to be able sheet out and dump the power and turn snappily
4. a kite you're comfortable enough with that you don't think about it when flying it one-handed

In the beginning, you'll probably ride the same size kite as lawn mowing with your TT, until you can foil consistently--then you'll drop right down in size.

Big kite, light wind = sucks. Small kite, high wind = sucks.
Find your own balance of wind and kite size; for me, it was a 10m kite in about 15 knots.

...

Straps . . . assume the designers and builders know what they're doing, and the straps are situated for good balance. Moving your foot ahead of the rear strap is not a cure, it's treating a symptom of bad stance. Get it right from day one.

...

Stance. Don't push or lift your feet--lunge.
Ride the board flat. Stand bolt upright, flex both your knees and side lunge onto the front foot, like this:



...but without looking like you got caught playing with your balls.

Keep your torso upright and straight, bend your front knee more than your rear, and move your weight forwards.
Why do it this way? Watch yourself in a mirror. You move your CoG and almost all your weight over the front foot.
Do it again, now push or lift a foot, and watch. Your CoG almost doesn't move and you actually transfer weight on the rear foot. Good luck with that! You can sidestep the problem by moving your feet together (rear foot forward) but that's a crutch.

Lunging is more stable. Slower to react to changes, sure, but stability is the key at this stage.

...

Back to straps. You *can* learn with front and rear straps, but open them up to be as wide and lose as possible. As you water start, you might feel the need to jam your feet as far forwards as you can but if you have good stance, soon you won't have to.

...

Speed is your friend. Like riding a bike or learning to ski.
If your stance is right! Ride with the board flat on the surface and go faster until it starts to push against your feet. There you are, you're foiling. No really! And you're not porpoising!

Why? Because if you try to ride slowly, the foil will be near stalling speed and it will be constantly trying to pitch up as it stalls. Trying to fight that when you're learning sucks.

Go faster. Probably just a little faster than you feel comfortable with. And always have a plan for bailing out

This is an interesting read.
I am sitting here looking at this board foil combo I just purchased today and the board is nearly at shoulder height.
After being a kite addict for a few years, I have hardly kited for the last couple of years and was after something to spark an interest again.
This is going to be a crazy, scary, fun learning curve.

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HeavyInt said..
Nice to know there are a few people in the same situation as me. Am learning on an El Stubbo with Zeeko Blue and White. Now two sessions in:

Session 1 (1.5 hours) - 10-20 knots - 13m Ozone Edge (I weigh 97kg)
First few runs lasted 2-4 seconds, I was following advice of putting weight on front foot and kept falling over the front of the board. Soon learned that I needed to get going first (with a bit more weight on the back foot for the first 1-2 seconds), then put weight forward. Ended up downwind 3 times and spent at least 30 minutes walking upwind. Finished the session wondering if I would ever get this f**kin thing sorted

Blitzed the online tutorials after this and tried to visualise myself getting up and going (which I think helped).

Session 2 (1.5 hours) - 10-15 knots - 13m Ozone Edge
First run I went 10m! Not bad compared to session 1. Then a few crashes later I was downwind again - decided to have one more run before the 10 min walk upwind. But then something just clicked (for me it was figuring how to turn the board upwind a bit without coming off). Found myself back upwind (300m run) - not foiling, but not falling either! After that I was able to go for as long as I wanted as long as I stay on the water. So now I just need to nail the foiling bit down, but stoked to no longer have to do the walk upwind. Fell on the foil once, took a chunk out of my leg, but could have been worse.

Will bring the foil one notch forward for the next session. Everyone's learning experience is different, but it is fun learning something new.

If anyone is considering the El Stubbo and/or Zeeko Blue and White, I would recommend this for learning. The board is not very floaty, but after the first session it doesn't really matter.

Any more tips on how to get on the foil and stay up would be good. Cheers.

You can hold quite a bit of power surface riding. But once you pop up on the water you need very little power. that 13 edge will punish you 13+ knots. i recon go smaller for the touch and go phase.

Thanks for the advice. Will try the 9m edge next time. I have found so far that a loose front strap and no rear strap works well so will keep that set up for now.
The ability to make small adjustments to the back foot position seems to help when learning.

