Another board that we tested last year and which hasn’t changed shape at all for this season.

On the water:

By modern standards the New Wave feels sleek and at only 235.5cm is actually now the longest board on test! Again, by modern standards the tail and nose are relatively narrow. However, the board is no old-style, high-grip toothpick – it features single concave from tail to track, giving it a slidey, low grip feel. The overriding sensation of the New Wave is its stunning acceleration and slippery feel through the water. Despite an average waveboard rocker and needing average amounts of wind to unstick, it seems to really shoot out of the blocks once up and going and quickly hit an impressive top speed. You can’t be heavy on the back foot and push too hard either upwind or into take-offs, but with such accessible speed on tap it’s a great jumping board. The ride is pretty lively and although not the most settled through chop for lesser ability sailors it is dynamic and exciting, and high speed gybes with good exit speed can be expected. On a wave it has good bite in the carve and feels very redirectable. It doesn’t have the low speed flow of a wider tailed onshore board or the snappiness of the twinsers, but it’s still fully riding capable and loves fast rides, giving controllable, smooth bottom turns and feels surprisingly easy to pivot off the top.

Fittings: The 75 comes with a good quality 22.5cm fin, suitably large to provide sufficient grip for all-round sailing. The straps too are excellent but be warned that Fanatic use very closely mounted strap inserts (14cm) that can end up wedging wider and/or booted feet too tightly. The deck is quite domed and the pads comfortable.

Overall: A very fast and exciting all-rounder that was very popular with the team, who perhaps enjoyed it even more this year having had one more season to acclimatise to single concave boards. It is a board that likes to do things at speed and yet doesn’t always feel 100% secure so it takes a bit of mastering – but the rewards are great! It’s not particularly biased to any one type of sailing, offering a good balance between riding and jumping and between onshore or slower waves and side shore or faster waves. While not perhaps the ideal first-timer’s high wind board, it’s undoubtedly excellent for jumping and faster riding.