Latest News
On Racing: Current, Tide, and Timing
Current is the quiet architect of many races. Unlike wind, it rarely announces itself. There is no sound, no visible force—just the subtle difference between working hard and going nowhere, or moving efficiently with effort that suddenly feels justified. Paddlers who ignore current tend to misinterpret both. Tide charts offer certainty [...]
On Downwinding: Decision Scope
Around the ninety-minute mark, a bump builds ahead and gets left alone. Not because of anything physical. The opportunity was real. But a sprint that reads as obvious on a twenty-minute run reads differently when the landing beach is still forty minutes away. The conditions haven't changed. The calculation about what [...]
On Training: Recovery and Adaptation
The main concept behind "training" of any sort is that damage accumulates when work occurs, and adaptation happens during recovery. There's a well-established process at this point for optimizing our adaptation mechanism to quickly achieve substantial gains, particularly in younger people, but it works for everyone. Arriving at the next session [...]
Nationals: Shifting Context
The first thing you notice at an unfamiliar venue is the water: how it flows, how the wind sets up, how the waves stack, whether there's chop on top of swell or just one or the other. You start reading conditions before you put your boat in. You start reading conditions [...]
On Racing: Wind Direction and Strength
Wind strength gets the headlines. Wind direction decides the race. Many paddlers fixate on how hard the wind is blowing, yet struggle to explain from where it is actually affecting them once they are on the water. This misunderstanding leads to poor lines, wasted effort, and missed opportunities. A strong headwind [...]
NK Rapido Surf Ski Review at 40 miles
Review by Wesley Echols Intro I got my NK Rapido, Carbon Lite layup(Green Tip) at the Run of the Charles Race in Boston, Massachusetts on April 27th, 2026. I had previously paddled the Storm for about 20 minutes and more recently the lastest version of the Nitro at the 2026 Narrow [...]
Surfski Reviews
Looking for an ocean ski? Check out the surfski comparison chart!
Epic V10 Sport Ultra Review – by Wesley Echols
The Epic V10S( Sport) is one of a group of more stable surfskis along with the Think Evo, Mako XT, and Huki S1R. The Sport, along with the other Epic skis, is offered in several different layups. I have personally owned the Ultra(24 lbs) and the Performance (32lbs). Like all [...]
Epic V14 Ultra, My First Impressions by Wesley Echols, SurfskiRacing.com
I spent many years running road races and I rarely talked to my training partners about anything other than "training". The topic of conversations were how many miles did you do this week? Did you do interval training? How is your recovery? Are you at optimal weight? How many long [...]
Nelo 550, Think Evo 3, Stellar SEI, Surfski Time Trials
In my garage and basement I have my favorite skis. As usual it is a mix of advanced skis (Think Uno 2g, Ion 3G, Epic V12 2g, Stellar SEL 2G, Nelo 560M and intermediate skis( Nelo 550, Stellar SR 2G, SEI 2G, Think Evo 2, Evo 3). Of the advanced [...]
South African, Ian Black’s SEL 2G Review
I couldn't wait another 2 days for the truck to deliver the boats, so I borrowed a trailer and drove to the depot in peak traffic to unpack the crate and bring them home. At first sight I could see the effort put into the preparation of the craft and [...]
Huki S1XL Surfski Review by Wesley Echols
History with Huki My history with Huki dates back to 2004 when I got my first Huki S1X(orange in pic below) with a fix leg length. That was my second surf ski after a 3 month stint with my first surf ski, a Mako XT. As I have told the [...]