MWsails said..
I don't know how things in Australia but in Europe and USA race sails not really popular.
That's only true for the USA, not for Europe. Just look at Defi Wind, and you'll see more than 1000 race sails on the water
at the same time. Judging from the videos, almost every single racer is on full slalom gear. Along the same lines, retailers in Germany say that slalom gear is by far the best selling gear. The Bavarian speed event (
https://www.speed-kini.de/) has about 100 participants who used race sails. It covers only Bavaria, a landlocked state with less than one sixth of the German population. At least in France and Germany, two of the biggest windsurfing markets in Europe, slalom sailing and race sails
are popular. Judging by posts on the GPS Team Challenge, it's also popular in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Croatia.
The biggest windsurf race in the US is the OBX Wind long distance race in April. It is about 10-fold smaller than the Defi Wind, and only about 10% of the participants use race sails. At times, it is impossible to get slalom boards or race sails in the US. One of the largest retailers had
prepaid orders for race sails canceled by the importer because "race sails don't sell". Several members of our GPS TC team have ordered race sails in Europe because stores in the US did not even bother to return emails. There is just one area in the US where I have seen a relatively large amount of race sails and slalom gear: Corpus Christi in Texas. Some days, about 1/4 of the windsurfers are on slalom gear. It probably helps that the local store has one long-term employee who races slalom. But overall, race sails and slalom boards are not nearly as popular in the US as they are in Europe and Australia.
Of the multiple factors that contribute to this discrepancy,
perception plays a big role - many windsurfers I know would give exactly the same arguments as MWsails for not using race sails, without ever trying them. If someone tries and gets a used race sail or two, then lack of mates with slalom experience becomes an issue. Figuring out the correct trim, stance, and technique for any gear can be hard. For freeride or wave gear, there'll be plenty of windsurfers to ask. For slalom gear, not so. It took me quite a few years before I had gotten enough tips from better sailors to be comfortable on slalom gear. But 49 out of 50 sessions in these years, there was nobody around who was able and willing to give those tips.
On the bright side, things are slowly changing. The OBX long distance race will go into it's third year in 2018 and is growing; the event includes a slalom clinic, and the local store has started carrying slalom gear. With a widening user base, others may discover that race sails are much better and easier to use than they thought - to cite my wife about her favorite race sail: "amazing - it feels just like a freestyle sail".