Any advice for moving to a smaller narrower board? I have an RRD Firemove 135 which is 85cm wide, a Kona (70cm wide) and a foil board (71cm wide). Can plane in the straps, occasionally hit a waterstart, bad gybes and tacks. Going to a Goya Bolt Pro 117 which is 69cm wide and was wondering if there are any tips that make the transition better? I've got the straps mounted fwd and inboard compared to the other boards where everythings back/out wide. Reason for the smaller board is for higher wind/chop days when I found I couldn't keep the Firemove going fast or straight so hoping the narrower hips on the Goya let me go faster and with better control.

Do the same as your doing , just more central on the board.

yes of course it will be nicer in chop and faster with better control ,good purchase .There will be challengers ahead of course but thats progression ,as you go smaller water starting becomes more frequent than up hauling ,practise your gybes ,even if they are ugly .You will get it in the end ,its good to hear some one getting into windsurfing ,as IMax said keep your feet closer to the mast base don't step out on the rails ,talk to other windsurfers at the beach for tips ,or ask on here ,

70 wide down to 69 isn't a massive jump width wise but it's obviously got much less volume, so much less float. The finer lines are going to make for a much racier feel though. It'll feel much less like you're sailing a dinner plate. You'll probably find yourself loading the fin (back foot pressure) a bit/lot more depending on what sails you're using. Having the foot straps inboard might negate some of that.

what fin are you planning on using in it? Something around a 36?

117l, 69w is still a relatively large board. Unless you're a really big guy, I suggest you need around a 100l/63w board. It'll be a lot easier and faster in stronger wind and chop. If you're not that confident with water starts yet, wear an impact vest, it'll make it a lot easier and less tiring. Choose shallower water if you can also

Cheers for the tips, all makes perfect sense.For the fin it came with a 42cm fin that actually doesn't fit, but I might not use that one as I have a really nice carbon 41cm and G10 36cm race fin that I'm thinking might be better. Was thinking this would be my board for 7.5m sails and under.Been windsurfing two years, and last month was the first time I really felt like the 85cm wide board was too much, but it's because I sail in the midwestern US where it's just not windy that often. That was literally the windiest day I've had and it was barely 20kts. Started day on 7.5 and ended on 5.8m sails when better sailors were all between 5m and 6m. Just wanted something that won't bounce up in the air on chop or tailwalk so much! I'd love to sail a 100l board but I think it might be once a year with the conditions we have. 9.5 is my most used sail if that gives you a clue about what it's like.

I'll check back when I finally get a chance to use it and report how it goes and if anything comes up to pass along.

What size sail? First thing to do when sailing smaller for the board is to use a shorter fin.

Second, as long as there's wind no problem going with a smaller board altogether.

Waterstart is very important but uphauling still works even in when windy so long as the board is wide enough.

I think learning to uphaul a small board is just as important as waterstarting. If the wind drops , instead of laying in the water drifting downwind hoping for a gust , just jump on and go. I use a combo of both , depending what side the sail lands and how underwater my 9.4 cammed sail is. It's not fun swimming around a underwater huge sail that is facing the wrong way . Whichever takes less energy.

Was planning on using this board when it's choppy or windy, so pretty much 7.5 and under.

I'm curious about how hard the 117 will be to uphaul at 75kg. The Kona at the same width is super easy which is great as that's my really light wind board, but know the volume matters quite a bit as well for picking up the sail.

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Kristo said..
Was planning on using this board when it's choppy or windy, so pretty much 7.5 and under.

I'm curious about how hard the 117 will be to uphaul at 75kg. The Kona at the same width is super easy which is great as that's my really light wind board, but know the volume matters quite a bit as well for picking up the sail.

You should easily uphaul that board. With a bit of practice you should be able to uphaul a 95 litre board.

One more thing - smaller boards with smaller fins generate less lift than larger boards/fins, or need higher speeds to produce the same lift. When you get on the plane and step too early towards the rail/back and get into the footstraps too early, your smaller board might turn into the wind and you stall. So on a smaller board, you need to pick up a few kn more of board speed before stepping especially into the rear footstrap.
Other than that - learn to waterstart consistently. Just stop uphauling. You will fall more often on a smaller board and use up all your energy for uphauling. So just don't do it, even if in the beginning waterstarting takes a few attempts.
Jibes will also be more difficult - simply because a smaller board is less forgiving for the smallest of errors of weight distribution compared to your larger board. Tacks will almost be impossible, unless you are really fast.

I'm ~95kg plus thick neoprene, I have poor balance. I can uphaul 110L without too much drama unless it's very choppy.

Unfortunately haven't had the chance to go try any board yet... eager but running out of soft water season!

Mariachi, do you really think tacking a 117l won't be possible? I've had no issues with any of the other boards and this doens't seem like_that_ big of a jump, Hoping to never really be schlogging on this board with the higher wind range, but where I sail I often find a tack is preferred to keep working up to the wind or wider parts of lakes so a tack is often the turn.

