Hello all the kiters!
A new sparkling delivery from the RRD brand arrived to our HappyKite station few days ago..altough it was late afternoon, the activities almost over and the staff relaxing after a super windy day, suddenly everybody stood up and rushed to get some new toy to try.
Attracted by the brightness coming from the bottom of the bag, I dipped my hands and сatched a colorful small board. To be honest I’m not really into dazing graphics but I got impressed from this design because, even though at first glance seemed a bit untidy to me, at the end I found it so happy, intriguing and – why not – easy to see in the water when body dragging after failing the landing of your latest crazy trick. :)
There was already a kite set up on the beach so I just grabbed a screw driver ready to assemble everything. After placing the fins I realized that I needed no tools anymore for the footstraps. It just takes a little longer to remove the trimming plastic part where the heads of the screws are melted and rotate them directly in the board through the pads and then put all together again; however eventually you’re sure there will be no screws which may let you with an unexpected strapless twintip board! :) This system in fact prevents any turn of the footstraps connecting points to the board.
Finally I bounced in the flat water of our lagoon impatient to enjoy this pure freestyle board. It’s called POISON Camo and the size I was about to try is 131x39. Actually I got used to ride with wider board, also because of my feet size, so at first the feeling was quite different but it wasn’t a problem to keep the board stable even if the wind was pretty gusty.
What I could appreciate from the very beginning is the amusing speed and maneuverability: just point slightly downwind and you will be stunned by how fast the board reacts to your commands and gain incredible speed! What else can you do? The excellent feature is that the Poison does exactly what you want it to do, responding to the amount of pressure that you exert with a perfect and light feeling under your feet.
Precise as a knife in the hands of an expert chef, the Poison Camo requires quite good tecnique to land jumps, steering the kite back in time after a move and with the right power in order not to overload your knees as the shock-absorbing finishes quickly. This board likes to land on the edge with speed but still, on the other side, forgives some rough landing if you correct in time your body stance; please just not fall down the sky waiting to touch the water before start riding again, it’s not made of butter! :)
At the end of the kite lagoon there’s always some chop so I rode downwind to try some more pop. Even if the rocker is not exaggerate - I’d say it’s quite a flat deck indeed - the board prevents most of the sprays in your eyes, I guess due to the shape of the outline and the concave. Small work is needed with your front foot to ride through the chops.
As I mentioned already, the width of the board I was trying is quite narrow and I couldn’t expect an insane pop; I actually found it satisfactory instead and just smoother, with not much effort you can release the edge actively and wait for the board to do the rest..you won’t be disappointed! And once in the air the light feeling in your feet will help you to calibrate your move without dragging your legs around. The pads and foostraps as well help this sensation of freedom, that at the beginning made me worry (“am I riding on my bare feet?!”) but they’ve been always reliable holding firmly my insteps.
Therefore if you have been riding for a while, you manage to close some stylish aerial moves, rotations and basic power tricks but you don’t understand why all the times you try there is always something unpredictable going on, with this board you will get the right feeling to make the things happen in your way, you’ll decide exactly where, when and how. Definitively the perfect board to bring your skills to the next level, improve your timing, push your motivation and make your riding more aggressive and nimble; anyway the Poison can “fill the space under your feet” to enjoy some freeriding too (intermediate level) thanks to the good upwind performance. Would be probably challenging for beginners looking for easy stability and not used to slight adjustments and fast reactions.
Only one note: for tall guys and big feet size I suggest at least 132 х 40 or better 133 х 41.
Keep up the good work RRD!