RRD COMPACT VOGUE 5.0 2021 TEST REVIEW
VERDICT:
As a package the Compact Vogue is an incredibly well designed and thought-out piece of kit, combining convenience with ease of use. For anyone who is short of space or needs something to travel with, this is a great setup that won’t let you down when you’re trying to enjoy your time on the water.
THE LOWDOWN:
RRD continue to blaze the trail with their compact rig offering and have made some tweaks in their Y26 lineup. The Compact Vogue making up the wave section of the full compact range of sails and is based on the 4 batten Vogue HD, which is RRD’s control wave sail.
Sizes have been modified and the 5.0 on test is an all-new size. The smaller sizes have also been reworked to help fit into existing quivers and whilst the rig can come supplied with the RRD compact mast and boom, work has also been done to improve performance on standard masts as well. The sail comes supplied in an extending sail bag, meaning once the split battens are connected, or you’ve reached your destination, you can leave the sailed rolled up in the bag as you normally would. The rig package, including compact narrow diameter carbon boom and mast all fit into a iSUP style backpack which has room to fit up to 3 sails inside.
The split battens connect through a quick release system that doesn’t need any tools and the connection happens across a reinforced Dacron strip in the sail, allowing the sail to fold easily but also offer plenty of strength underneath the batten connection.
BRAND CLAIM: The Compact Vogue takes everything you love about the Vogue, our flagship wave sail, and makes it compact. Control and incredible handling, but in a sail that fits in a backpack.
PERFORMANCE:
To fully review the Compact Vogue, we almost need to look at it as the functionality of the compact side of the sail and then its performance on the water. We were initially worried about the extra time it might take to rig the compact sail, as we needed to connect the battens and also adjust them. However, this added almost no time to the overall rigging process. No tools are needed, all parts are already connected, and the connections are both user-friendly and seem really robust.
Likewise, the boom and mast sections clip together easily and go together seamlessly. Once rigged the first thing you notice is the amount of luff curve in the sail. The mast has a huge amount of shape to it and creates almost all of the sail’s profile, with very little being through seam shape. It was well worth checking the batten tension just to make sure the sail had good shape.
On the water the sail is very balanced with the pull in a very neutral position, almost at boom height, so is very easy to control. The Compact Vogue didn’t have the most powerful bottom end, but as it powered up, offered smooth controlled power. The top end of the sail was really impressive, and at no point did you give any thought to the fact that it folded in half. There was no sign of the sail creasing or deforming as it gave easy to use neutral drive and stayed easy to manoeuvre in the hands.
The supplied compact carbon boom gave no clues of where its split point for connecting together was, and its reduced diameter only added to the overall controlled feel of the kit. The natural top end of the sail was good, and you could increase this further through downhaul tuning. Whilst moving to the higher clew eyelet did help increase the bottom end performance.
VITAL STATS:
Size: 5.0
Luff: 423 cm.
Boom: 165 – 170 cm.
Battens: 4
Mast: RRD RDM 400 / RRD Compact RDM 340 + 60.
Sizes: 3.7, 4.1, 4.6, 5.0, 5.3.
PRICE: £789
RRD COMPACT VOGUE 5.0 2021 TEST REVIEW
Other sails in this test: