x sport guy said...



It's good but it is light winds and strap to strap.... he's pretty in control so much so that he doesn't have to move his back hand back... and though his knees are bent, they're not really bent

Can someone explain to me the difference between "strap to strap" and any other gybe, to fullfill my noob curiosity............... and why as Izaak said it may be better in light wind

The 2 main kinds of gybes are strap to strap (aka classic carve aka sail first gybe) and step gybe. The strap to strap was invented first and is popular with the wave boys. The step gybe is the preferred gybe for racing. The principal difference is that with the strap to strap you don't change your feet until the very end ie after you flip the rig. It gives you a very smooth carve but the rig flip (necessarily different from the flip in the step gybe) can make you push your weight back and dig the tail in. The step gybe was invented to stop the nose rising during the flip. In the step gybe you step through 180 degrees just as you flip the rig.

hhhhhmmmm must be me with the strap to strap jibe haha,any way not my favourite way to jibe would rather do duck jibes and normal jibes (step jibe)???

x sport guy said...


Can someone explain to me the difference between "strap to strap" and any other gybe, to fullfill my noob curiosity............... and why as Izaak said it may be better in light wind

As I understand it, strap to strap, you flip the rig, power on, then change your feet. A step gybe, you flip the rig and change your feet at the same time.
A step yo step may allow you to maintain better board speed as you exit the gybe, as you have not disturbed the trim. It's easier to get flicked over the front as you power on though.
Like most things, what works best, is what you are best at.
Me, I favour lay-downs and steps on my good side, strap to strap on my gumby side and could really only do duck gybes on my gumby turn too, though apart from a fluke one earlier this year, on my gumby side,I have not done duck gybes for some years.

I found a pic of a glory days gybe for this thread and I'll get the techno-wife to scan it for me.

Cool thanks for those replies, i'm still trying to get through my gybes with some kind of style instead of wobbling about and stalling in the last part of them.

Sorry Ginger, didn't mean to hijack your thread and turn it into a tecnique session.

A pic from my glory days, taken on a setting that allows 3 underexposures on the one frame, hence the ghosting.