Progress Rapidly with Your SURFit Surfboard Fins

Here are tips on how you can boost your performance with your SURFit fins.

Fins are almost as important as your board. They can change your board from a slow log to a lively fast flyer. SURFit fins are designed to give you great surfing in specific conditions and will give your surfing an edge. Here's tips on how to progress farther, faster

SURFit Fin Design & Testing

Extensive design, modeling and testing has produced a high performance and versatile SURFit fin range, that's easily understandable, that will boost your surfing performance. Check here for your explanation of the SURFit fin range

The three models of SURFit Thruster fins work great in their sets of three fins.

Look closely though and you can see that the SURFit V Series and D Series have smaller rear fins. With the V Series, the rear fin is in fact a different template all together.

Why Different Rear Fins?

Designed this way, you get a heap of drive from the side fins. Then, when you want a big direction change, like in a top turn, the smaller rear fin releases, giving you less resistance. This is normally manifest in a massive blast of spray in the lip or fins releasing out the back of the wave.

What about the fin sets that are all the same size? Do they work too?

This is where personal preference comes in.

Personal Preference

Kelly Slater and Filipe Toledo. How do they differ in fin preferences? Kelly & Crew by Jim Hogson, Filipe by Marcelo Martins

Some surfers like the release from a smaller rear fin. For example Kelly Slater and Jordy Smith.

Surfers liking consistent drive from having fins the same size include Filipe Toledo and Mick Fanning.

All these surfers can do almost any manoeuvre they want so their fin choice is what they feel works best for them, their personal preference.

How do you develop personal preference? Explore, experiment what works for you.

Team Feedback

Team Feedback, surfing in all conditions gives the most valuable input into SURFit fin performance

Here's feedback from our SURFit Team Riders that will help direct your exploration to fins that will maximise your performance:

Big Side Fins

The TF1 8020 side fins create a huge amount of drive even in small surf. The V1F rear fin gives optimal flex and release from its smaller form factor

Sticking great big twin fins on your thruster for small waves you'd think would create too much drag, track and bog.

When paired with a much smaller rear fin you end up with a super drivey experience that generates power in the smallest waves while still being whippy in turns.

For our bigger Team Riders the TF1 8020s paired with the V1 Rear is a proven setup. You get a feeling of extra power, top to bottom drive, smacking lips.

For our smaller Team Riders, pairing the V1 or X1 8020 sides with a rear Carbon Flex fin from a Small size set will give you the same buzz.

Carbon Flex Carving

The SURFit Carbon Flex series offers a variety of combination options, primarily to benefit the Smaller surfer. Using Carbon Flex sides maintains light weight while giving flex for light weight drive. Using a Carbon Flex rear can also benefit a Bigger surfer who wants the tail to come around in carvier turns, the Carbon Flex flexing more than the Fibre Flex

For smaller lighter weight surfers the Carbon Flex fins are a great option as they're light and they flex just right for you. One way to mix it up is to try Large sides with Small rears.

If you're a larger surfer and want more of a carving feel try a Carbon Flex fin as your rear fin. This flexier construction helps your tail come around through the turn with you.

If pushed hard, the carbon will give you a boost response and pop for your air game.

Carve, Drive & Flow

The SURFit Twin Fin Series makes great Thruster side fins. You can see the difference in the mid area between the fins. The narrower TF2 and TF3 give you hold through fin height without bogging or tracking from excess area. They are super whippy and lively

Instead of punctuated lip smacking,  surfing with solid carves, drive and flow can be very satisfying.

The SURFit TF2 and TF3 twin fins are purpose made for this kind of performance. The TF2 has a wider base so gives more drive if you're a Bigger surfer. Both fins have area reduced through the middle and upright. They're very different from typical twin fins.

Their extra height lets the fin go deeper into the wave channeling wave power giving hold. Their narrow area and less sweep means they don't catch or track when you push into a hard turn.

Well worth trying.

Board Type

The SURFit Fin Series work great across a variety of surfboards matching the way you want to surf in differing conditions. If you want to mix it up to optimise your performance you can mix-and-match from the SURFit Twin Series for side fins, and mix up the Carbon Flex fins too. You're covered for everything from short arc top-to-bottom surfing through to flowing power carves

Fins can be matched to boards.

Wide tail boards respond great to the Big Side Fin scenario. Whereas narrow tail boards don't.

This is good as you're most likely to have a wider tail board like the SURFit 2 Series for small waves and big sides and small rear will work great.

In narrower tail boards, fins with less area work better. But less area, normally achieved via a smaller fin, means you loose hold and drive. This is where the TF2 and TF3 will also work great. 

Your narrow tail board is usually used for bigger waves and the TF2 and TF3 are purpose made for these conditions.

Concaves also tend to work much better with a smaller rear fin helping channel the water flow.

What Not To Do?

Testing Session

Find a bank away from the crowd with workable waves and test your fins, and your boards. Make sure you test your different equipment on the same session as waves can look the same but be more weak or powerful, creating a similar impression of your surf gear

When testing out fins, and your boards, do it in the same surf session. Surf can look the same from day to day but actually be weaker and slower, or stronger and faster, and you Won't get an accurate comparison.

First Impressions, Except in Big Surf...

 

Sometimes you need big powerful surf to bring a fin to life. Once it comes to life you can often carry through to smaller and mid-sized waves that same performance

You can normally tell very quickly if a fin setup is good or bad. You'll either feel more speed or less speed. This is true in almost all cases. However some fins need the power of big surf for you to really gauge their characteristics. Once you've felt them come good in big surf, you can often carry through this performance back to smaller or mid-size waves.

Also a fin that is slow in small surf has a good chance of giving you control in the power, where you don't want to be going too fast.

Counter Intuitive - Small Surf & Big Fin

When the surf is small don't think you should go to smaller fins. In his interview at the US Open the interviewer asked Kelly Slater about his smaller fins for the small mushy waves. Kelly responded his fins were bigger, to harness as much power from the small waves, and maximise his energy, as possible.

So big fins work in small waves, with the right setup.

Small fins can also work in big waves such as in your gun. However if your fin is small you'll start losing drive and hold if you want to surf hard in head-high to overhead waves.

As per the Team Rider Feedback, the TF2 and TF3 work great giving great hold and drive without the extra area to bog.

Mental Matching

Your surfing world is full of great images. Sales images can be very strong directing to gear that may not be what you need. Our SURFit D Series fins are designed for Drive, but it's rare to find local conditions that need them. The V Series is great for shifting punchy beachies. The X Series is a great balance between Vertical and Drive surfing

With surfing you might like the idea of a lot of drive, charging down the line and so go for a drivey fin setup.

However in our local surf, it's rare you have a wave where there's a wall that stands up in front of you so far that you can't see the end that you really need to drive hard. This is what the SURFit D series fin is made for, driving down a solid wall.

For most of our daily local beachie surf, the V Series is great. The X Series gives a great balance when you want a big more down the line.

Give your surfing a high performance boost. Use SURFit fins!