Which Surfboard to buy?

[marin]

Thanks to everyone for all of the great advise and board demo offers. I ended up getting a POW 6.0 quad skull wave. I had it out for the second time tonight and am totally loving it. I don't have much experience on other kite surf boards, so I can't really compare. I will say that the board seems fast and goes up wind like a rocket. I am surprised at how well it handles chop and rough conditions. I am starting to make my jibes going one way, but need lots of work. Jeff K. seems like a great guy and was really helpful. It seems like there are lots of great choices out there, but at the end of the day I liked the idea of supporting a local shaper, and everyone I talked to that had the POW's swore by them.
-rick

[TomAUSTRIA]

hey guys,

this may be a quite dumb question, but i don't have much experience with surfboards: Is there a board which is suitable for both kiting AND regular wave riding (without a kite). Can I buy a regular shortboard and just mount straps on it?

tom

[gideonlow]

I rode Underground directional 5'-4" and I liked it so much I bought one on Saturday. Helm has a demo at the 3rd AVE shed.

Hey Sonny! Now that you have a directional, it's time to come to the coast! PM me when you get an opportunity.

Cheers,

Gideon

[nate]

You can absolutely take a surfboard and mount straps on it for kiteboarding. Try riding it without straps for a session so you know where to mount them. I drilled a 3/4" hole and dropped a 1/4" tee nut in the hole, threaded the bolt almost to the bottom and filled in with resin. I greased the bolt so it wouldn't bind up in the resin. So far it's solid and watertight. Moreover it's quick and easy.

[adamrod]

as I see it, you have two options....

1. you can buy a shortboard and put straps on it. Using stick on straps is probably easiest (no drilling holes). The difficulty with this is that most likely, the board will not be epoxy, and you'll likely put some cracks in it as kiting does tend to abuse surfboards.

2. you can buy a kite directional that you can also surf on. These have footstrap holes pre-drilled, and they're quite a bit more bomber. However, they're probably a bit heavier than a normal surfboard and might be a bit tougher for normal surfing. A good number of companies make boards like this, I know LF does, as well as others



since, like you said "i don't have much experience with surfboards" I'm going to assume you're a beginner surfer? On that assumption, I'm going to say that you are going to have a VERY hard time surfing on any board you can kite on (be it through option 1 or 2). You're really better off just getting a sweet kite directional and an old beater longboard to practice surfing. You rarely see people kiting on boards bigger than say 6'2" and surfing on something that size requires quite a bit of skill.