Like the title says, 2 sails broken exactly in the same way!
On my first windfoil session, board came down, fell forward and with my front elbow punched through the boom panel.
The sails are Ezzy Wave Panther 5.5 (2009) and Ezzy Wave SE 6.0 (2007), both X-ply with dyneema reinforcements.

Did they break because they are old (yes they are but I use these sails only a few times a year)
Or did they brake because the way I fell into them, the second time I was aware that it was because of the position of my elbow.

Is there anything I can do to prevent this, like not holding out my elbow obviously.

Has that sail with the blue bit on the batten pocket been repaired before? If so the extra set of stich holes might result in perforated sail and weakened. Once that tore when you fell on it the tear spread. Thats only 1 sail though. Unlucky to go through 2 Ezzy sails in 1 session though. It might be age.

No, the blue Dacron tape was not stitched, just applied by me because the batten pocket is slightly damaged there.
I did not take a photo from the 6.0 but it is exactly the same rip.

Of course the X-ply would be weaker because the age of the sails, but I want to know if there is anything I could do "fall better" with fewer damage, like holding into the boom, or pushing out or anything like that. Any tips are welcome. Cheers

#1 rule for foiling: always hold on to the boom in crashes! It reduces the likelihood of the mast hitting the nose, and eliminates elbow damage to the sail (have punched a few elbow holes myself windsurfing). But the biggest reason is that you cannot fall onto the foil if you hold onto the boom. If you let go, you can (which I also verified a few times ).

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FFish said..
but I want to know if there is anything I could do "fall better" with fewer damage, like holding into the boom, or pushing out or anything like that. Any tips are welcome. Cheers

Not much you can do to control a fall. The old advice of "keep hold of the boom, no matter what" still holds reasonably true, but I'd put it down to just damn poor luck.

Bad luck comes in threes. One to go.

If the glue is starting to fail then the stitch thread and holes become "tear here" perforations. Different sails use different quality adhesives, maybe times up on those adhesives on those sails. They will often keep going for lots longer if not "crashed".
A humans weight on an elbow is roughly the same force per unit area as an elephant on one foot, but actually I think the adhesive is a more likely problem in this case.

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sheddweller said..
If the glue is starting to fail then the stitch thread and holes become "tear here" perforations. Different sails use different quality adhesives, maybe times up on those adhesives on those sails. They will often keep going for lots longer if not "crashed".
A humans weight on an elbow is roughly the same force per unit area as an elephant on one foot, but actually I think the adhesive is a more likely problem in this case.

I had an old severne overdrive once upon a time. One day i decided to pop the camber inducers across by weighting the sail on top of my head, and that was the end of that sail.

+1 for holding on to the boom during crashes. Besides keeping you away from sharp foil tips, and helping keep the rig from hitting the nose of the board, it also prevents the board and sail from drifting away from you faster than you can swim. (I know this from experience.)

That last item is true mostly for a cambered sail that acts like a big floating bowl on the water and never fills with water. A no-cam sail acts more like a sea anchor and does not drift as fast.

Yeah I know the "hold into the boom" rule, but apparently in practice, I didn't quite follow it
I hit a lot of crashes that morning, and it looks like there will be some more...

For my board I took 3 measurements:
- a Surfbent under base of the mast foot (a few decent marks show me it was a good investment)
- a Unifiber adhesive nose protector
- a Unifiber Boardguard around the luff into the mast

For myself I sail with a crashvest, but no helmet (hate the things)
Of course it kicked the back fin with my feet trying to waterstart so will only uphaul now.

Hold on to the boom, Hold on to the boom, Hold on to the boom!!

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segler said..
+1 for holding on to the boom during crashes. Besides keeping you away from sharp foil tips, and helping keep the rig from hitting the nose of the board, it also prevents the board and sail from drifting away from you faster than you can swim. (I know this from experience.)

That last item is true mostly for a cambered sail that acts like a big floating bowl on the water and never fills with water. A no-cam sail acts more like a sea anchor and does not drift as fast.

