Select to expand quoteutcminusfour said..
Paducah, That's Amado NB20 in that clip. He is not small or a teenager. He also looks really good at a move that was shown as a "first time ever" by somebody else just a few days ago.
You're right. Misread the caption - I thought it meant that Luc Schmitz was in the video. He was the camera man. Thanks for the correction.
This ups the ante for everyone. Except me. I think my place at the back of the pack is still safe. 
Nico's attempts at planing tacks... aka "Harracks" offers some good tips for foiling tacks too!
Forget the foiling tack, I'll be a happy camper when my tacks get as good as his planing tacks.
Love the thumbnail because the reality is that the second day (evening) was a dreary, overcast, drizzly session in a harbor with commercial boats in the background. Probably don't get a lot of clicks from that, though.
Good video - learned a bunch not the least of which is how much one has to practice something to improve.
Select to expand quotePaducah said..
Forget the foiling tack, I'll be a happy camper when my tacks get as good as his planing tacks.
Love the thumbnail because the reality is that the second day (evening) was a dreary, overcast, drizzly session in a harbor with commercial boats in the background. Probably don't get a lot of clicks from that, though.
Good video - learned a bunch not the least of which is how much one has to practice something to improve.
I feel better about myself now 
Honestly, there's so much to improve , all the time. Race gear vs. freeride, speed and crisp jibes/tacks vs. playing around with backwinded and other techniques...love the depth and variety of things with this sport.
Nice to see the confidence of him going without a helmet. One of the younger guys cracked a tooth trying to do a foil tack on youth IQFoil gear.
Prien does not appear to be using any of the technique that AUS22 succeeded with. That seemed to involve a hard pop with the back foot to jet the board really almost airborne before switching, whereas Nico is just trying to do a level planing tack but slightly above the water. In other words he's touching down on the entry a lot of the time.
I'm nowhere near making a foiling tack on purpose but I did almost do one accidentally. On the nearby New England lake there are huge wind shifts and I foiled into a 60? header. Lost mast base pressure so the board jumped up, and I switched sides so as not to get bonked into the water. Board never changed direction at all but I went from port to starboard tack, only touching down when I sheeted in too suddenly to pop the cams. Not anything I could possibly repeat, alas.
Agree. Harry and the others are pushing the back foot down ahead of the foiling tack to get the board over 50cm above the water and stepping over the sail which is extremely racked back and crumpling the foot of the sail. Nico enters only 5cm above the water and doesn't have the right sail angle or step position. not that I can do a planing tack or foiling yet. Life goals.
Select to expand quotePaducah said..
Forget the foiling tack, I'll be a happy camper when my tacks get as good as his planing tacks.
+1.
As good as Nico's tacks are, he seems to have missed some of the essential changes. Nico still steps to the mast foot several seconds before switching sides. In the foiling tack videos that show the foot work, the foot stays back. Even if Nico does not put any weight on his front foot, he ends up just shifting his weight to it, which pushes the nose down. The guys who foil through have to push off the back foot hard to get around the front of the sail, which makes the board rise.
I've always loved tacking on the foil, since you can keep so much speed straight into the wind. I played around a bit with speeding it up in recent sessions (although a fully foiled tack is definitely a "life goal" rather than a near-term goal). When I left both feet back in the carve and pulled the sail far to the tail, I had a couple of tacks where the foil height increased noticeably during the carve. It caught me by surprise and had me abort the attempts. After that, I put the front foot forward earlier again, which "fixed" this issue. Maybe when it gets warmer so that falling is more fun, I'll try again with both feet back, although I have a hard time seeing myself get around the mast in time. I just don't move as fast anymore as a few decades ago..
Select to expand quoteboardsurfr said..
I had a couple of tacks where the foil height increased noticeably during the carve. It caught me by surprise and had me abort the attempts. After that, I put the front foot forward earlier again, which "fixed" this issue.
Do you think wind getting under the board when you're almost dead upwind helps cause that or ?
I've seen a few more videos lately.
HK junior team seem pretty good too.
fb.watch/f31U8wuXdy/
Select to expand quoteberowne said..
I've seen a few more videos lately.
HK junior team seem pretty good too.
fb.watch/f31U8wuXdy/
It would seem that lighter foilers might have an advantage at this (Amado V notwithstanding). If so, it may even the playing field a bit between the heavy and lightweights.
