Kona One – Thoughts and Views

Arguably the Exocet produced ‘Kona One’ started the longboard revival which has seen a number of other manufactures follow. The Kona has quickly gained popularity and momentum as an all weather cruising board and as a One Design Class in its own right. LBWS thought that it was timely to investigate the board and take a quick look at a few opinions from various users of the board. Please feel free to add your experiences in the comments below.

Review by an anonymous LBWS member

“For those who want an all-wind recreational board”.

Some think this board should have been named the “Kona Freeride” as it can be compared to a larger freeride board. For example, it is 70cm wide and has a tail width of 49cm (30cm from the planing part of the tail). This makes it about the same planing width as a 130L freeride board.

Where it shines is in it’s planing speed on a reach and ability to carve gybe for it’s size. This makes it particularly good as a recreational longboard for enclosed waters where the wind is usually gusty. It can go upwind as good as a freeride board when planing (with the standard 46cm fin) and better when not planing and the centreboard is down. So in lulls I can climb up-wind better and therefore have more space to go down-wind in the next gust, so going fast more of the time. Many longboards will do this but few will be as much fun in planing conditions.

While being comparable to a larger freeride board in performance, it obviously still has the versatility of a longboard. The ability to light wind cruise and/or explore, light wind freestyle, learn or teach and the volume to take a passenger. It can also be raced in a Kona One design class.

Versatility however has it’s costs and for the Kona One it is early planing. It’s not an early planer, or quick to accelerate once on the plane. For this reason it needs a bigger sail than a freeride board in the same wind. Having said that, it does stay on the plane reasonably well in lulls.

One entertaining thing about riding the colourful Kona is seeing the surprised reactions of people who are not expecting this longboard to plane as fast or carve as well as it can. Many of them are other windsurfers.

The reviewer provided the following statistics to accompany the review.

Weight – 84Kg.

Sail used for review – 7.5m freeride sail in winds up to 25 knots

Skill level – Intermediate

Comments from Chris Thompson of LBWS’s

Over the past year, three new windsurfers, all shaped like the Windsurfer One Design and all aimed at simple fun sailing, have been introduced to the market. Two very different longboards have also been announced, and Mistral has confirmed that they are still backing the IMCO raceboard. None of these new boards is going to turn us off the Wally, of course, but it’s nice to get that buzz of new stuff happening again in longboards.

First of the new-style old-school boards was the Exocet Kona. Unlike the “opposition” (AHD Summer board and Tabou Windstyler) it’s got decent length and a decent centreboard. One of the driving forces behind the Kona is Tor Bakke, one of Europe’s top Windsurfer One Design racers back in the ’70s and ’80s. With the Kona he’s trying to reproduce the fun of windsurfing in those days, when it was the fastest-growing sport in the world. The Kona will be raced in weight divisions, with marathon, freestyle and slalom events just like the One Design- they will even be borrowing our pumping rules.

Some Sydney Wally sailors (Original Windsurfer One Design) have been trialling the Kona. It’s lighter than the One Design and has an unusual “ducktail” bottom so it feels like a slalom board in strong winds. It’s fast tacking and stable; pretty damn impressive in lots of ways. It also seems slower than the One Design in light winds, doesn’t feel quite as nice to us upwind, and it’s over twice the price and probably not as tough.

No-one in the One Designs thinks that the Kona will replace the Wally. It can just help revive our class, because it’s proving that simple one design longboards still appeal to today’s windsurfers, and it proves we’re not alone. The Kona just proves that there’s a buzz back in longboarding again, and that can only help the Wally.

Comments by “Lostboy” – Boards.co.uk forum

Having now sailed the Kona in proper planing conditions I can tell you that it doesn’t feel the same as a race board, possibly due to the duck tail – but almost certainly because the nose shape (which I thought would be horrendous for catching in chop) is very smooth through the sort of horrible wind and tide chop that the Solent kicks up.

It’s obviously nowhere near as good upwind as a raceboard but is better than any shortboard (bar formula). The soft deck is comfortable and railriding is VERY comfortable. It gybes and footsteers SO much better than a race board (curve in both rails and the duck tail I would guess). It also gets upwind VERY effectively without the daggerboard if it’s planing (46cm Kona fin) so you have the choice of just grooveriding it or sticking it up on it’s rail and really working it upwind. The other benefit is that the transition from planing to non-planing (and vice-versa) is very smooth and this means that you can carry momentum and adjust your weight very slowly and comfortably to keep it driving, it’s nowhere near as on/off as short boards (this would obviously apply to raceboards as well).

Overall, I really enjoy mine and am looking forward to mucking about in the Kona Cup fleet as well as just cruising around with it (on it’s side as much as flat!).

Comments from Tom Ingram – Exocet forum

The Florida Windfest was a blast as usual, but the highlight for me this weekend was trying out all the new gear. We lucked out with strong gusty winds of 15-25mph (sometimes more) on Saturday afternoon and Sunday afternoon.

The coolest board out was the Kona. I tried it Saturday morning in light to moderate wind of 8-14 with a 6.8 (Cuben) Phantom, then again on Sunday in 20mph+ with an 8.0 Rapid Fire. In the light air, it is just narrow enough to move easily through the water in subplaning conditions, and doesn’t have the aircraft carrier feel to it.

I would say in general it reminded me of the old superlight in light air, but a little smaller. In getting up to a plane it gradually accelerates without a hard transition from nonplaning to planing. The big difference between the old school superlight type board and this is once it is planing it is pretty fast. I didn’t get much planing on the 6.8 and didn’t have it dialed, but on the second day with the 8.0 it was a blast – full tilt going downwind with the board coming completely out of the water in the chop, an experience not dissimilar to formula except without the “if I fall my equipment might explode” feeling. Also, sailing full blast on it was considerably less physical than formula, though obviously it is not quite as fast.

The duck tail acts as a “wheelie bar” – when the nose starts to fly up, the duck tail (normally out of the water) makes contact with the water and puts the board back down. It sails upwind with the centerboard up just fine in solid planing conditions, about 5-7 degrees less than a formula board but better than most other shortboards and much better than the old style raceboards.

Perhaps best of all was the jibing. It carves a beautiful planing jibe, nice and long, like you might on a bottom turn on a surfing longboard. Everything about the board is comfortable. Over the course of the last two days I saw people doing light wind cruising, light wind freestyling, teaching their kid how to windsurf, and full tilt blasting all on one board.

There are better boards out there for each little set of conditions, but for somebody looking for one board, or for a board they can share with family and sail in light air up to heavy air and not make a major sacrifice in performance, this is a cool board. I am also hoping we can race it as a one design fleet once we get a few more boards out there.

Conclusion

There can be no doubt that this is a great board that suits many situations and circumstances. Sure it may not be the best at some things but it is obviously good at many things. Exocet need to be congratulated for there foresight and courage to release the board that arguably reignited the longboard windsurfing movement. If you own or have sailed a Kona tell the LBWS community what you think?