I’m 65, 87 kg and an intermediate. I’m using a Gen1 FD+.
At 87kg and in crappy Wellington waves and trying to prone in 20-30 knots the Sk8 1050 felt great but just didn’t have enough low end and so was a bit unforgiving.
The 1150 Sk8 solved that for the most part but still felt like a struggle at the low end.
In decent waves the 1150 sk8 was fabulous in up to head high waves. Smooth and carvey and gorgeous.
The 980 and 830 nomad are a whole new world. Heaps of on-foil bottom end, pumping/gravedigging is light years easier. The 980 is about the same in terms of takeoff to the 1150 Sk8 ie it’ll take off on flat water if I double paddle UPDATED I must have had a little bit of chop assistance, I really struggle to get up on glassy water and will probably get an Atlas for pump practice on flat days.
The 830 needs only a little wave to get up and once up the pump feels almost as easy as the 980.
I loved the 1150 Sk8 and didn’t expect the KTs to be a huge advantage, there’s always another bloody unicorn foil on the market etc. I tried the Armstrong HA 980 and 880 and wasn’t that impressed although my friends thought they were amazing.
I was ready to buy the 980 after the first minute, similarly with the 830. If I could only get 1 then it would be the 830 and then I’d only go out if there was a semblance of a wave. I wouldn’t need much!
The detail
I’m running a FoilDrive+ Gen1 with a Magic Hub.
The KT rig is 63 cm fuselage, 190 nomad rear, 77 cm Carbon mast.
The F-one rig is 80 cm 14mm mast and 200 carve rear.
The board was an Amos Sultan prone, 5 foot/55 L/18 inches wide.
UPDATED
I pushed the good ship Ridiculous further out today and demo-ed the Nomad 700 in intermittent 2-3 foot (front) closeouts and 10-20 knot offshore wind.
Same board, same FoilDrive, same body Rich in Pies.
I couldn’t just use a lifting wave to get up, like the other two foils, I had to be actually dropping in.
The other two foils would allow me to use a closeout to get on foil by j-turning down the back side just as the wave closed out, but the Gen 1 FoilDrive didn’t have enough grunt to keep it on foil.
However…
Once up and flying it was as user-friendly as the other two and as loose as I expected.
The Gen1 had ample power to keep it flying.
I found out that my pump is ham-fisted and I need to develop a lighter touch as I was pushing it down when I thought I was jumping up. Oh well.
However grave digging it off the water was astounding. The board being on the water gave me something to jump up from (see above. Sigh…) and the 700 lifted off like a champ.
How often would I use the 700? A lot more than I expected!