That tack looked like black magic to me. 
Select to expand quoteberowne said..
I've seen a few more videos lately.
HK junior team seem pretty good too.
fb.watch/f31U8wuXdy/
Being a freestyle world champion helps with those moves :) While this might be one of the (if not the) smoothest race foiling tack we've seen so far, make no mistake: Val Er?en and his older sister Lina are world-class windsurfers, coming from a strong freestyle/wave background, and now also competing in IQ foil. Lina won silver at the Euro IQ foil.
Practically speaking, are the racers doing foiling tacks also on regattas? Are such tacks in fact faster on an upwind-downwind course or not? To me it looks like they're doing them on a relatively broad reach due to extra power and speed required, so I'm honestly curious what are the tactical or racing advantages.
Select to expand quoteFormuIa said..
Practically speaking, are the racers doing foiling tacks also on regattas? Are such tacks in fact faster on an upwind-downwind course or not? To me it looks like they're doing them on a relatively broad reach due to extra power and speed required, so I'm honestly curious what are the tactical or racing advantages.
I've been wondering this too! Definately don't seem to be 90 degree tacks, closer to 120 or even 160.
No flying tacks here...
Few different tack videos of my 360 camera.
Any tips appreciated!
youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrHB6IE31HOuLRtxwaIPYA-GwKzOnIY1k
Select to expand quoteutcminusfour said..
Are foiling tacks happening on the IQ racecourse yet?
Didn't notice any in my brief viewing of the Lanzarote coverage. As it's a difficult move to pull off and fast as the top sailors go through a tack, the advantage is small and the risk of botching it not.
The men's final (last race) with one of the more exciting finishes in memory.
My only thought is that I need to practice a lot more. Tacking in what I think is a windy patch and then having to pump like mad to get back off the water is a big disincentive to practicing especially on very light days. I have been practicing recently and gotten much better about carving around further than before. But there remains a limit on how much I want to pump on any given day.
Your 3 kt video is pretty impressive for us rank amateurs. How much more wind/power did you have in that one vs the others?
Thanks Paducah
I've only been practicing a little bit more than last year... and sometimes I'll go and do a 3km run instead of throw in 10 tacks... but doing these videos and threads helps me think about the micro movements more.
There was only about 4 kt difference all day from like 8-12 kts maybe down to 6 to be honest but i tried to avoid the light patches...!
Easy to do when free sailing, harder to do on the layline!
Other tips I have had is to put your back foot into Center of the board and rail hard to windward and force the bottom of the sail down on to the board which can help to keep you planing.
Also when springing around, find the footstrap as fast as possible and rotate the board around by sliding over the water, new windward rail down to skim over the surface.
Throw the sail forward on the new side and trust it!
Sheet the sail in hard so you can push against it and trust it will hold you. If you don't commit all your weight, you might get pulled forward. If the wind drops, you will fall back!
Also some tacks I noticed the foot of the sail dragging in the water... feels slow, but you need the mast/sail weight back to keep the nose up. Not sure how to think about this...
Gah... I suck at this. Probably 30-40 tacks the last couple of days and only a couple that felt good. I used to fall practicing jibes. Now I fall practicing tacks.
Anyway, Berowne, your comments and videos are super helpful. I'm going to restudy this thread and hope that something imprints on my monkey brain.
Select to expand quotePaducah said..
Gah... I suck at this. Probably 30-40 tacks the last couple of days and only a couple that felt good. I used to fall practicing jibes. Now I fall practicing tacks.
Anyway, Berowne, your comments and videos are super helpful. I'm going to restudy this thread and hope that something imprints on my monkey brain.
Spent a long time last night going through so many of the videos posted here and rereading the comments, especially Berowne's. Went out and practiced today and significantly better. Things that helped where I'd been stuck. Yeah, it's stuff that's been said earlier but maybe it'll help someone else.
- Really, go from one side to the other. Don't fool around with anything in front of the mast. I watched a lot of the videos over and over and I found that the best tackers were almost like apparitions. They'd dematerialize from one side and suddenly appear on the other. A bit of exaggeration of course but I can't emphasize this enough. Bonus: if you are beside the mast instead of in front of it, it can't push you into the water if the board touches down hard.
