Endurance Paddling Showdown: Surfski vs. Kayak
Transcript with Additional Photos:
Hey guys. I'm Joshua Forester and I just finished my 400-mile circumnavigation of beautiful Lake Lanier. It took me a little under seven days to do it, and I'm going to be talking about some of the watercraft that I did it in--the Epic 18x kayak and the V10 surfski by Epic that I circumnavigated Lake Allatoona in just a month prior. And we're going to be comparing them in terms of what watercraft is best for what duration paddle.
So some of the things about the V10 is the way that the boat is shaped on top, it's nice for slicing through the water. If there's any water that comes up and over the bow, it usually rolls off pretty quickly and if it doesn't then what it ends up doing is it comes into this open hull cockpit. So this is universal most surfskis they've all got buckets like this. What you'll see in the Epic surfski is this auto bailer. And what you can do is you can kick it back with your heel right here, and it opens up this little hatch and--as long as you're at speed--what will happen is there's a suction that forms and it drains all the water that's collected in this boat out. If you kick it back with your foot it re-closes it and you don't have to deal with that water anymore. You get all of the water out of your boat and continue on your paddle.
If you can look here, there's some stains on the boat. That's because I've removed but I haven't actually removed the glue that remains but I got the Epic butt pad that they have and that's because I found that on very long paddles (anything three hours plus) the surfski started to cut off blood circulation in weird ways my buttocks. So I got their butt pad. And one trick that I did that was also useful is...you can see over here there's cutouts on the butt pad. And these cutouts are to give your butt cheeks a little bit more space and what I used is I reused them over here I use those styrofoam pieces and sunk them in at the bottom of the foot pedals here so that my heels, which would also get kind of achy over over the hours of paddling, could rest on those those foam pads and it would provide a little cushion for them. So that was something that I highly recommend if you're going to do any very long paddles in the surf ski. Get something for your buttocks. Get something for your heels because those are the touch points on the boat, and it's far more comfortable to paddle with those guys--they're really light you don't don't worry about it being a lot of extra weight.
So in this boat when I did the Lake Allatoona circumnavigation I had a water bladder in the footwell down here. I had a dry bag behind me with light stuff in it. And then I had a dry bag actually on my shins that was just kind of balancing there with the heavier gear in it. And the reason for this is the surfski I found very quickly does not stay very stable if you have a lot of top heavy weight on it. So if you look at the water line of this boat it's a very narrow boat the V10 is made to go fast. But at the same time the carrying capacity...you have a trade-off there. You have to make some aftermarket modifications to get access to the hull to put gear inside of it if you want to store a lot more weight in it.
That said, it is a very fast boat; not ideal for turning. It's a little bit longer than say the 18X over here. The surfski is at 21 feet and the 18X is at 18 feet. So just because of the length itself, it makes it a little bit harder to turn. That said, we can talk about turning power in a little bit.
Photo Credit: Lakeside News
If we come over here to the hull shape of the 18X, it's a little bit broader and that accounts for stability. It is a sea kayak, so it's it's made for billowing waves and big chop out in the ocean. Obviously, it's got a lot more carrying capacity than the surfski. That's a good thing when you're doing a very long paddle and you have to carry a lot of gear with you. The carrying capacity of the 18X is far superior to that of the V10 surfski, and mainly that's because of the hatches that they have in the bow and also the stern back here; but also to the right back of the paddler that's accessible from the cockpit. One of the things that I did to add to that carrying capacity was to get this cockpit bag right here, which made for a lot of snacks' easy accessibility, to some electronics like headlamps or portable speakers or anything that I wanted for entertainment while I was paddling. Also I put this water bladder from Source up in the front with this very long tube. I can keep it out of the way but yet that tube was accessible to me. It kind of had this aerodynamic feel to it when I had everything set up properly.
The Lanier Lap was a 400-mile paddle and it took us 6 and a half days paddling 18-19 hours a day. So, I needed to be very comfortable. I need most of the things that are needed to be accessible to me very quickly, so that I wasn't having to go to shore to get things. As far as the things that I did have to go to shore for, I had extra food that was refrigerated and unrefrigerated food stored in the hatches.
Epic 18X with a loaded deck.
Let's talk about these hatches for a second. These latches come undone with these little latches right here. So once you go to shore, you can access this front hatch or maybe the back hatch. They come off fairly easy. You see that they have this seal right here and a holding string so that you don't lose it in the water. But within this hatch itself, there's a ton of space. Basically even everything you see in the bow right here is accessible. So far off in the front of the bow, I would store things like camping and overnight gear--bivy bags etc in addition to sleeping gear like a closed cell foam mattress so I could soften the ground a little bit for myself. Further up I had a water supply what's called a dromedary from MSR. It held 10 liters of water. That would allow me to resupply this water bladder right here. Further, I would have food in this forward hatch.
