Great Day on North Chic with new Hero and Hero Review

Dream boat! That is the new Hero. Takes care of you like having Super Man as a body guard. Today was a super fun day. Emily, Clay, Stephen, Jessica, and I ran the 12 miles of beautiful TN water.  See Stephen’s Article with photos here.

So what is it like?

1. First off the front view sitting in the boat is sweet!   Narrower knees and a turned up bow both make it sleeker and sexier as well as keep you from hitting your hands on the deck.    the bow inspires confidence that you will be able to keep it up easily.

2. Stability is incredible making each rapid seem like tipping is a thing of the past.

3. The turning and locking into eddies is snappier, sportier, and the natural turning radius is ideal for most eddies, making it an awesome creeker too.

4. Bow up- speed and ease of punching holes- and boofing:   This boat wants to stay dry!   UBER easy boofing on drops or just going through holes.  The bow lifts over the foam pile quickly and then the planing hull sails right through.   There is a little more bow lift than the Villain and you reel up higher at high speed, but the boat just keeps trucking downstream.     Late boofs are redicuously easy.   Petons are much easier to avoid with ample bow rocker.

5. Rolling- Ha- Not even worth talking about.   Unreal for how easy it is.

6. comfort and sizing- The Hero has ample volume, and plenty in the bow.    this means footroom too.    Super Hero same thing.    you’ll find a very similar foot area to the villain S and Villain.      Ample.

7. Speed- while the Hero isn’t made for flatwater speed, it is surprisingly fast for its length.   it is faster than lower rockered longer boats in the whitewater in most cases and would be a great racing boat for certain types of races because it paddles so dry.    Since the average speed a boat goes downstream (relative to the water) is only 2 miles an hour- with 0-4 being the typical range, it goes 4 miles/hour with a few acceleration strokes and floats like the best of them.  

Hero or Villain– that is going to be the big question for 2011!    Villain for a narrower, longer, creeker with more room for gear.    Hero for shorter, sportier, more stable, super easy to paddle boat.    The Villain is super easy to paddle in comparison in its category, but the Hero sets a new standard in that area.

EJ