Submitted: 10-21-2008 by gk
I bought the KayakPro Vampire a few months ago. The bottomline is that the Vampire is a fast kayak. After a few times out on the lake, I was able to maintain 7.3mph (measured with Garmin GPS). I am sure a more experienced kayaker would be much faster.
My previous boat was an Epic Endurance, and at first, I found the Vampire very tippy in comparison. I am still holding back due to the stability, but I find that as my balance improves I getting more comfortable paddling the Vampire. One very noticeable advantage of the Vampire is the ease of maintaining speed. It seems to take much less effort to maintain a 7.0+ speed in the vampire as compared to anything I have paddled. The construction quality is top notch. The kevlar carbon marathon construction has some flexibility to the hull. I have not noticed the flex in my paddling, but the flex would seem to make the hull more forgiving when encountering rocks or logs. I plan to race locally this spring. I will update my review with any relevant results.
I would recommend this kayak to any experienced paddler looking to do some unlimited marathon racing. |