Dan (01:03)
Welcome to the Lab Rat Foiler Podcast. My name is Dan, and today we have Andrea Crociada, an extremely well rounded foiler man that you caught my eye wave riding with the parawing. So welcome to the podcast, man.
Andrea Crociara (01:18)
Thank you. Thank you for yeah, thank you for having me. I'm super stoked and looking forward to talking all about pairwinging.
Dan (01:25)
Yeah, man. Look, you've you've been on a tear recently just posting clip after clip of powered up wave riding on the parawing, which I'm really excited to talk about, man. Not that many people are doing what you're doing. I think it's an underexplored area in parawing to be on a wave with a powered parawing. So I really, really appreciate your creative approach. So I'm really keen to break down some of your
wave riding clips. You sent me some clips, so we'll go through those. keen to talk about what gear you're riding to make wave riding possible. you know, what's your local spot like and the ideal wind direction for wave riding and all that stuff. But before we get into all that, I'm really keen to understand a little bit more about you, man.
Like where did you start like your sporting journey and how did you get into foiling? And we'll go from there.
Andrea Crociara (02:21)
Yeah. Well yeah, I was really never honestly a a water person. I was never like since little I was always a more on the ground type of guy. I was always skateboarding,
Dan (02:34)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (02:35)
dirt biking, biking, but I was never never in the water sports, as a little kid. my dad was always a windsurfer, kiter, and now winger and pairwinger. And he always tried to get me into into the water sports, but I
I never never gave in. But yeah, COVID is what did it for me. yeah, when COVID came around it just got so boring and then my dad started learning a wing at the harbor down in we have a harbor here which where all the beginners learn and it's like a really nice flat water place to learn. And he was down there one day and I decided to go and, you know, check it out 'cause it was really boring in COVID. And that's where, you know, actually most people learned was during COVID.
It's kinda also when the sports kinda started to, you know, get known. And so I went down there and I tried it and it was fairly fun, fairly easy. And then I just stuck to it because there was honestly nothing else to do during that time. There was no school and there was not really h hanging out with people. So yeah, that was the one activity to do and I stuck to it and then fast forward to that I yeah, didn't go to school and then I just started winging every single day.
Dan (03:50)
good. That's the life, man. So you live
Andrea Crociara (03:51)
Exactly.
Dan (03:53)
you live in Maui?
Andrea Crociara (03:55)
Yes, correct.
Dan (03:56)
You were born in Maui or did your parents move to Maui like 'cause that's that's
Andrea Crociara (04:00)
I was born in Maui.
Dan (04:01)
an Italian that's an Italian surname, right? Cur Cruciata?
Andrea Crociara (04:04)
Yep,
yep. Yeah, so I was I was born in Maui. my dad moved to Maui a couple of years before I was born for windsurfing. So yeah, he moves here for windsurfing from Italy.
Dan (04:15)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (04:16)
and so I still I still go back to Italy, like since I was born every summer, I never skipped the summer of going back to Italy and Europe.
Dan (04:23)
Where do you go in Italy?
Andrea Crociara (04:25)
well we have a a house for for the summer over there, which is next to Venice, right below Venice. And so
Dan (04:30)
Mm hmm. Mm-hmm. Amazing.
Andrea Crociara (04:34)
You know, now each time I go back I bring all my gear and I also wing out in Europe, so it's fun.
Dan (04:40)
Not a bad life, bro. That's really good.
what so you started on the wing and but I've seen clips of you on the kite, I've seen clips of you doing, you know, rock starts and all that stuff. Like tell us a little
Andrea Crociara (04:52)
Yeah,
Dan (04:53)
bit about all the the disciplines that you practice in foiling.
Andrea Crociara (04:56)
Well, I kinda started I did it totally backwards actually, which is funny. So I yeah, I started with the wing and I learned to wing
Dan (05:03)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (05:04)
foil. and then I learned to kite and then I learned to windsurf last. So actually I
Dan (05:11)
Wow. Yeah, that that is opposite.
Andrea Crociara (05:13)
yeah, I did it total opposite. But yeah, I'd say, you know, I'm always w winging and par winging the most now. kiting is, you know, still one of my
favorite sports out there. And windsurfing which I love a lot, but I'm not too good at it and I don't do it that much. But I you know, I still I still, you know, appreciate this the windsurfing sport.
Dan (05:38)
Yeah, I I feel like windsurfers get more in the way than anything else, but I appreciate the people who appreciate windsurfing.
But tell me a little bit about so you were like really good. I mean I've seen you, you know, on the wing, so you were really proficient on the wing. What kind of caught your eye with the pairwing that made you kind of, you know, say, I wanna try that. I wanna give the parawing a go?
Andrea Crociara (06:02)
Yeah, well it's pretty funny 'cause, you know, when pairwinging first came out, I was pretty skeptical about it actually. and I was like, you know, it's it looks it's just like a little trash bag with lines on it, you know. It's like
Dan (06:16)
Hmm.
Andrea Crociara (06:18)
I'd rather go kiting if I was gonna pairwing, you that's what I used to say. I was like, you know, I don't really see the point. But then, you know, I started to play with it in like let's say the most the key factor of pairwinging back then to me was like, well
you get to stow it and that's that's the main thing is like if I'm gonna do a downwind or whatever and I don't need a paddle now or I don't need anything, I just need a pairwing and I get to stow it and then it disappears. So it's almost like you're doing like a you know, a prone downwind at that point. So that's where I like
Dan (06:46)
Yeah. A hundred percent.
Andrea Crociara (06:48)
kind of accepting the pairwing a little bit more and I was doing some downwinds and stuff and experimenting.
and then of course like after that the first thing I wanted to do with it was go on the waves and
stow it away in the waves because it's like it's like you know it's like doing toe foiling but you know without
Dan (07:07)
Hundred percent.
Andrea Crociara (07:07)
a jet ski. That's what I called it. I always called it toe foiling without a jet ski. So
Dan (07:12)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (07:12)
took it on the waves and I'd stow it on a wave and I'd ride my whole wave pretty much, you know, just Yeah, carving, carving, carving and then I'd fall and then when you fall, since it's still stowed away, I'd actually prone a wave back on foil and then redeploy it. And so
Dan (07:27)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (07:31)
Then I was like, wow, this is actually really fun. You know, it's like it's almost like a free for all. It's just like a playground out there. And
Dan (07:38)
Awesome.
Andrea Crociara (07:38)
it really opened up, you know, new doors for me for the pairwing. So then I got, you know, even more interested in it. and I kinda stuck to that for a little bit just to see, you know, what more I could do. and then came the day that my dad, he actually totally quit winging for the pairwing.
Dan (07:59)
Really? Converted. Hundred percent.
Andrea Crociara (08:00)
Yeah. So yep.
He fully converted. So he g he actually just gave up on the wing and just went straight to the pairwing and just said, you know, forget about the wing. And you know, he he likes kiting a lot on the waves. And so
Dan (08:15)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (08:15)
his first thought instead was it wasn't stowing, it was riding the wave powered. So that was his first thought. So mine was, you know, stowing it and you know, feeling like I'm toefoiling. instead
Dan (08:28)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (08:28)
he had the thought of
riding a wave powered with the pairwing, so it feels like, you know,
Dan (08:33)
How cool.
Andrea Crociara (08:34)
kiting in a way. so that's actually where I got the idea of of trying it out and you know, it took me a little bit 'cause I actually didn't like his idea at first. Yeah.
Dan (08:44)
You're like, man,
this is supposed to go away and get rid of it. But it does I mean, you can do both, right? Like I've I've been just reading comments of people like on your clips and they're like, Why are you doing that? And they're like, dude, you can you can do both. Like you could catch a wave, stow it, you could catch a wave and like throw throw a big
Andrea Crociara (09:00)
Yes.
Dan (09:02)
air with the powered pairwing and then it's all good, you know?
Andrea Crociara (09:06)
Yeah. Yeah, I still see a lot of lot of people in the comments are not too used to it yet.
Dan (09:13)
I know, it's just I just like the creativity, man, 'cause it's it is something that we're not seeing that much.
And I'm keen to kind of understand because you mentioned a few things like winging and and kiting, coming together. Like what kind of skills do you think that you transferred from those two sports into parawinging?
