Saturday, October 5, 2019

Windsurf sail mounted to 14x23 SUP Raceboard

I tried mounting an 8.0 windsurfing sail on my 14'x23" Rivera RP SUP raceboard today. I had to do a lot of fiddling to get the universal joint attached to the carry handle on the SUP, but once I was actually on the water it was a lot of fun. I filmed some video of sailing it with my version 1.0 universal joint attachment, which was pretty wobbly, but worked. The location is the north end of Lovers Key in Bonita Springs, Florida, where there is a bridge over Big Carlos Pass, which connects the Gulf of Mexico to Estero Bay. There's some red tide beginning to affect the area again, and beachgoers including myself were coughing a bit.



After filming I redid the mast base attachment and went out for a second round of sailing. The new attachment felt a lot more secure, and emboldened me to circumnavigate Lovers Key on the craft (see GPS track). Under sail power the board felt light and sleek, and had a smooth transition from gliding to planing. It went upwind OK considering that it didn't have a daggerboard.

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