Foiling has now fully integrated itself into waterman culture. And one of the places the tool looks most natural is in channel crossings, in big open-ocean conditions where paddlers can let loose and hold on as the foil carries them silently across the water, connecting house-sized wind swells.
This year, the world championships of open-ocean bump riding, the Molokai2Oahu, will feature a SUP foil division for the first time. The event is already a world-championship caliber competition for prone and stand-up paddling and it’s hyping itself as that in the downwind-foil segment as well. It’s a big step for a race that has been anchored by custom.
“We have a history of being very traditional,” M20-founder Mike Takahashi told me. “It was hard for me to accept stand-up (when we did). What really helped to change my mind was watching the guys surfing Sunset on foils. It’s just remarkable and I couldn’t see myself holding back the progress of any sport.”
The tool is certainly worthy in the middle of the channel where, if conditions cooperate, giant swells carry skilled athletes 32 miles between Molokai and Oahu’s south shore, where paddlers fight their way through the current at China Walls to land at Maunalua Bay Beach Park. Records could be broken. The problem is in navigating those flatwater and side-swell currents at the start and finish as foil boarders have to work their way in and out of protected landings without the help of lined-up swell. And if race-day conditions are too calm, then paddlers will be forced to choose whether or not to integrate back into the main SUP division.
“That’s why we don’t have 20 entrants,” said Takahashi. There are currently nine registered. “The last six or seven miles of the race to the finish line, the wind turns to a quartering direction. But if the conditions are right, the potential is there to smash records.”
Takahashi says that Kai Lenny, who’ll compete in the field July 29th, did a Molokai run in 3.5 hours. The course record is nearly four at 3:59:52, set by Australian Travis Grant last year on a SUP. Because of their potential for speed, foil competitors will start 40 minutes behind the main pack.
The Molokai2Oahu event has a list of athletes on its site, including Lenny, that had committed to the foil division. “I think a lot of guys are waiting to see how it turns out,” said Takahashi. “But we only had four guys the first year for SUP so we’re well ahead of that number.
Lenny, and super-skilled waterman Zane Schweitzer (who hasn’t yet registered for the M2O event) have been racing foils between Maui and Molokai recently, another fantastic downwind run that some would argue is more lined up than the fierce Ka’iwi Channel that makes the Molokai2Oahu one of the toughest races in the world.
