izaak said...
Awesome!! This Will be the only way, at this present time. To have a chance to break the world record. I would love to have a go, on the foil.

CJW said...


Won't happen, i'd be surprised if they could even get near 30kts with a foil like that. While certainly cool, they are pretty much a novelty and no windsurfer resembling anything close to what we have now will break the new world speed record, the bar is set that high.

terminal said...
Sailrocket has quite a windsurfer-like design, so a variation of it would be what I would think would be the fastest. Sailrocket was designed almost without design restrictions, so it would be very hard to beat - especially if they scale it up.

The only advantage a windsurfer might bring would be quicker reactions and more sensitivity.

We still need to see how far the current design of windsurfer can go as they are going much faster than the windspeed now in 40 knots of wind, and we need to see what a windsurfer can do in 50 to 60 knots of wind.

Sailrocket is much more efficient, going at perhaps 2+ times the speed of the wind, so will get many more opportunities to set new records than if needing to wait for 60 knots.

CJW said...


The genius of Sailrocket is how the force from the sail is reacted into the foil, they have totally eliminated righting moment from the equation. This enables them to hold down massive amounts of power = overcoming drag. Their biggest issue is foil cavitation which they seem to be on top of.

Neither a windsurfer or a kite has this luxury and in both of their current forms it's just not possible to compete purely on a power/drag basis. Kites and windsurfers are both at this point chasing efficiency, which is why we have seen such small incremental improvements, but the laws of diminishing returns are already well in play, imo of course.

evlPanda said...
^ I've always had this idea for a kite attached to a buoy. Person rides somewhere on the line, in the air.

[bubble bubble bubble]

terminal said...
I think this guy is saying that he has developed a self-regulating foil that maintains its depth.

Sharks are known as extremely fast and agile swimmers, due in part to the surface of their skin. Sharks are covered in very tiny tooth-shaped scales called denticles which are streamlined in the direction of flow over the shark. If you were to run a hand over a shark's skin from head to tail, it would feel silky smooth, but rub against the grain and it's like running your hand on sandpaper.

Water encounters a similar resistance, which, according to new research, provides the shark with a passive flow control mechanism, requiring no effort on the part of the shark. When water near the shark's denticles tries to reverse direction, an early stage in flow separation, the denticles naturally bristle, slowing and trapping the reversed flow. This prevents local flow separation which would otherwise increase the shark's drag and hinder its agility. (Photo credit: James R. D. Scott; Research by A. Lang et al.)

terminal said...
I think this guy is saying that he has developed a self-regulating foil that maintains its depth. It might be possible to have a way of auto-control for the foil so the widsurfer only has to steer the board and sheet the sail.
Something like the old Starboard Supersonic 90l might work as the hull as it should ride on a cushion of air at speed?