What are the immediate performance differences an average freerider will notice using a slalom sail for the first time?

Apart from the cost what are the differences between using for eg. a NP 2 cam sail compared to a NP EVO in terms of wind range, stability, weight, and handling through transitions?

Heavier, much harder to waterstart, harder to gybe & harder to trim.

Depending on the design of the twin cam they can have more bottom end than a race sail but alot less stability. Though most dont really make use of the stability benefits of a full race sail prefering to change down than hold an 8.6 in up to 25knots of wind.

Ive found some of the twin/older 3 cams a little dangerous because they have enough drive to get you moving fast enough that in really gusty winds the lack of stability can get you into trouble off the wind, dont really get that with a no cam as they depower & not going quite that fast.

Ive always mostly owned race sails but im a big fan of the 3 cam stuff that dont focus on improved bottom end. These have all the stability you need in normal (not pwa sailor) conditions, are nicer to use than full race sail & well suited to going fast as the leech twists a bit further down.

Select to expand quote

Orange Whip said..
What are the immediate performance differences an average freerider will notice using a slalom sail for the first time?

Apart from the cost what are the differences between using for eg. a NP 2 cam sail compared to a NP EVO in terms of wind range, stability, weight, and handling through transitions?

I used to use NP 2 Cam sails and found that the bottom end grunt kept pulling me out of my stance when I got hit by a big gust which unsettled me and wasn't fast.
As soon as I changed to the full race sails I noticed how fantastically they accelerated in the gusts and how stable they were.

I recently got a 7 metre Neil Pryde Evo X and I have to say it's the best sail I've ever had. I have the 3 Cam RS Racing 7.8 and an old 8.6 Evo race sail (4 Cam) and the Evo X is miles better. The Evo X has heaps of bottom end grunt to get going in wind that I used to use the 8.6 or 7.8, but can release the gusts so well I don't need to change it til around 25 knots as long as I change down with my boards.

I dont feel the extra weight of the cams and I'm only 70kgs. I'd definitely go with race sails if you're keen on performance.
:)

From memory you have a H2 ?
The differences are the race sail will feel more solid like a wing but not really heavier to handle . It will however push much harder down onto the board. Harder to get planing. A little faster than the H2 , ( H2 is quite fast , faster than a V8 ) but u can hang onto it in heavier wind. In rough water the race sail will make your board feel heavier and not as flicky. Water and pull starting are much harder.
Im heavy and use 2 cams in rough water where I don't want to go so fast. Race sails on smoother water.

If you're an average free rider then I don't think you'll benefit much from going to a slalom / race sail.

The other downside that hasn't been mentioned is rigging. It takes longer and more fussy. I much prefer rigging a free ride sail when I'm going for the quick after work sail.

for me the benefit of a multi cam slalom sail is in variable or gusty winds, I can rig bigger and plane through lulls while being able to hold on in big gusts.

A race sail with its huge luff pocket is easier and quicker to rig than a twin cam with a small luff pocket.
Same procedure way less scrunching .
The H2 is painfully cringeworthy trying to get the mast up.

Thanks for helpful replies. iMax, close, 6 batten Hornets not H2s which I think were 7 batten.
W4Wind said,
"for me the benefit of a multi cam slalom sail is in variable or gusty winds, I can rig bigger and plane through lulls while being able to hold on in big gusts." This is probably the aspect/feature that is tempting. I would only look at using one up to 20 knots, water state a bit rough beyond that. Maddlad's comments about his 7 metre Evo X got me thinking.

I get what's going on here .
Madladd's is on to it it.
The H2 And hornet are a strange beast .
Ive had both and the next raciest thing the slalom and the Evo , all within a couple of years .
I've felt the H2 was a handful , ( catapulty ) , a workout , backhand heavy , but fast , good light wind power and easy to water and pull start .
Because it was not overly accepted NP re named it into the Hornet.
Over downhaul a H2 or hornet and u can get good speed oversized.
The new V8 is different , it's easy , ( still a bitch to rig up the luff ) , but it's easy grunty power.
The Slalums or Evos are so much easier to go fast.

The biggest difference I think is how much more physical a race sail is. You will expend much more energy with a race sail.

Select to expand quote

Capie said..
The biggest difference I think is how much more physical a race sail is. You will expend much more energy with a race sail.

Is that just due to the extra weight? I assumed there would be energy savings due to the stability through gusts.

Select to expand quote

Orange Whip said..

Capie said..
The biggest difference I think is how much more physical a race sail is. You will expend much more energy with a race sail.

Is that just due to the extra weight? I assumed there would be energy savings due to the stability through gusts.

