Kiteworld Magazine | The original international kitesurfing magazine

KW reviews Airush’s beginner to advanced foiling set up

LOCATION: Bracklesham, south coast, England

CONDITIONS: Perfect nine metre weather on foils / barely ridable on a twin-tip, around 12 knots

TEST TEAM NOTES:

The 2017 Airush Core foil is brand new and pitched by Airush as a beginner to advanced performance foil. Featuring all the shape technology of their Team carbon foil, the Core design is aimed at those looking to invest less into foiling at this stage, with the mast and fuselage instead constructed from aviation grade anodized aluminium with CNC precision milled parts.The modular design means you can upgrade key components between the Team carbon version and this Core model, allowing you to step up as and when you feel the need.

The first thing to note is that there are several wing pitch settings to get your head around and this level of adjustment isn’t something you’ll see on many foils designed with beginners in mind. With the bolt and wing removed the fuselage has two screw holes for large scale adjustment, and a track in the wing along which you can fine tune.

Set with the rear wing to rearmost position, the angle of attack is pointed down, creating maximum pitch stability and maximum lift. It gets you up and foiling quicker, but reaches its top end quicker and then starts over foiling.

Set the rear wing right at the front, the angle-of-attack is much higher for less pitch stability at slow speeds and minimal lift, meaning it will handle much higher speeds.

The Core mast is 80 centimetres, which we feel is a nice height without being too technical like the bigger one metre masts. The Airush definitely leans towards suiting a faster rider. You can find the right spot for the wing placements, but it does take a bit of experimentation, so remember to take your screw driver to the beach. Fortunately it’s very easy to move the wing position and we managed it with our kite in the air, so it doesn’t disturb your session too much.

Of all the foils we rode for this issue, the Core has the most swept front wing and smallest surface area, so although Airush point towards its stability, it was the fastest and least stable of the three boards on test here. The Core also has one Tuttle box position in the board for the mast and it’s right at the back of the board. Interestingly, the more racey Team version has two options to set the mast, with one much closer to the middle of the board, which we reckon would surely require much less back foot pressure and give you more comfortable, freeride-focussed leverage with your back foot. The Airush requires much more front foot pressure than both the Shinn and Levitaz. It’s super fast and is naturally much happier at speed. If you look at all the race foils their masts are set really far back on the board as you can really leverage the smaller high-aspect wings on the front.

Compared to the lower aspect foils you also need to be going faster to get this foiling. Probably only by just a few knots, but in the early stages it does mean that your initial crashes are harder.

However, foils are a big investment, so obviously you don’t want to outgrow your new toy very quickly. It’s possible to make reasonably quick progress on this Core foil, but it’s not as easy as the other two. However, if you’re not switching from foil to foil like we do on testing, you won’t be building up a different muscle memory anyway – instead you’ll simply be getting used to the weight orientation of the Airush. But it is very different!

Airush have tried to give you lots of options with race winning performance and a more cruisy setting, but although aluminium is a robust and cheaper option, once you start getting really fast you’ll want to upgrade to the carbon modules which are stiffer and can handle the speed and forces much better.

The outstanding part of this whole design though is the board. It’s a real beauty and shaped very nicely indeed. Offering plenty of buoyancy at low speed it’s quite stable when you’re not foiling and moving your feet around on. The rails are very well angled to not trip you if you touch down, and also allow the board to be really angled over without the rail catching the water. Very comfortable, great fixtures and fittings, it’s just a shame there isn’t the extra mast mounting position on this that there is on the Team series.

SUMMARY:

Great level of manufacturing and everything plugs together quickly and easily. The pitch control allows you to set up your foil for just how you want to ride; meaning that the stance and pitch range is optimised for you, rather than just shifting straps and mountings forward and back on a more fixed set-up. For the expert this has obvious advantages in efficiency, and you’ll find that when you get confident and start tweaking it’s a pretty quick set-up. But for Joe Bloggs just getting into it, the amount of settings are a bit daunting when you’re really just looking for plug and play. The board is stunning though and the whole set-up is better suited to the higher performance market, because even the freeride setting just wants to go fast. Once you’re in the groove with foiling though, add in the carbon parts as and when you’re ready and you’re going to have yourself quite a rocket ship.