Yeah, every windfoiler instinctively flinched when reading that.

fwiw, the only sail to float away from me (twice) was a no-cam Ezzy Cheetah which has some built-in shape. Sat on top of the water like a leaf and blew downwind faster than I could swim. Led to an interesting afternoon the second time, one which I'm not inclined to repeat. And, it was because I half-a**ed a waterstart in overpowered conditions and the sail blew out of my lazy hands.

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segler said..
it also prevents the board and sail from drifting away from you faster than you can swim. (I know this from experience.)

Me too. I have let go and fallen off and the board can stay foiling for quite a distance without me on it. But once it stopped, the board has the massive mast and foil to stop it getting blown over and away like a fin board can.

Was told to hang onto the boom at all costs when foiling to reduce the chance of foil laceration or bone fracture. Bit counter-intuitive. When blowing up windsurfing I take a flier. Rather have to swim after the gear vs. hit it or be hit by it. So far, the foil crashes have been me swing from the boom and never directly hitting the sail directly head-on. More glancing blows and no damage to the sail.

Like FFish invested in a SurfBent. Happy I did. The Horue Tiny used is a light in weight board relative to volume. Assuming it's lightly built. Even with the SurfBent noticed some spider web cracking on the nose. No bubbling as the board sat in the sun. But just incase applied some SolarEZ. After finish sanding it looks new. Easy to hide the fix with the carbon look finish. No paint required.

Heres Thomas Goyard demonstrating "hanging onto the boom" just in case you thought the pros never screw up:

Yeah the monofilm is very very thin and with the strings stretch, it cuts through like butter. Same problem over rotating back loop and landing with rear elbow right through.

Similarly, the nose of my board went right through after white water pushed the sail against it.

Anyway, here is my repair video, will be as good as new!

PS: the clew area is even more problematic and much more difficult to fix without patching stitching over.

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PhilUK said..

segler said..
it also prevents the board and sail from drifting away from you faster than you can swim. (I know this from experience.)

Me too. I have let go and fallen off and the board can stay foiling for quite a distance without me on it. But once it stopped, the board has the massive mast and foil to stop it getting blown over and away like a fin board can.

I think the foil makes the board move faster downwind if nothing on it or nothing attached, it is the sails drag what makes it slow down. I had caught a beginner wing foilers board going downwind without a leash, the board was several cms above the water, it was on a mission to get away, moving very fast. It is olso apparent when windfoiling, in non planing conditions board moves or gets into speed much faster compared to fin.

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FFish said..
Like the title says, 2 sails broken exactly in the same way!
On my first windfoil session, board came down, fell forward and with my front elbow punched through the boom panel.
The sails are Ezzy Wave Panther 5.5 (2009) and Ezzy Wave SE 6.0 (2007), both X-ply with dyneema reinforcements.

Did they break because they are old (yes they are but I use these sails only a few times a year)
Or did they brake because the way I fell into them, the second time I was aware that it was because of the position of my elbow.

Is there anything I can do to prevent this, like not holding out my elbow obviously.

I think it is both. Although your sail looks in very good condition for its age, 15yo monofilm should be more crispy even if it had not seen much sunlight, just like car tires, i guess they lose softness by time. But even a brand new sail might not handle a point pressure from falling on it with elbow.

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Subsonic said..
Heres Thomas Goyard demonstrating "hanging onto the boom" just in case you thought the pros never screw up:

Now that's a perfect image to store in my brain, cheers!!

We seem to be getting a lot of foil questions here. There is a forum for foiling. You'd get better feedback there.

You need to train your balance off the board, try an Indo Board or similar balance trainer, perfect for foiling. Also, detune your setup so you do not get up so fast on the foil, by moving sail mast base forward so you are just skimming over the surface of the water, then at least you are not falling from 2' onto the sail when you crash.

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Sandman1221 said..
You need to train your balance off the board, try an Indo Board or similar balance trainer, perfect for foiling. Also, detune your setup so you do not get up so fast on the foil, by moving sail mast base forward so you are just skimming over the surface of the water, then at least you are not falling from 2' onto the sail when you crash.

