Just a question for the experienced foilers who are chasing a bit of speed.
When i was learning to winDfoil I used a waist harnes with pretty shorrt lines. This kept me upright which was great for my crap skill levels, however I found I was getting a sore back ( old fart). I then changed to my hybrid seat/waist which has a lower hook height more like a seat harness. Solved the back issues. I am now getting better and chasing a bit of speed. With the hybrid I am running 32 inch lines but I am finding with the low hook height when I really commit to the harness and bend the legs a little there is noticaebly less weight transfered down onto the board and the foil starts to feel a bit nervous.
So should I try the waist harness with long lines (clearly the answer too my question is 'Yes, just try it") however i would like to hear from the racers and speed gurus about their choice of harness styles and line lengths.
Thanks

I do chase speed, going hard upwind on an AFS W95 foil with F770 and S670 wings, I use a Dakine Reflex seat harness with the hook height adjusted to about the same position as a waist harness, and use lines that are 23" from boom face to boom face, they require you lean over pulling the rig with you and really commit, a bit nerve racking at times but oh so fast!

I use a seat harness to really get my weight on the rig when racing mate. Id go a seat harness if i were you.

In the waist camp, myself. I feel like I can better separate the outboard and downward forces plus improved mobility.

Most of the higher level PWA/IQFoil types I see online are waist, iirc. Are there many notable high level foilers wearing waists that I'm overlooking?

Sam Sills from GBR uses seat harness on iQFoil gear, and he's a top racer.

I personally switched to waist years ago and wouldnt go back to seat. Prefer to use the same harness on small wave gear and on race foil, the body memory to hook and unhook, etc

I think it's personal preference. Ford or Chevy? Do what feels good to you.

The pros mostly use waist harnesses and universally run long harness lines.

I've been sailing a seat harness for over 30 years. When I got into foiling I noted everyone on wait harnesses at the elite level so I bought one. Spent half an hour in the kite shop hooked in to their rope to make sure it was comfortable. Then of course the different angles while foiling moved the pressure points and I didn't like the waist harness.

I did have a FIN session in 30+ knots and 1m+ swell. I HAD to switch to the waist harness as the only way I could control body weight in such extreme conditions was to not rely on the seat body weight.

Foiling, I find the seat harness works for me upwind in course racing mode. Downwind I enjoy the weight control in smooth water (26kts race gear, 30kts slalom) but above 50cm / 2' chop I really struggle. Maybe because I'm using a seat but by that stage I'm usually unhooked which might be the problem. Need more TOW to work it out.

Has anyone used the RIGID Carbon waist harnesses that are popular with kiting? They are $$$ but I was wondering if the strong strucutre benefits when sailing with a twisted torso?!?

It would be nice to know why pros wear waist harness for foiling. For finning, it seems many switched from seat to waist because they can unhook/hook faster during a gybe.

+1 for the waist harness.
I used to wear a seat harness for everything since getting my first Gaastra Speedlite ; I could not sail a draggy raceboard or formula with a waist harness.
When switching to foil I found I was less reliant on the harness (even with the big sails) so switched to the waist harness.
I find the waist harness allows alot more flexibility.

There is an approx 2 year old interview with AA talking about how he (& other fin slalom sailors) switched from seat to waist over 10 years ago because it allows more adjustment, flexibility & rapidity and he said nothing has changed going from fin to foil. Sam Sills uses a seat in the iqfoil but not many else. I tried a very low raceboard seat harness on the foil & had an epic cannonball when I couldn't unhook in time.

To be fair, the hook height in my seat harness is pretty high, it just fits through the loop in the WIP impact vest, so close to what I imagine would be a waist harness level.

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berowne said..
To be fair, the hook height in my seat harness is pretty high, it just fits through the loop in the WIP impact vest, so close to what I imagine would be a waist harness level.

Same here, seat harness hook height is the same as a waist harness hook height, tested my seat harness and a waist harness in a store with a harness testing rig.

