Tales of Windsurfing on a Lake in the Southeast U.S.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Mistral NTrance: What a Nice Board

I sailed a Mistral NTrance XL today in 5 mph wind and thought it was fabulous. The 58 year old owner sailed an original tanker in the mid-80's and had not been on a board since. After I took it for a test ride, he went out and did really well.

He bought it with an Ezzy Superlight 6.5, which as you can see from Ezzy's site is not a high-end sail, but feels great and responsive and is well made.

Ezzy says the package comes with a 30% 460, but his came with a 450, which I hate to see. Why stick us with a non-standard mast length? I fault the shop for that. He also got a no-name mast base and the cleat is so wide that the line would not cleat off. I had Formuline and two other nice types of line and thank God the black/blue Chinook line worked in this base. I would recommend that any beginner who buys gear ask for a Chinook or other well known base as well as a standard length mast.

I don't see the NTrance on Mistral's site, so here are the specs from another site:

volume: 240
length: 290
width: 90
weight (kg): 13.9
construction: hrs composite / EVA
rec. sailsize: 6.8-10.5
freeride fin: 34

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

thanks for the review.
Looking to get into windsurfing on Lake Michigan in chicago and think this is a good fit.
Thanks again.
alex