Fluid Kayaks - Team Blog

When I ordered my Composite Element Large, Celliers gave me a weird look and said something like "Don't you live in Colorado? What will you do with a surf kayak?" I told him that I would find a use for it.

Sure enough, it's late march, and the whitewater park in Casper Wyoming is running really high since they are releasing water from the reservoirs upstream to prepare for the real spring flood. I got totally pumped up and loaded up my Nemesis and the Element. Natalie and I met up with regional team paddler Dave Schmitt and our buddy Jonny Meyers for a little early season playboating. Long story short, it was pretty cold, and the park was ok but not great. However, I was able to try out the Element, and I had a blast! I thought I'd write my thoughts on the boat. Since I am a playboater, not a surf kayaker, some of my review probably applies to all surf boats, not just the element. Also, let's hope that I don't get in trouble with Celliers, because it turns out that surf kayaks are really good at surfing, but not the best at other stuff. If you want an all around boat, get a Nemesis. The Element is all about waves.

However, I like to try to push the envelope, like when I surfed the Detox at the Mwave. So I figured I'd include all the categories I would have if the Element were a playboat.

We showed up friday evening, and Jonny and I braved the cold winds for a couple rides in the top hole. The Element is terrible in a hole. I wasn't brave enough to try looping, since the park was pretty shallow in most places. Sidesurfing and spinning were fine, but the boat was not balanced like I am used to, and it was hard to backblast. However, it was really easy to make that transition from a sidesurf to a frontsurf that can sometimes be difficult in longer boats.

The next day we paddled the rest of the way through the park.

The Element is pretty bad at running rivers. There's not a whole lot of volume, and although it is very stable on a wave (I'll get to that in a minute) it is sort of tippy while river running. However, the composite version is really light, so it kickflips bigger than Tony Hawk.

Feature number 3 in the park was a crappy little flat green wave. Everyone else threw a kickflip or a macho move and just kept paddling down to the next wave. There was just no way to surf this wave in a playboat. However, in the Element, this wave was one of the most fun features in the whole park. The Element ROCKS at frontsurfing. It rocks so hard that frontsurfing is fun for its own sake, instead of just being something you do between tricks. It's hard to describe, so I won't try.

I spent my first few rides just enjoying carving around on the teeny tiny little face of the wave. The Element was incredibly stable once it got on a wave. It had the speed to move around the wave like I've always wanted to. I could carve out onto the really really flat part of the wave, switch edges, and come back to the surfable part without washing off.

Then, just for kicks, I tried a couple tricks. You have to understand, this was really just me being silly. There was no chance of actually doing anything on this wave. It was too flat for normal boats to surf, it was not very fast, and it was totally green. However, I tried a couple blunts and some helices. The blunts were better than I expected, but still unexceptional. The helix was incredible, though.

I would come down the face of the wave trying to bounce, feeling really silly, and throw the helix with that no-bounce feeling that usually means you're about to flop on your head, but then the Element would just snap up out of the water and whip around in a helix.

I can't wait to get the Element out onto a medium or large wave. I could feel the limitations of the small wave. When frontsurfing even this small little wave, I could feel the boat popping up onto plane. In a backsurf, though, the Element wasn't quite as fast (still faster than a playboat, but not as fast as forwards). Basically, it's just not designed to backsurf. This meant that the edges would dig in unexpectedly while backsurfing, or sometimes I would bury the stern. It took a couple rides to get used to it and figure out how to stay balanced. I think that on a faster wave, the Element would stay on plane while backsurfing, making it a little butterier and forgiving.

Even if I'm wrong about the backsurf, who cares? Frontsurfing this boat was totally awesome. I can save my backwards tricks for the Nemesis if I have to. The Element is going to rip the hell out of normal waves. The Casper whitewater park was just an appetizer. Now I REALLY can't wait to get the Element out on a real wave.

This fish still got more air than me.