Island Foil

Go from zero wing foiling experience to wing surfing on a wave in 5 X 2 hour lessons! 

The first two lessons – Intro to Foiling and Wing Handling 101 – can be conducted with light wind on a flexible schedule. However the next 3 lessons – Beginner Wing Foiling, Jibing & Pumping, and Wing Surfing, we will be targeting the optimal conditions.  

Whoever signs up first will be given priority to take a lesson when wind conditions are optimal. When the forecast predicts a windy day,  Ill contact you (approx. 3 days ahead of time) to see if you may be available. Then the day before I’ll confirm the forecast and your availability. Usually the windiest time of day is 2pm to 5pm. 

Ideally this course will be completed over a 2 week period provide that we get 3X 14knt+ days and your afternoon schedule is somewhat flexible.

*Only 3 VIPs may be enrolled at a time because all lessons are one on one and not every day is windy*

3 X 2 hour lessons

Get up and Wing Foiling in about a week with these 3 lessons: Intro to Foiling, Wing Handling & Getting Up On Foil, Beginner Wing Foiling 

The second two lessons, we’ll be targeting a good breeze, so its ideal if you have some afternoons free because the wind generally peaks between 2 and 5pm. 

Fast Trackers will be given priority over a la cart learners. When the forecast shows wind, I will reach out several days a head to see your availability. The day of a planned lesson we’ll double check the forecasts to ensure good wind otherwise we’ll postpone till conditions are optimal. 

Learn to foil behind my boat. 

Beginning on a very large stable board with a large foil, you’ll learn the basics of shifting your weight forward and back to scoot up on to foil and to drop down off of foil. You’ll then learn to do this switch, because when you graduate to wingfoiling its best to ride on your heel edge in both directions in order to cut further up wind. At first, we’ll only need to tow you at about 8 knots then slowing down to 4-6 knots once you are up foiling. The board has a suction to the water, so you need to go faster at first to break free and begin foiling but then once up you can actually foil at a lower speed.

During the second hour, we will drop down in foil size, so you’ll experience what its like to foil at a slightly higher speed but with much less drag and a lot more glide. You’ll practice switching your stance and getting more comfortable gliding with the rope slack for some periods. You’ll learn to ride higher up above the water so when the rope goes slack you can pump forward and continue to ride without just slowing down and stalling. You’ll also get a feel for how the foil begins to cavitate shortly before it breaches out of the water so you can recover from this without falling. 

Getting the basics of riding a foil dialed in before wingfoiling will greatly accelerate your learning. People that go right to wing foiling with no foiling experience will have 4 to 6+ sessions where they are constantly getting up briefly and falling over and over again, which becomes extremely tiresome. Getting up wingfoiling takes about 10x the effort of continuing to wing foil once up so I want to set you up for success and not exhaustion. 

 One of the key things to learn about foiling is how to distribute your weight. At first you’ll have about equal weight on both feet but as you begin to accelerate you’ll be putting more and more weight on to your front foot in order to prevent yourself from foiling to soon. You’ll pretty much be putting as much weight forward as possible without the nose going underwater. Once traveling fast enough you can briefly shift your weight on to your back footing causing the nose to come up and you to rise out of the water. Moments later you’ll want to shift your weight forward again to level out the board. Once up and foiling (or wing foiling) its great to do a few pumps – more so with your front foot – to give yourself confidence and control. This helps you to feel that you are riding and controlling the foil rather than balancing for dear life. 

 I have 5 different sized boards as well as 5 different sized foils. So if time allows or if you decide to take a second foiling lesson, dropping down to a smaller board with smaller foils is well worth it and alot more fun! When wing foiling on Block Island, especially off the east beach with the prevailing south west wind there’s usually puffs of wind which you can see coming by the textured water. You can capitalize on these by sheeting in the wing, accelerating, pointing up wind, and riding high on the foil but as soon as you lose the wind, its key to angle away from the wind and pump until the next puff. ( This is also the case in the harbor particularly when you go behind a large boat. ) On a flukey day, you may need to spend as much as 60% of the time pumping and gracefully riding the foil versus merely sailing with the wing.