Andrea Crociara (09:38)
well let's see the kiting I mean kiting definitely has on like on a surfboard, you know, in the waves definitely has its its close riding skills I'd say from when you're doing your bottom turn to hitting your top turn and it really to the pairwing it actually really transfers nicely. You know, it it feels really, really close to kiting, honestly.
with the wing instead I don't really see it that similar to pairwinging. I see it more as I feel like more I'm when I'm windsurfing actually, when I'm wave riding with the wing. not flagged, by the way. So when I'm
Dan (10:19)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Andrea Crociara (10:20)
actually powered y like using my wing and I do my bottom turns and I lay my wing like as close as I
Dan (10:26)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (10:26)
can to the water and I come for my top turn, you know, that feels like you know, windsurfing, more than kiting, but a pairwing instead is actually
almost identical in my body positioning, correlated to kite. So
Dan (10:38)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
It's cool because I I see like when I saw your clips, I'm looking at the pairwing and I'm seeing like how you're holding the bar and where you're sending the pairowing and when you're like r riding away with the kite. And I used to foil with the kite on some waves like a long time ago. And you do have to kind of like be a little bit ahead of what you're doing with the pairowings. Like you have to anticipate the moves so you're always powered. So
I was really happy when I saw that. I'm like, man, you're crushing it out there. and I think like I I just like to talk about these skill transfers because a lot of people that are winging that are thinking about pairowinging and they do bring some good skills that will help them with the pairing, just like the board balance when you're trying to pop up. You know, that the early phase of learning how to pairwing is such a grind, man.
I'm actually curious to go back to your first session on the pairwing.
And get your impressions of like what surprised you when you got out on the parawing for the first time?
Andrea Crociara (11:44)
Ooh, that's a good one. I think my first impression you know, going on a pairwing was the pull it had, honestly. It was
Dan (11:56)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (11:56)
like the difference in how a wing sheets out and a pairwing at the time really didn't. So back
Dan (12:06)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (12:06)
then it was like that was my first impression, is I I'd hop on my board and you know, now I'm flying it with one hand and I don't need two hands.
which was that felt nice 'cause it felt, you know, more free. And you know, this the constant pull that it had was really interesting to me. You know, there was not much pumping at the beginning. It was really just like either I'm pumping a lot my board to get on foil, but my pairing would just be there to kind of just have this constant pull and get me up on foil. And, you know, it was interesting to feel to feel, you know, something different like that and not really having much
you know, pumping to it as as you would with a wing, you know. but it was just this like
Dan (12:44)
Yeah. Yeah. What what
was your first one? What
Andrea Crociara (12:49)
Huh?
Dan (12:50)
was your first pairwing?
Andrea Crociara (12:51)
It was it was the the first pocket rocket from Ozone. Yeah.
Dan (12:57)
Yeah, okay, the V one.
Andrea Crociara (12:59)
Yeah, it's the V one. That was my fur the first one. And I mean I think that was one of the better w first ones, honestly.
Dan (13:05)
Yeah, yeah. P some people still like to ride that one, to be honest. it's it's a great pairwing.
Andrea Crociara (13:11)
Mm-hmm.
Dan (13:12)
but yeah, I think I think you're right. Like I think the thing that surprises a lot of the wingers is the lack of bottom end. And it like compared to like you could just pump a wing and you get on foil, parrowing requires a little more effort. but I think once you're up, you know, you get the advantages of all you can do with it. What was the hardest skill, man, that you learned, like
From the start to like what you're doing now. What was the one thing that kind of like, hmm, this is kind of tough on the pairing that you kind of had to work at a little bit and and break through? because I I love to see you ride, man. I I I I love people that come from a winging background that like, you know, they're always on their heel side stance and riding up wind, all that stuff. Like it looks nice when, you know, you're you're riding efficiently, let's call it.
rather than being on your toe side all the time, that kind of stuff. But I think that would have come pretty naturally to you. But what was that one skill that kind of took you a little bit of time to get your head around?
Andrea Crociara (14:14)
Yeah, yeah. I honestly like I don't think it really was like super hard, but it's something I'm honestly still going after is always improving how I pump a pairwing. Honestly. that's probably the one thing that I am still trying to find the best and better better way to to figure out like what's the best way to pump a pairwing to get me up on foil the fastest.
That's probably
Dan (14:43)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (14:43)
the one main thing that I'm always going after. other than that, I mean like the first thing I probably want to do on a pairing was like let me tack it. You know, let me see how tacks work, how backflips work and stuff like that. But I think the main thing I'm really always going after is the pumping ability of each and every different model of pair wings and really seeing maybe what model pumps better and
How to pump a model maybe more efficiently than others, you know? But yeah, it's really
Dan (15:16)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (15:17)
to me, it's to me it's always how to get up on foil the fastest, especially for me being the waves. I don't really want to get, you know, just you know, washed in the waves constantly. I like to just get up and go. So definitely it'd be my pumping technique. I'm always trying to improve that. Yeah.
Dan (15:35)
That's interesting. Yeah, I
saw like back in the day, I remember I had a a few chats with Boz Mueller and he was he was kind of pumping the pairwing in a circular motion. Like he would
Andrea Crociara (15:45)
Mm-hmm.
Dan (15:46)
bring it forward and then bring it back and bring it forward. I don't do that anymore, but that's something that I kind of tried a little bit at the start. And I think what you mentioned there is really interesting about how different model of pairwings pump differently. So right now I'm
pretty much exclusive exclusively on the afterburners and that parrowing pumps like nothing. Like I'm getting on foil without pumping my legs, right? and it's it's really impressive. But then when you go to a pocket rocket, that one kind of shoots you a little bit further downwind. And you kind of if you just leave it there, then you kind of pump your board and that's how like I think it performs better when you get up.
Have you written all those pairowings and what's your impression on them then?
Andrea Crociara (16:37)
I am left out on the afterburner. That's the one it's the one pair wing I haven't actually got to use yet just because I've been really focusing on the waves and
Dan (16:44)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (16:45)
I wasn't too sure if I want to bring an afterburner in the waves, you know? So
Dan (16:49)
Yeah, it's I'm curious to s to have you try it though.
Andrea Crociara (16:53)
yeah, yeah. I'm it looks I mean I've tried it on the beach. it looks, you know, fantastic for flat water speed and maneuverability and all that. It looks amazing.
but I haven't gotten a chance to to really give it a good day yet. so yeah, I will be excited to try that one. But as of lately, yeah, it's it's I've tried all of except the Afterburns, the Power Pack, the V one, the V two and the Pocket Rocket V two Ultra X. So those
Dan (17:24)
Yeah. What what are your
thoughts on the Ultra? I tried it just the other day too.
Andrea Crociara (17:28)
I honestly love it. to me I I put it in a way that it's it feels like an in between of a power pack and a pocket rocket. That's you know, kinda how I feel that it works. You know, it's like it's it feels like a power pack but with way more performance, you know?
Dan (17:48)
Yeah, so tell me what what bits of the power pack do you think it brings in?
Andrea Crociara (17:52)
Well, the power pack the thing I love the most about the power pack was it always really got me up on foil really easily, you know, it was just this like little punch ball and and the stowing ability was just was amazing. And so
Dan (18:05)
It's ridiculous. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (18:08)
actually that was my number one go to in the waves for the day I would decide that I would be like, All right, today I'm just gonna stow it was, you know, I'd always choose the power pack because it was just like
you know, fold away in like a second and then I'm just riding the wave and having a good time. and then the V two pocky rocket instead I would you know I'd use it more if I was like I'm not really gonna stow it today, I'm just gonna, you know, wave ride powered and so I'd go for
Dan (18:36)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (18:37)
my my you know, the pocky rocket V two. but the old tracks now it's like I'm doing both and with ease. So it's like I'm getting performance and I'm getting
you know, a really, really fast stash, which is like insane to me. And I'm getting two and one on top of, you know, it being really light and it has a more I'd say direct feel, like from your bar to the pairwing. It's
Dan (19:07)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (19:07)
it feels more direct and it also acts faster. So any movement you do in the bar, it does it faster than
let's say the normal Pocket Rocket V two. but yeah, I mean I've been loving the Ultrax. It's amazing and it really does everything, honestly.
Dan (19:29)
That's the that yellow and blue one on the clips that you ride. Yeah,
Andrea Crociara (19:32)
Exactly. Yeah.
Dan (19:33)
yeah. I feel like 'cause I took it out the other day as well and I was d just doing like some fast carving going down wind and I felt it drifted really well, which I think for w I mean, powered up wave riding it like it's kind of like a kite. You need something that drifts super well going down the line.
Andrea Crociara (19:52)
Exactly, yeah, you you said it perfectly. that's exactly a good thing that the Ultrex does is it provides a better drift with the light material. So I mean the
Dan (20:02)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (20:03)
wind takes it better and you know, because of that it actually pumps better. That I I found that it actually does pump better. So since the material's lighter and it tends to drift more in the wind, every time let's say I'll have my boom here, but every time you go
Dan (20:20)
there you go.
