Dane and I walked out of the factory door on a Thursday and were on the plane on Friday with two new Villain 2 prototypes.    By Saturday afternoon after a flight and then a 15 hour drive we got to float them for the first time.   During that week we ran a ton of vertical drop, doing laps on a variety of cool rapids and falls.     The villain paddles like having a conversation with your best friend.   It is easy and you feel right at home.  

Dane and i had good protos, very close to the plug shape, which is hard to do out of a glass mold.     A nice slightly crowned out semi-planing hull, perfect rocker profile, forgiving sidewalls, and great ergonomics.   

Two of the days I was left without my Villain as Barry, Talon, Ben, Suson, and more were all trying it and if I let it happen I wouldn’t have been able to paddle it at all.  It was a hot commodity.   Ben almost suckered me into letting him buy them for his kayak school, which would have sucked, as today every creek in the Southeast is raging and I would not have had it!

I’ll write up a full review for the website soon, but here are some photos showing it in action with Dane, EJ, and friends trying it out.

EJ