Nice to hear you're getting into foiling Kent! I'd be happy to give you some live tips if I see you out there

high as a kite, here is what I think you should try for stage 2:

With your speed control dialed while the foil is DOWN, board flat and riding at a slight upwind angle (similar angle to a twin tip going upwind) start increasing your speed while you increase the front foot pressure in an effort to keep the foil down for as long a possible.

Basically, you're trying to go as fast as you can WITHOUT lifting the foil out of the water at all. That typically corresponds to roughly 25-30 km/h max.

Now all you need to do is to put a *SLIGHT* pressure on your back foot, which will easily lift your foil out of the water. If you really focus on giving the back foot very slight pressures (while keeping most of your weight on the front foot) there is no reason to have an explosive lift and crash.

At this stage you're simply trying to lift the foil out of the water as LOW as possible, meaning you're trying to foil at half-mast or less height. This allows for extra balance and control and again avoids spectacular crashes.

Try to get comfortable foiling at half-mast (or less) first, this is done by controlling your pressure distribution between the front and back foot mostly. If your foil lifts too high up, you have too much back foot pressure. The faster you go, the less pressure you need on the back foot to lift the foil out of the water so you have to be *Extra* gentle with that back foot. Once the foil is up it's all about pressure distribution again and finding the right balance between both feet.

The most common mistakes at this stage are:

-Going too much crosswind or even worse, downwind! It's much harder to learn to foil in those directions

-Overpowered. At this stage, if you are overpowered (kite too big) you will be forced to ride downwind and push your bar really far away, which will make learning very difficult.

-Edging (leaning back) when the foil starts to lift off the water. ALWAYS keep your feet FLAT on the board, if your toes are lifting up, you will edge and fall. Changing your direction of travel on a foil is mostly done using a rotational movement from your hips and ankles as opposed to leaning back or forward.

-Going too slowly: if you try to foil at slow speeds you will inevitably start to hop up and down constantly. Increase your speed so you can foil with more balance


So yeah, in summary, it's all about heavy front foot pressure, increasing your speed and giving slight pressures on your back foot.

Here is a good example of low mast foiling (less than half mast)








Happy Foiling,


Christian

Thanks Christian. That sums it up really well - this will be top of mind next time I am out. The main challenge is going to be controlling the speed once up on the foil. You mentioned previously that this comes down to kite control - keeping the kite high (and kite size). One question here - does pointing further upwind help reduce the speed once on the foil?

Hi again,

I wanted to share other tips for learning to foil easily. For those who have access to a boat, you should try foiling behind it. When I flew back to Canada last year I taught a few friends and family to foil behind this 6 HP boat!

At first, I thought no way there will be enough power, but it turns out it was just perfect! We tried on bigger boats which was actually harder as it was going too fast and too much turbulence in the water behind the boat.


Most people I taught behind a boat managed to foil long distances in well under 1H with zero prior experience.






Too easy! you can even bring back fish for dinner :)

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HeavyInt said..
Thanks Christian. That sums it up really well - this will be top of mind next time I am out. The main challenge is going to be controlling the speed once up on the foil. You mentioned previously that this comes down to kite control - keeping the kite high (and kite size). One question here - does pointing further upwind help reduce the speed once on the foil?

Pointing further upwind will actually increase your speed as you will generate more apparent wind, unless of course, you are pointing too far upwind in which case you will slow down to a stop. Most beginners I see learning to foil are trying to ride cross-wind too much and it's hard to maintain a steady pull from the kite like this. The key is to get going with the board flat (foil down) cross-wind, then increase your upwind angle (turn hips and ankles) which will naturally increase your speed so you can start lifting the foil up and more important keep it up.

Epic! Was he trying to loop the boat with his fishpole technique? :)

Hi Christian,
Really appreciate the advice on foiling beginner stages.Great advice regards front and back foot
pressure.
Also just showed my wife your info and shots.She is a competent kiter but very reluctant Foil starter.We have a 3.5m runabout with 15hp Yamaha.This could be a game changer for both of us.
Many thanks to the other foiling Frothers for their ongoing advice.