Andrea Crociara (20:21)
you go out
on a pump,
Dan (20:22)
Hmm.
Andrea Crociara (20:23)
it goes out faster than the normal material does. So it actually has a a quicker pumping reaction compared to the the normal materials. So that's something I didn't notice.
Dan (20:37)
Yeah, I agree a hundred percent with that. It's
just that recovery recovers from that pump well, so you're ready just to pump again.
Andrea Crociara (20:43)
Exactly.
Dan (20:45)
which I think is like when you try the afterburner, send me a message, man, because I'm really curious to see what your thoughts are on the pumping because that pairwing has so many ribs and is so stable that you can pump and the thing just is just solid. It takes zero time to, you know, recover. But in saying that, like when you're on the wave, you don't want to spanny
parrowing cause to do those turns, bottom turn and quick, like you want something that's a little bit lower aspect that will turn a little bit better. And it's even better if it kinda pulls you downwind too. So yeah I'm I'm keen to try some of the stuff that you're trying, man. Like when the the waves are, you know, kind of chest high here. I'm gonna chuck some straps on and get get Andrea style out there and try some stuff. I love it. It's fun, man.
Andrea Crociara (21:31)
Yeah, you gotta gotta figure it out. It's very fun.
Dan (21:35)
I
I wanna keep going with gear though because I'm keen to understand a little bit more about your quiver, the stuff that you're riding on the waves. so what board and foil do you normally ride?
Andrea Crociara (21:47)
Yeah, so honestly I pretty much use my my wing setup all the time and I
Dan (21:51)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (21:52)
use that for pairwinging if I'm you know freestyling around the waves. and I'm always on a sixty liter. I have a Apple Slice V four from Apple Tree and that's always my board to go. unless I'm doing a downwind, then I switch it with my mid l mid length that I have, which is actually a sixty seven liter, just a tiny tad bit bit bigger.
but yeah for the waves I'm always on the 60 liter apple slice and I love that board. I mean it's perfect for pairwinging you know to do performance things. And my foils instead I always vary between two different foils. So it's either the 737 Razor from SAB or the BALS 805.
And
I you know, I've I switch between those two depending on, you know, if it's a little bit lighter wind, smaller waves, I'll go in the balls. and if it's a little bit bigger waves, more energy, more wind, then I'll go in the razor, seven thirty seven.
Dan (23:01)
Yeah, nice. I like I like minimal setups like that. Like you don't have much to choose from. Two foils and a board. Let's get out there. What size mass do you ride?
Andrea Crociara (23:06)
Yeah. Yeah.
I use a eighty five centimeter. Yeah. Always eighty five.
Dan (23:14)
Yeah. Yeah, nice.
Andrea Crociara (23:16)
And seventy five I've tried it out for winging and pairwinging, but I'm a I'm always a eighty five fan.
Dan (23:25)
Yeah. I'm I went from eighty to eighty five as well. I feel like if it's a little bit, you know, a little bit bumpy and you're trying to get up wind quick, you want to lean on the para wing, like a little bit of extra mast allows you just to plow through chop and stuff like that. It feels more like kiting, kite foiling kind
Andrea Crociara (23:41)
Yeah.
Dan (23:42)
of vibe.
and then what how how much do you weigh, Andrea? So just we can give the audience a little bit of reference to your board and volume stuff.
Andrea Crociara (23:51)
I'm
at right now I'm about one sixty-four. Yeah, round that.
Dan (23:56)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (23:56)
Yeah, so I'm at one sixty four. And yeah, I mean sixty liter is pretty much perfect for me. I like a a
little bit more floaty board, even if I'm winging, just 'cause you
Dan (24:08)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (24:09)
know, I used to ride way smaller boards. I actually feel like we evolved, you know, we went we all went like from big boards to micro boards and now we're all kind of
Dan (24:19)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (24:20)
back up to using bigger boards. and you know, the shape of boards they all evolved and got better and better and so now even with I think bigger boards you still get almost the same performance out of a board than you know than back then when you had to use like a thirty liter board to feel like you had a cool like writing experience
Dan (24:41)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (24:41)
instead of a big board. So
Dan (24:44)
Yeah, and I'm assuming for to do like airs and come back and white w like ride the whitewash and stuff like that, you want a little bit of volume just to pop you back up as fast as possible.
Andrea Crociara (24:55)
Yeah.
Dan (25:51)
I I also want to chat to you about what accessories do you use to stow and ride waves? Are you just using the the stash belt or do you have anything else that you use?
Andrea Crociara (26:05)
N I'm mainly always using the stash belt. Yeah, the ozone stash belt is always my go to. I used to I used to experiment just with my wetsuit actually, my wetsuit top. So I
Dan (26:16)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (26:16)
would just I would you know turn on a wave with my with my power pack and just like stow it away into my shirt, like into wetsuit
Dan (26:26)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (26:26)
top, and then I'd just ride my wave like that and it was you know, it was actually pretty fun. That was it that worked too.
But but yeah, now I I
Dan (26:35)
It does.
Andrea Crociara (26:35)
always use the stash bill just because it also has the little hook so I can hook in and it's very convenient to be hooked in while riding, you know. So it's I do both, you know, it's hook
Dan (26:47)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (26:47)
in and stash and it's it's convenient.
Dan (26:50)
When I see some of your clips and like when you deep out of the parawing and you're riding with the parawing in your hand, I always feel I just want that one more step of getting actually rid of it quick and bringing it out quick as well. But the stash belt you do have to like give it a couple folds and you don't wanna, you know, fold it the wrong way 'cause then redeploying is a hassle. So do you feel that it's like there's anything that we can explore with accessories that can make that better? 'Cause I'm an an accessory like
pursuit right now to help with just making any kind of stowing and stashing as quick as possible.
Andrea Crociara (27:27)
Ooh, gotcha. I really haven't thought about, you know, the accessory side of it yet. I've been really caught up with with my wave routing having it powered, so I haven't really got the you know, the thought process yet of really, you know, finding better and faster ways to stash. but you know, that's a good point and it's it'd be really nice if you know if we find better and faster ways for sure.
Dan (27:54)
Yeah, I'm trying all sorts of stuff, man. I got like neoprene tops that I kind of put like some sort of stretchy material on the front for me to stow and try that. Like cause there's a there's a thing about that front stow that looks a little kooky. You know, you have a big kind of pregnant belly when you're riding, which I don't like, but it's fast. It's super
Andrea Crociara (28:16)
Yeah.
Dan (28:16)
fast, you know? and I've been working with ride engine on a vest just to get
you know, an entry and an exit when you're stowing so you can actually do a dirty stow. You can just put the bar and the leading edge, boom, get all that stuff in. And then you bring it out to the other side and that kind of works so the lines don't get tangled and all that. So I was curious to know like if you have any thoughts, even if it's later, let me know because I'm I'm deep into that rabbit hole right now to get
Andrea Crociara (28:47)
Yeah, yeah.
Dan (28:48)
a sub sub five second stow
is the goal 'cause I think for r wave riding, man, if we I mean we take ten seconds to probably stow it properly, folding it, stuffing it in the in the belt. And then like you have to catch the wave so far out or work away to catch the wave in a different spot. And then you want to be riding that performance part of the wave with with it away. So a sub five second stow is what I'm after. And I told Dom as well, from Ozone I'm like, man, those power packs, I think we can do it like
How can we make it better? And I'm always sending them emails about like how we can make the stove quicker. So that's how I push Ozone, the stove. Everything else they they just kick ass.
Andrea Crociara (29:30)
Yeah, that's I think that's a good that's something good to look to look after is the stow and yeah, I'm I definitely r didn't really think about I didn't really think about it that much, but I'm sure if we find, you know, better and better and faster ways to stow, I mean it'd be even better just f especially for the waves, that's it. I mean like downwinding I have no problem. Like I'm relaxed
Dan (29:52)
Yeah, doesn't matter.
Andrea Crociara (29:53)
and I'm just cruising, but then when I'm in the waves it's like I get on the wave and the second I turn on a wave and I'm like
I'm like, I wanna w ride this wave like you know, like right now. Instead I'm like
Dan (30:02)
Now. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (30:04)
well wait, first I have to put put away my my pear wing. And so I yeah, I mean the technique I have for the waves is pretty decent actually, I think. I see people downwinding and they get they get really fancy with it. I mean I see guys they go downwind, they and they're doing like it almost looks like art, you know. They're putting it away and it looks like they stowed it away just like it came from the factory, you like
That's pretty impressive. But then, you know, when I'm in the waves, it's like I just wanna put it away as fast as possible, but without really messing it up, you know, because I still wanna
Dan (30:38)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (30:39)
get my my my redeploy when I s you know, take it out the stash bill when I finish my wave. So you know, I definitely I definitely think there's gonna be better and faster ways though in the future of stowing.
