Parawinging the Sunova Pilot Mid

***If you are seeing this notice then this post is not finished. Due to the high number of questions I've received about this board I've uploaded some initial thoughts. I'm entering the off season for the gorge and will re-visit this post in the spring when I can get some serious mileage on it.***

Intro

I didn't expect to buy another stock dims board. I had settled into ordering customs and figured that's all I would be buying for years to come. Unfortunately, in 2025, global shipping and prices have been tampered with making acquisition of custom gear more challenging and significantly more time consuming. Fortunately, this boards weight, shape, dims, and design were perfect for answering a lot of questions I had. I figure that getting this board now, will aid me in answering design questions for my next custom order.

Why a new board?

I ordered two new boards for 2025 to kick off a year of testing and winging. A custom Carver and a custom Pilot. Both boards were rippers with the Pilot quickly becoming my favorite board in flight, while the Carver solidified it's position as my favorite all rounder. I should have been set, for a long time. I blissfully entered 2025 thinking I was doing the final bits of tuning to my kits and then the parawing came along. Starting in July my focus became dominated by the Pocket Rockets and I went through the learning process of testing my board and foil quiver all over again to figure out exactly what my best setup would be. I found my 6'6"x18"x90l Aviator to be a lifesaver early on in my progression. After mastering that board I dropped down to my smaller options and found pros and cons to each. I wanted to look into optimizing my parawing experience so I decided to give the Pilot Mid a go.

My 2025 Sunova foilboard quiver. Pilot, Carver, Aviator. Nose length stays nearly the same across the models.

Rider Data and Style

Location: Columbia River Gorge.

Experience: 100+ days a year. 10,000+ miles on foil.

Weight: 86kg

Style: My style has been shifting a bit since learning to parawing. This was my first season with the Pocket Rockets and I only got 600 miles on foil so I'm still growing and adapting to the experience. With a wing in my hand I was always extremely aggressive on swell and commonly rode my smallest (Silk 650) foil. With the parawing, and perhaps this is related to late season conditions in the gorge, my style has been smoother, flow based, more relaxed.

Board History

If desired, take a quick look at my board history so you can tell how my quiver has evolved and where I'm coming from: Complete Board History

This board showed up with the following stock dims:

6'5"x19"x4.25" 68l

10lbs 3oz (4.63kg) after adding deck pad.

BAR*GF: 3.242 (click here to learn more about BARG Factors)

~Gear and Conditions Used in Testing~

Foils:

AFS Silk 1050 with Ultra Glide 41

AFS Enduro 800 standard fuse with Ultra Glide 41 and Flex 130

Skinny 75cm UHM mast.

Sails:

3m and 2.4m Ozone Pocket Rockets (PR)

Wind and Swell:

Tested primarily in good Gorge swell riding conditions.

• High Wind: 40 knot gusts. It can get a little squirrely in wipeouts at this windspeed but everything lower than that is great. I am yet to find a size of Gorge swell that I disliked this board in.

• Low End: TBD 2026

  
  
  
  

First Rides: East Winds - Stevenson, WA

Average 27-30 knots gusting to 35-40 knots.

Paddling out.

Winging at Stevenson on east winds is not my favorite. It's not the on water experience that bothers me, it's the experience of getting in and out of the water in shore pound with a wing, over a rocky bottom with weeds everywhere. I keep my gear pretty flawless all year long and then always end up damaging a foil on the rocks at this location. This year, as a parawinger, I expected to be able to prone paddle to gear safety without the wing dragging me into the rocks while it's blasting 30 knots of wind. I swam through the shore pound, getting to deeper water, flipped the board, and hopped on to paddle my way out past the rocky point. I immediately got my first question answered. This board is a dream to paddle. I quickly zipped out to safety and was grateful that the length provided me with such an efficient experience.

Waterstart stability and float.

Sitting on the board it's fully submerged and very stable. 19" is comfortable to sit on and 6'5" balances out the teeter toter nicely. As soon as I deploy my PR the board pops to the surface while I sit with my legs in the water. If my sail is in flight with even the smallest pull, this board is on the surface which is awesome.

My hack for stability with the parawing on skinny boards is to simply hook into my harness before getting to my knees. Paddle out, deploy the parawing, hook in, go to hands and knees, unhook, stand up. I had no stability issues on this board in pumping wind and swell when using this technique and took flight quickly once on my feet.

First flight.

