I'm after advice on a particular matter. Background: I'm 73 y.o. and my balance is not as good as it once was (which was always mediocre). It has taken me 12 months of pretty regular efforts to get moderately good pitch control while windfoiling and now I am trying winging.
When winging, I'm having trouble standing up on my 140 litre Fanatic Stingray that has given me success with windfoiling. (With it, I have finally got confident about uphauling a sail in 20 knots on reasonably choppy water.) That confidence is why I am considering using the Stingray for winging. The problem, for winging, is that the twin slots are right at the back of the board, so I immediately head straight down wind once I get on the board. I am considering getting a good local shaper to add an extra twin-slot box immediately in front of the existing ones (i.e. allowing for about 40-90mm of high-density foam between the 2 pairs of slots). An alternative would be to buy a big (130+ lt) board to get going on, but it needs to be cheap and $350 to adapt the Stingray sounds an economical option. I don't think the extra slots will harm the performance of the board for windfoiling. I'd really appreciate comments on all of the above. Thanks in anticipation!

Hi, I have started winging this summer in NZ, I have the Stingray boards 125 and 140 for windfoiling but I would recommend spending your money on a dedicated wing board.
I bought a Fanatic Sky 125 ltr and it has made my entry into winging so much easier.
the Stingrays are more wind foil oriented and harder to get on foil with a wing. Been there done that.
have the Fanatic 2000 front foil and that has also made things easier, lots of lift and easy to ride in 10 to 18 Knots, nice glide for gybing and a very nice foil for learning.
three months in I am moving down to a Fanatic 5.4 95 ltr board and a 1500 front wing and loving winging. I am 70 next month so everything is possible with some effort.

How heavy are you.. and how wide is your 140L Fanatic board?

Hi Taveray I would just like to say how fantastic it is to be 73 and still living the Dream on the water I take my hat off to you I hope I am still as agile as you and playing on the water in my 70,s all the best cheers Rich

Thanks for your helpful and encouraging replies Gentlemen. DavidJohn, I'm 71 kg in nuddie and the board is 228x83cm. I'm finding the width of the board very good for uphauling, which was causing me some grief. Incidentally, I put the straightedge on the tail section and it is dead flat for about 90cm from the back of the board, i.e. enough to take the 2nd twin-slot box. That means, of course, that I could straddle the 2 boxes with the mast base, if that was required. Having said that, I take Carbonlover's point that winging is different from windfoiling, so the Stingray might not solve my winging problems and not to risk spoiling a good windfoil board!
I am about to try a (pre-EGG) 109lt One Ocean Sports downwinder (6'8"x28"x4.2") board that I've borrowed from an aquaintance. I suspect it will be a bit too small for me to balance adequately on, but going to try it anyway. Incidentally, some of my mates have Fanatic Skys and are happy with them, but I am concerned that some models seem to have the slots too far back, so I might finish up with the same 'getting blown downwind' problem that I have with the Stingray. Please comment on all of the above.

What foil are you using? Some (Armstrong for one) have the front wind mounted directly against the front of the mast so need a board with forward mounted tracks. Others (Axis for one) have the front wind at least 50 mm in front of the mast so can tolerate more rearward mounted tracks.

I have a 130 litre One Design downwind board and it's lighter than a Fanatic SkyWing 95. The earlier One Design boards do have the foil track close to the back of the board.

Thanks gregwho. I use Axis foils. I have a standard red with front of fuse (which I take to be the Centre of Lift of the foils)190mm in front of mast front, but also a windfoil fuse with front of fuse 320mm in front of mast. Both are similar from back of mast to stab, so the windfoil fuse is 880mm in total (i.e. quite long for winging, but I'll try it soon anyway as I'm not too fussed about sharp turns yet). The One board proved to be too difficult for me at the moment, so I won't be using one for a while.

I started winging on the Stingray 140, and it has some advantages and disadvantages. For someone with poor balance, the width and length makes things a lot easier than a typical 130 l wing board.

Due to length and track position, it tends to go downwind more when you start, but that can be addressed. Trim is one part: the mast must be all the way forward in the track. The rear of the front wing should be quite close to the mast. With a windsurfing fuse that has a large gap between front wing and mast, the front wing would end up too far forward for winging (since you don't have any mast foot pressure pushing the nose down). The Red standard should be fine, though. The longer length does not matter much at the beginning.

The second part is how you start. You can minimize the initial downturn by where you are on the board (further back), and how you lift the foil (also more toward the back). But there will be some turning downwind, so you'll have to turn the board back towards a beam reach before standing up. That is a trivial thing on shorter boards that turn quickly, but the long waterline of the Stingray makes it harder. What worked quite well for me if this: as soon as the wing is flying, leave the front hand at the flagging handle, and grab the front handle with the other hand (the one that will eventually go to the back handle). Then move the wing to your side towards the back of the board, and get some wind in it. The further back you can put the wing, the better the board will turn back upwind. But you'll may a little bit of patience, too. Once you are close to a beam reach, you can grab both handles, and stand up. On a typical (shorter) wing board, you can grab both handles, and then rotate the board from a downwind angle to a beam reach, but on the longer Stingray, that is hard to (nearly) impossible.