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cbulota said..
Hi again,

I wanted to share other tips for learning to foil easily. For those who have access to a boat, you should try foiling behind it. When I flew back to Canada last year I taught a few friends and family to foil behind this 6 HP boat!

At first, I thought no way there will be enough power, but it turns out it was just perfect! We tried on bigger boats which was actually harder as it was going too fast and too much turbulence in the water behind the boat.


Most people I taught behind a boat managed to foil long distances in well under 1H with zero prior experience.






Too easy! you can even bring back fish for dinner :)

I can only imagine how much easier it would be to learn the basics on butter flat. I had 1.5 to 3m swell with cross swell and chop on top for the first month. Needless to say I got SMASHED. Best i've had is 1m swell and that feels like learning nirvana compared to 3m!

Christian your advice of going as fast as you can with board flat, then you slowly lift the foil makes sense.

But what about when learning in choppy or worse lumpy choppy conditions. Bloody hard to get that speed up and control of it I'm finding.

I am adicted to this post as lesson booked

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eppo said...
Christian your advice of going as fast as you can with board flat, then you slowly lift the foil makes sense.

But what about when learning in choppy or worse lumpy choppy conditions. Bloody hard to get that speed up and control of it I'm finding.

Yeah. Just punch up and pop up on the foil as low as possible with speed. The foil will bridge the gap between the chop. Hell it will bridge the gap with swell up to its mast height. When the swell is higher than the mast height you have to pump though the swell.

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eppo said..
Christian your advice of going as fast as you can with board flat, then you slowly lift the foil makes sense.

But what about when learning in choppy or worse lumpy choppy conditions. Bloody hard to get that speed up and control of it I'm finding.

Do the same thing you would with a TT -- use your knees as shock absorbers over it.

The advantage of learning in ****ty conditions is you can handle ****ty conditions better in future :D

Simply saying that adjusting your back foot pressure to allow the foil to rise is a shallow and incomplete description of the required action. When enough speed is achieved the foil will rise by itself. At this point the rider is required to adjust their center of gravity to keep the foil flying level, whatever the height out of the water. Ongoing mini adjustments of your center of gravity (in relationship to the foil/stabiliser pivot point) is done by moving your hips forward or backward. That in combination with small amounts of sheeting in to get lift and out to reduce height when required add up to level flying, at least for the writer.

If you want to accelerate the learning curve start with a short mast (eg. Slingshot flight school), it makes everything much easier.

My first sessions were in marginal 14 knot winds on a 15" mast and I was up straight away, although I was still bouncing all over the place. It's not super graceful, I was staying upwind and could track both directions without too much trouble. The short mast allows you to drop the board back onto the water before you crash (mostly). After a couple runs it becomes clear where to pressure and the balance gets easier. I've switched to a longer, but still relatively short, mast and the transition has been easy. A few more sessions and I'll go to a full length mast.

Basic analogy, if you wanted to learn to walk on stilts, you'd start with short ones and build up, not go straight to the 6 metre ones.

Well that was crazy fun and I have got a lot to learn.

Thinking more about the foot weighting thing.

I think Ral Inn's advice a few threads ago was bang on.

dont think foot pressure think body position slightly forward, slightly back. When i was trying to distribute load via foot pressure it was too brutal and i ended up with a bucking bronco. Leaning forward, then a slight lean back slight lean forward or to the direction i want to go was the answer.

So it appears more of an upper body movement thing compared to a foot weighting thing. Does that make sense?

I found the Liquid Force Foiling tutorials sum up most of the advice given here in a great series of videos:

Lesson 1:
Lesson 2:
Lesson 3:

These got me up and riding pretty quickly and minimized the pain although I still managed to get an ear infection from the head slams from wiping out at height.

Other tips:

- Replace straps with foot hooks - www.northshoreinc.com/store/pc/msg.asp?message=95 Foot hooks let you escape the board easily on wipeouts which takes a lot of the fear away and aids progression. Straps lead to snapped ankles and harder wipeouts. Riding strapless is great in theory but miserable in practice - don't bother - the folks advocating for it aren't the type of people that you want teaching beginners with normal skills.