We’ll spend about 15-20 minutes on land so you can practice the basics of flipping the wing over, using the wing to assist you to stand up, transitioning the wing from a canopy position to a more vertical position that will propel you forward, switching hands so you can switch directions while foiling, and most importantly how to pump the wing to gain enough speed so you can get up wing foiling! 

We’ll inflate two different sized wings so you can handle a smaller wing first that wont drag on the beach or in the water as much as a large wing. Once you’ve got the basics down with the smaller wing, you’ll go through the motions with the larger wing and then get into the water with the board. 

A smaller wing is more fun to use but you’ve got to be more efficient with its usage and time your pumping with a gust to get up on foil – so despite being a bit more cumbersome its best to start wing foiling with a large wing.

Ill follow you in the dingy and you’ll have a radio headset embedded in your helmet so I can provide you some real time tips and you can ask me questions as you go. For the first half hour with the full regalia in the water, you’ll mainly just use the wing to give you forward momentum while kneeling, assist you in standing up, and to propel you slowly forward. The faster you go the more stable the board becomes. You’ll work on your foot positioning, which unlike foiling behind the boat where both feet are on the centerline of the board, your front foot will be a couple of inches more towards the heel side and angling forward. 

Once comfortably standing on the board with the wing, itll be time to start using the wing  to capture the wind to accelerate you. This can be thought of as scooping the wind towards you with more emphasis and motion with your rear arm than with your front arm. Its a bit like cranking a trailer jack but in more of an oval than a circular fashion. This is referred to as pumping the wing.  Your front arm primarily directs the wing and you should think of transferring the wind’s power through your front arm and shoulder and down thru your front leg. I find the optimal angle to maximize the wind’s power is by going 20 degrees down wind. 

 As you begin to pickup speed, put more weight on your front foot so that you dont foil too early. If the wing feels taught and exerts a steady force then you should continue to accelerate and you may able to just hold this position without pumping your rear arm. Once you feel you are going sufficiently fast – and you are noticeably pushing on your front foot –  you can shift your weight off your front foot and begin to rise up on the foil. A common mistake at this point is to shift your weight on to your back foot or to lean back. This will cause you to rise at too steep of an angle which transfers your forward momentum into vertical lift and causes you to slow down and then almost immediately the foil stalls and you’ll drop back down onto the water. You should begin to foil merely by releasing some of the pressure on your front foot so your weight is no longer 80% forward its more like 50-60% on your front foot.  Instead of concerning yourself with whether you are foiling or not or how high up on foil you are, focus on lowering the wing so the bottom wing tip is nearly in the water. This will cause the wing to shift from a canopy position to a more vertical position which gives you more acceleration forward and less vertical lift. This helps prevent you front riding higher and higher up on the foil and breaching. If the board is still splashing through the water, try to pump your rear arm a little bit or reduce the pressure on your front foot slightly. 

Once up and foiling, look over your front shoulder and towards a buoy or landmark thats just slightly upwind of you. Take a pump or two with your front foot so you can test your foot position and take control of the situation. While foiling, when you have lots of speed, you can angle higher up wind then as you lose speed return to a course thats more perpendicular to the wind. Often you’ll find your self working your way up wind carve by carve rather than just by traveling in a straight line. 

The goal of this class is to get you up and foiling in both directions. 

Here is where the fun really begins! You’ll practice the wing handling and footwork needed to jibe, or switch directions while not on foil. We’ll break the jibe down into 3 stages- preparing to jibe and switching to your dominant stance, gliding downwind and changing your hand position, sheeting the wing back in and riding out of the jibe. You’ll then work through the stages with the goal of completing a jibe on foill. Once you can jibe and go up wind, wingfoiling becomes exponentially more fun and takes much less effort!

