Windsurfing board tests

Most windsurfing board producers has adopted the wide board designs. Regardless if you are looking for a plug and play freeride board, a competitive freerace board or a hard core slalom board there are a tremendous amount of great boards on the market today. Also check out our windsurfing fin section.

Freeride boards

Freeride as a concept extends over a large number of board types and board characteristics. A freeride board tends to be more comfortable and forgiving than many boards within the Freerace segment.

Freeride – Super Carvers vs Blasting Boards

Within the freeride segment you’ll find super carvers as Starboard Carve, Quatro Freeride and RRD FireRide. At the other end of the spectra you will find blasting boards as Fanatic Hawk and Mistral Screamer, freeride boards that will require a lot from you as a sailor, but will reward you with a top speed competitive to many windsurfing boards within the Freerace segment.

Tabou Rocket vs Starboard Carve

Tabou Rocket is an excellent compromise with slightly less carving performance than the best carvers and slightly less top speed than the best blasting boards. On the other hand the Tabou Rocket will give you a really good average speed, thanks to early planing, great acceleration combined with awesome top-end control. Starboard Carve is an excellent and fun carving machine with great top-speed. Compared to the Rocket the Starboard Carve is considered to be slightly faster but a bit more demanding in over powered conditions.

Freeride faster than Freerace?

Many freeride boards offer you high performance that is easy to unlock. If you are a beginner or intermediate and into speed you will probably go faster on a high performance freeride board than most of the boards within the more demanding Freerace or Slalom board segment.
>> Windsurfing – Freeride board tests

FreeRace boards

The freerace board is a golden compromise between the comfort and forgiving characteristics of a freeride board combined with the more hard-core straight line performance of a Slalom Board. The Freerace boards are  more demanding than the freeride boards but if you are skilled enough you will be able to squeeze some extra knots/performance from your Freerace board.

Freerace – User friendly Slalom performance

Within the freerace segment you will find hard-core freerace beasts like the RRD FireRace. The RRD FireRace is as close as you get to a pure slalom board without loosing all the user friendliness that a freerace board normally offers. At the other end you will find user-friendly freerace boards as the Starboard Futura and the Fanatic Ray. The Futura and the Ray are almost as fast as the RRD FireRace and almost as user-friendly as a freeride board, a combination that is hard to beat.
>> Windsurfing – Freerace board tests

Slalom boards

The slalom board group holds user-friendly freerace-like-boards like the Tabou Manta and straight the straight line rockets like the Starboard iSonic.

Slalom faster than Freerace? – The average speed is crucial

If you are skilled enough to handle a pure racing machine, most Slalom boards are faster than any Freerace board when it comes to straight line performance. When it comes to gybing however, the slalom board can be more than a hand full and nobody likes to be overtaken by a freerace rider or, in worst case, a rider on freeride gear. The average speed is crucial.
>> Windsurfing – Slalom board tests

Choose the right windsurfing fin

With two or three fins in your windsurfing quiver will improve your
wind range massively and at the same time boost your overall performance.
>> Windsurfing Fins – How do I choose the right fin-quiver
>> Windsurfing fins – Buyers guide and fin selectors
>> Black Project Fins Type R – Review

GoPro boom and mast mounts – DIY and production mounts

The GoPro Hero action camera is one of the best sport cams on the market. Through the years we have tested various types of GoPro mounts.  To mount the GoPro on your windsurfing mast or boom you can use the included helmet mount or you can easily make your own boom and mast mount. We have also tested various types of production mounts, for example the the K4 harness mount and the Flymount boom and mast mount.
>> GoPro Camera – Windsurfing boom, mast and harness mounts on test