Welcome to the REAL Board Loft. I’m Trip Forman, and today we’re going to talk about the new Christenson Wolverine.

The Wolverine is part of the Christenson Nautilus family, and you can see it has a lot of Nautilus-influenced outline and rocker. Where the difference comes in is the outline steps in right here with this wing, then goes back into a swallowtail, which the Nautilus does as well. It goes to a twin fin on the bottom using Chris’s more upright fin template—not a keel fin, but a more upright MR-style twin fin.

What you can’t see when you’re looking at photos or video clips of people riding this board is that I feel like Chris’s next generation of boards, whether it be the Wolverine or the new Osprey, are becoming more foiled out and more refined. While the outline may look a lot like a Nautilus, the rails throughout the board are a little less boxy. It’s definitely less boxy up here under the chest, thinner up in the nose, and throughout the entire board just a little more refined than the Nautilus. You’ll actually see a lot of the new Nautiluses coming out like that as well, but I feel like with this board Chris is really trying to push performance and progression in the design.

When Chris talks about this board, he talks about long rail surfing, more projection, and it being a great travel board. When Chris is talking about long rail surfing, obviously he’s talking about long rail. This board is designed to be ridden longer. You’re typically going to see this board longer than six feet, up to about 7’0” or 7’2” max. It’s meant to be surfed longer, so you don’t want to try to size it down into something like a 5’6”. It’s really meant for the 6’2”s to be used by lighter-weight surfers, and the 6’10”s and 7’0”s to be used by larger surfers—or, as many people politely say these days, more mature surfers.

What longer rail surfing does for you is give you more drive, more momentum, and more speed. It’s addictive and super fun, especially on a good board like this. A lot of people associate performance with shorter boards, but once you have a board like this that’s actually made as a performance board with a target of longer rail surfing, it’s a lot like riding a big mountain powder board above tree line at full speed—to the point where every piece of your equipment is whistling and you’re absolutely hauling. That’s what long rail surfing feels like at speed. It’s basically like above-tree-line snowboarding.

The sessions I’ve gotten on this board really helped me understand what Chris is talking about. My first session was at the Lighthouse during a memorial paddle out for Ray Gray, who was a great person and leader in our community. What do you know—we had some of the best waves of the longest-period swell right there for Ray’s paddle out. Ray was definitely looking down on us. It was a super fun day in the water, and right off the bat I clicked with this board. I got some great waves on it, took off behind the peak, got a few little covers, and right away it felt good on both frontside and backside waves. It turned well, had a great wave count, good speed control, and really let me feel both the flow and speed of the twin fin.

Because a twin fin has less drag than a thruster—which is what you’ll normally find on a Nautilus, either as a thruster or quad—it feels noticeably faster. The difference between this and a Nautilus Twin is why Chris brought the tail in behind the wing. I’ve also surfed a Nautilus Twin. To date, I’ve got three Nautiluses: two 6’10” thrusters and a 6’8” twin. What I noticed on the twin-fin Nautilus with Chris’s fins is that when you push it really hard off the top, you can get it to control-slide or even slide out a little bit. You can solve that by upsizing to something like a Futures Twin or an FCS Power Twin. You’ll actually see Boehne Crain ride that board a lot with the Power Twin setup.

Chris wanted to have that style of board that you could ride with his fin template, so he brought the tail in. That allows you to use his fins, ride a smaller fin with less drag, go faster, and still have total control. It definitely solved the sliding issue when you’re pushing hard off the top and keeps the board connected to the wave.

Let’s talk about wave range. That first day at the Lighthouse was consistently chest high with good punch. There were smaller waves and bigger waves, but the travel-board aspect of this thing is absolutely dead on. On our strike mission to Pavones, I rode this board more than any other board on the trip—definitely my most-used board and my favorite board of the trip. It handled a super wide range of wave sizes and shapes.

At the peak of the swell, it was well overhead, with some double-overhead sets on the takeoff. It had total control and made it super easy to hunt down the waves you wanted in a pretty spread-out lineup. It had great speed, great control, and really good speed-building ability. I’m going to quote my friend Paul Murray from Rhode Island, who’s basically the mayor of Munic: “Absolute balls to the wall. No cutbacks. Just going as fast as you possibly can to keep up with the wave.” Then every once in a while the wave opens up and gives you a good section for turns. This thing generates plenty of speed to keep up with the wave and is incredibly fun when you get to those turn sections. It can hold through a turn at any speed you’re capable of generating on it.

On the smallest end of the spectrum, I rode it at the end section of the wave called The Wall. We had some smaller days down there that were waist to chest high, and by the end of the wave it was more like thigh to waist high and pretty slopey. The board still performed really well. A lot of times you get something like a 6’10” on a thigh-to-waist-high wave and it doesn’t feel all that good, but this thing still felt lively, fun, and performance-oriented.

The thing I noticed immediately when I got on a wave—other than the paddling and speed—was how free it felt. It was able to turn, bend, and generate speed from any part of the wave. A lot of other boards felt sticky in comparison, while this thing felt loose, free, and absolutely flying down the line.

From an accessibility standpoint, it’s every bit as easy as a Nautilus. For those of you who have ridden a Nautilus, a Surfer Rosa, or a Lane Splitter, it’s just as easy to ride from a lower ability level. On the upper end of the spectrum, the Australian guys just dropped that crazy edit from Indo, and there were a bunch of riders on Wolverines over there absolutely destroying waves on them. It covers a wide range of ability levels and a super wide range of wave conditions.

The Christenson Wolverine is definitely a home run. If you have any questions about the Wolverine or would like to place an order for a stock or custom board, you can always call us at the shop at 252-987-6000 or look us up online at realwatersports.com/surfing. Thanks for tuning in.