It’s a little strange for me to recommend a first time board buy to anyone. My first board I bought by helping out at my parents surf center and having them pay it. It was a custom made twin fin wave board with something around 50 litres. I must add that I was 11 years old at the time 🙂
My first board next to a 62 l 🙂
However, despite this different initiation, I can still advise my students on what their first board should be like.
First off, dont bother with buying a board with a centreboard. That is, unless you want to stunt your own progress for not pushing yourself. The board you will use for the longest period of time is something in the range of the 140-160 litres. Naturally this will vary a little depending on your weight but generally this is the litre rangeyou will get the most use out of.
This is the board on which you can learn the beachstart, waterstart, use of footstraps and perfect the harness use with. It might be a little chunky to get into the speed jibe. Until you get the beach and waterstart down it still offers enough buoyancy to allow for uphauling.
All in all, my recommendation for a first board should also be one you will be likely to keep for those really low wind days once you progress past it on windy days.
160 litre board
Hello Andre,
First of all, my congratulations for your really useful posts.
I’ve been learning windsurfing for 1,5 year now and I’m planning to buy my first board. In order to do so, I have three key factors in mind:
-My level: beginning-early intermediate level (I’m already using the Harness, but I haven’t tried to use the footstraps). I`ve learnt to make fast tacks and gybes (non planning ones) consistently, but I haven´t get into planning yet. I’ve already sailed with boards with a 170 Litres of volume and sails of 5.5m but I’m fully aware that I have a lot to learn.
-My size: I am 1,82 m tall and I weigh 83 kg.
-Place to practice windsurf: I want to use the board (i) in the sea in the months of June, July, August, Sept and Oct (with and average wind of 12 to 16 Knots, and some days with stronger winds) and (ii) in an inland lake (with lower winds, an average wind of 10 -12 knots)
– Purpose: I want to use this first board to improve my intermediate level, get into the footstraps, learn how to plane and start with the planning gybe. It is important to take into account that I would like also a board to be able to sail in low wind conditions in inland waters.
Taking the aforementioned three key issues, and that I really like the starboard boards, I doubt to buy one of the following boards:
– Starboard GO 161 Litres (2017)
-Starboard GO Windsurfer 175 Litres with daggerboard.
-BIC Techno D (with daggerboard) or any other similar.
I would appreciate if you could advise me so that I could choose the most suitable board for me. In practical terms, I have doubts with the daggerboard, since I know that it would be useful to sail upwind in light winds, but I also want a progression board for a 3-5 years period and I’m afraid that a board with daggerboard (starboard go windsurfer) may have to be changed too early.
Thank you very much in advance.
Best regards,