Thanks boardsurfr. I'll try your suggestion for sure. I have tried to do it, but haven't used the two hand holds that you suggest, and so haven't got the wing back far enough. I'll try them. Also, I've borrowed a friend's Slingshot 130lt which puts you quite a bit closer to the mast, so doesn't go downwind as much (I've only been kneeling so far. I have to get fitter in the leg muscles!) I'll try a few sessions in flatter water to see if I can regain my earlier stand-up ability. I also tried the 130lt with a 3.7m sail with with good (first-time) success so, if I can master standing up on it, it might be a better dual-purpose option. Have you tried that?

Yeah sounds like staying with something with a bit of size wont hurt for now for sure as it really is no fun when not getting on foil and falling in all the time or struggling for balance.
If you are chasing a cheap but stable board that might do the job and far better option than trying to reto fit another board then this might be an option www.oneoceansportsaustralia.com/used-boards/65-foil-board-recessed-deck
It's 6'5 x 29 x 130L and they make a great wing board so maybe could be the nice step to board!! Keep things stable and enjoy getting on the foil as there is no real need to go smaller unless you know you are ready for it.

Thanks paul.j. I've looked at that board on Seabreeze and been tempted, and I've tried the 109lt version of it, which was too small, but I was impressed by the construction. So I think I'll call them.

I had a 160 litre 36 wide cabrinha inflatable which I could stand on before I got the wing organised which I liked because knee starting is a bit harder with the old knees but it got water in it so I took it back and now have a JP X-Wing 6'10" 158 litre 31"wide but I'm finding it pretty unstable for my 120 kilos but did go out supping yesterday in perfect offshore conditions where I could stand on it just good enough so hoping to loose some weight... was thinking of trying wind foiling so I could do waterstarts or uphaul using the sail for counterbalance and stability...it's so much easier to "rig up" a wing though.

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taveray said..
Thanks boardsurfr. I'll try your suggestion for sure. I have tried to do it, but haven't used the two hand holds that you suggest, and so haven't got the wing back far enough. I'll try them. Also, I've borrowed a friend's Slingshot 130lt which puts you quite a bit closer to the mast, so doesn't go downwind as much (I've only been kneeling so far. I have to get fitter in the leg muscles!) I'll try a few sessions in flatter water to see if I can regain my earlier stand-up ability.

It really helps to have good power in the wing when you still learn to stand up. Not only can you use the power to pull you up, but once up, it helps you to balance. The penalty for using a wing that's bigger than necessary is quite small, since it's easy to depower wings. The first time I had fun winging was in 22 knot wind gusting to almost 40 with a 4.2 wing on flat water. Chop can make things harder until you get better.

Awesome taveray. In your 70's and foiling! Great to hear.
I also started winging with the 88cm red fuse and it was really good for learning pitch control. Now normally I'd say go get a winging board as they're really made for it, where the windfoil boards are a bit of a compromise. As Boardsurfr says the problem you often see with windfoil boards being used for wingfoiling is that the mast track is set far back on the board which means that when you put the windsurf sail on the front of the board, things are pretty well balanced. But take that off and put a wing in your hands and you find yourself standing further forwards on the board (so that you're not sinking the tail) in non-foiling conditions and as you start to get speed, you'll find the board will struggle to get enough lift in that position, so you have to shuffle your feet back so they're over the sweet spot of lift for the foil. Shuffling your feet often leads to unbalancing the board and having to reposition your feet and start again.
The axis 88cm fuse really projects that foil a long way forwards from the mast, so there's a chance it might work if you position it far forwards in the track? So you might get away with it? Also, before getting out there, I'd put the Stingray in calm water with nothing under it. Stand on it and feel where you need to have your feet to have a nice balanced position on the board (so the tail isn't sinking or the nose isn't diving). Mark where your feet are located. Now put on the foil and see if the foil can be positioned along the track so that the front foil is positioned under the mid point of your stance (between where you've marked where your feet are). If you can do that, then it's got a chance of working. If the foil is still too far back (and your feet are too far forwards), then don't go there. Consider a wingfoil board.
The other thing that I haven't seen touched on much is the conditions you're learning in. If it's choppy and messy, then go for a more stable board. Or look for a place with flatter water.
And as others have said, a good solid breeze will be really beneficial. Having a little too much power is good as you can easily dump excess wind to get going. But if it's too light, trying to incorporate pumping into the mix makes the learning curve much more difficult.
Good luck. I really hope you can make it work. Wingfoiling gybes are soooo much fun and way easier to learn than windfoil gybes.