The board arrived beautifully packaged and in perfect condition. Not a weird blemish or tiny chip in sight. It is an interesting shape and carries much of its width across the length of the board and is much thicker than I was expecting, clearly to pack in the volume into a short shape. The photos we've seen on this forum before didn't really convey how thick the board is in the middle in my opinion. I haven't weighed it, but the board is super light. I think it may be lighter than my 8'2" Starboard Pro.
Unsurprisingly it's more stable than my 8'2" x 29 x 118 Pro and a bit less stable than my 8' 133l Hypernut. I am around 106kgs at the moment without a wetsuit. I received the board yesterday just in time for some swell after about a 3 week flat spell. I paddled out this morning at my local at 5am in 1-2 foot slightly janky conditions with the occasional 3 foot set. Multiple swell periods from slightly different directions after the storm last night coupled with a breezy cross shore (11 to 21 knots) made for slightly challenging conditions, but the board was easy to stand on and to paddle into the wind. I tend to judge a board's stability these days based on how much I need to concentrate. I was able to stare at interesting things on the beach and let my wind wander, which means I was very comfortable. Frankly, in the near future I would be tempted to step down a size to the 7'6" x 29" x 115l.
Paddling into waves is easy enough, but it does help to get your front foot and weight as close to the front as possible. The board handled late drops very well, despite it not having much rocker. On the wave the board is exactly what Dave Boehne said it would be in the Infinity videos - flowy, squirrelly, skatey and fast. Having said that, put your foot on the back and you can do some sweet carvey cut backs and throw buckets of spray. The board is happy on both vertical and lateral turns and I did a really sweet top turn on a close out section that I was particularly proud of. The board is an awesome groveller, exactly like I suspected. It will be interesting to see how it handles slightly meatier 3-5 foot waves and to discover its limits.
I guess I ought to balance the review and include something to gripe about. The light deck pad looks great, but it's going to be a nightmare to keep clean. I've already got some dirt on it from my roof rack. I also wish that the handle was a bit deeper. I tend to go out in all sorts of super windy conditions and the lack of depth is a minor concern when it comes to being able to hold onto the board and when putting it on / taking it off the roof racks.
Overall I think it's a great board for 90% of the typical UK conditions if you are looking for something short and fun.
Some quick photos (please excuse the fencing as I have building work going on at my house)
Certainly an interesting shape..I'm not sure I could paddle such a short length board these days...so used to over 9ft boards nowadays. Agree on the handles, just wait until you try carrying the board mid winter..manageable with 1.5 mm gloves but I'd struggle with thicker. Good to hear it is a ripper! My deck pad is pretty minging but then I always wax them.adds character 
Select to expand quoteSlab said..
Certainly an interesting shape..I'm not sure I could paddle such a short length board these days...so used to over 9ft boards nowadays. Agree on the handles, just wait until you try carrying the board mid winter..manageable with 1.5 mm gloves but I'd struggle with thicker. Good to hear it is a ripper! My deck pad is pretty minging but then I always wax them.adds character
When I first picked it up I recalled a post on here complaining about the handle and gloves. I guess that was your post
I reckon this board is the perfect stepping stone for those wanting to get onto something smaller. It's forgiving enough that if you are currently used to something up to 9' and around <140 litres, then you will be able to get used to this fairly quickly. Select to expand quoteKisutch said..
these look sweet, I have white pad on Blurr and it only gets dirty if you wax.
I wax my other boards, but haven't this one yet. That means my roof rack has a bit of old wax and dirt and is dirtying up the pad. Oh well.
I really wanted to see how good the Escape Pod would be at grovelling compared to my Pro on the same day, even though the Pro is clearly not designed for it. So off I went with both boards to UK's premier grovelling and logging destination - Saunton Sands. The forecast was 2-3 foot and the never ending onshore wind was quite gentle for a change. I surfed the Pro first thing in the morning in the cleanest conditions and then I jumped onto Escape Pod after a short hydration break.
The Pro reacted begrudgingly, but I still managed to get a few rides. The Escape Pod on the other hand was all "woohoo, yay, yippee". Trying any sort of turn on the Pro would normally mean getting hung up and the wave passing me by. I do think that bigger fins would wake it up a bit, but the board needs a bit of oomph from the wave to work. The Escape Pod allowed me to string a few maneouvres together and managed to keep going through all sections. This is self evident in the length of ride. What was interesting though is that the Escape Pod felt much quicker, but the difference was only about 1-2 km/h on all the waves.
I believe that I have now found my perfect 2 board quiver. The Pro for the good days and the Escape Pod for every other day. I'll probably keep the 8'8" Spice for the occasional really big and challenging days, but I'll be getting rid of everything else.
Some more photos. You can see here how thick it actually is. The rail itself is quite thin and then the board gets fat very quickly with an aggressively stepped rail.
Looks sweet Seb. Be great to try the MR twins on it, ala Smik hipsters. Could imagine get really 12 0 clock vertical reos on that design. Interesting tail, kind of a diamond/area pin/swallow hybrid with a square tail thrown in-one with the lot. Lot of design parameters being played with here. Keep the reports coming mate ;-)
Select to expand quotebackbeach said..
Looks sweet Seb. Be great to try the MR twins on it, ala Smik hipsters. Could imagine get really 12 0 clock vertical reos on that design. Interesting tail, kind of a diamond/area pin/swallow hybrid with a square tail thrown in-one with the lot. Lot of design parameters being played with here. Keep the reports coming mate ;-)
The board comes with Futures boxes and I haven't seen a Futures version of the MR fins for sale. I think they only come in FCS II variant?.
An MR branded version is only FCS. But plenty of MR style (futures box) fins are available...
Eg:
www.surfnvs.com/collections/apex-twins/products/nautilus-twin-stabilizer-apex
www.trueames.com/collections/twin-fins/products/ta-twin-futures-compatible
futuresfins.com.au/products/en-twin-1
For the moment I am very happy with the stock fins, but I'll experiment in the future
I've finally got myself an action cam, so been recording a few sessions, but until I get around to editing them, here is a little video that I got off the Surfline cam, so apologies for the quality. Still loving this board. She excels in the smaller stuff like in the video, but I've had her out in 4-6 foot max so far and it was actually more manageable than I had imagined, even though she loves to go fast.