Dan (30:53)
Yeah.
Talk us through your your stove method, 'cause I've seen like there's two that I've seen. So you putting it completely in the belt, so we can talk through that. And then when you just kind of wad it quickly and you still hold it in your hand going down the wave. What are you what are you doing on
Andrea Crociara (31:08)
Yeah.
Dan (31:08)
those two?
Andrea Crociara (31:09)
Well so I kinda see it as like it depends on what pair wing I'm on and also on what model. So I have some videos up there that are with like the Pocket Rocket V two and I call it the the raccoon tail. Yeah, I call it the raccoon tail. So
Dan (31:29)
Raccoontail. Okay, that's a new one.
Andrea Crociara (31:31)
pretty much what I do is I'll get on the wave and I do a a half like a half sash, I'd call it.
So I go and I I grab all my well not all my lines, but the center lines where you grab on the V two. You grab
Dan (31:44)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (31:45)
them and then when you get to the very top, when I'm holding the bar, right, I grab it all the way to the very end and then with my pinky I wrap round and I just grab all the lines with my pinky at the very like
Dan (31:59)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (32:00)
like pretty much I have some of like sometimes it's almost the little bridles
that where the material is. I mainly almost have all the material little bridles in my pinky. Because if you just have just just the lines, the wind will actually catch one of the the ribs and it'll kind of
Dan (32:20)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (32:20)
puff out a little bit. But I actually just you know pull really hard and I can kind of grab some of the material and then everything is in one hand and I'll do my wave riding with my pair wing that is it's closed but it's still
the rest of the lines are still, you know, they're all dangling. And I'll do half my wave riding like that when I'm on like a four three, you when I don't really feel like stashing.
Dan (32:42)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (32:43)
But I I kinda wanna be stashed. that's what I do. And I'll just ride my wave like that, end off with my top turn or whatever, and then I could just let go of my pinky and I redeploy. And it's
Dan (32:55)
I like that.
Andrea Crociara (32:56)
I love it. And and I really never do I honestly really don't get dangled doing that. You would think you get tangled
Dan (33:01)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (33:01)
a lot more, but
If you have the right leash, like if you don't run a coil leash, which is probably the worst thing you can
Dan (33:06)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (33:07)
do with a pairwing is run a coil leash.
Dan (33:09)
Yeah, it is.
Andrea Crociara (33:10)
if you don't run a coil leash and you don't have many things I need to get tangled, I you I mean, I don't have any problems and I never get tangled. So I've been having a lot of fun doing that little half still. And
Dan (33:22)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (33:23)
it really works, it's awesome. And lately I've been doing half of my wave like that, and then when it starts to really jack up,
I, you know, let go my pinky, I redeploy
Dan (33:33)
Redeploy.
Andrea Crociara (33:35)
and I finish it with a powered top turn. So it's pretty cool. It's pretty cool.
Dan (33:39)
Like that. I haven't seen that one. We gotta post a clip of that one. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (33:44)
and then other than that, then I have my you know, my stow a like my full stash. And that one
Dan (33:50)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (33:51)
is like honestly it's kind of the same. I I still, you know, grab the center lines, put everything in in the pinky, and then I just put it against my my hip.
I'll just put everything against my hip and I just with my left hand I go as far down as I can and I reach for the
Dan (34:08)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (34:09)
very bottom and pretty much what I do is I just bundle everything in the middle. So all the lines that I can grab from the very bottom go all next to my like hip, next to the like right below the bar, and I just bundle all the lines inside there and then they all disappear. And then it's just material and I kinda just ball it up and then
it becomes really small and I always make sure to keep the end of my bar visible and out at least like, you know, a couple inches. Cause this is where I grab to. You know, when I redeploy I never go from the front because then I'll redeploy and I may be tangled and I wouldn't know.
Dan (34:46)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (34:47)
but if I grab from the back most of the time I can always save it. So if I know that my back is, you know, free of any lines and my front is all maybe messed up with lines, most of the time
it's always perfectly fine because I'll just grab out my whole, you know, pair wing and I grab the bar which is free and this whole front may be a mess. I launch
Dan (35:11)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (35:12)
it and then if there's any lines here, I'll just quickly take off and I'm good to go. So that's always my my best way of like not being tangled when I redeploy is always having like half of my bar always visible and free of lines. And so
Dan (35:28)
I
love that man. I haven't
Andrea Crociara (35:29)
Yeah.
Dan (35:30)
I haven't thought about it that way that you can actually get rid of any kind of snags. It's not really a a tang like a a knot, just a little snag that sometimes gets caught on the bar through the top of the bar rather than the bottom of the bar. it does make sense.
Andrea Crociara (35:44)
Yeah, I yeah, yeah.
I mainly just I I've always done it like that for some reason. I never really felt like I should go from the front. just because yeah, I I felt like when I would do it from the front it would I would have a higher rate of being tangled up when I would redeploy.
Dan (36:02)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (36:03)
Instead, now it's like every time I stow and I'm looking down at my my stash belt, it's like this part is kind of is always out of my
of my stash belt and the rest will be inside and so every single time I grab it out, I'm grabbing from the back. And then I redeploy and then I grab from the front and continue. So that's always been my my go to and I've always it's a pretty good, you know, win rate. Yeah.
Dan (36:32)
Yeah, I love it. Well that's what
we're you know, what we're aiming for because there's no better feeling, man, than finishing a wave stowed or something like that and just popping out and go blah, they just go back up wind and like man, then you get into that
Andrea Crociara (36:43)
Exactly.
Dan (36:44)
rhythm and flow, it's the best.
Andrea Crociara (36:46)
Exactly.
Dan (36:47)
you mentioned the right leash. What kind of leash are you rocking? 'Cause I did see a coil leash at one point on your board.
Andrea Crociara (36:55)
You did. You did. Yeah. And then
I I found out, you know, the hard way. It's kind of annoying but when you when
Dan (37:01)
It's the worst.
Andrea Crociara (37:03)
you do some turns and then that one that one line wraps back and it just catches and you can yank as hard as you want
Dan (37:09)
Doesn't come out.
Andrea Crociara (37:10)
sometimes and it won't come off.
Dan (37:12)
No. It's yeah.
Andrea Crociara (37:14)
I've you know, I don't really go for any I don't I have a proper leash actually. I decided to just take one of my ozone wing leashes.
That are, you know, those stretchy dynemas and I just put some clips on it and I just connect it to my board and connect it to me. And it works.
Dan (37:33)
Mm, that's
exactly what I do is as well. I got so much heat, man, when I posted something about that online a little while back.
Andrea Crociara (37:39)
Yeah.
Dan (37:40)
People are like, it's gonna screw up your your your board plug and all that stuff. I'm like, man, I don't know what you guys are writing, but
Andrea Crociara (37:48)
Yeah.
Dan (37:49)
like f for the speed that I'm riding, I mean it has some stretch in it as well. Like it's it's pretty it's it's okay, but yeah, I think Sinbad was like, Fuck, everybody here is you know, ripping board plugs. I think that she thought it was a fixed dynema line.
Which I can understand. Cause mine has stretch as well. I just got like a I think it's a mystic one. Yeah, it's a mystic one. A mystic wingleash. And it has plenty of stretch. Like you put a little carabiner in one end and that's it. And it's working pretty well.
Andrea Crociara (38:16)
Yeah. Exactly.
Yeah, I I mean I have no problem with with running it like that. I'm also I haven't got like any big waves yet, you know, for this season. So I mean I haven't really got to test it out, but if it rips out my my plug then that means I found out the hard way. But
Dan (38:34)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (38:35)
for now, I mean, I like it the way it works and it's way better than running a coil leash for now. So yeah, I've been running that
Dan (38:41)
Yeah, I agree.
What do you have big plans on taking your riding into like mega waves or what's the goal there?
Andrea Crociara (38:52)
Well, I guess we'll find out this winter. Yeah, I'm
Dan (38:55)
Yeah. 'Cause
that's a different beast, man. Like the wind on the face of a big wave is completely different from a chest high wave.
