C-Forum

Just wondering what the pros and cons of these 2 boats are in terms of a good river runner.

Cheers,
(O)C

My vote goes for the Atom, as a C1 river runner. Haven't paddled the Whip-it, but know it to be a smaller, narrower boat designed to be a kayak.
Bruce

I Have a Whip- it. I'm 5'10" and 190 lbs and bought it hoping that it would surf better than my Slasher.
It doesn't.
The Whip-it feels slow and squirley with a strong tendencey towards pearling. It might be better for a lighter paddler.

Tommy

I owned a Whiplash and have paddled an Atom. Note that the Whip-It is a pretty small boat, the Whip-Lash has a bit more volume. My impression of the Whip-It/Lash boats :

cons:
*narrow, no primary stability to speak of...

pros:
*fast for a conversion
*good secondary stability
*surfs, carves awesomely
*stern squirts like butter
*nice enders (good "pop")
*the lack of primary stability made me a better boater...


To Tommy T:
I can understand your impressions of the Whip-It, you'd probably have had a better time of it in the Whip-lash (it's bigger), and compared to a Slasher just about any conversion will seem slooooow. The pearling might have been due to your trim, might have been due to technique. The Whip* boats, are short and rockered, leaning forwards and backwards influence them a lot. On a steep wave I could surf up a storm, but feel like I had been doing situps the entire time from the leaning back... It carved like a banshee, I could cut back from nearly impossible angles where the Slasher would have irretrievably washed off.

Now I have a Score, all that plus low enough volume in the bow to cartwheel/flat water tricks, stable enough for naps, and only a little slower.

Scott

p.s. I know of a Whiplash for sale cheap, might even be able to bring it to the May 22-23 Armada...

Could be my technique. Short boats are a mystery to me. I figured mostly I was just too big for it. Didn't seem to have much primary or secondary stability.
Got a Foreplay and while it's kind of slow and my technique still leaves much to be desired it's a lot easier to control and when I mess up I usualy know why.
Gonna try the Whipit out on my kid if I can get her motivated. See if she likes it any better.

Tommy

Thanks for the comments-

Paddled the Atom and liked the stability, speed and general feel.

Think it will be a great & comfortable river runner...