This is my first east wind season as a parawinger and the experience is a lot different than west winds in the gorge. I wanted a guarantee that I would get on foil so I started off on my Silk 1050. This is also the foil that I need the most leverage over to ride aggressively so it would be a perfect test for the 19" width. I put an hour in doing downwind upwind laps in pumping conditions and walked away thrilled with the results. I had no problem ripping the 1050 in fully powered conditions. I never had a sensation or sixth sense feeling of being on a board that is too narrow. My toes were commonly off the edge of the deck pad but the deck concavity nested perfectly into the ball of my foot giving me full command over the rail to rail experience. The thinner, flat chined rails, and narrower deck never caught on a single carve. The length did not feel like it hindered my riding style but instead complimented the smooth carving nature of my end of season riding. I couldn't be happier.

Day 2. Durability check.

My first day out winds peaked at 35 knots and for my second day out the gauges were peaking at 40 knots. This is my first Sunova board in "Standard" layup which is a little heavier but more robust than my "Vapor" layup customs. I pride myself in taking really good care of my gear and have never done severe damage to my equipment. With everything rigged up I set my board, foil up, in what I thought was a spot with sufficient wind protection. I stepped away for a second to lock up my vehicle and heard a bang. My heart sunk. I knew what happened without looking. A rogue gust snuck through the parking lot and the 19" width with 15.8lbs total kit weight was not enough to stay put. My board was tossed across the grass until it's tumble and slide was arrested by a trusty concrete curb. I walked over to assess the damage. On the nose of the board, on the black rail, there was a bruise. Not a crack, not a fracture, just discoloration. It appeared to still be water tight as I couldn't feel even a hairline fracture on the board. I rode it without issue and emailed Sunova that night getting the following answer:

"For the bruised and discolored rail, if it's not cracked and seems watertight, it will be okay for now. This is just the fiber glass layers over the carbon, if there is an impact the glass can spiderweb or shatter, it becomes a lot more noticeable with the carbon behind. As long as there is no more impacts it won't deteriorate further overtime."

That's it!?!?!? A little knick in the nose finish and a bruise on the rail!?

Stronger winds, smaller foils.

My second day out on this board was 30 miles of downwind upwind on the AFS Enduro 800 with the 2.4m Pocket Rocket. Everything went great. I had zero low end issues and did get to experience a few moments of slog, as much as you can in winds like this (20-40 knots). Only once did the board submerge for a split second while my 2.4m PR sniffed around for some wind. Otherwise, I was quite relaxed putting in close to 3 hours on this setup and tested an abnormally high number of restarts due to the amount of loose weeds floating around in the river right now. Rail to rail performance was great, my toes came back onto the deck with the more reactive/faster Enduro 800, pump was fine, and again I avoided any carving touch downs which was really nice.

Board Flips:

On this second day there was one observation that I can share.

1. This board flips in extreme winds. Most people wont care about this because they aren't out in 40 knots but this is a board element that I keep an eye on. I think there are two, maybe three metrics to watch for this:

   1. Kit weight: Heavier stays down.

      1. Pilot Mid 10lbs 3oz: Flipped frequently.

      2. Carver 10lbs 8oz: Never flipped.

      3. Aviator 11lbs 4oz: Never flipped.

   2. Surface area: More surface area can be grabbed by the wind easier.

      1. Pilot mid 19x77=1,463 square inches. Flipped frequently.

      2. My Carver 20x71=1,420 square inches. Never flipped.

      3. Aviator 18x78=1,404 square inches. Never flipped.

   3. Foil selection. This is the biggest unknown for the high wind flip test. Could there be something about the nature of the foil involved that makes it more prone to flipping in high winds? Is there a size sweetspot for flipping? I'll find out down the road if I notice a large difference in the Silk vs Enduro in extreme winds.

      1. Pilot mid with Enduro 800: Flipped frequently.

      2. Carver with Silk foils: Never flipped.

      3. Aviator with Silk foils: Never flipped.

Dims Analysis

I was excited to learn and experience pretty much everything related to the dims on this board. It was a major reason I ordered it and it also made me nervous, not knowing if this would be a hit or a miss for me.

BARG Factor: 3.242

I've been using this equation for a few years now and it has never let me down. Yet, I wasn't sure if I trusted it when ordering this board. My current custom Carver had a BARG Factor of 3.22 making it nearly identical to this board, despite the Carver being 9l higher in volume. The question I wanted an answer to here was can I use a longer, narrower board with lower volume and still get the same takeoff power? Initially, the answer appears to be yes.