Andrea Crociara (39:04)
Yeah, I yeah. I mean I'm I'm kinda scared just thinking about it. I mean wave running right wave riding with a pairwing and it's like actually big, you know, it's kinda scary just thinking about it. I'm not too I have no idea w what's gonna happen. you know and a pairwing it's not inflatable, right? So Yeah, it's it's and there's no leash. There's really nothing to it. So
Dan (39:28)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (39:30)
you know, we'll see what it finds out. Getting wiped out by
ten footer or something or bigger. We will see. I mean hopefully hopefully it's not too tragic. But
Dan (39:40)
Hopefully it's
not too tragic, but I yeah, there's a definitely, you know, a lot of risk in getting tangled with the pairing, which would be the worst case scenario. I think, you know, like if you're under the water and you're like in the middle of lines and
Andrea Crociara (39:52)
Yeah, I think I would be more
scared of of losing my pair wing, honestly.
Dan (39:57)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (39:58)
I think you know, I've gotten scared a couple of times in some you know, in these past swells as like I'll fall on like a wave and then I just like wipe out and I pop my head up and it takes me like a good twenty seconds to realise like where's my pairwing, you know.
Dan (40:12)
Yeah
Andrea Crociara (40:13)
So I I'm sure with a wave, like a a a big wave, it's gonna be a lot more than thirty seconds of of looking you know.
Dan (40:21)
Yeah, and then
you'll get a few in the head on top of that as well.
Andrea Crociara (40:24)
Yeah, right.
Dan (40:25)
and you yeah, like I I saw you ride that white and purple one. I'm like, man, if that gets caught in whitewash, like you're not gonna find that thing. It's like it's white.
Andrea Crociara (40:35)
Yeah.
I think it's good to do a good color selection if you're gonna go in the waves. That's for sure.
Dan (40:40)
Yeah,
it doesn't hurt. It doesn't hurt.
dude, let's have a couple of let's have a look at these clips, man, 'cause I'm gonna start with one that I that was well the first one that I saw from you was actually I think was a rock start on like I think it was in Europe. It might have been
Andrea Crociara (40:57)
Yeah, that
was that was yeah, that was late Garda. That was in Italy. Yeah, I tha that was
Dan (41:00)
They guard that, yeah.
Andrea Crociara (41:03)
I was actually pretty stoked that I that I managed to do that. I I was just like it was like a pretty bad day. Actually I didn't have any of my wing gear yet. I just had pump foil and stuff and I had pear wings and I was like, Why not just try a rock start and see if I can use my pear wing? And it actually turned out successful and it was pretty fun. So
Dan (41:23)
It was good. I was I was watching you and then I'm like, after that, I think you started posting some wave riding stuff and I'm like, okay, this is
Andrea Crociara (41:32)
Yeah.
Dan (41:33)
this is definitely something I wanna see. So this is the the first clip that kind of caught my eye. I slowed it down a little bit so we can kind of have a look at what you're doing. But you know, this handle pass, which you know, i is a really useful trick to do like a handle pass jive and something like that. You
kind of incorporated that onto your bottom turn, which I thought was super creative and it looks sick too. So talk us through a little bit about like getting to this idea and just trying it out. Did you get it first go? How did how how was it?
Andrea Crociara (42:06)
Yeah yeah. well so the one see the one thing I was always finding, like or I guess always chasing in the waves riding with the pairwing is you know being as aggressive as possible and riding fast. You know, if I'm not riding fast, I don't feel like I'm aggressive enough. and so the one the one problem I was having with the pairwing was, you know, my bottom turns. You know, it's it's hard to do
a fast like a really fast bottom turn and not like doing a sharp like fast turn but you know a foil doesn't have much drag so when you're flying down a wave and you go for a bottom turn I'm going pretty high speed and appareling sometimes they don't they have a hard time keeping up with your speed. So if you do a bottom turn going that fast downwind it's not gonna have enough wind to keep it like opened.
And so what'll happen is it'll die out of the sky and you know it'll mess up your bottom turn to get to your top turn. so the handle pass idea came from well if I do a handle pass I can go as fast as I want going downwind and then I can just send it behind my back and do my fast, you know, bottom turn, and then it redeploys that like the perfect time that when I'm aiming it back
Dan (43:31)
So good.
Andrea Crociara (43:32)
towards the beach.
I get to slash the wave. So that's kinda where my idea came from, from the you know, the behind the back, you know, top turn, I guess you could call it.
Dan (43:43)
Yeah, and I love it. And I think it like it looks good. It's functional. and you can see in this clip there's someone eating it just at the start. There's a parawing, I think, just in the water. And I don't know if they recovered that parawing or not. but when you continue here the clip, you could see what we're talking about, that drift. Like you're here's the parawing on the left. but you do the the handle pass and then you pop this slash kind of and here you need you need the parawing to kind of pull you.
'Cause you're going
Andrea Crociara (44:12)
huh.
Dan (44:13)
down the line, right? So, that's why like even the power pack, man, do you did you feel like the power pack would kinda give you a little bit more of that or the pocket rocket is
is even better?
Andrea Crociara (44:27)
Actually, I did experiment a little bit with the power pack and it works. It does work just as good I'd say.
Dan (44:35)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (44:36)
but it's kind of missing the forward drive, you know, that the V2
Dan (44:41)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (44:41)
has. So the thing I like a lot is the forward drive, which gives which is what gives me like the energy to go for my turn. So yeah, I mean it does work and it does drift.
but it's kind of missing the f the forward drive, kinda I'd say.
Dan (44:59)
bit do you feel like it's a bit d it's a bit draggy or
Andrea Crociara (45:02)
Yeah.
Dan (45:02)
yeah. I know what you mean. And the forward drive is kinda just wants to point and fly. It has that tendency to like want to pull you and keep you powered. yeah, it's it's interesting 'cause I think the power pack has that more just downwind pull rather than that drive. Yeah. Well,
Andrea Crociara (45:19)
Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.
Dan (45:24)
after this one,
You sent me a couple of other clips that I'll go through now. So just bear with me. and I'll try to bring them up. who filmed you by the way? Cause these are like legit huh?
Andrea Crociara (45:37)
Slater, it's the main guy.
Slater, he he always films with me and Jesse Richmond for when we do ozone shoots. He's always it's always
Dan (45:46)
Yeah, no.
Andrea Crociara (45:47)
him, me and Jesse. And he gets some pretty clean clips, I will say.
Dan (45:53)
Yeah, I I was impressed 'cause it's like slow motion and like a a good perspective from the land with like a I don't know, some sort of fuck off lens on it. So I was like this is
Andrea Crociara (46:07)
Yeah.
Dan (46:09)
so I have one here. So this first one, let me know if you could see it 'cause on my screen it's a little bit Yeah. So this one you're riding the Ultra X. What size are you riding here?
Andrea Crociara (46:23)
that was a three six. very it was windy that
Dan (46:25)
Three six, that's such a good size, man. It's one of my favorite sizes.
Andrea Crociara (46:28)
day. It was gusting probably over thirty. It was very very Yep.
Dan (46:33)
On the three six,
that's pretty powered, man. Because one of the things that I looked at this clip, I'm like, look at the bombs out there. I was like, I would probably be riding those as well. man, what a day. so you find like you can take the three six at 165 pounds on the what bottom end of that 30 knot range.
Andrea Crociara (46:58)
Yeah, yeah.
Dan (47:00)
Pretty good. cool.
So I wanna like just play this one and I I think it's just cool to have you kind of narrate like talking us through the moment you spot a wave to the exit, like what are you reading on the wave? Like how do you choose a line, you know, and and obviously those things just happen and you react to it, but what are you looking at on a wave when you're actually riding it? So I'll just let it roll and you can just talk us through a little bit what's happening.
Andrea Crociara (47:28)
Yeah yeah, of course. but I mean yeah sometimes, you know, Kanaha has can get pretty weird, I will say. And sometimes there's like two different swells that will mess up a wave, kinda I'd say, and so it's hard to sometimes find like the perfect wave. So I'm always kinda looking for one main peak instead of, you know, two different waves coming into each other. and when I find one main peak, that's always the one I go for.
I'll turn on the c the cleaner looking
Dan (47:58)
Just a cleaner cleaner wave.
Andrea Crociara (48:00)
wave, exactly.
Alright, well let's see, yep. So and this day was particularly small. It was very small. But you
Dan (48:10)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (48:10)
know, anything for the vids. And I do I mean I still
Dan (48:13)
Yeah. Little s little foil slide.
Andrea Crociara (48:16)
have a blast in small waves just 'cause I get to you know get to own them pretty much. I get to do whatever I want in a little wave.