- Try to keep from touching down as late as possible. As mentioned elsewhere, pushing down with the back foot hard helps keep the board off the water a lot. What also helped was being mindful when pulling the back foot out of the strap and into the carve to keep the board off the water. It's easy to get an incidental touchdown when your weight goes forward a touch. Once I really started to work on keep the board off the water, it improved my entry speed.
Again, my thanks to all who posted advice and videos.
Paducah, this is a great story and a perfect example of what these threads are all about!
It has been a while but I tried to tack a bit faster at last weekends races. Very light lulls 4 knots I think as we did drop off the foil on a reach. But some big gusts too with 30? shifts and power at 16 knots. I was on my biggest on big gear: Patrik foil 10m sail, 1000 wide board and F4 945 foil with big 210 rear wing and -0.5? power shim
There are a few obvious errors like not getting straight into the new front footstraps as soon as possible and maybe I need to lean the sail back even more against the deck. and when on the new side I should probably drop low and lean against the oversheeted sail more . but I'm happy for now. At least I'm not dead in the water so tick that goal!
Could this be my Best Tack Yet
Looks like the Jrs are foil tacking in competition now. Missed this from the IQFoil worlds a couple months back. Check it out at 44:10 and just after. Also, see how much of an advantage it is upwind around 1:15:51 with two tacks that by Shaw that drill the competition.
Theoretically, as a lightweight, I should enjoy their advantage. Realistically, I still suck. 
Select to expand quotePaducah said..
Looks like the Jrs are foil tacking in competition now. Missed this from the IQFoil worlds a couple months back. Check it out at 44:10 and just after. Also, see how much of an advantage it is upwind around 1:15:51 with two tacks that by Shaw that drill the competition.
Theoretically, as a lightweight, I should enjoy their advantage. Realistically, I still suck.
?si=KsUY_ErBR3T9mpfW&t=2650
I know what you mean, Im in that same spot. Got the lightweight advantage, but none of their agility/ability or fitness.
realistically, i don't know how much foiling tacks will come into play. Unless competition venues have relatively flattish water, i think foil tacks (even planing tacks) are very hard to do with any amount of regularity. Especially in rolling swells, with chop on top. Theres simply too much else going on a lot of of the time
i hope to do a foiling tack one day, but at this rate i'll probably throw my back out and be on a zimmer frame before then.
Select to expand quoteSubsonic said..Paducah said..
Looks like the Jrs are foil tacking in competition now. Missed this from the IQFoil worlds a couple months back. Check it out at 44:10 and just after. Also, see how much of an advantage it is upwind around 1:15:51 with two tacks that by Shaw that drill the competition.
Theoretically, as a lightweight, I should enjoy their advantage. Realistically, I still suck.
?si=KsUY_ErBR3T9mpfW&t=2650
I know what you mean, Im in that same spot. Got the lightweight advantage, but none of their agility/ability or fitness.
realistically, i don't know how much foiling tacks will come into play. Unless competition venues have relatively flattish water, i think foil tacks (even planing tacks) are very hard to do with any amount of regularity. Especially in rolling swells, with chop on top. Theres simply too much else going on a lot of of the time
i hope to do a foiling tack one day, but at this rate i'll probably throw my back out and be on a zimmer frame before then.
they help all the under19 gold could do it in waves at cadiz
Select to expand quotelen024 said..Subsonic said..Paducah said..
Looks like the Jrs are foil tacking in competition now. Missed this from the IQFoil worlds a couple months back. Check it out at 44:10 and just after. Also, see how much of an advantage it is upwind around 1:15:51 with two tacks that by Shaw that drill the competition.
Theoretically, as a lightweight, I should enjoy their advantage. Realistically, I still suck.
?si=KsUY_ErBR3T9mpfW&t=2650
I know what you mean, Im in that same spot. Got the lightweight advantage, but none of their agility/ability or fitness.
realistically, i don't know how much foiling tacks will come into play. Unless competition venues have relatively flattish water, i think foil tacks (even planing tacks) are very hard to do with any amount of regularity. Especially in rolling swells, with chop on top. Theres simply too much else going on a lot of of the time
i hope to do a foiling tack one day, but at this rate i'll probably throw my back out and be on a zimmer frame before then.
they help all the under19 gold could do it in waves at cadiz
Fair enough
i certainly can't speak from experience, only looking at what im seeing in footage of events