You can fast tack anything:





Waterstart is a great tool for small boards.
Big guys can uphaul sinkers and it's actually easier since it goes below the chop!

Hi all, wanted to report back now that I finally had a chance to try this board. Used it with a 5.0 in probably the breeziest conditions I've yet been out in. Good news is the things I was worried about were not big issues; it's totally uphaulable, and barely harder to tack. The things I found much trickier were gybing (which I'm not good at anyway) but also had the hardest time getting it planing in the first place, getting the straps, and waterstarting. Getting planing took a lot more work. Sometimes when things are gusty on my big board I'll get into the straps first before a gust, but you really can't do that on this narrower board. And for water and beach starting it seems like the board is real easy to push away by accident. MIght be the 36cm fin I was using?

The good was great. I had a hard time getting planing due to getting used to the board and being under rigged a bit, but when you do get planing the control and speed are great. Last year in similar conditions by 85cm wide board just got smacked around by chop and didn't ever seen to get fast as the shoulders of the board were hitting waves. This narrowed board (~70cm) was way more comfortable and didn't seem to mind the chop nearly as much. Thanks for all the tips!

after 10 sessions you will have built the muscle memory to enjoy that board , for jibing try and keep the speed and flip early. The fin seems a bit small

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powersloshin said..
after 10 sessions you will have built the muscle memory to enjoy that board , for jibing try and keep the speed and flip early. The fin seems a bit small

So maybe that's how you do it, but I'm going to just keep splashing and crashing.

I think I got the fin match from a calculator online. I did notice the board really wanted to slide out water and beach starting. Just going to be a new learning curve I think but really really fun so far. Getting into the back strap was probably the hardest thing I had to learn on the big board, and I think it's going to be a bit of a repeat on that as I kept putting my foot in the water!

Got to try this board again, wasn't quite as successful feeling as the first time but I did get a bit better. Felt overpowered with a 7.0 Lion, and crashed and dropped the sail a TON. Upside was able to get both footstraps and got over 20kts with it. Downside was I had the hardest time not rounding up into the wind while slogging. Everything felt heavier and sinkier and this time I kept stuffing the nose and windward rail itno chop, which didn't happen last time. Got some good tips from shore as my buddy was doing some coaching that really helped: getting more speed before turns was really really helpful on this board. He also suggested going out with a small sail on a light day and doing lots of up and down turns, "snaking" he called it, to get better at exagerrated turns with the board and sail. Will update hopefully next week if we get some wind, but if someone out there is thinking about making the jump to a smaller board it's definitely worth it for the higher wind control and comfort, but be prepared to look baaaad for a bit!

Have only gotten out three more times this year, but two of them were very god wither in terms of fun or progress.The best progress I think I made was on a very windy day on the smaller Bolt, when I broke part of the extension so didn't want to venture out very far, so just practiced waterstarts. On one hand it seems like a waste of a windy day, but holy cow did my rig control improve. Had a buddy on shore coaching me and in about an hour and a half there was a lot of progress. Probably got three good ones, and a whole bunch of marginal ones on the baord I previously couldn't water start before.The next day out I switched back to the big board (RRD 135) and ended up with the nicest day I've ever had. Everything seemed super easy and I spent the whole day planing and for the first time ever it felt like I was able to sail with the other windsurfers and not be completely shot out the back. I think the rig control imrpovement from the waterstart day really paid off, as I've never had such an easy time turning or getting planing. Didn't fall once except when I was overheating and jumping in, which was different. Hope this encourages someone to push themselves on a smaller board a bit.

The one question I've had is that on the bigger freemove board it's super easy to hop into both straps before the puff and then just push it downwind and plane off. The smaller free race board seems to punish getting into the straps too early, which isn't what I was expecting based on internet reading. Is there a better or worse way to approach the smaller board or is it just time on the water? For getting the big board planing at first I found it really helped to be unhooked, get planing-ish and then work my way into the straps one at a time, but these days I can do the straps/harness/planing in any order. Any better or worse way to do it on the narrow board? It's usually light and gusty where I sail.

Ha, nevermind. Had a very marginal day today and found that I can sail the Bolt in any order. Really think spending a day on waterstarting was a big help as everything is feeling easy now. Sailed the Bolt with an 8.0 in very light and gusty wind with no problem. Now I just need some wind!

Finally had big breeze to try this out in and it's absolutely amazing. Even in short steep chop the Bolt is far more comfortable than the Firemove, the extra width really lets you press hard.

The one thing that keeps helping me out on this board is to practice waterstarts a lot, always seems to make actually sailing the thing easier and more fun to practice rig control first. If anyone else is on the fence about going smaller, my advice is to t go for it and just have a lot of fun getting used to it.

Actually thinking about getting a smaller board yet as lots of the guys were on 100ish L boards yesterday!