Nelo 560 - short waterline skis

The 560 from Nelo intrigues me.

We all know that a ski's total resistance is skin friction and wave-making resistance. The more surface area a ski has, the more skin friction it has. This has a positive linear relationship to the boat's speed. Wave-making resistance, on the other hand, is more or less related to waterline length, prismatic coefficient, blah, blah, blah, and increases logarithmically at increasing boat speed. So, the faster you go at our normal race speeds, the more your total resistance is from wave-making....on flat water. Or, something like that.

But, how does the formula change on rough water, i.e. 6 inch waves, 1 ft waves, 3 ft downwind conditions, if you're paddling into the waves, beam to the waves, downwind? I would assume that the resistance from skin friction stays more or less the same and is linear. But, since waves or chop would overwhelm the size of wave-making waves from the hull....see what I'm getting at? Is the total ski resistance equation different on rougher water? Does the shorter waterline Nelo 560 have an advantage in rougher water due to its having less surface area - if we assume that the wave-making resistance formula is changed? Or, am I thinking about this incorrectly, and it's not really "wave-making" resistance, but more or less moving the hole of water that the ski is sitting in, that applies and it therefore remains a slave to the logarithmic equation?

In other words, given two boats, an elite 21 ft ski and a "masters" type ICF K1. Assume that they are of equal speed for an elite paddler on flat water. Which boat is faster going upwind through 6 inch waves? Is the K1 now faster for the reasons I proposed above?

Any naval architechts out there...

I think that trading off every last 'nth' of drag goes out the window when talking about doing downwinds. I think other posters have pointed out that the Molokai record is still held by a boat very different to today's elite skis.

You could view it that on a downwind - especially one with short, steep waves - and given the limited power even the fittest human can provide, that much of the time speed is dictated by the speed of the wave train. The gains therefore (perhaps - I'm certainly no expert) come from being able to surf for longer while maintaining manouvreability - without sticking the bow in or having the rudder come out. This would maybe allow you to rest more, to stall less and be able to manouvre into position to push through a low spot in the waves in front when the opportunity presents.

That's my take on it anyway.

I agree with you on downwind - heck, SUP go downwind pretty well with a good driver. It's the other points of sail in non-flat water that I'm scratching my head about.

I guess if you can get 3 or 4 better rides on a downwind then you might pull out a lead you could defend on flat-water?!

Also I guess it depends on paddler size - there are very few boats out there for small people. Will also be interesting to hear how they stack up in the stability stakes - given that the previous Nelos seem to have been regarded as 'a bit challenging'...

Sorry, misread your post - my experience in paddling cross sea is that in a longer boat the ends get knocked about a lot more (particularly if it's breaking regularly) which has an energy cost in maintaining stability/direction.

tcsurfski.com/2016/04/18/ppp-episode-002...ith-oscar-chalupsky/
enjoyed this podcast where Oscar spoke about his flat water speed in the 560 being better than in a K1

in the past Greg Barton has mentioned his 10km flat water time is the same in a v14 versus a K1

amongst my local paddling mates (heavier good intermediate paddlers) their elite ocean ski 10km flat water times are quicker than in a K1(by a few minutes) , so it will be interesting to see where the 560 will sit in this comparison.

so the K1 is certainly quicker over 1000m but over 10,000m very dependant on the skill & weight of the paddler.

there is has not been a lot of comment by other elite users on the 560 length ocean ski, altho' tim jacobs raced his older 1st gen 560 with great success against the longer ocean skis a few years back.

I look forward to seeing some unbiased elite paddlers perspectives on the new 560 in the future.......