At this point, we could talk about the rear hatch a little bit, and what I had stored back here for the trip. I had clothing in a dry bag stored on these bungees up top, and that was extra dry clothes essentially and wet suits for at night when it was really, really cold.
Beginning The Lanier Lap with the Epic 18X.
Behind me in this immediate hatch right here--which stores quite a bit--I had more accessible food--stuff that I wasn't going to store in the cockpit bag upfront but maybe I needed every now and then. Also, I had my pee bottle back here (sealed and cleaned every time) and then of course there were other more accessible items like for example shoes or wet socks so that I could get out to shore pretty easily if I needed them (if it was a rough shore/bank or whatever).
In the rear hatch back here, we've got additional space. This one--like a lot of hatches on kayaks--has a shallower but broader hatch back here. So for this one a lot of times I would have the dry food for me was kind of in a bigger dry bag and so I had to dry bag within that hatch. It was broader so I would put it in the rear hatch back here. So one of the things to consider when you're loading your boat is the weight. You don't want to have too much weight in the stern boat because it's gonna cause it to ride a little bit uneven, and that may affect either your turning ability or your speed; especially when we're going through waves. If you're digging too much in your water that's going to slow me down. If you're riding too much with a lot of weight in the back, then you're gonna have potentially too sensitive steering, and also your waterline is going to be a little off which can slow you down as well. You may experience some funny stuff in chop, also.
One of things I mentioned before is it doesn't turn well. That's not exactly correct. It does turn really well for an initial three feet or so to the right or to the left. Then, after that it seems to chill out for a little bit and then just steadily turn after that so when you initially hit the rudder one way or another using these foot pedals here what will happen is the boat will lurch to left or to the right. I do believe is designed that way because the surfski is intended for surfing waves in the ocean and you do need very quick, minor response in the boat. But after that, you need to be able to make sharp turns with it but it's a little bit hard when it's 21 feet long.
So for me I was doing a circumnavigation of Lake Allatoona in Georgia. It's a highly fingered lake so I'm going in and out of very sharp coves. And as a result of that, this boat was not ideal for turning. However, on any straightaways, it was far superior to the 18x in terms of speed and ease of paddling.
Rudder damage on the V10 from underwater rocks.
I'll show you the rudder here in the back. You'll notice it has taken some damage. That's because again I was lake paddling, and sometimes there's shallows and you hit rocks and things like that. It is a fixed rudder so this is not going to fold up like a kayak like most people would think of a kayak doing when you hit something (the rudder folds up and gets out of the way so it doesn't take me damage). This is a fixed rudder.
If you look in this hatch here, you can change out that rudder very simply with just an allen wrench. You pull off this plate, you drop the stem down, you pull off the rudder, and you can put in another one. So if you're not happy with how the boat turns, you can always replace it with a more robust rudder. Something longer, sleeker, broader, whatever; figure out what you want for it.
Replacing the rudder on the V10.
Also, if you're doing a lot of lake paddling or you've got paddling in the ocean where there's lots of debris, they've got a rudder guard, which is a small carbon fiber piece that fits that is shaped in such a way that it deflects any weeds from getting stuck in the rudder. I found personally that the weeds were not getting stuck in the rudder so much as the bow of the boat.
So if you look at the front of the boat you've got a very narrow bow and again that's made to cut through the water so that it doesn't submerge when you're sinking into the ocean when you're surfing. As a result, that edge will catch some debris in lake paddling and stuff like that. What I found that you have to do (and this is the same on the 18X) is you basically have to stop the boat entirely, reverse it a little bit, and then that allows the debris to clear. Sometimes you can turn hard left or right with a rudder, and that will kind of clear the debris as well. But usually that's maybe a one in four chance of it actually working.
One other thing I'll talk about is the 18X's rudder system. I spoke before about the V10 and that's mainly controlled by these pedals here on the foot board. With 18x you have a carbon-fiber plate on the bottom and you have the pedals on the top here like this. And it's a pretty comfortable setup I'd say. The bar goes all of the way across so you kind of reposition your feet as you need. And of course that's connected back here to the ruddering system. Now when you hit the pedals on the 18x, it actually shifts part of the boat as well as this rudder that can kick back in case you have an impact with anything. So in that regard I think the ruddering system is actually a little bit better than the V10 in terms of lake paddling, where you might encounter a lot more debris or underwater rocks or logs or anything like under the lake than say in the ocean.
As far as the mechanism for changing out that rudder it's very similar to the V10. So there's like this universal system in the sense that you can that you can you can easily access it from this hatch right here and then if you need to change out the rudder you can. Because you have this part acting as a rudder in addition to the piece coming down you can make that a tighter turning system or looser turning system for how you want and what rudder selection you use. So that's the ruddering for the 18X. It's very similar to like I said the V10 with exception that it's using part of the kayak's hull to turn the boat in addition to that rudder.
