Foil Tack Footwork

 Yesterday, a few videos came out that showed fully windfoil tacks that were fully foiled through - here is one of them: 

Sure, Balz Müller had shown fully foiled tacks a couple of years ago already, but his tacks were Duck Tacks. Duck Tacks may be "easy" for world class freestylers, but they out of reach for most regular windfoilers and windsurfers, and they are just about completely impossible with large race sails. 

In a regular windsurfing tack, you always loose just about all speed when tacking. In foiling, that's not the case - even mediocre amateurs like yours truly can keep a few knots of speed for the entire tack, and good racers keep so much speed that they pop right back up onto the foil. But compared to other foil disciplines, that's not really that good. America's Cup boats foil fully through their tacks all the time, often at speeds well above 30 knots. Advanced wingfoilers often foil through their tack; I recall a wingfoiler in Florida who would always jibe on one side, and tack on the other, without ever touching down.

But until yesterday, all windfoil tacks that I have seen had included at least a brief moment where the board touches the water. In my tacks, that usually happens when I put my front foot in front of the mast, or a moment later when I shift my weight from the back foot to the front foot. No surprise here - put your weight far forward, and the board goes down. So the critical question is: how can you get around the mast without putting your body weight in front of the mast? Just head over to Windsurfing.TV on Facebook and check the foil tack video there (https://fb.watch/cSdv0BHLkY/): it has a big smiley face that hides the foot placement.

So let's have a closer look at how the windfoiler in the video above solves the problem. Here is a screen shot as he carves into the tack:

It's a hard carve, but there's nothing unusual about it. That happens a little later:

Here, Harry started moving his front foot. Note that he has not moved the back foot, so it carries all his weight, which pushes the board higher out of the water. In a normal tack, we usually put down the foot in front of the mast, and then step forward with the back foot - but Harry does not stop moving his foot until it is on the other side of the mast:

With both feet behind the mast, his weight remains further backward. It also helps that the sail is tilted far towards the back, moving even more weight to the back. Let's look a fraction of a second later:

Harry is now moving his old back foot to the other side, again without putting it down in front of the mast. Note that the other foot has moved quite far back on the board already, again putting weight towards the back of the board. In the final picture of this series, he has both feet on the new side, and well behind the mast:

Clearly, the talented 15-year old Harry Joyner has figured out how to get around the front of the mast without ever putting his weight in front of the mast, which allows him to clearly foil through his tacks.

For a bit more detail, here are screen shots from a different perspective, taken from a video Harry posted on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/p/CdOOkRzMA3f/):

Carving hard into the tack.

Two seconds later, still carving hard.

Just about to move the front foot.

The front foot is starting to move. All the weight is on the back foot.

The old front foot goes around the mast to the new side, without stopping in front of the mast. The front hand moves to the new side on the boom. Note that the board having all weight on the back foot has pushed the board higher out of the water. 

The foot does not stop moving, but right away slides further back on the new side.

The old back foot starts moving, with the old front foot already quite far back on the new side.

Harry keeps moving to the back of the board. The new front foot briefly touches the board behind the mast.

The new front foot keeps moving back, with all weight on the back foot.

All that weight on the back has kept the foil flying high.'

Ready to get going on the new tack.

It will be interesting to see how many racers will be foiling through their tacks this year. My bet is that many of the top guys will. In hind sight, it seems a bit surprising that it took several years of racing before someone figured to out how to foil through tacks. But maybe that's because all those windfoilers with a windsurfing background has the "step before the mast" too deeply engrained in their muscle memory.