Dan (48:22)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (48:23)
So it's I still have a blast. And
Yeah, this day I didn't really I didn't I didn't figure out the the behind the back technique yes, I was just doing the good old, you know, kiting down or bottom turn. But there was a nice little backflip. Yeah. A little backflip right before
Dan (48:41)
Casual little backy there. Yeah. So
Andrea Crociara (48:45)
we're going for a turn and
Dan (48:52)
Yeah, so there he gets a little sketch, leading edge going
Andrea Crociara (48:54)
Yeah.
Dan (48:55)
the wrong way, but yeah, it recovers really well, man.
Andrea Crociara (49:01)
Yeah, no, it's
Dan (49:01)
So do you feel
like you have to be a little bit on that heavily power to not overpowered, but borderline to make this work?
Andrea Crociara (49:10)
So what I found out was is with the the handle pass, the behind the back bottom turn, that allows me to go as light as I want with wind wind speed. And instead if I want to just, you know, wave ride more traditionally as you could say, and just go as like a a kite motion, then the windier it is, the better it is. the more you will drift faster and the more your your pairwing
will have a reaction to your commands. So that's
Dan (49:43)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (49:43)
why I'm on a three six and it's like, you know, ridiculously windy that day. but for wave riding it's perfect. For normal cruising, kinda hec hectic. So yeah.
Dan (49:55)
Yeah, it would be.
It would be. Do you feel like you are finding it hard to stay on the like on you know, the pocket of the wave when you're overpowered? Do you tend to like outrun the wave sometimes or not?
Andrea Crociara (50:08)
not at all. No.
Dan (50:09)
Nice.
Andrea Crociara (50:10)
No, when I'm parawinging, you know, if the windier it is, the more I'll ha I'll be in control actually going down the line of a wave. And start my writing.
Dan (50:22)
And so people can get a an understanding of how the spot works a little bit better, explain to us like the spot and where the wind's coming from in relation to the waves, 'cause there is a you know, a preference for wave riders on on when the wind's coming if you're a parawing well, for any sport really. But how does this spot work?
Andrea Crociara (50:45)
Well this spot it it's you know the the direction varies between a you know north north yeah, north northeast to a you know pretty aggressive east. and my, you know, preferred wind direction is just, you know, east. East wind is my favorite and for this wave it'd be pretty much like a side off. So when it's nice and
Dan (51:12)
Side off.
Andrea Crociara (51:13)
east
the wind is a side off for this wave, and on a let's say more regular day maybe it's more of a side on. So when it's sight on,
Dan (51:22)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (51:24)
I tend to you know I tend to do my bottom turns with the the handle pass just because with a side on wind, it's gonna be hard to really drift the pair wing with that direction.
Dan (51:38)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (51:39)
And it's kinda just like a kite. It's like when you have sight on wind, you have to work a kite more to really surf the wave.
Dan (51:44)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (51:45)
But with east wind, you kinda just park your kite and wave ride and it's the same thing with a pairwing. It's like the more east it is, the more I get to use my pairwing less and the more I get to rip the wave with my pairwing kinda just sitting there and getting me in every position. So yeah.
Dan (52:03)
Nice. Nice.
talk us through this backflip man too, 'cause there's two variations of the backflip. There's this one that you're gonna pop now, which is it looks freaking awesome. That you actually go over the pair wing. What's the movement there, man? Because a lot of people, you know, wanna start hucking those. And if someone wants to try one, what should be sh should they be looking at?
Andrea Crociara (52:33)
well, if you have any sort of wave, that's a plus one. You know, any any kickers to you know, learn a backflip on
Dan (52:42)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (52:43)
a pairwing will help you in a huge way. I had to learn it on flap, so but yeah, I mean
Dan (52:50)
Not bad.
Andrea Crociara (52:50)
from the wing, from a wing backflip to a a pairwing backflip, it's fairly the same. You do have to stay really close.
with your arms I would think. I mean, in my opinion, that's kinda how I'd like to backflip is I tend to really bring my my arms like a little T Rex and I tuck
Dan (53:12)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (53:13)
my backflip and I point my bar up and I go for my backflip and I just, you know, look back as i as in the video. And now I started to slow them down. But at the beginning, you know, it was, you know they were faster. So
Dan (53:28)
Whoa. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (53:30)
When you're learning the pairwing backflips, at the beginning you tend to want to do it as fast as possible because that's always how it goes when you're learning tricks and then later on you'll start to slow them down. but they it has a really different pull than the wing. The wing feels like
Dan (53:46)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (53:47)
like the wing you have to really kind of bring it around. instead the pairing, it almost does everything for you. So if you're pointing if you're pointing that bar.
in the direction that it's supposed to go, which is, you know, back. The second
Dan (54:03)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (54:03)
you pop your foot out of the water and you bend your knees and you, you know, tilt your head back, it's just gonna like loop around and it has a crazy like has a pretty crazy force, you know, between you and the parent,
Dan (54:16)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (54:17)
you you're you almost start to like stretch in in that rotation. So it feels it feels awesome. Like it feels way better than a winged backflip I will say. Yeah, it feels amaz
Dan (54:26)
So in
this point here is where like if I think about hucking one, this is where I would actually get a little bit worried that I don't have like if I try one and I don't have enough height, the leading edge of the parawing will touch the water there and I will fall into the pairwing.
Andrea Crociara (54:45)
Yeah. Well, you know, I would say the nice thing of pairwinging is I mean yes, when you break something it's always expensive. But, you know, it's always better you you break something instead of your body breaking something. I always look at it in that way. And the nice thing of pairwinging is when you're doing a backflip and you're scared of catching the water, it may happen, but
the worst thing that happens is you land on your pairwing but that's it. instead of winging it's like if you do a backflip and you, you know, don't commit or you mess it up, when that wing touches the water, it's not going under and you're just gonna either, you know, get slammed on top of the leading edge or the boom or something, but you will hit something more instead of just the water. Instead of pairwing, you'll land on your pairwing but
you're not gonna hurt yourself, you know. So it's
Dan (55:45)
Hm.
Andrea Crociara (55:46)
it's more you know, comforting knowing that I don't really have to worry about landing on anything hard because it's just me in the water at that point and other than breaking a pairwing, which is also fairly really hard. So
Dan (55:59)
Yeah,
look it's it's crazy, isn't it? Like I've been not that I've been trying to, but I've been riding a para wing for a long time and I haven't like even put a foil through it or anything like that. Like, you know, winging freaking hell, man. Coming into the water on an onshore day, I would just get my equipment wrecked. I'm like, I hate this thing, man. so yeah,
Andrea Crociara (56:19)
Yeah. Yeah.
Dan (56:20)
I feel like, I don't know, if it's just, you know, the parawing gods letting us get away with some stuff, but
Andrea Crociara (56:27)
Yeah,
it's it's eas it's it's nice that, you know, you don't have to worry about a rip in your in your wing every time you go out. It's you
Dan (56:34)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (56:35)
know the percent rate is crazy. It's it's a big difference. And I've for now I've only ripped one pear wing. And I t to this day I still don't know how. I was just riding and I saw a hole in it. Not too sure how I did it, but yeah, to this day only one rip, which is pretty crazy because when I go wing in the waves
I'll go through like, you know, three wings in like you know, even like in a short of like two days. So Yeah.
Dan (57:02)
wow, that is s nuts, man.
Andrea Crociara (57:06)
So it gets it gets expensive with the wing, but the pear wing, I love it because I don't I don't do much damage. So it's
Dan (57:14)
Yeah,
they take the beating.
How do you feel the the Ultra X's are holding up in the water, like in in the waves and, you know, getting thrashed in the waves?
Andrea Crociara (57:22)
They hold
up perfectly, honestly.
Dan (57:24)
Yeah, right.
Andrea Crociara (57:25)
I haven't really broken one yet and you know, as kind of an everything, I don't recommend holding on. So like when you fall on a wave
Dan (57:35)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (57:36)
and you're the thing the pairwing does is in the waves it really does get taken. If you're holding on to the boom and a wave hits your pairwing, you know, it's like having a an underwater parachute. I mean, it'll totally
Catch. And so the
Dan (57:53)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (57:54)
worst thing you can do is hold on. You do not want to hold on. 'cause you know,
Dan (57:58)
Good tip.
Andrea Crociara (57:59)
one it will it will literally tow you like a jet ski. It's it's ridiculous. Like if you've ever had a wave crash on you and you're holding on to your pairwing boom and you actually don't let go you're gonna you're gonna have a nice ride. You know, getting
Dan (58:16)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (58:17)
just dragged underwater. so if you yeah
Letting go of your pear wing, you will never damage it. Absolutely never. The worst is you'll get a little bit tangled up but in two minutes you'll be up and going again, you know? but if you hold on, then that's the one way I guess you could potentially damage a pear wing. You know, just like a kite.
