By the way, the dimentions are: Length 250cm, Width 64cm and Volume L. Paddler weight range (for PEAK performance ) is about 160lbs to 210lbs. Obviously, a good 20lbs each way will also do just fine.

Yesterdays info below:

I've started work now on the new Dragorossi kayak, which will be on the market in the early spring 2008.

The concept is quite simple. Actually, no it's not, it's very complex. In fact, it's one of the toughest nuts to crack that I've encountered as a designer in a long time.

The idea itself is simple. There is a growing group of paddlers, some young, some older, who are "tired" of the butt bouncer method of paddling - that is to say, slow boats to paddle which "waddle" through the water, "plow" down the river, and "sigh, arrgh, Okayyy", slowly move about the river. OK, so butt bouncers rock on steep fast waves, IF you're trying to be the next Pat Camblin, and creek boats are "all that", if you're on class 5+.

But there is a whole demographic who are NOT interrested in being the next rodeo star, but they do want to play teh entire river. Some of these people USED to be at the top of thier game. They are great paddlers, with suprbe skills. But they are just over the "one trick pony" boats out there today, and literally want to kayak the whole river - waves, holes, eddies, ferries, attainments, stern squirts, boofs - all linked together.

Then there is that group who never were stars. They paddle for fun. They don't paddle as often as they'd like, but they love to paddle anyway. They have no pretenses or illusions of being top paddlers, and they have little interrest in linking 15 ends in a hole, or doing a McNasty on a wave. But they do enjoy paddling the river, and they don't need a creek boat either. After all, creek boats are no fun on river runs which are not creeks.

So, how to do this? It's been a month or more of turing this over in my head, thinking about every aspect, from volume, knee and footroom, and the effect this has on "longer boats that you want to be able to cartwheel, but not "slicy". Do I make the hull aggressive and carvy and ultra responsive, or more forgiving so it has some class 4+ application... but then how much wave perormance am I giving up?

It hasn't been easy, thats for sure. it's not like creating just another creek boat, or another stubby butt bouncer. This has been a design challenge to say the least, and it's just getting started.

In my head, the boat is basically done, and now it's a matter of cutting off the excess foam that I don't want. So here, for your interrest, are the blow by blow photo's of the process of cutting down the foam and the shaping of the basic template, and rocker/volume, and then the shaping of the deck to it's "near" finished shape.