Your Hornet is not the easiest sail physically . ( the brochure even says it's for the dedicated sailor ) ,
I don't feel a race sail is any more work than a Hornet , until you drop it into the water.
If you have a floaty board that you can uphaul , and that's what you want to do in light wind , what have you got to loose ?
If your over 100 kg go a 8 and a half or so.
You should be able to go way faster than the wind speed.
Go on , do it , you will like it

Freeride sails are fun to use easy and forgiving , easy to uphaull and water start, slalom or race sails are blisteringly quick, very comfortable when dialled in and hammering along but heavy pigs that will exhaust you unless you have been sailing a lot and are in good race shape. Race sails defiantly need to be matched to the correct board. Small race sail on a big board is no good, big race sail on a small board is no good, the push down on the boards in a strange way hard to describe, perfect when matched correctly but were unforgiving and uncomfortable when mismatched. Freeride are way better in heavy slappy chop and easy on you when the wind is up and down making it hard to make the exact right sail choice (do I rig over powered for lulls or over down hall for the gusts). When race or slalom fall in the drink expect to take a long tiring while to flip the rig swim it to get into position and then pop the cams onto the right tack and then do massive weightlifting sessions to water start and watch everyone round you zoom past . In other words if your good and fit enough and don't stuff up your gybes and don't fall in you will get value from them but if not (like the rest of us!) get some NP ryde HD they are quick super easy sails and only slightly slower, they also rig quicker and cost less. More time blasting with free ride sails, thats why I ditched all my cam sails and now love my windsurfing again.

It depends what kind of sailing you do. If you reach back and forth or bump and jump on fsw or freeride boards then a rotational sail is probably best. If you GPS sail and are competitive then the Slalom sail is probably best. Typically rotational sails are lighter and easier to use but have less top end. Slalom sails are heavier, harder to rotate and require good water start technique, however if tuned and trimmed well are incredibly stable, fast and fun to sail. It's horses for courses.

Select to expand quote

John340 said..
It depends what kind of sailing you do. If you reach back and forth or bump and jump on fsw or freeride boards then a rotational sail is probably best. If you GPS sail and are competitive then the Slalom sail is probably best. Typically rotational sails are lighter and easier to use but have less top end. Slalom sails are heavier, harder to rotate and require good water start technique, however if tuned and trimmed well are incredibly stable, fast and fun to sail. It's horses for courses.

My two cents....agree with John340 with a couple of small personal testimonials. It does, I believe depend on what sort of sailing you are into. I have been apart of the FNQMob GPS Team for a few years now and am slowely but surely learning the art of GPS sailing. Not great at it, but am getting better in each of the disciplines each an every year. I started on Tushingham T4's - a very nice Freeride sail. Easy to rig, use, waterstart, gybe and just generally a plug and play sort of sail. They got used that much over a 4 year period that my 7.5 eventually took one headbutt to many, way over powered and trashed it beyond repair!!!!
This was a concern for me, as my back up sail was a 2012 HSM GPS 7.3 - we had a love hate relationship. I loved to hate it. The first time I took it out to Green Island in 20 knots, I **** myself. It had so much pull of the line and just wouldnt let up. I wasnt used to that and hated it. I actually went back to the beach, de rigged and set up my smaller 6.5 T4 and felt comfortable. And I was happy being comfortable. My T4's just worked. I still managed the odd 30 knot run and was happy clocking up Km's across the reef flats or on the ocean, but at 90+ kg's you cant always get away with a 6.5 sqm sail and so I had to use my 2012 HSM GPS. I had to force myself to use it. Quite simply I wasnt in a position to be able to afford another T4 type of sail at that time.
It was hard work and I can say that it took me approx 4 months of solid use to learn how to waterstart the sail once it had filled with water. It did my fitness a huge favour. The cams wouldnt rotate easily (using a Hotrod RDM) and required reasonbly heavy pumping to rotate into place. In the end though, when I had her dialed in and despite the overall quite weightyness physically of the sail dry, let alone when wet, I can say that we finally fell in love. It was a pleasure to use and was so locked in. I stopped worrying about what I had to do with the sail and in the end just concentrated on what my feet did on the board. The HSM GPS, being a Race sail, (in the same league as your Reflex and NP RS/Evo range) are not easy sails to jump into and do take quite an effort to master both physically and mentally.
My very recent acquisition was to purchase 2018 M1 Overdrives. A compromise I feel between full Race Sails and Camless Free ride - approx a 30% reduction in the luff pocket. I havnt had a great session on these yet as we are in the middle of a small FNQ doldrum at present, but looking at the build, they are pretty much sealed at the mast tip and typically the luff tube has 3 access vents ( to get to the cams) that allow any water to quickly escape making water starting so much easier. The other huge difference between the build materials on these M1's and my HSM GPS, is that all of the material on the M1's doesnt soak up water, so the whole rig virtually floats on the water rather than sinking underneath the waves. Rigging on the M1's is a breeze also. No crinkling at all. Slide the mast up the luff tube to about 30cm from the top when you need to exert some pressure and down haul. Very simple, very easy and really no different to my T4's. All the outhaul, down haul measurements are printed on the sail. What more could you want.
So back to the beginning....."what sort of sailing do you want." I wanted to get better, faster and sail for longer so I headed down the cammed path. But you can do the same with camless sails as well. If someone in your area has and is preparred to offer you time on their late model cammed sails than take the opportunity. It will be worth your while.

