Tech talk: Sizing surf foil board
23.12.2022
What’s up guys? Welcome back to another Appletree Surfboards tech talk video. My name is Wieger, co-founder of Appletree Surfboards and today we’re gonna explain you a little bit more about how to choose the right board for surf foiling.
So this is a question people ask us quite a lot – I want to get into surf foiling, but I don’t really know what board size to choose and what kind of volume. There’s some very easy tricks to find the right volume for you. It’s dependent on a couple of things.
Your ability as a normal surfer helps quite a lot
Number one, is your ability as a normal surfer. We do advise people surf foiling is not that hard, but it does help a lot if you are a competent surfer and you know what you’re doing. You’re paddling well and you’re catching waves well, and especially your popup is solid and in one fluid motion. That is an important one for surf foiling.
What is the ideal shape for a surf foil board?
If you are a slightly less experienced surfer, it can help a lot to go for a bigger foil board. But on the other hand, it will hold you back when you need to duck dive and you need to maneuver the board. So that’s something to keep in mind. As a sort of a baseline, normally you will ride a surf foil board quite a lot shorter than a normal surfboard. For instance, my normal surfboard would be a 6’2″ and my foil board is actually a 4’6″, but the volume that I ride is very similar. I ride a 4’6″ at around 36 liters of volume and my normal short board will be about 32 liters of volume. So I’m actually riding more volume in a shorter package.
Why is a surf foil board shorter than a normal surfboard?
Now, the shorter package, what it does, it creates a lot less swing weight. So you have to imagine your board is on top of the foil and if you move back and forth, the more length you add, the slower this motion will be. You want the board to be compact with the volume very centered around your chest area to help with paddling. You need the volume when you’re paddling hard, but then you want to have a lot shorter board when you’re riding. That’s way we try to pack as much volume into our boards as we can, and that should help you quite a bit.
Which sizing would you advice for a surf foil board?
Let’s say you are our beginner to mid-level surfer and you want to get into surf foiling. Our advice would be to go for the 4’8″ kind of size, which will have about 38 liters of volume. You will be able to ride that board for a long time, although when you get better, you might want to drop down one or two sizes. Now, if you’re an advanced surfer, you can catch your waves, you can select your waves, you can definitely start on something like a 36 liter board. But I wouldn’t advise to go much smaller than that. Let’s say you’re a very inexperienced surfer. You can surf a bit, but you want to get straight into foiling. We do advise you to get a fairly big board at around 40 liter kind of shape. This will really help you to get into the slowest waves, just the crumbles and get you into the foiling. And because the board is still relatively short, let’s say five foot, it will not hinder you in your future performance, although you might wanna downgrade it. Actually go to a smaller board at some point.
Hopefully this helps a little bit when you’re choosing your surf foil board. If you’ve got any questions, always feel free to send us an email or call us. Or go to your local reseller and they’ll be able to help you out further. That’s it for today. Hope to see you next time in a new tech talk video. Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel so you don’t miss any of our future updates. We hope to see you again soon!
Next episode
Excited about our next Tech-Talk video? Or are you wondering if your question will be discussed in the next episode? Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll send you an email when the next video is out!