12'6 Glide vs Starby Race - the fat boy's POV

I spent about 30mins on a carbon glide at dawn this morning in relatively calm conditions under the cliffs in Beauy Bay and about an hour on a 31.5 Starboard Race (the one that won Sunday's RPS race). At 6'2 and 120+kg I'm probably testing the upper limits any of the 12'6 boards but on first impressions I found the Glide pretty comfortable from the off. It sure feels quick. I was also pretty comfortable stepping back to attempt a kick turn, could probably have gone back a fair bit further but even so the nose comes around quick & easy. I reckon for big guys it could probably do with a bigger area fin, in the following ripple it felt a little loose with the skinny stock unit.

By comparison the wider and bigger volume Starby is as stable as a table so I felt like I could use a bit more body english to put some power down (such as mine is) and it also carries a glide very well. It seems like it's pushing a bit of water but the spoony nose was completely unaffected by the light chop and fisho's boat wake that was around. The Glide's cutting bow seemed to me to be bit more susceptible to it but the flipside is the Glide tracked noticeably better.

Both are lovely boards but for different reasons, the Jury's still out but probably leaning towards the Starby for the extra stability. More testing required I reckon . Back-to-back on a circuit course in our typical sloppy/choppy conditions would be a better test, and maybe get the Garmin into the mix. Haven't tried the 29.5 Starby yet, might be a bit more of an apples-for-apples comparison.