Fanatic Fly Air Race 12’6” and 14′

I  walked round to see Chris at SUP Lanzarote to check out the new Fly Air Race boards.

The rucksack is large enough for you to pack all the gear you need. We are in summer, so boardies and sun block is all we need. The tide is very low so this first test is in the lagoon at Sands beach resort.

Rolling the boards out, you can see that the quality is high and they feel strong.

Pumping them up takes time, especially the 14′. The first part of the pumping is easy but as you need to pump it up to maximum. (As hard as you can) It is a good warm up.

I am 58 Kg, so I did find it hard to get it up to 20 Psi. As we were on the lagoon I left it under but in the sea you need it over.

As the high pressure gets into the board, you see the shaping is very uniform. I am impressed. They are very flat but we will go into that later once we get on the water.

The 3 part paddle is basic, so we used our race blades. Maybe they could do a system similar to there adjustable race blades. The fin system is simple and is great as you do not need tools.

So onto the water with the 12’6” x 26.5” and the 14′ x 26.5”

The boards are surprisingly stable for 26.5” wide and you can see that the 14′ has a lot of volume. I hardly make it go into the water. Even though there was not much wind, I can see that I would have problems if I had to go across the wind. The boards are very light.

So that Air feel. The board does not really flex so much but you feel every movement. Now I said the boards are very flat, so as you move around the board you are in fact creating rocker into the board. Even though I did not pump the board so hard, you can see I do not really bend it. Chris is on the 12’6” and we pumped that much harder.

This time he is on the 14′ and you can see that he gives rocker to the board.

And here it shows that he would go over the chops but I would go straight through. So in fact you will have to inflate the board to the rocker line you wish to create, plus where you need to strand. It will be interesting, testing to find out the different pressures you will need to use.  I think the pressure I put into the 14′ would be Ok for me but Chris would need more.

A fun session, Thanks Chris.