Dan (58:39)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (58:40)
When a kite falls in the water and the wave hits it. If you don't go for one of the lines and just hold on to your kite from one line, then if the wave just really
hits the kite with all the lines in tension, most of the time they go. You know?
Dan (58:56)
Yeah. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (58:58)
Not much. So same thing in the pairwing. If if there's nothing holding it, it's not gonna break. So it's that's the good thing about it.
Dan (59:09)
you I I like just to talk quickly about safety gear. Like you're rocking a helmet. do you r ride any other safety gear? Do you ever ride like a impact vest or anything like that?
Andrea Crociara (59:21)
When I wing I use my helmet and my impact vest, you know, it's comfortable. when I pair wing instead it's always just my helmet and my my stash belt. You know. Then you know, if I have a impact vest and my stash belt it it kinda feels like a little
Dan (59:40)
Mm, yeah. Too much.
Andrea Crociara (59:41)
bit extra. so yeah, I've been lately I've been just going helmet and stash belt.
maybe if I'm in some bigger waves then I'll I'll rock both. But yeah, for now it's just like my wetsuit top, my stash belt and my helmet and that's you know, s good combo.
Dan (1:00:03)
What helmet do you use? 'Cause I always find it's so hard to find a good helmet.
Andrea Crociara (1:00:08)
Well, being honest, I'm just using a a pretty old Cabrina helmet. And I never
Dan (1:00:13)
Whatever works.
Andrea Crociara (1:00:15)
I never switched out of of trying out any other helmets. I used to ride Gath,
Dan (1:00:21)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:00:22)
but I lost that helmet and then I have this helmet and I I actually I made some I I did some custom things to it to make it really comfortable, so that's why I'm not really switching out of it. It's not really 'cause it's it's the brand that makes it good, but I just
I did some custom things to the inside of it and now I really it's really a good helmet for me since I customized it myself at my house. So I I until until I don't lose it or something, I'm probably gonna rock that helmet until I find a better one, I guess.
Dan (1:00:54)
What did you do to it? Is it just the padding that you kind of got it like really conformed
Andrea Crociara (1:00:57)
Yeah.
Dan (1:00:58)
to your sh yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:00:59)
Yeah. I I modified the the inside of the padding and I I made it really fit in my head. It's nice and snug. Like without the without the the the latch it's it doesn't come off. So it's pretty nice. It's nice and snug
Dan (1:01:12)
Yeah, nice.
So let's look at this other clip now. This is I think like I had a look as well, an article that you were featured on Foiling magazine. Kind of you're you're emphasizing flow and control and all those things that you pursue when you're riding. I think this one is pretty cool 'cause it it's I think a little bit of a a longer way than you do your raccoon tail stow.
Andrea Crociara (1:01:36)
Yeah, there you go.
There you go, yeah. So let's see. Yeah, and this wave I did it that d the little raccoon tail and wasn't being that aggressive on this wave, just kind of more calmly. but top turn.
Dan (1:01:57)
I just not not that com not that calm.
Andrea Crociara (1:02:01)
Yeah. And then we'll see. I think I might have should have redeployed on this wave. We'll see at the end of the video.
Little slash and then we should see that my little pinky let go of the pairwing at the very end. If I remember.
Dan (1:02:19)
I
wish we had that 'cause I was when I when I see someone ride a wave and they're either holding the parawing or fully stowed, I always wait for the moment of the redeploy 'cause I wanna see what that looks like. And I think we missed it on this one. I'm like
Andrea Crociara (1:02:35)
I fell
on this one, I th no, did I fall? Let's see.
Dan (1:02:37)
I don't think
you fail. I think you wrote out, but you the clip kinda cuts just before you you relaunch.
Andrea Crociara (1:02:43)
Darn.
Dan (1:02:45)
But these little waves are so much fun, man. Like
Andrea Crociara (1:02:47)
Yeah.
Dan (1:02:47)
it's what like I think see, it just cuts out there. I think these are this is like the training ground for you to see like what will work. You know, how do you turn, how do you keep this thing powered up? When you go to a bigger wave, I think the th the thing that you might feel is the most different is just how the wind behaves on the wave face. So it'll kind of pick up a lot of speed on those bigger waves, and might become very turbulent as well. So
It'll be interesting to see how you cope with that.
Andrea Crociara (1:03:17)
Definitely. And I mean when I'm in the waves now, like especially pairwinging with the wing it's not that bad 'cause I just you know, I can power through almost anything with the wing. but when I'm in bigger waves and I'm, you know, stashing and I don't really have anything in my hands, I always try to go for either the first wave of the set or the biggest set that's in the very
Dan (1:03:41)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:03:41)
back so that I don't
You know, so I'm not riding in white water 'cause that's
Dan (1:03:46)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:03:46)
that's the the least favorite thing I like is is doing a a whole wave and it's just like turbulent waters and my whole
Dan (1:03:54)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:03:54)
my whole wave ride is just, you know, very shaky.
Dan (1:03:59)
Yeah, you end up you kinda you end up riding at like, I don't know, sixty percent 'cause you know you're not like you don't feel the foil under you, you're like
Andrea Crociara (1:04:08)
Exactly.
Dan (1:04:10)
So we talked a little bit about safety, so that's cool.
But I also have a clip of you trying to get up, which is also part of the reality of this sport. Like when you're riding such a small board,
Andrea Crociara (1:04:26)
yeah.
Dan (1:04:28)
Do you mind if I put this one out?
Andrea Crociara (1:04:30)
Yeah yeah yeah I I I totally forgot about this. I d totally wanted to talk about this a lot. so yeah, this is this is a a water start that I always
Dan (1:04:41)
Hm.
Andrea Crociara (1:04:41)
use, like every single day, every second, every time I fall. it's a water start and I wanted to get on a video and send it to you. And now this was with a five meter actually, if I'm correct. I'm pretty sure yeah, that's a five
Dan (1:04:53)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:04:53)
meter. And it was very light that day. But that water start is
my favorite way and here I fell again and I'm gonna do it again here. Here's a even better
Dan (1:05:05)
Talk us through it.
Andrea Crociara (1:05:06)
even better demonstration of it. But yeah with the wing I always like, you know, kind of all of us, we always tried and like sought like to see if there's like a way of doing a water start. but there really never was and unless it's like really like thirty miles per hour or something and it's like you
Dan (1:05:27)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:05:27)
get really get ripped up onto your board.
But other than that, there wasn't like a a really easy way of doing water starts. and still no one really cares to do But with hairwing I found that it's really, really convenient to do this type of water start every single time I fall back. And the one thing I never do is when I fall I never kick my board off my feet. At least I try not to. I always stay in the straps 'cause
The more I'm in the straps, the less I know I can get hurt by my foil, you know? So I always stick
Dan (1:06:02)
Mm, mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:06:03)
to the straps most of times. And so when I fall, I never take my feet out the straps. And I found that with the Pear Wing, it's kind of like a an opposite it kind of feels like you're doing a like water start windsurfing, but the opposite way. So you're kicking with Well actually no, it's not really that you know, it's not the opposite way, it's actually the same way. But
Dan (1:06:26)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:06:27)
your back foot will be on the board and then your front foot is underwater kicking. So that it's kinda keeping you in balance. And then you
Dan (1:06:36)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:06:36)
put your front hand on the nose of your board and then your back hand is is powering the po the pairwing.
Dan (1:06:44)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:06:45)
And you kinda just lean it over and with your foot kicking it's gonna kind of bring your board flat and the second it goes flat, your front hand is kind of
keeping pressure on your nose and then that foot
Dan (1:06:58)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:07:00)
will just go right back up onto your pad and you're up and right.
Dan (1:07:03)
That's awesome.
Andrea Crociara (1:07:04)
And so the windier it is, like it you know, I can when it's windy on like a three meter, I can do that start in like you could probably time me, I'll take like two seconds. And the
Dan (1:07:14)
That's awesome. It's almost like
you're you're behind the boat almost. You have something pulling you forwards and you're like that's really cool. Let's have a look at that like we'll just let it play. So here
Andrea Crociara (1:07:20)
Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. It it actually does feel like that. It does feel like that. So like there
Dan (1:07:29)
your foot, yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:07:29)
my front foot came out and my front hand is on the nose and the wind see at my tail is gonna be the one guiding the like going downwind. And then the
Dan (1:07:39)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:07:39)
prayer wing is pulling me while my other foot is kicking and then boop I just put my foot on the board and I'm good. And and like the lighter
Dan (1:07:46)
That's cool man. I'll try that. I think it yeah, if
you're with with straps.