My experience: I've been riding combo seat-waist harneses for all my life, previously on formula and now on foiling. Hook height is very similar to waist ones, but they don't ride up and offer nice protection and support for lower back.

To my surprise, a kite harness works even better, because it's built way sturdier than a wind one. So that's my way to go for the past few years, a good combo kite seat harness with a higher hook, the latter I replace with a windsurf one (the kite hook being harder to unhook on wind gear).

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FormuIa said..
My experience: I've been riding combo seat-waist harneses for all my life, previously on formula and now on foiling. Hook height is very similar to waist ones, but they don't ride up and offer nice protection and support for lower back.

+1. The seat harness I use most of the time (foil & fin) basically works as a waist harness, with the leg straps just there to keep the harness from riding up. Another seat harness with a lower hook where the leg straps take more load only gets used for fully powered slalom (fin) sessions on flat water.

I can't say enough about the Liberty Harness, which is a kind of hybrid without leg straps. Hook height is easy to adjust, there's no riding up, no ribcage squeeze, no constriction around the legs and although it was expensive and slow shipping from Japan to USA, there's now a US distributor and I bet shipping Japan to Oz isn't that bad. In any case price is no worse than the hard-shell waist setups.

You can lean back into a power-7 like with a waist harness, or sit down with a break at the waist, or anything in-between. Take their advice about sizing which is governed by height rather than girth. I'm 180cm tall and have a 100cm waist at 100kg and the Medium fits perfectly. Construction is incredibly solid.

libertywinds.jp/english/2022-4/products/harness/index.html#impression

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Awalkspoiled said..
I can't say enough about the Liberty Harness, which is a kind of hybrid without leg straps. Hook height is easy to adjust, there's no riding up, no ribcage squeeze, no constriction around the legs and although it was expensive and slow shipping from Japan to USA, there's now a US distributor and I bet shipping Japan to Oz isn't that bad. In any case price is no worse than the hard-shell waist setups.

You can lean back into a power-7 like with a waist harness, or sit down with a break at the waist, or anything in-between. Take their advice about sizing which is governed by height rather than girth. I'm 180cm tall and have a 100cm waist at 100kg and the Medium fits perfectly. Construction is incredibly solid.

libertywinds.jp/english/2022-4/products/harness/index.html#impression

In US goes for $375, got my Dakine Reflex seat-harness for ~$135.

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Sandman1221 said..

Awalkspoiled said..
I can't say enough about the Liberty Harness, which is a kind of hybrid without leg straps. Hook height is easy to adjust, there's no riding up, no ribcage squeeze, no constriction around the legs and although it was expensive and slow shipping from Japan to USA, there's now a US distributor and I bet shipping Japan to Oz isn't that bad. In any case price is no worse than the hard-shell waist setups.

You can lean back into a power-7 like with a waist harness, or sit down with a break at the waist, or anything in-between. Take their advice about sizing which is governed by height rather than girth. I'm 180cm tall and have a 100cm waist at 100kg and the Medium fits perfectly. Construction is incredibly solid.

libertywinds.jp/english/2022-4/products/harness/index.html#impression

In US goes for $375, got my Dakine Reflex seat-harness for ~$135.

Sure, and if it works for you the Reflex is a terrific harness - adjustable, comfortable, sturdy, very low hook height. This replaced a still usable Reflex which I used for seven years with big sails or race gear, and the Reflex had replaced an XT-Seat/Reactor. It also replaced an awful T7 which I used briefly for foiling because I was getting scared foiling off the wind in the Reflex and thought a waist harness was the solution...

Direct from Japan it was just under $300 and probably the best windsurfing purchase I've ever made (apart from buying my first foil!) because at age 66 and with all kinds of major injuries I can stay out for hours on fin or foil and walk to the car afterwards.

For comparison the Mystic or Ion hardshell waist harnesses are right around $400 - one place has the Mystic at $425 without a hook.

