First, I made a bad call by heavily underestimating that northerly windswell in yesterday's post. I apologize, but lately I've been disregarding Hookipa because of its unclean conditions, and overlooked this opportunity of surfing around the corner. I didn't even go look (was kinda tired from the Hi-Tech sale), but there were shoulder to head high empty waves to be had.
Then I went to work and, since we didn't sell them all at the sale, I bought myself a Maliko GoFoil and immediately put it in the water in the afternoon at Kanaha. In the meantime, the windswell reached 5f 8s and I can claim I rode the first successful waves at Lowers. Riding waves on a foil is a trip. The wave adds its own lift to the foil and I had to completely sheet out otherwise the thing wanted to come out of the water.
I also had to move the mast foot and my feet forward for the same reason. Check this photo of Zane Schweitzer again, during last week's Maui to Molokai crossing. See how forward he is compared to the foil mast position? That's because he's on a Maliko. It gives you a lot of lift, even at low speed, and you have to balance it by staying more forward.
After those adjustments (so much fun to figure it all out!), I finally understood why the guys you see riding waves on their foil SUP's are having so much fun... because it really is!
The mistake we all do (myself included until now) is to look at them with the eyes of the surfer. With those eyes, it looks lame: no rail digging, no lip hitting, no spray throwing. But instead, a board with a foil is obviously something completely different. They're using the energy of the wave to generate the speed they need to get the foil going. Can't even compare it to surfing on a regular board, it's just a different feeling. An amazing one.
We can say that the Maliko foil is a very slow foiling foil. That might sound bad, but it's actually a great thing, because it means that it foils at a very slow speed (at least compared to the other foils). Since it's also pretty wide, it's also very stable. That makes it ideal for learning. To have a confirmation of that, yesterday I let a friend and Dave Ezzy briefly try it and they both did better than they would have done on the Kai. It's pretty obvious that learning to foil at slow speed is easier, less scary and less dangerous than learning to foil at high speed. Don't be afraid to ask me if you see me at Kanaha, I'll let everybody try it. I'm also officially ready to teach beginner lessons.
The reason I got into windfoiling is because I found way too hard and dangerous to learn to SUP foil right away. That is confirmed by point n.3 (minute 3) of this brilliant video. I'm gonna keep windfoiling until I consider myself good a proficient windfoiler and then I'll go back to the south shore to try catch small waves on my foil SUP. Obviously, I'll report the result on this blog.
This photo by Andy Bridge shows a windsurfer enjoying the unexpected waves at Hookipa.
4am significant buoy readings
South shore
W
1.8ft @ 12s from 162° (SSE)
SW
2.4ft @ 11s from 171° (S)
SE
1.6ft @ 14s from 153° (SSE)
1.4ft @ 12s from 174° (S)
Small energy from the south at the outer buoys, check the webcams for size and conditions.
North shore
Pauwela
4.9ft @ 8s from 34° (NE)
The short period energy continues. 34 degrees is a direction that is completely unblocked for Maui's north shore.
Wind map at noon. I'm off and I'll hit the water earlier than that. Now that I got a Maliko, I wonna work on my jibes.
Windswell fetch still in place in the North Pacific while Fernanda slowly approaches. There's also a tiny westerly fetch that at the moment won't do anything for us.
Just like yesterday, the South Pacific offers a nice but weak fetch.
Those clouds are bringing some rain.
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