surfski lengths?

Elite single racing shells come in several different lengths and widths for different body weights, i.e. a 140# sculler might row a boat that is 25' long and 10" wide whereas a 220# sculler might row a boat that is 27.5' long and 11.5" wide.
Using Epic as an example if their V12 at 21' long by 17" wide will support up to a 300# paddler why not make a ski for a lighter paddler, say a 150#er, about 18' long and 17" wide?

If you check out the ski mfgs. you will see a trend to a wider range of skis . Varying in both length , width , volume and "shape". While the descriptions may not directly speak to your query , the different boat designs do. The "elite" label seems to be fading as a definition of ski design , witness the rise of the likes of "swordfish , Huki S1-XL and many others either in production or on the horizon. Bottom line is to get past the labels and try a number of skis to find the "one" . Guessing that if more buyers would follow this path rather than taking the "elite" hook , we would find a generally happy consumer market and perhaps a further continuation of the trend to appease consumers true desires in ski performance. Some indeed desire an "elite"level ski , see plenty more that buy the hype and the ski beyond there abilities and wind up frustrated and wallowing about in the harbor. BTW , I backed off from a 17" ski to one of the new "intermediate" skis and couldn't be happier.

Ok your olde worlde measurements mean little to me but there are smaller lower volume skis out there, I started in a V10l, always felt to big for me, went to the smaller in length and width Stellar SES, great ski and my favourite, still have it. 8 months ago when I was 83kg I bought a Stellar SEL which is more stable than the SES but longer and this was my favourite ski due to the added stability, however I lost 10kg over that 8 months and now it feels too "corky" in the bump and I like the smaller Stellar SES much better, its smaller length and width and volume are much more comfortable for me where the largr SEL is getting thrown around, if its a bigger downwind the SEL is fine, otherwise it feels to big and I get chucked about in anything other than a downwind. I bought a shorter length Swordfish which is wider than the SES and more stable and this also feels better for my size than the larger SEL. I'm picking the larger high volume skis of the earlier years are going to go on a bit of a diet with lower volume skis like the V10l and SEL more the norm for the bigger guys.

1x sculler, I suspect (guessing here) that there are two things in play. First, sculls are for flatwater and the hydrodynamics are a bit more straight forwards. Secondly, I suspect we are past the period of rapidly changing rowing shell hull designs and they now have a set of near-optimized designs for different size paddlers that will weather many years before they get tweaked ever so slightly.

Skis, on the other hand have a bit more complicated design need in that the designs are trying to optimize form drag, wind resistance, surfing quality, maneuverability. Also, because they are used in rough water, the hull and deck shape that creates the form drag is continually changing and the designers are still closing in on what they feel is optimum. So, my guess is that we're in the tail end of the period of rapidly changing hull designs and we'll soon see "downsized" models for different sized paddlers that are based on the prototype model. Building molds and prototypes is not cheap and I think the smart designers wouldn't want to just throw a bunch of models onto the market if they'll likely have to tweak all of them every couple of years to get them right.

Just looking at the Fenn evolution from the Mako to the millenium, the mako 6, the mako Elite, the Elite SL, the Glide - all evolution of their top-end racing ski since the late 90's. Now that their tweaks are getting smaller and smaller, Fenn might feel that they're getting close to design optimization, so now their attention can go towards the new Spark for lighter paddlers and incorporate what they've learned from their higher volume (in sales, too!) model. My guess, anyway. Erik B

what are the ski's that suited heavy paddlers ? and where does the swordfish fit in the range ?

Not sure what weight your referring too but I think just about any ski has the volume to carry a heavy paddler, if they can fit in the bucket.

This is a great subject for me. I've being paddling a Flow Superstar for the last few months which is only 5.95m length. A few weeks ago I had the comment that my boat was not full sized! They really knew how to upset a guy. Anyway I've being a bit unsure as to how fast I am in the Flow Superstar compared to my "full" sized ski, but today I had a race in Rosebay Sydney and it was easily my best performance in a race yet, overall I think I improved around 2min over my rivals.
I was thinking that the Superstar was going be my ocean ski because of its great stability, but today's race was in Sydney harbour in glorious conditions, a drag race over 14km.
Now I am 6'2" and 90kg so it's not as if I'm a small paddler, so maybe what this is telling me is that skis are longer than they need to be? And stability is everything.
I must admit that since I loved the Superstar so much I am now the Sydney Flow dealer, totally unbiased though.

Nah Bruce - I reckon your two minutes was due to all of the standing start practices you did yesterday. Got you off the start line of ~130 boats in a good pack. Good work!

Yep, the start practice was great,thanks,I got off to a flyer.But I put that down to being in a boat is has the stability for you to just put on the gas and not getting the wobbles.(or falling out as happened to a few)
But after you get up with the leaders you have to stay there, and I don't think I lost any racing speed in my short Flow compared to my Think Evo. At the end of the day the quickest boat is the one that gets you to the end the fastest.