However, its easier said than done. You’ll need to learn to ride on your toe edge which feels a little awkward and is a less efficient position to foil in. You’ll need to learn to switch your stance, adjust your footing, carve downwind, switch your hand positions, and more. 

Depending on the wind conditions, for those with prior boarding experience who gravitate towards a dominant stance, we’d ideally reserve a little bit of this lesson to ride on a smaller board or atleast with a smaller front wing. Its amazing how much faster you can go with a slightly smaller wing and how much less effort it takes to stay foiling. However, you’ll need to be more efficient to get up on foil which is the trade off. 

For those who perhaps are skiers and dont have a propensity to put a certain foot forward, this would be the ideal time to learn to jibe switch so you can evolve as an ambidextrous wing foiler without biasing yourself towards always riding one way. 

The goal of this class is to rocket through the beginner phase of wing foiling. There’s quite a lot of subtlety to jibing and pumping. Hopefully at this point we’ve also dropped down in board and maybe even foil size, so your ratios of muscle to equipment are higher and so theres less drag.

Jibing efficiently and maintaining your speed requires a series of carefully orchestrated actions. We’ll take a deep dive into this process which will give you the ability and confidence to wingfoil on your own in any location, particularly when you begin foiling aiming straight at the beach and need to get up on foil and jibe quite quickly and without losing much ground down wind. 

At first pumping will be a tentative action primarily with your front foot where small taps give you a little bit more speed and control. However, for pumping to be an effective tool for you to make it from one puff of wind to the next or from one wave to another, you ll need to shift your foot positions and engage your whole body. You should really be able to feel your weight on your back foot and that you’re standing on the foil mast as a solid platform. Your front foot should be shifted towards the center line of the board and back a little ways so your feet are shoulder with a part. A proper pump is almost like a deadlift or like you are jumping on to a table. Force is applied equally to both feet. You should feel the heel of your rear foot lifting off the board.

The real glory of wingfoiling is when you begin to catch waves. You are gliding silently above the ocean and when the foil begins to interact with even a small 1-2ft wave you can feel the magic. You can now sheet the wing out and effortlessly glide along. Small pumps on a wave generate an amazing amount of speed. As you go cruise along on a wave the apparent wind gives you an additional boost of speed and then when you carve over the top of the wave and away from the beach you can get another boost as you pump off the back of the wave.  

For those with surfing experience, wing surfing is counter intuitive: surfing is about pumping off your edges with your weight forward and then leaning back if you need to burn some speed while wing surfing is the opposite. You should only be pumping when the board is level and if you feel your are accelerating too quickly and  in danger of breaching, you then need to shift your weight forward and go even faster, which will give you more control and then the ability to carve off the wave. The whole approach is very different from surfing in which you need to stay near the pocket of the breaking wave. With wing surfing its actually best to approach the wave at an oblique angle with a lot of speed and then stay high on the wave and high up on the foil so that the foil interacts with the top of the wave. 

This lesson will be the culmination of all you’ve learned so far. You will be hooked on foiling, motivated to buy your own gear, and panning the forecasts 10 days out for opportunities to wing surf.

Wingsurfing in waves versus wingfoiling on flat water is a lot like skiing or snowboarding in fresh powder versus on a groomed trail – your mind is fully engaged with the elements and the activity at hand. Each wave, turn, and jibe is unique and exciting. There’s no longer any question of what to learn next or what element of your foiling to focus on. Its simply pure pleasure to race away from the beach and then swing around and catch wave after wave. Ultimately, you’ll find that you can catch a wave and then switch to holding the wing with just one hand and using your other hand to balance while just feeling the energy of the wave propel you forward. 

There are numerous places on Block Island to wingsurf depending on your ability and the conditions, so I’d encourage even advanced foilers to take this class with me.

*This class is cheaper because all be out on the water wing surfing with you instead of following by boat!