Far out you started on Nomotu?? Gotta be all downhill from their I assume
Just my personal experience:
* you got to keep it slow without the straps or you'll spend too much time in the water. Bring on the power/flatten board between waves and wash it off/edge hard before you go over a wave or wash. Once you're outside the break you can give it some juice again and will have your best chance of going upwind. Sometimes I'll park to the point of sinking to give a wave enough time to dissapate, with the sb it's easy for a little squirt of kite power to get you going again.
* use the lateral force of your fins, i.e. push your back foot out rather than leaning back to create an edge when you're going slow. Inside the break you want to keep the board as flat as possible unless you're overpowered.
* strapless requires a lot of trimming from what I've found, to the point of adjusting for each tack. If you're going too fast you miss waves, get dragged downwind on gusts and get yanked off your board on turns.
* some guys say ride switch and they're right cause it's easier to maintain everything as you pointed out. No getting around the drawbacks of toeside but having said that when it's all working upwind toeside works ok for me.. Like just ok, till I want to use two hands on the bar or something.
* time; guys that have been doing it for years motor upwind where I'll plod upwind.