No. No one "needs" to train their balance to foil. If you did and it helped, great for you. Zero of us at my local did it. For 99% of us, if one can walk safely down a sidewalk and uphaul their board, they have enough balance. Just like the rest of windsurfing (and a lot of other "balance" sports like mountain biking), looking up and out (e.g. the horizon) is enough to let our inner ear do it's thing. Don't look at the water, the nose of the board, your hands, feet, etc. It works for a newbie trying to uphaul and it works for us.

If the board is doing swervy things, it's not balance. Like the rest of windsurfing, make sure you aren't putting pressure on your heels on the rail, staying over the middle of the board, etc.

Again, if it helped you, I'm happy for you but it is by no means mandatory or necessary.

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Paducah said..

Sandman1221 said..
You need to train your balance off the board, try an Indo Board or similar balance trainer, perfect for foiling. Also, detune your setup so you do not get up so fast on the foil, by moving sail mast base forward so you are just skimming over the surface of the water, then at least you are not falling from 2' onto the sail when you crash.

No. No one "needs" to train their balance to foil. If you did and it helped, great for you. Zero of us at my local did it. For 99% of us, if one can walk safely down a sidewalk and uphaul their board, they have enough balance. Just like the rest of windsurfing (and a lot of other "balance" sports like mountain biking), looking up and out (e.g. the horizon) is enough to let our inner ear do it's thing. Don't look at the water, the nose of the board, your hands, feet, etc. It works for a newbie trying to uphaul and it works for us.

If the board is doing swervy things, it's not balance. Like the rest of windsurfing, make sure you aren't putting pressure on your heels on the rail, staying over the middle of the board, etc.

Again, if it helped you, I'm happy for you but it is by no means mandatory or necessary.

Sorry, balance trainers were made for a reason!, the Indo board was designed by SoCal surfers to help train their balance in the off season, and after using it in the off season and then surfing I was amazed how good I was on the first day of the season, never fell off when dropping into a wave. In contrast, without the balance trainer on the first day of surfing I would fall multiple times. Great for snowboarding too!

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Sandman1221 said..

Paducah said..

Sandman1221 said..
You need to train your balance off the board, try an Indo Board or similar balance trainer, perfect for foiling. Also, detune your setup so you do not get up so fast on the foil, by moving sail mast base forward so you are just skimming over the surface of the water, then at least you are not falling from 2' onto the sail when you crash.

No. No one "needs" to train their balance to foil. If you did and it helped, great for you. Zero of us at my local did it. For 99% of us, if one can walk safely down a sidewalk and uphaul their board, they have enough balance. Just like the rest of windsurfing (and a lot of other "balance" sports like mountain biking), looking up and out (e.g. the horizon) is enough to let our inner ear do it's thing. Don't look at the water, the nose of the board, your hands, feet, etc. It works for a newbie trying to uphaul and it works for us.

If the board is doing swervy things, it's not balance. Like the rest of windsurfing, make sure you aren't putting pressure on your heels on the rail, staying over the middle of the board, etc.

Again, if it helped you, I'm happy for you but it is by no means mandatory or necessary.

Sorry, balance trainers were made for a reason!, the Indo board was designed by SoCal surfers to help train their balance in the off season, and after using it in the off season and then surfing I was amazed how good I was on the first day of the season, never fell off when dropping into a wave. In contrast, without the balance trainer on the first day of surfing I would fall multiple times. Great for snowboarding too!

I stand by my point. If someone can walk down a sidewalk while chewing gum, they have requisite balance skills to begin windfoiling. "Balance" issues beyond that will come down to technique and focusing eyes in the wrong place. There are a good many people on this forum that can uphaul/tack a 85-95 l. wave board. You're going to tell them they "need" a balance board if they want to start windfoiling? Be careful talking in absolutes.

Not to mention most people figure out balance trainers work a lot better when they look up at the wall eye level instead of down at their feet. I never said balance trainers aren't of value to someone, e.g. you - just not a "need" item.