Volume: 68l vs my 85kg

The lowest volume board I've had the chance to ride was a 60l Omen Flux. My other Pilot is 66l and gets up fine but it's not a low end specialist by any means. I was a touch nervous about this volume as I've never been a rider who chased low volume boards. I questioned:

Will it paddle well? Yes! Far better than my Carver, it's an excellent paddler.

Will initial takeoffs with the parawing do well? Yes! I hook my pocket rocket into my harness while sitting on this board and a minimal pull quickly brings this board to the surface.

As of Fall 2025 I have only tried this board in winds gusting over 30 knots so there hasn't been any real opportunity to test it's low end performance. What I have noticed is that when I am in bad lulls, down towards 20 knots, fishing for a gust to get up with my 2.4m Pocket Rocket I have been very impressed with this boards ability to stay at the surface. While I doubt this will be an awesome slog machine, I think the fact that it paddles so well makes up for that. I look forward to learning more about this boards low end mid season in 2026 and will comment more at that point.

Length: 6'5"

I have a 6'6" 90l Aviator that rides great so I wasn't afraid of this length. think longer boards smooth out pitch and tend to have better take off and touch down characteristics. I would say that's accurate on this board as well with one caveat. If I am grave digging, desperately trying to pump and save myself from a bad decision, and I touch down at a slow speed... I feel like this board grabs the water and jams on the brakes more than the Carver or Aviator. Takeoffs and full speed touches are excellent though.

Width: 19"

18" is about as skinny as I can really rip turns on but the whole time I'm doing it I feel like I'm on a narrow board. 20" has been my gold standard for a long time but the subtle concavity of the Pilot deck opened my eyes to the possibility of boards being fun under 20". I had never ridden a 19" board before and 19" was an important box to check in my overall understanding of board dims and performance. This board, at 19", with it's widened rail to rail concavity, is excellent. I don't feel hindered or held back when turning my Silk 1050 and as I have tested it on smaller foils the narrower width has been perfect. While I don't expect I'll buy another 18" board in the future, I can definitely see 19"-20" being the long term norm for me.

Thickness: 4.25" or 10.8cm

Thinner is better. I'm yet to find any scenario where I want a thicker board. Thinner rails grab less and release quicker when carving hard and clipping the water. Thinner boards are less tippy when sitting in the water. Thinner boards get you closer to the foil, making your foil system more responsive.

Weight: 9.75lbs (4.43kg) without pad. 10lbs 3oz (4.63kg with pad)

Light boards are awesome. They are easy to throw around on the water. They are also easy to carry across the beach. It's hard to find fault in a light board in normal conditions. I think I spend an abnormally high amount of time riding in high winds in comparison to most riders. I've jokingly started to say that anything under 30 knots should be considered "light wind" while winds 30 and up are "good winds." When gusts reach 40 knots I feel like light boards get themselves in trouble. They have a tendency to take flight on the beach as well as on the water when unattended.

Deck, Hull, Rail Shape:

I'm not a shaper myself so I'm just going to share the shape details direct from Sunova and will add a few comments below:

Screenshot from the Sunova homepage.

The Foil Box:

If you are buying this board to wing or parawing it's important to note that this board is designed for prone. As such, the box is further back than any of my other Sunova boxes have been. Every other board I mount the back of my mast plate even with the bottom of the number 5 written on the bottom of the board. It spooked me when I unboxed and I was worried I had made a mistake in my order. I ride the foil almost all the way to the front of the box, about 2 inches further forward than my others, leaving me about an inch to spare and it feels just right. If you have a serious concern about mast placement just ask Sunova to slide the box forward a bit to optimize it for wing/para usage.

This is where my mast has historically sat on all my Sunova boards.

This is where it sits on the Pilot Mid.

Answers to my questions:

• Prone paddling? Excellent.

• Slogging? Unknown at the moment.

• 19" stability in the water? No issues.

• 19" width in flight? No issues, but I don't think I'll go narrower if I want to surf foils over 900mm in span.

• Does a long, skinny, low volume board crack the code for takeoff? Yes, I'm loving it so far.

• Is 68l (-17l vs dry weight. -25l vs wet weight.) too low for me to parawing? No. I don't seem to have any issues with this volume to weight ratio for the downwind upwind riding I do.

Final Thoughts

TBD

Questions?

Feel free to ask any questions in the comments section below and I'll do my best to answer!

See you at the river,

Bryan Lee, M.S. Experiential Education.