2012 Cab Vector Kite, Early Impressions
 

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I demo'd a 9 m 2012 Cabrinha Vector today in 23 to 30 kt winds. The wind had come up over night so the seas weren't that big yet, ranging around 4 to 6 ft. or so.


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Winds were side on shore out of the northeast. Despite that running parallel to shore even a bit offshore wasn't difficult. Usually, you need to do a fair amount of edging, weight redistribution to help ride closer to the wind.

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The kite points well and easily. I took some shots with the GoPro HD during the session.


I initially thought conditions might build away from land and so trimmed for max depower on the pigtails. This was more depowering than I needed as it turned out. Despite that it boosted nice jumps, had a relaxed feel and easy response to inputs. Again it went upwind remarkably well. The kite has LIGHT bar pressure, coming off some slow healing wrist injuries this is a blessing. Good measured response to control inputs, minimal bar pressure, sounds good to me.

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I went in and retrimmed the kite for the middle range on the pigtails. This gave me a bit more power and boosting jumps was even more fun. Despite being a slightly smaller canopy (than I'm used to for our lighter winds), the kite had nice float on jump descent.

Tom Dunfee came up, said he was thinking about buying a Vector or Switchblade tomorrow by odd coincidence.

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He took it out for a while on a strapless surfboard. He too was impressed by its upwind ability. And from what I could see from shore the wave riding characteristics were nice, good control, no overflying, pretty much fun in motion. Tom may provide some input on this himself.


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I noticed a small, 1 1/2 ft. long dead shark in the weed line. It looks like it may have just been pupped or born, hard to say. I didn't recognize the species, Tom thought it might be a thresher from the extended caudal fin.


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I haven't seen a thresher in person before and as this one is a juvinal am still uncertain. Looking on the net it might be a "sharpnose shark" but again, I haven't seen one of these before in person either. I did notice one school of bait kick up near shore but that was all. I didn't see enough feeding activity to motivate me into shore.


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There goes Tom


Anyway, for a first session, have to say I was impressed with the ease of use and performance of the kite. Looking forward to checking it out in more strong wind sessions.


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