SUNOVA Carver : the effortless glide board review with Tom Saunders from Poseidon Sports

A few days ago, a new board was added to the already extensive range of SUNOVA foil boards, which were presented to us by James Casey last summer. This board is the SUNOVA Carver! As its name suggests, this is the board that will let you go carving in waves of all conditions… but not only! With its longer narrower shape, the Caver promises to take off sooner and be the one-board-quiver for effortless glides. To check this out, we called on Tom Saunders from Poseidon Sports, one of the very first lucky owners of a Carver. This Australian is a loyal SUNOVA enthusiast, and gives us his detailed feedback on this new board.

Hi Tom! First of all, can you introduce yourself and your shop Poseidon Sports ?

Hi, yup I’m Tom from Poseidon Sports, I’ve been involved in water sports, both as a surfer/rider, but also as a worker from the retail floor to upper Management with big surf skate brands like Globe International for over 25 years. Poseidon Sports, ‘gear the Gods would ride’ was kind of a fun name I came up with when I went out on my own with Code foils, VAYU hand wing and riding SUNOVA boards (apologies to Poseidon Water Sports, I think they’re an English shop with same name, I became aware of later, but I bet they’re great too haha).

For several weeks now, we’ve been seeing on Instagram that you’ve been riding the new SUNOVA Casey. Carver, even though it only came out a few days ago. What’s your connection with SUNOVA?

I sell Code foils and VAYU hand wings, while riding SUNOVA boards, for both foiling and SUP surfing. I’m a SUP surf coach for Moon Tours in the Maldives, (yes I know, that should annoy everyone straight off haha) and have had a long relationship with SUNOVA riding and selling their boards. I’m also a sucker for timber and carbon and what they produce is high quality, high performance and with Marcus Tardrew and Bert Burger at the helm of design, they’re evolving quickly and making great boards.

With its elongated shape and really bevelled rails, the Carver stands out! As someone who’s had it in your hands, can you tell us more about its shape?

I first realised how efficient narrow boards were, when I took James Casey’s downwind SUP board prototype for a paddle and then a wing. It was 6’6″ x 19′ x 82L. It was literally the easiest board I’ve ever got off the water winging and refined light wind winging for me, it was also great for winging waves when the wind was light. The 6’6″ in my opinion, was a touch too long for winging, although the board was very light, so it had very little swing weight, but a touch longer than what would be ideal for riding waves. I did also note how well narrow boards, especially with chines, can bank over, carving or up winding and not touch rail. I found boards that are wider, always used to slap and touch when banking over, especially when there was lots of wing chop and had a chinless full rail to pack in volume. You can use a longer mast to counteract a wide board and full rail a bit, but when I wing waves, I don’t want longer than 85cm mast, nor do I want to slap rail and sometimes have the board ripped from under me.

When I was winging the 6’6″ x 19″, I don’t think I touched rail once, no matter how hard I banked! This was just so ideal for winging and wave riding and put my mind in motion for the perfect light wind and wave board. I’d already played around with the idea of narrow wing boards for efficiency, making my own scaled up kite race board for winging, as I saw how far those board could bank over, so I made a 5’0′ x 19″ x 60 L wing board, it worked great, but I’m an ugly glasser, so it wasn’t super pretty haha. I annoyed Marcus and Dylan from SUNOVAs via email (Bert’s son), on what I thought would be a great light wind and wave wing board. Turns out they were already onto it and were in works for what has become the Carver. As soon as I saw the design and shape, I put my order in and paid for it to be air freighted to me, hence I was one of the lucky ones to get it first. I think I even beat James Casey to the punch haha sorry James!

Can you tell me a little about its TR3 Tec construction?

I’ve ridden the TR3 Tec construction in their surf SUPs and I know it to be strong, durable, light and also have a bit of natural flex, all down the natural properties of the paulownia timber. Carbon rails, act as a double stringer to give it stiffness and keep its shape. How they laminate the carbon and timber together, is amazing and makes for, in my opinion, an exceptionally nice looking board and more environmentally friendlier, which I think is important too. You can also tint the resin for no extra weight, so you can get as custom and as pretty as you like. All my surf SUPs are purple and blue, with my downwind board being orange, in case I get lost at sea, but actually it just looks like a giant 7’6″ carrot haha.