So the next thing we'll talk about is handling. One of the things that was interesting about this paddle for me was that both of these boats are ideal in ocean conditions. That's what they're designed for. Of course they can work in a lake as well. So we have the surfski on the right which is mainly used for paddling out in open ocean and surfing waves. And then you have the ocean kayak, which is more of an expedition kayak. It has a high carrying capacity; also handles really well in the ocean.
Photo Credit: Gainesville Times
But I was using each particularly for lake paddling. Which is fine. Both of them are perfectly suitable for, but in paddling the lakes--Lake Lanier and Lake Allatoona--both are more akin to ocean paddling in terms of the amount of chop that they get both from the wind and the boats out there. Lake Lanier is extremely high-traveled lake and the south side of the lake is a very open body of water. There's everything from ocean faring type boats they put on the water to big house boats to weight boards etc, and you get a lot of chop out there. These boats will do fine in those conditions.
Obviously, the surf ski requires a little bit more skill to handle in those conditions but once you get used to it, it's fine. What I will say is that the 18X handles the weight a lot better, when it comes to maintaining its stability. I mentioned before when I was packing on the weight on the V10 what the problem was was any top-heavy weight made it really unstable. So for me when I was going through any chop on the lake, if I didn't have the majority of the weight above my shins here, I was going in (and I paddled this a fair amount). Anybody who's paddled a lot of surf skis in the past will tell you if you've got weight on top, it's going to be a problem. I didn't have time to modify mine. But if I could have I probably would have modified by cutting holes either in the bow or in the stern or a little bit of both to make them accessible to put gear in.
So that would just be an aftermarket type modification. In terms of comfort for long paddles, obviously the 18X is far more comfortable in terms of long paddles. One of the primary reasons is right here--it's got a lower back support. Obviously, 400-miles off paddling this guy will put some wear and tear on this lower back support that obviously needs to be repaired now.
But in terms of comfort, there are a lot more leg positions that are available 18X than say the surfski. For this, there's only one set of leg positions, and you can't really dangle your legs out or move them around while you're paddling. It makes the boat unstable and you lose a lot of your power from doing.
Taking a food break ashore while paddling the Epic V10.
In terms of comfort over time that the surfski is really difficult (in terms of staying comfortable). At the same time, that was kind of offset by the amount of time I needed to go shore. I couldn't stop to take snack breaks or anything like that in the surfski myself. If I would have stopped on the water and there's a lot of chop from boats going by and things like that and I'm trying to eat a snack, it would have to be very very quick before I would get very unstable and risk dumping out. A lot of times in the surf ski, if you're not moving it becomes more unstable. So if you're not paddling forward, then you're running the risk of tipping. So I would paddle ashore a lot of times, get out of the boat, eat a snack, get back in. And I think those repetitive breaks like that did allow for my body to stay in a more comfortable state, but I would say after 55 hours, my lower back was shot because the lack of back support here. And I did as much as I could to kind of keep my paddling form straight, but paddling straight for 55 hours, it tends to slouch or tend to get weak in your paddling form tends to go away. That said, I could always compensate by tightening up this backrest in the 18X. So in terms of long paddles guys I'm gonna say the ruling is the 18X is absolutely the best pick for anything over 24 hours.
If you're talking about paddling for 24 hours straight, the surfski definitely does it.
In terms of turning ability, I would favor the 18X again here, but the surfski's got the top speed covered and it's a lot lighter and easier to handle.
In terms of carrying capacity for both boats, the 18X again wins here, but if you don't need to carry that much weight (if you're doing a shorter paddle), then the V10 has no problem with lighter-weight stuff, as long as again you position it properly. One other thing I'll note any weight in the 18X you don't feel it while paddling. It's always a little bit more tough to accelerate to get up to speed. But once you're up to speed, you don't really feel it. Also very curious to me is it felt like to me I was paddling faster in chop and the 18X in flat water. So in those calm mornings when the lake is just like glass the 18X itself felt slow. Maybe I wasn't going slow, but it felt slow like maybe I was working harder then when I was in chop.
All right guys so that's it that's the review of the 18X versus the V10 in terms of expedition paddling. Which one works for you take your pick. They're both excellent boats, but my recommendation is anything you're going longer than 24 hours, you're gonna want the 18X; anything less than that and you may consider strongly a V10 or similar surfski because that's going to give you the speed you want, and you don't necessarily need the carrying capacity of the 18X. That's it guys. I hope you liked this review and happy paddling!
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If we come over here to the hull shape of the 18X, it's a little bit broader and that accounts for stability. It is a sea kayak, so it's it's made for billowing waves and big chop out in the ocean. Obviously, it's got a lot more carrying capacity than the surfski. That's a good thing when you're doing a very long paddle and you have to carry a lot of gear with you. The carrying capacity of the 18X is far superior to that of the V10 surfski, and mainly that's because of the hatches that they have in the bow and also the stern back here; but also to the right back of the paddler that's accessible from the cockpit…