- A good way to get yourself to ride on the front foot better is to pretend you're dribbling a basket ball with your front hand and take it completely off the bar as you ride.

- The Liquid Force foil fish is a nice, slow foil to get you up and riding without high-speed fear and wipeouts. Its lack of a stabilizer makes it difficult to gybe. At the price it's still a decent foil to get into the sport but don't be too hard on yourself if you don't progress quickly when it comes to toeside and gybing.

- Don't be too hard on yourself if you don't progress quickly regardless. As a 14-year kiter it was extremely humbling to learn a new sport and gave me renewed empathy for beginners. Every beginner-crowding, shore-whoring kiter needs to ride a foil sometime :)

- If you're riding somewhere with minimal chop, see if you can borrow (don't buy) a foil with a short mast. It really helps with the learning curve. If you're in big chop and need a longer mast to get through it, just deal - as a beginner your height control will be poor and continual porpoising with a short mast in big chop will be frustrating.

Select to expand quote

cbulota said..
Nice to hear you're getting into foiling Kent! I'd be happy to give you some live tips if I see you out there

high as a kite, here is what I think you should try for stage 2:

With your speed control dialed while the foil is DOWN, board flat and riding at a slight upwind angle (similar angle to a twin tip going upwind) start increasing your speed while you increase the front foot pressure in an effort to keep the foil down for as long a possible.

Basically, you're trying to go as fast as you can WITHOUT lifting the foil out of the water at all. That typically corresponds to roughly 25-30 km/h max.

Now all you need to do is to put a *SLIGHT* pressure on your back foot, which will easily lift your foil out of the water. If you really focus on giving the back foot very slight pressures (while keeping most of your weight on the front foot) there is no reason to have an explosive lift and crash.

At this stage you're simply trying to lift the foil out of the water as LOW as possible, meaning you're trying to foil at half-mast or less height. This allows for extra balance and control and again avoids spectacular crashes.

Try to get comfortable foiling at half-mast (or less) first, this is done by controlling your pressure distribution between the front and back foot mostly. If your foil lifts too high up, you have too much back foot pressure. The faster you go, the less pressure you need on the back foot to lift the foil out of the water so you have to be *Extra* gentle with that back foot. Once the foil is up it's all about pressure distribution again and finding the right balance between both feet.

The most common mistakes at this stage are:

-Going too much crosswind or even worse, downwind! It's much harder to learn to foil in those directions

-Overpowered. At this stage, if you are overpowered (kite too big) you will be forced to ride downwind and push your bar really far away, which will make learning very difficult.

-Edging (leaning back) when the foil starts to lift off the water. ALWAYS keep your feet FLAT on the board, if your toes are lifting up, you will edge and fall. Changing your direction of travel on a foil is mostly done using a rotational movement from your hips and ankles as opposed to leaning back or forward.

-Going too slowly: if you try to foil at slow speeds you will inevitably start to hop up and down constantly. Increase your speed so you can foil with more balance


So yeah, in summary, it's all about heavy front foot pressure, increasing your speed and giving slight pressures on your back foot.

Here is a good example of low mast foiling (less than half mast)








Happy Foiling,


Christian

Thanks Christian, very informative.
That all makes sense, now time on the water trying to put it into action.
Cheers
HaaK

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Plummet said..
Thinking more about the foot weighting thing.

I think Ral Inn's advice a few threads ago was bang on.

dont think foot pressure think body position slightly forward, slightly back. When i was trying to distribute load via foot pressure it was too brutal and i ended up with a bucking bronco. Leaning forward, then a slight lean back slight lean forward or to the direction i want to go was the answer.

So it appears more of an upper body movement thing compared to a foot weighting thing. Does that make sense?

Yes mate that works for me. Provided feet are in the or near optimal position.

Select to expand quote

FishOutOfWater said..
I found the Liquid Force Foiling tutorials sum up most of the advice given here in a great series of videos:

Lesson 1:
Lesson 2:
Lesson 3:

These got me up and riding pretty quickly and minimized the pain although I still managed to get an ear infection from the head slams from wiping out at height.

