6.4 Dominator for 95 kgs / 210 lbs? intermediate

[Chris]

now we're talking!

[Ben]

Have now surfed the spitfire 6'4 FST in a week or so. Basically only with SA4 fins in quad setup as the waves have been missing only 1-3 feet, small sized beach break, the upside being clean faces with no wind at all.....anyway it took a couple of rides to get used to the wider noise and flatter rocker compared to my Blackbox 6'2.

After adjusting myself to the board and getting a little more pressure on the tail on take off, as I had the experience that the wider nose can dig into the waves if pushed too much, the spitfire is extremely good at catching waves early. I am amazed with my 210 lbs and 184 cm, I manage to catch waves as good as guys on funboards, yes it takes an extra effort, but its just amazing how good this board paddles. I felt that I have so much more time on the take off then before, and get on my feet so fast in this small surf to get onto the face to generate speed. The spitfire in the quad fin mode just speeds down the line, amazing board. Despite the 6'4 being wide and a good a mount of volume it still feels very nimble, Im really curious to experience how it will behave on bigger and steeper faces.

Cant wait to take the board out to some proper sized surf, this board just has so much potential. I am really glad that I got the spitfire as I initially was hooked on the Dominator, I guess the two boards are quite similar, however I am really looking forward to test the spitfires capabilities in bigger surf like the fast hollow beach break we have around here, where I think it would be a better choice then the dominator.

I must say that if I have to choose a new board right now for the bigger surf, I would without hesitation pick the hellfire, even people around here says there is an overlap with the spitfire, I am so sure that the 6.4 hellfire would be a amazing board to supplement the spitfire on the bigger days. Yes I got the Alternator in 6'8 FST as well, however have not taken it out for a surf yet, due to the missing waves, however the feel of the spitfire is just great, a slimmed down spitfire with a tad more rocker must really rock in bigger surf, I guess that would be the Hellfire :-)

The board has a good flotation, though its still manageable to duck dive, though in bigger surf a sloppy duck dive will be punished fore sure, when sitting in the water, the board floats me so my upper body is above the water from about 9-10 cm above my bellybutton. (Bermudas only, its Brazilian summer time :-))

I am amazed about the FST durability, initially I was a little hesitant to how good these boards are, hey its my first Firewire and epoxy ;-) but even a couple of times having my knee on the deck, there is almost no dings, the construction just feels super solid and the response/spring of the board is just so crisp when worked harder

Cheers from a happy trooper :-)

[buzzy]

Glad to hear you're stoked with the purchase Ben. I'm looking at a HF myself and tossing up between the 6'4" and 6'6". I need to hold them in store properly. I remember when I first say the HF in store I thought it wasn't much different to the Alt, but a very brief fondle the other week had me feeling it was more beefed up than the Dom! It makes me wonder whether I was looking at a Spit and imagining it was a HF.

Anyway, I'm stoked you're stoked!

[Ben]

Hi Buzz, yeah - I'm stoked about the boards fore sure, and thanks for the recommendations on the sizes, I totally agree with you a bit more foam is better then too little :-). Actually I laid up the 3 boards next to each other in the shop, Alt 6'8, HF 6'6, and SF 6'4, and when you look at them all together there is something about the HF, it just looks right, the shape/outline just so harmonic and the deep double concave, but in the end I chose the Alt because it gives me a board for the bigger days, no limits...., I mean just look at the Alt and you know its a performer, so refined and balanced. I have a trip coming up to Peru, where I expect to use Alt alot, overhead mile long surf :-).

In two weeks I will head down to Santa Catarina, Florianopolis where there are several options for good overhead surf, then I intend to test the Alt to get a feeling for how it compares to the Spitfire.

Cheers

[Chris]

thanks for the great words Ben!!

Keep ripping!

[Muz74]

Gday Ben, if you haven't already made your mind up, i'm usually between 95 and 100 kg and bought a 6'4 Dominator just to use for small waves. I bought it 4 months ago and have not ridden any of my other boards since. Its magic, I catch so many more waves than any of my other boards and it is really fast and manouverable. I have just been changing the fin configurations for different types of waves and its like having 3 boards in 1.