Description
The KOR is Jim Snyder’s latest long sinker design and reflects the current focus in the sport on destination mystery moves. It is immensely popular with zombies in the mid-inseam range.
It has several new features which key on the boat’s ability to spin in a plane underwater. The seam line has no rocker to minimize the thickness footprint of the boat underwater so it condenses the cross-section that must be driven through the spin. In other words the ends of the boat are more trimmed into the line of effort. The boat is also longer than most and has more “tool area”- the thin sections of the ends which help pry you into laminations of current. It also features a new hull with indents which help keep the boat’s volume small and keep the “wing” aspects of the boat neutral- to enhance its planar referencing.
The KOR also has the newest version of the Jimirim (Jimirim II) – smaller now to make for easier entrance and exit of the boat and keep sizing problems to a minimum. The design is actually bigger inside and smaller outside than previous designs. And it has a bigger knee-friendly area to help with trim/seat position issues. The boat trims very low and is almost totally underwater in expert chops. It likes to run with the bow slightly submerged so it is NOT recommended for cruising rivers. Underwater it has very smooth handling and maintains a nice oblique speed which can be harvested into performance. It is also very stable so you can thrust the boat into new areas and then regain your position “over the wing”. It has a lot of forgiveness and is geared towards dropping to a certain depth (determined by the rider ~hopefully) and then rising slowly. So you can get more shallow mysteries with bigger downtime if you want. It is a bit slow for cartwheels and loops so it is not as optimized as the Whirld for World Championship-type competitions- where flatwater routines are scored.
So~ comfy bumps/decent speed/long reach/dependable dropper/big DT/LOW chops are NOT optimal for cruising~~park and play only.
The “Soft Kor”:
This is the popular Whirld hull configured with a KOR deck. The KOR deck brings very focused knee and foot bumps and a more streamlined stern deck to a hull which is ideally suited for cruising and competition. The boat’s shortness facilitates loops and cartwheels – all manner of competitive moves~ but the soft chines and streamlined cross-sections allow silky smooth mysteries with sports car handling. The KOR deck also solves sizing problems by allowing a greater variety of knee positions by virtue of the smaller groove taking up less room inside the boat. This would be the perfect boat in a medium chop for cruising the Gauley with optimal performance.
The “Shy Kor”
Why is this KOR shy? Because it has a much smaller footprint in the bow- it likes to run and hide. Over the years we have run into customers who tend to have lighter legs – and some have trouble bending way forward – and they have trouble sinking their bows. It seems the bow is just to wide for them to drop it readily in flatwater. This has caused all kinds of difficult chops where it needs to be smushed down here and propped up there etc. So Jim Snyder and Paul Schreiner teamed up to co-design this new hybrid offering. This is the solution to those chops. It’s a size where the bow drops easily but is still comfortable. Specifically- the toe bumps have been brought in 5/8″ total. This makes each toe bump 5/16″ (just over a quarter inch) closer to the center of the boat. But with substantial trimming of the bow width at the feet and knees- this KOR is about 2.5″ narrower at the feet! The bumps are also higher (valleys lower) in the bow (by about a half inch). So- this is a flatspinning KOR stern hooked up with a twitchier (more Whirld-like) bow. This is a good solution to make state of the art sink machines available to anyone KOR sized or smaller. Anyone who is short or light legged should consider this one. It doesn’t have the divoted hull of the KOR- so it is cruise friendly.