Other tips:

- Replace straps with foot hooks - www.northshoreinc.com/store/pc/msg.asp?message=95 Foot hooks let you escape the board easily on wipeouts which takes a lot of the fear away and aids progression. Straps lead to snapped ankles and harder wipeouts. Riding strapless is great in theory but miserable in practice - don't bother - the folks advocating for it aren't the type of people that you want teaching beginners with normal skills.

- A good way to get yourself to ride on the front foot better is to pretend you're dribbling a basket ball with your front hand and take it completely off the bar as you ride.

- The Liquid Force foil fish is a nice, slow foil to get you up and riding without high-speed fear and wipeouts. Its lack of a stabilizer makes it difficult to gybe. At the price it's still a decent foil to get into the sport but don't be too hard on yourself if you don't progress quickly when it comes to toeside and gybing.

- Don't be too hard on yourself if you don't progress quickly regardless. As a 14-year kiter it was extremely humbling to learn a new sport and gave me renewed empathy for beginners. Every beginner-crowding, shore-whoring kiter needs to ride a foil sometime :)

- If you're riding somewhere with minimal chop, see if you can borrow (don't buy) a foil with a short mast. It really helps with the learning curve. If you're in big chop and need a longer mast to get through it, just deal - as a beginner your height control will be poor and continual porpoising with a short mast in big chop will be frustrating.

Some good advise. But I don't agree with the strapless thing. I learned foiling strapless and I am not one of the super talented kiters. Experienced, and good at light wind kiting and disciplined and don't mind trying the same thing hundred times. I had some advise here on sb early on (don't remember from whom) how to position the board when strapless and it was spot on and worked a treat. I believe with regards to technique strapless actually helps learning the optimal technique.

Also, I found my LF Fish actually very easy to gbye and go toeside. The only thing it struggled with was going powered and at speed as it just wants to lift all the time ie gets a little nervous.

But it is all personal, so not everything works for everyone. So really just sharing my experience. Suggesting everyone needs to figure out what works best for them. But it is good to have some guidance so to know where to start.

Select to expand quote

snalberski said...
Simply saying that adjusting your back foot pressure to allow the foil to rise is a shallow and incomplete description of the required action. When enough speed is achieved the foil will rise by itself. At this point the rider is required to adjust their center of gravity to keep the foil flying level, whatever the height out of the water. Ongoing mini adjustments of your center of gravity (in relationship to the foil/stabiliser pivot point) is done by moving your hips forward or backward. That in combination with small amounts of sheeting in to get lift and out to reduce height when required add up to level flying, at least for the writer.

This makes sense to me... in theory at the moment of course

Select to expand quote

eppo said..

snalberski said...
Simply saying that adjusting your back foot pressure to allow the foil to rise is a shallow and incomplete description of the required action. When enough speed is achieved the foil will rise by itself. At this point the rider is required to adjust their center of gravity to keep the foil flying level, whatever the height out of the water. Ongoing mini adjustments of your center of gravity (in relationship to the foil/stabiliser pivot point) is done by moving your hips forward or backward. That in combination with small amounts of sheeting in to get lift and out to reduce height when required add up to level flying, at least for the writer.

This makes sense to me... in theory at the moment of course

It is really about working in three dimensions..... the up/down transition and your feet not being the pivot points are a BIG deal. Then once you get it, you just forget about it (except for the odd specular crash as a reminder).

I would suggest that it's best to leave the straps on the board, but position them out of the way so you can ride out of the straps. The straps make good handles to hang on to the board and to help position it for water starting. One of the biggest surprises to beginners is that the board seems to have a mind of its own and will try to position itself everywhere except where you want to go.

It's easy enough to put your feet in the straps, position the board then take them out of the straps to water start and ride away.

While you're at the early stages you can practice starting without the straps and body dragging with the foil in various positions. They're two sides of the same skill.

Obviously foiling is the skill you're trying to crack, but body dragging is the skill that frees you up to go foiling from any beach at any time. It's massively liberating to be able to just go into the water and drag out to your starting position and not be trying to walk in chest deep water with onshore winds and waves.

Any good tips on body drag out to deeper waters.
Tried for the first time last night and ended up with banged up shins from the wings and mast.