Andrea Crociara (1:07:49)
The lighter wind it is,
of course, the more kicking you'll have to do. And the stronger it is, the less kicking you'll have to do, of course. But it's a really, really convenient way of getting up on your board when you fall instead of like redoing everything and going on to your knees and then trying to get on foil.
Dan (1:08:08)
Your knees.
Andrea Crociara (1:08:09)
It's it's pretty cool. It's a fun technique that I that I figured out and now I always use that technique.
Dan (1:08:15)
That's awesome, man. I haven't seen that one before. And I'm gonna let this clip play a little bit further because here we also see the other type of backflip that you can do, which is the one that the parawing stays in the same position. It looks more like a back roll than a proper backflip.
Andrea Crociara (1:08:36)
yeah,
the the Palau. Yeah, they call it Palau.
Dan (1:08:38)
Do you have a name for it? Like plow. Plow.
Andrea Crociara (1:08:42)
Palau, yeah.
Dan (1:08:43)
Here we go. I think you come in and you just hock one here.
Andrea Crociara (1:08:47)
Did I land it? I don't remember. Yeah.
Dan (1:08:50)
Doesn't matter. We can still talk through it.
Andrea Crociara (1:08:54)
A little palau.
Dan (1:08:57)
So in this one I think the most important thing is really to understand what's happening with your hand placement on the bar. but talk us through the trick. Like you ride into the trick with some good speed, you wanna be like pretty powered, I I suppose.
Andrea Crociara (1:09:14)
Yeah, and I was severely underpowered in this one.
Dan (1:09:18)
Yeah. Probably why you didn't write out of it.
Andrea Crociara (1:09:20)
Yeah, exactly. the Palau is actually really it's fairly simple. It's way it's way easier than a a than a backflip. it's probably the first trick that you should learn in winging or pairwinging. And it's kind of it's you have to really stay I would say, like compact in your role.
So when you go
Dan (1:09:45)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:09:45)
for your jump and you go to look back, I'm looking, yeah, as you can see, I'm looking at my bar the whole time kind of. And
Dan (1:09:54)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:09:55)
my other hand it doesn't swing back out. And that's the one thing that you will always encounter when you're first trying this trick, is that you're gonna go for your palau and you're gonna start an underhand. that's always how you start a palau, is you you go normal riding
and then you
Dan (1:10:13)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:10:13)
switch to underhand. and then it's kinda hard because when you're underhand, you know, you're kinda limited to flexibility on your wrist. But
Dan (1:10:23)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:10:24)
the more you can turn it up when you go for your pop is the the better your palau will be because your paragon will be floating you instead of sending you straight into the water, right? So the more
Dan (1:10:36)
Nice.
Andrea Crociara (1:10:36)
you can turn your wrist up, the better your palau will be. And then
You kinda just gotta go up and then bring it around and you're always looking you have to look at your hand. That's the main key, is look at your hand and don't have this hand swing out. And you know it's it's it's a pretty known fact that that happens as a beginner is you're gonna go for it and this hand you totally forget about it, and you
Dan (1:11:03)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:03)
swing it out. And most most people will complete their role, but they're just gonna land like this.
You know, and then
Dan (1:11:12)
Yeah, yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:12)
then and then once they're already like on the water, then they'll grab back. But that would be you know, that would be like the incorrect way of doing it. The the correct way is you go up and as you see in the video, you look at your boom and you stay compact and that hand, the second you you let go of this hand, it's already
Dan (1:11:32)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:33)
reaching for the other side of the
Dan (1:11:35)
Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:37)
and then, you know, it's a it's a
you know, fairly soft landing if your pairwing was pointed up instead of down. You know? And also the bigger the pairwing, the easier the pullout is, just because they have
Dan (1:11:52)
Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:52)
a slower I'd say
Dan (1:11:58)
Less reactive, right? Like if you have a little bit of a bar input. Yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:11:59)
Yeah, they have a lot they have a lot Yeah, they have
a a really slower they have a slower reaction compared to the small sizes. So the small sizes like even if you go up sometimes and you'll you'll point it all correctly, but then if you kind of twitch it just like an inch down,
Dan (1:12:14)
Mm-hmm.
Andrea Crociara (1:12:16)
man, it it it it goes the opposite
Dan (1:12:18)
It'll yeah.
Andrea Crociara (1:12:19)
direction like halfway through your trick. And but with the five meter and like the big sizes, it's really easy because it
tends to stay in the same spot where you kinda want it to stay. So I definitely recommend like trying this like this trick on a on a light wind day and a big size 'cause it'll be way easier. Instead the backflip you wanna do it on the windiest day on the smallest side.
Dan (1:12:44)
Hm.
Andrea Crociara (1:12:45)
So two two
Dan (1:12:46)
Sick man.
Andrea Crociara (1:12:47)
two opposites. Yeah.
Dan (1:12:49)
Keen to at some point start trying these. I think it's important for us to just get out there and and and try new things. I got one more clip I want to go through. and I think this one number four. this one this is just a a cleaner take of the the backflip. Like it it's it's one that just looks at it a little bit closer. But we've seen it.
Andrea Crociara (1:13:21)
this is a n yeah, yeah, yeah. Another little backflip with this is with the Pocket Rocket V two Ultrex.
Dan (1:13:27)
here we go.
Andrea Crociara (1:13:27)
There you
See you what Yeah.
Dan (1:13:31)
The coil leash on that one. That's where I spotted it.
Andrea Crociara (1:13:34)
Clear leash on this one, exactly. But I wasn't stowing so it was okay.
Dan (1:13:39)
okay. Not too bad. So this one is the three six. Mm.
Andrea Crociara (1:13:41)
So here it's C, this is this is underhand. So my hand
is like that on the boom right now. Like that and like that. And then let's see, find a little bump, turn it back.
Yeah, it just pulls through. It's amazing. Like the way the way the pairwing just like flows through it and it and it's the one pulling you through instead of you pulling it through is like a really cool
Dan (1:14:07)
That's so cool, man.
Andrea Crociara (1:14:08)
feeling, so it's amazing.
Dan (1:14:13)
That's nice. Well, I'm keen to give these a go. I don't know when this is gonna happen, but you know, I think one day I have there is there is like on on a s on on a suddenly here we get some good little kickers that I can try going out on my good
Andrea Crociara (1:14:28)
Yeah.
Dan (1:14:28)
stance, which is the other thing. everything has the lineup, so
Andrea Crociara (1:14:31)
Yeah.
Dan (1:14:32)
maybe I'll send you some clips of me eating shit and you could just coach me through it.
Andrea Crociara (1:14:37)
Yeah. I would love to see that. I mean if you have kickers, like that's the luckiest you can get. Sadly, I was I never got good at goofy, so my goofy is really really terrible. I'm a I'm a strictly regular writer. So
Dan (1:14:52)
Yeah, I'm the same.
Like I can ride up wind and that's basically it. I wanna do everything on my stance, on my good stance. And cool.
Look, Andrea, I know that you wanna get out there, man. There's maybe the chance of a little bit of wind today. So I just wanna thank you for coming on the podcast, man. I'm really enjoying your clips, your writing, you're bringing something to Parawinging that not many people are are doing. So I'm excited to keep, you know
following you and and following your clips and your journey. And if there's anything else you want to share with with us, man, let us know. I'm gonna link all your social channels on the description of the video so people can follow you as well, which I highly encourage people to do. But otherwise, any final messages man you wanna share with the audience or motivate to get on the para?
Andrea Crociara (1:15:42)
Yeah, I mean I think it's a new sport, so keep on experimenting, do stupid things even though they're not stupid, just keep on doing anything. The more the more things you think are stupid actually is gonna create something new. So keep on doing anything and everything with pairwings and it's a very brand new sport, so I mean I can't wait to see what it's gonna come out to. And I'm trying my best in the waves to do more and more. So I'm stoked to see
you know, other riders with their stash techniques and downwind stuff and waves and freestyle. Freestyle's n is one that I haven't really seen much of and you know there's definitely gonna be more of that in the future. So yeah, hope everyone keeps on going with experimenting the pairwing things that it can get to. So yeah.
Dan (1:16:35)
Awesome. Well, I appreciate your time. I hope you get a good session today, man. And we'll keep chatting. Thanks for coming on.
Andrea Crociara (1:16:41)
Yeah.
Thank you for having me.
Dan (1:16:44)
No worries, bro. Have a good day.
Andrea Crociara (1:16:45)
Cool man. Thank you. See ya.
