At A Glance
If your riding style sits between freestyle and freeride, then the Ronson Player from Shinn is for you. The brand has been synonymous with outstanding kiteboard design for some time, and the Ronson Player sets out to give you freestyle levels of performance with a rider smoother than melted butter on silk pants.
The outline is wider in the middle and draws out smoothly towards the double-stage diamond tips; a classic freeride shape with a modern twist. On the underside, there is a smooth concave with double-stepped channels in the tips. The 90-degree rails offer plenty of grip, and there is a constant curve rocker throughout.
The board has a medium to stiff flex, Shinn rate it as a 6 on their flexometer. Smooth lines litter the board, and the craftsmanship is exemplary; the 40mm Bite Fins accompany the excellent Sneaker SRS bindings which allow for really easy tensioning with a ratchet system similar to snowboard bindings.
On The Water
Wow, it isn’t often you come across a twin tip that really set your heart on fire. In a world where twin tip design can often be argued as having a reached a pinnacle, along comes the Ronson Player. What makes it so engaging? It’s happy to cruise along and cuts through chop so well your knees will be singing you love songs. More than that, however, you can stick the edge in and send it into overdrive.
The board has a turn of pace that is electric, and as a famous windsurfer once said, “if you wanna go high, you gotta go fast”. This statement has never been truer: engage the edge, load up the kite and accelerate at a blistering pace, yet with total control. Even massively overpowered in choppy conditions, I never once felt like the board couldn’t handle it.
Load the edge and pop and be impressed at the power released. It’s sometimes easy to lose control or lose the edge on takeoff, especially when conditions are sub-par, but in hundreds of jumps in the worst of conditions, the Ronson Player didn’t skip a beat. Upwind is incredible too, I was riding back to back with my brother on a mission up the coast and had to wait for him twice, you can get some crazy angles with this board.
Landings are smooth thanks to the flex in the tips, and those rounded ends make it a fun board for carving some shapes on the waves.
Overall
The Ronson Player can be many things to many people, to me, it’s one of the most engaging boards I have ridden in a while. Smooth through the chop, faster than a ray of light and with more pop than Kylie Minogue in the ‘90’s it’s an impressive bit of kit. We loved the ratchet Sneaker SRS pads and straps as well, that’s the future right there!
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