slalom sail is better when fully powered. It's not the sail to get up and go the quickest, if you want to get up and go in 8 knts, you need the board and sail to do it in slalom. In freeride you have more flexibility to play with sails and board, slalom comes in combo.

However, the range and the stability of slalom sails are amazing!!

I got both slalom and freeride setup. When sailing in choppy water in 17+ knots, I'll pick the freeride gear 9 out of 10 times. For my limited skills, my best freeride sails have a range that's pretty similar to the range I get from slalom sails. But I don't sail slalom sails anywhere near the top of their range, unless it's very flat. I also like to do a bit of carving freestyle when it's warm, which requires freeride gear.

On flat water and when the wind is light, slalom gear can be a lot of fun. It's definitely more physical. Getting slalom sails out of the water is more work, but usually no big issue. Then again, I may use a 6.3 when others of similar weight may still be on 7.0 or 7.8. As for rigging, slalom sails seem to be a pain the first few times, and they need to be rigged much more exactly than freeride gear. But once you figured out how to rig them right (which may require tips from someone who knows), they are easier to rig and derig than freeride sails.

Just a few days ago, I had a chance to demo a North Warp 7.0 slalom sail on a Fanatic Blast 100. Somewhat surprisingly, that was a really nice combo. The Blast was much easier to sail than a full slalom board in the chop we had. I was going about 4 knots faster than on freestyle gear before in the same session (Skate 110-Idol 5.0). The one thing I did not care for in the demo gear was the race boom, though - the thicker diameter killed my forearms in no time.

So consider the board, too, when thinking about the sail. Something like the Blast will work fine with with either kind of sail; something more towards the "race" end of the spectrum will work better with slalom sails, while something more towards the "free" end (e.g. center back strap) may not work nearly as well.

Repeat after me...

"If you are not doing slalom racing, you don't need a slalom sail".

The main advantage a slalom sail has over freeride (no-cam/twin cam) sails is stability right at the top end, and the ability to keep going at really deep angles. This second point makes a big difference when you are gybing as you can run down deep in to a gybe and keep the speed which is important in slalom racing. But that's about it. There's not a tangible difference in top speed (I can get similar GPS top speeds with my NCX vs a Reflex_8 as long as I'm not sailing deep downwind). As everyone suggests above, race sails are heavier, slower to rig and have more components that can fail.

Something that no-one has mentioned yet when it comes to stability and performance is MASTS. I always encourage people to invest in masts as much as possible. A lot of people get a no-cam sail as they are half the price of a race sail then stick a heavy 75% carbon fabric wound mast in them. A really good, lightweight 100% pre-preg carbon mast in a freeride sail is a quantum leap in performance. These masts reflex back to shape much quicker which helps your stability immensely (when you don't have cams to help), they are also lighter which helps pumping and early planing, and overall your rig feels a lot more responsive. 100% masts aren't cheap but (touch wood) the brands don't change their curves that often you can usually get 5 seasons out of a mast if you treat it nicely. I think people give no-cam sails a hard wrap, but if you put good masts in them they are really performing well, easy to rig, hard to break and really fun to sail.

Last summer I chased Jesper across the river when he was sailing a Simmer Twin Cam 6.5m.

I was surprised by his performance especially upwind. He seemed to be pointing just as high as his race sail which surprised me a lot. He was also sailing every bit as good in the lulls.

However,in the 20 plus knot gusts sailing on a reach he did seem to lose a little of his top speed.

Ive never tested a late model twin cam so not really in a position to know any differences.

Agreeing with the above even though I only have 3cam narrow sleeve mast, I love them for "freeride" sailing, when I compete against the big boys of the spot, with their race sails, I am always 1sqm less and 4-7knots slower...15-25knots wind - 20-30knots sailing speed....which can also be my skills...
one thing not mentioned is the boom, good carbon boom is mandatory for race sails...which makes the rig quite expensive after all...for a few knots. Well rigged, a 3 cam is a bliss for me, stable, powerful.