13 year-old son (little guy 28kg) is keen on starting on a board this summer. We have an early model Starboard Start board – the huge 190 litre number that they first did. The good thing about it is the centreboard. (Used to get him on the front for scream sessions when he was 3 – had a rope handle knotted to the hole in the nose!)

But is there something better for a little kid?

He's done a few sessions of sailing school in dinghies, so not a 100% noob.

Have plenty of sails and gear for small rig.

Guess I want to avoid the first part of the learning curve being too cumbersome, but I don't want him to flounder on stuff that's too small (unstable) or difficult to get around into the wind.

Will probably start off in the sheltered part of Middle Park (St Kilda), maybe Inverloch inlet – that sort of thing. But as zoo as he gets going in Melbourne it will be out into the bay where there's a bit of swell and chop.

Advice welcome.

The best learning combo is a big board and small sail in light wind. So you should use what you have, the Start and see how it goes. Hopefully he will soon be able to turn around and sail back to where he launched. Once he does this reliably and is starting to go out in stronger winds its time to look at trying a smaller board.

Last summer started my 5 year old on the same board. Biggest issue that we had was fin size. Being only light and with 1.5m sail there wasn't enough lateral force to be able to rig steer the board.
Tried all the compatable fins that I had (smallest 23cm) to no avail. Even tried without a fin altogether, just the half moon centreboard and that sort of worked in zephyr type wind to show her rig steering but no good above 2knots of wind.
Ended up cutting down a broken fiberglass wave fin and using knead-it to form a tuttlebox insert that resulted in a 5cm fin which worked a treat even though it was about 3 degrees off being square due to my dodgy craftmanship.
Probably not the info you were chasing but the fin issues almost turned her off continuing as she could only sail in straight line down the beach and had to walk back.
As a flipside, good exercise for me wading though waste deep water chasing her for a week of early morning light breezes.

Anything with a centre board is optimal
the little tackers weigh doesn't allow the fin to prperly work and sideways drift occurs.
My young fellas on a similar sized board with a 2.5m
A good solution i saw was a fin attached to a tiling suction cup mounted on the bottom.
It creates a bit of drag but assists with the lateral movement heaps.

We have found with our daughter that a 130 ltr SUP has been great for her learning, not too big, better in waves as well,

Phoebe also has a 115ltr JP Young Gun, this is a great board for her to blast around on, get used to footstraps and harness etc, gets on a plane better as well. It has a centre board for maintaining position if need be,

We have found that the big thing with sailing / learning for kids is the weight of the rigs, the 3.0 severne X-1 has been perfect for Phoebe, super light and not flimsy at all. She is probably nopw ready to step up to a bigger adult sail, but on lighter cruisey days she still prefers her 3.0 - once she starts water starting she will probably need a bigger sail,

check this out,

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Stuthepirate said..
Anything with a centre board is optimal
the little tackers weigh doesn't allow the fin to prperly work and sideways drift occurs.
My young fellas on a similar sized board with a 2.5m
A good solution i saw was a fin attached to a tiling suction cup mounted on the bottom.
It creates a bit of drag but assists with the lateral movement heaps.

How old is the young fella? The other part of the equation for my daughter was that it wasn't as fun as it could be as there were no other kids. If you're keen to get a group of young tackers sailing together then I am all in. Generally sail around the Safety Bay area.

My son is 7.
We're down at the pond regularly when im rnr. I live just doen the road.
Hes going pretty good already. Learning rig control and foot positions but like i said the sideways drift is a pain.

Good on you, Pheobe!

Thanks for the advice, guys. I'll try the big board for starters and see how that pans out. (Was secretly looking for an excuse to buy something around 140 litres that I could use myself! (Maybe that will have to wait.)

John, I'm in the same position. I have ordered a AHD Sealion XL. It is 150L only 9 foot long (so fits in the van) and not too long to turn. Has no footstraps for kids feet to trip and has a power box in the centre of the board so the kids can grind down some of those power box fins I have kicking around and can't be bothered to sell instead of trying to work a centre board. The deck is foam. Just over 9kg so not too heavy and also sounds durable. Looks like a good teaching board, is a SUP, and can be used in those 12 knot days when it is a bit of a pest to SUP and not windy enough to windsurf and also I think is one of the only SUP's that has a rocker that can plane so should be good for praciting heli tacks or anything else I can think of when I need to cool off.

http://www.ahd-boards.com/models/sealion-concept/

PS. I not good enough to be sponsored in any way and regularly work night shift in a non related windsurf industry so that I can pay for gear I don't really need.

I ordered mine through sunshine coast sailboards. My kids are 7 and nearly 5 and I will be taking them to Sanctuary Point NSW a bit this summer where a lot of other kids sail in NSW over the school holidays.

Save your money John.

Just use what you've got. The start is perfect. We've used them for teaching since they were first produced.

Get him hanging, and fanging in the harness, then think about something more specific if he gets the bug...

Cheers.
Jez

Looks like a nice afternoon today for the kids (in Perth).

I'll have my young bloke who is 9yo down at Melville this arvo. It would be good if there are a few other kids around.

I may even convince my crazy 5yo daughter to have a go

Probably worth a repost of this...

www.seabreeze.com.au/forums/Windsurfing/General/How-to-teach-kidswhat-we-learnt-at-VIC-kids-club/

Thanks everyone.

I'll probably get the little guy out (on the gear we have) next weekend and see how it goes – will report back. :)

The older boy some years back at Port Stephens. There were dolphins around that day … bouncing around in front of us as we crossed the bay.

Last year we tried a range of boards with our little bloke and SUPs are too large. After a did of search I managed to find a 120l Kode with tuff deck that also has a tuttle box that can be used for a centreboard. Works a treat and he can now up haul and cruise around on a small ezzy rig.

Big advantage is that I now have a light wind board as there is blank for the centreboard. Finished the ledge to lancelin on it last year using a 6.5 so very happy with board.

For the WA crew I have setup a WWA juniors facebook group www.facebook.com/groups/WWAJuniors/ as a way for us to share our experience and to organise sessions with the kids on the water.

for us skeptics who refuse to join facepalm is there another way of communicating this info?

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TimB said..
Last year we tried a range of boards with our little bloke and SUPs are too large. After a did of search I managed to find a 120l Kode with tuff deck that also has a tuttle box that can be used for a centreboard. Works a treat and he can now up haul and cruise around on a small ezzy rig.

Big advantage is that I now have a light wind board as there is blank for the centreboard. Finished the ledge to lancelin on it last year using a 6.5 so very happy with board.

Good find Tim. Just had a look at Starboard website. Missed that one. I would have gone for an even smaller board in the Sealion but only the 150 had the centre fin option. The longer boards require too much technique to turn with a small rig and working the centre board as well has to go in the too hard basket.

I try keep the none facebooker in the loop when something is planned.

I don't think a big board is necessarily a problem for kids. As long as the mast base is located very close to the centerboard, they will pivot around pretty effectively for easy turns. My young bloke is around 28kegs and spins his 160 litre Tabou Coolrider around no probs using a power-gybe.

The thing that I find puts the kids off is that they can sail along pretty easily with a little sail, but once it drops in the water, they find getting going again to be a huge drag, especially if it falls in to windward.

I have found that you need to let them have fun too and not always correct what we think is wrong. My nephew managed to sail over 100m clew first and back winded on his second try sailing. When I asked why answer was "it was fun".

And that is why kids quickly pick up freestyle too. We are all stuck in our ways.

My young fella wasn't interested until I put the dog on his board.

The dog hated it but I figure that's a small price to pay to develop a new windsurfing buddy (besides, I feed the dog)