5'6" convertible fishing

 
 
 
 

This past weekend offered extremely varied conditions to test out my new shape, which came out well, although the sanding job isn't quite as clean as on my first board. I definitely burned through a couple spots and had to touch it up with some sanding resin to make sure it's all watertight. On saturday the waves were small and weak, so i rode it as a quad. the fins are fairly far forward, the tail is thick with generous vee, and my Stretch quad fins are pretty small, so it's super loose. the first time i tried to do a cutback the tail almost immediately broke loose into a snap. fun when you expect it, but definitely takes some getting used to. it's really fast and fun to work down the line, at least in small surf like this, which it's designed for. I want to test drive some larger keel fins and try running it as a twin, or just a more stable quad. Once I get it dialed in with the right fins I think it's going to be a lot of fun.

Sunday the swell was forecast to come up a bit, so I pulled out the trailing fins and used one as a center fin. So basically a thruster configuration, except using my quad fins, so it would still be really loose, but have slightly more control and centering. It was foggy and hard to see, but the surf was pumping. The inside bar was relentless closeouts and it kicked my ass. I got shut down a couple times, but eventually was able to punch through. Took me 20 minutes to make it to the outside bar. Sets were head high+ and pitching, with some fast and steep sections to navigate. I was definitely undergunned, but managed to catch a few screamers and make a couple big drops on my new board. It's really fast down the line so I was able to catapult myself pretty high out of a few, although I didn't manage to keep my board under my feet. I tried a few turns at speed, but the board felt way too loose still and would just slide the moment I threw my weight into a turn or tried to force the board to track up a really steep fast section. Again, I think I'll be able to reign it in a bit with the right fins, I need to find the sweet spot for this board between speed and looseness and control. On most days though I'll gladly trade a little control for a bunch more speed.

As usual, thanks to Joanie for taking some pics and hanging out on the beach. She was able to capture some of the dolphins frolicking around in the surf too, which always makes a session that much more special.