What sizes do you have this new SUNOVA Carver in? It’s quite unusual that they’re all 20″ wide, from the smallest 4’8″ to the biggest 6’2″…

Yeah that’s a great balance of stability to get up and efficiency when getting up. 20″ wide is the sweet spot and they actually ride narrower, due to the bevelled rails/chines underneath, so the bottom of the board is much narrower. This also helps displace water as you gain board speed and pump up. You just have to choose your volume to what you’re trying to achieve, a sinker or body weight, session saver board. I have two, the 5’10” for light winds and the 4’11” 60L for strong winds. I’m 90 kg, so I kept some length in my sinker. Length tends to allow the board to come to the surface easier, where as short sinkers, can push water and get their nose stuck underwater, if you don’t have it balanced perfectly. Shorter boards have less glide getting up, so I always had to go a bigger hand wing to compensate, so I’d rather not do that anymore and just add a few extra inches, with very little downside.

How does this new board fit into the SUNOVA Casey range? Between the Aviator Wing and the Aviator Downwind maybe?

The Carver really is a great balance between the two and great for people who ride waves, light winds and all round winging. The Aviator wing is a great all round wing board and definitely great for those that freestyle, as it has more nose volume and width to land jumps and not push through the water, in a more compact shape, so if you have consistent wind and love jump, this is a great board for you. I snapped my ACL winging, so don’t jump anymore and where I ride waves, it’s very susceptible to holes in the wind and not sinker board friendly, so I use the Carver to get up on foil early and have a relatively short and narrow template that is perfect for wave and general riding. With the forward 16″  tracks, it’s really very little nose you get left with and to me, there’s more tax to be paid with a wider board, than there is long. Long is where the Aviator Downwind comes in, if you want to use a paddle to downwind, then depending on skill, you need extra length for both stability and efficiency to create the board speed with the paddle to be able to get up. A hand wing is bigger and more efficient than a paddle, so you don’t need all that extra length to get up, a true 7’0″ plus DW SUP is generally more length that what you want/need when winging.

For which program is this SUNOVA Carver designed, and in which conditions have you used it ?

The longer the board, say over 5’10 and above, is less conducive to freestyle and I didn’t ask for foot straps, my shorter Carver, the 4’11” or shorter is ideal for freestyle and jumping and you can get those with footstrap inserts. The longer carvers are for waves, light wind session savers and all round wing boards, whereas the shorter Carvers you can use for anything, wave, freestyle all round, they are just very efficient at getting out of the water and onto foil. This means you can use a smaller hand wing and a smaller foil, so for me, that’s ideal. The smaller foil and the smaller hand wing I can use while wave riding, the better.

Let’s get to the point: how did the SUNOVA Carver feel on the water?

These boards are extremely efficient and came up off the water beautifully super early! It is exactly what I hoped for. I would describe myself as an efficient pumper (hand wing and board), to get on foil, but if you are learning, have an injury or want to make it easier, go a bit longer or higher in volume than body weight. The boards are very stiff and due to that, you feel really connected to the foil. They bank and carve so well, as you never have to worry about catching rail.

I’ll leave you with the last word?

Don’t short change the length! The extra length, with the narrow width, is the whole point! I think we all did the ‘how short can you go’ with wing boards, getting down to using my prone 4’6′ board and blowing sessions, sloshing around not on foil, but remember when ordering yours, make sure you know what you’re trying to achieve. If you have a short wing board or freestyle wing board, don’t get something close in length, go longer, as remember the length and the volume gives you the efficiency to get on foil early and improve your bottom end. I’m 90 kg, riding a 5’10” carver and comfortable getting on foil in 8-10 knots, with my Code foils 850 S and VAYU Aura X 5m hand wing. I don’t want a 6 and 7m hand wing and a massive foil with a short board in efficient board, I’d much rather have a slightly longer, narrow board and a much smaller hand wing and foil, it’s way more fun and efficient when up and riding.. Choose wisely and have fun!

Thanks so much Tom for your feedback and for your advices!

SUNOVA Carver, available from 4’8 (54L) to 6’2 (95L) :

More about SUNOVA:
Facebook / Instagram / Official Website

Follow Poseidon Sports:
Instagram / Facebook / Official Website / YouTube