Would be nice to not have legs straps, right now I always use a sports cup with the Reflex, keeps everything comfortable, especially when wearing a wetsuit!

I actually use a Liberty harness so think I will stick with it...thanks for the feedback.

waist harness...

...question was about what's "best" for chasing speed on foil. perhaps even more important on foil than on any other fin equivalent discipline (speed, slalom, FW,...) is control, which on foil requires you to constantly make tiny adjustments especially with your lower body/legs (see for instance recent clip in link below from Jordy NED69 in Garda). even with a relatively high hook, a seat harness instead tends to lock in your lower body; fine perhaps when your main goal is to just "muscle down" the rig, but otherwise not ideal. And I know that some make the seat harness work on foil, and guys like Andy B would no doubt beat me around a course any day, but the seat harness is clearly the minority view. This is also my own experience having previously used a seat harness in windsurf racing, and switched to a waist harness first for slalom only (easier transitions) but then also for FW & speed, having discovered how much it frees up your legs and improved my sailing stance.

www.instagram.com/reel/CgrzAwDIvdD/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

hey Martin the liberty looks ideal for my post-op back! what is your height, weight, liberty sizing cheers Peter

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bel29 said..
waist harness...

...question was about what's "best" for chasing speed on foil. perhaps even more important on foil than on any other fin equivalent discipline (speed, slalom, FW,...) is control, which on foil requires you to constantly make tiny adjustments especially with your lower body/legs (see for instance recent clip in link below from Jordy NED69 in Garda). even with a relatively high hook, a seat harness instead tends to lock in your lower body; fine perhaps when your main goal is to just "muscle down" the rig, but otherwise not ideal. And I know that some make the seat harness work on foil, and guys like Andy B would no doubt beat me around a course any day, but the seat harness is clearly the minority view. This is also my own experience having previously used a seat harness in windsurf racing, and switched to a waist harness first for slalom only (easier transitions) but then also for FW & speed, having discovered how much it frees up your legs and improved my sailing stance.

www.instagram.com/reel/CgrzAwDIvdD/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Well I do chase speed on a foil, and the Dakine Reflex seat harness works great for my "recreational purposes", lots of leverage to pull the sail over because it is lower (not the hook) than a waist harness, lots of flexibility because it has such a short back.

So the free move looks interesting.

interesting they call it freemove. the "freest" move would be to do away with all that stuff around the legs

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berowne said..
So the free move looks interesting.

looks like the Freemove back is a lot taller than the Reflex were the top of the hook is ~2" lower than the top of the back.

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berowne said..
So the free move looks interesting.

Thanks to Martin and Berowne for all the intel - have grabbed the Prolimit, one outing and I'm a fan - light and flexy, not obtrusive, can take load in hips, like my Severne POD seat, but hook is higher - sits at navel height when hooked in
Way nicer than waist harness for my post-op back!

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Peter Hands said..

berowne said..
So the free move looks interesting.

Thanks to Martin and Berowne for all the intel - have grabbed the Prolimit, one outing and I'm a fan - light and flexy, not obtrusive, can take load in hips, like my Severne POD seat, but hook is higher - sits at navel height when hooked in
Way nicer than waist harness for my post-op back!

That's what these forums are all about! Glad you found a good harness Peter

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I've used low hook a seat harness for 30+ years for speed, slalom, bump and jump, wave and foil windsurfing. I recently purchased an Ion Icon Curve 14 waist harness for foiling. After 5 sessions I can really see the benefits over my Severne Pod seat harness for foiling. I initially wore the harness very tight, but have found it feels better if worn slightly loose. The benefits include
- higher boom to suit the higher hook height

- earlier lift off in marginal conditions

- more freedom of movement of legs and hips

- no straps or low bar to cut into tops of legs when uphauling

I was worried about the harness riding up, but so far this has been manageable. Wearing it slightly loose helps with pushing it down if required