Small Paddler

I am a 60 year old female, 5 ft, 50kg and have been paddling a carbonology cruze for 4 years on flat water. I tried the carbonology vault and found it too tippy - in fact it caused my pelvis to move out of alignment every time (ouch). Can anyone give feedback on moving from a cruze to the boost or the splash? any other suggestions for a small paddler moving to an intermediate boat?

I suggest core exercises and balance training on a Swiss ball. It's not the ski that's the concern.

Maybe the fit of the cockpit isn't snug enough and/or the foot brace isn't close enough?

I'm a new paddler trying to learn in a tippy boat, and padding the cockpit and fine tuning the foot brace distance has helped my comfort/stability a lot.

Keeping my sessions numerous but short (<60 minutes) has also helped, since new parts of my brain and body are working too hard to go for a long time without problems developing. You have a lot more kayak experience than me, but I would still expect it to take a while for your core muscles and pelvis and stuff to adjust to the huge challenge of constantly maintaining balance in a tippy boat. Trying to go too long and hard right away could be counterproductive.

All good points - thanks - however, I've been doing pilates for 7 years so my core is pretty good and carbonology fitted the foot boards specially for me so I could easily reach them. Husband padded the seat - bottom, back and sides. I do think that pushing too hard for too long is an issue - can't keep up with the man! although a great ski, just not sure the vault is the one for me but wondering what is? ready to move on from the cruze.

Try the Fenn spark. The feedback I've heard is that they're not as tippy as you'd think. They have more rocker than the other 2 boats and on flat water they shouldn't be too much of a step up. Make sure you can remount whatever you can paddle.

Dicko wrote: Try the Fenn spark. The feedback I've heard is that they're not as tippy as you'd think. They have more rocker than the other 2 boats and on flat water they shouldn't be too much of a step up. Make sure you can remount whatever you can paddle.

You don't say what type of paddling you do, but assuming a combination of flat water and some open ocean, in small to moderate conditions, my commments are as follows:

The Spark is as tippy or or tippier than the Fenn Elite S (42.5cm vs 43cm). The Spark is an elite level ski for the smaller paddler. The jump from Cruze at 56cm wide to a Spark is huge. Remounting will also be challenging.

Look at the Nelo 520. It is a great little fun ski in the smaller stuff. Very comfortable and easy to handle.

The Boost is becoming more popular around here and should be ok stability wise. That said it is quite a high volume boat so may not be that well suited to the smaller paddler.

The Splash will probably be a better option given your weight at 50kg's.

From the Fenn Stable, you could look at the new Fenn Bonito. Although it is very short (4.2m), it is 50 cm wide and rated for paddlers up to 75kg's. Very new to the market so jury still out.

M

I thought I had a core of steel and balance of a ninja from years of standup paddleboard race training, but it's taking me months of wobbling and capsizing to develop basic balance skills on a 40-something cm wide surfski.

I don't doubt that your core is very strong from Pilates and stuff. But my impression is that no matter how fit and athletic somebody is, and no matter how good their general balance, reflexes, and flexibility are, they should still expect a slow and difficult period of brain and body adjustment when moving to a significantly narrower surfski. You attempted a 10 cm jump down in width from 56 to 46 cm, which is HUGE. I would expect that a 5 cm jump down in width, to something ~51 cm wide like the Boost, would be a more natural feeling step, though still challenging. The particulars of boat volume and stuff might have an affect, but I'm guessing that the huge decrease in width is mainly what threw you off your game when trying the vault. Of course, if I'd already bought the vault, I'd give it a couple weeks of easy, low-expectations practice before deciding to get rid of it.

Hi Gabrielle,
I'm 171cm and 68kg and found most intermediate skis were large volume.

The Cruze is a beginner ski at 5.5m long and 56cm wide. While the Vault is a lower volume ski, it is also at the upper end of the intermediate ski range for stability. I tried a Boost and found the hump too high for me to do any sort of leg drive, it was also a bit wider and more stable than what I was looking for. I guess the Boost would be similar to Fenn XT and Stellar SR, based on dimensions here surfskicomparison.com/

I had a quick paddle in a Vajda Hawx 46 and that was better. I tried a used Think Evo II ultra and purchased that, paddled it for a while. I then purchased a used Swordfish S carbon and found the Swordfish S was the better ski for flat and small stuff for my size/weight. It has a lower hump, narrower catch and less windage than the Evo II.

Nelo 550 is more of a lower volume ski than some others. I'm no where near as light as you however at 18ft long it's easier to manage off the water as well.