Looking for a riverrunner/playboat that I can fit into and paddle for more than five minutes. I'm 6'6\" 220lbs 13 shoe. What boats have worked for you guys? Anyone tried a Hoss?

The Hoss is more of a creeker. If you want good play as well as great downriver, check out a ZG 54. You should probably fit, but if not, the Project 60 will fit, although it will be geared more towards play than the ZG

depends how much play you wnat versus riverruning ability. Are you tallking the ability to just front surf, or something a bit more dynamic? If you just want basic surfing then the hoss might be ok, but if you want to do more maybe the LL CR, the JK Fun series or the Wavesport EZG series would be better. Havent tried out the Cr, but the fun series and ezg series can both be cartheeled and there are some sweet vidoes of them going off on waves for what thats worth.

How about a pyranha stretch, inazone? Second an EZG, big enuf for big guys to riverrun up to a certain level and low volume enough to cartwheel and playboat generally.
Dolly

I'm about the same size, just 10lbs lighter, and I fit in a large fluid flirt very well.

Just got a Dagger RX 6.9, I've over 6'3\" with a 33\" inside leg and the boat is very comfortable, I've the seat set forward so with the seat back you should fit I'd think.

D

I'm 6'3\" with a size 13 and 35in inseam. I paddle a jackson 4Fun and love it. It's super comfortable, runs rivers and plays quite well. I have the seat in the middle position so there is still room to move it back if I were taller and the Happy Feet footbag system is awesome, no more blistered feet. I still have lumps on my feet two years after paddling a wavesport boat.
Hope that helps.

Batayak wrote:

The Hoss is more of a creeker.

The hoss is a very good river runner not a creek boat was never designed for this allthough lots of people use it to paddle down creeks.

If you want good play as well as great downriver, check out a ZG 54. You should probably fit, but if not, the Project 60 will fit, although it will be geared more towards play than the ZG

The EZG60 should be a better river running boat from Wave Sport the PRoject is an all out playboat and may not be very comfortableover long periods of time.

I would also vote towards the Cross River as a great river running playboat. I used one for austrian flood water very nice lots of room but Im a short arse the bigger one should be fine. A friend could get into the bigger one fine with room to spare and he has uk 14 feet about the same height.

For a river runner style boat then the hoss is great also consider the burn large, Diesel 75, etc

In the club I paddle with most people with their own boats are using Dagger KingPins/Crazy 88s, Wavesport EZs, Projects, EZGs or ZGs and Jackson Funs and Stars. We run class II to class IV in western Canada. We play down the river Even our new paddlers are using these boats although our rental fleet includes stuff like (I will only mention what I can fit into) Dagger's Honcho and RPM Max , Wave Sport's Super EZ, Y, Z and Liquid Lodgic's AirHead.

The cool thing is that their are more good, comfortable, choices for big paddlers. Do look at the Jackson 4Fun and SuperFun, especially the 2007 models. Fluid has the Flirt which river runs well and the Spice and both of them come in large sizes (I have one large friend who squeezes into the medium flirt to play). I paddle Bliss-Sticks RAD 195, but the company put extra volume into the boat to carry me better. You may not need to do this at 220 which is their optimal paddler weight. If cash is an issue look at WaveSports Super EZ or an older Jackson Super Fun (I love that Jackson puts max inseam lengths as one of their measurements; everyone should do this).

Try them all as they all paddle differently. The new Daggers and Waveports don't have enough leg room in them for me. I didn't add the LiquidLodgic boats as the only one I paddle was the AirHead and found it a painful handful and I have couldn't sqeeze into the CR. My other boat is a Pyranha H:3, but I wouldn't start out with a boat like this (too boring unless you are running harder water, have no play, or need to haul gear).

I am 6'5\" with a 36\" inseam and size 13 feet.