Spy pics of the new Naish SUP race boards! Happy Monday!

We just got hold of the first photos of the new Naish Javelin LE12’6″ SUP race board, which is a big upgrade to Naish’s famous Javelin series and is expected to go retail later this year.

But for the 99% of you that don’t follow SUP race board designs religiously, and perhaps don’t quite appreciate how cool this board is, let’s back-up for a second…

In the beginning (2010) there was only one “Javelin” board from Naish: The Naish Javelin 14, which was an awesome flat water board and was used to win countless races.

Then last year came the Naish Javelin 12’6″, the Battle of the Paddle version of the 14 footer.

This year Naish stepped it up by creating a lighter, hollow core version of their 14, the Naish Javelin MC14 (the MC stands for Monocoque Carbon, which is just a fancy word for “hollow”). We’ve already seen that Naish is about to extend their MC range down to the 12’6″, with the Naish Javelin MC12’6″ hitting stores in a couple of months, but they’re taking it one step further as well…

You see the only problem with these crazy new hollow constructions (apart from the fact they’re super fragile) is that while the materials are innovative, the shapes aren’t. With the MC12’6″ and MC14′, Naish is using the exact same shapes as their earlier regular-carbon designs. That’s all about to change though, with the Naish Stand Up Paddle race board range about to get a big upgrade.

The Naish Javelin LE SUP race boards have just been spotted in the wild and are expected to be in production by the end of 2012. The LE boards will come in both Javelin LE-12’6″ and Javelin LE-14′ versions.

The big change is the width: These LE boards are LOT narrower.

The pics below show the Javelin LE 12’6″ with the MC (hollow) construction, which makes it an ultra-narrow and ultra-light board. We’re not sure if the final retail version will come in MC or the standard solid carbon, but either way, the Javelin LE12’6″ (and LE14′) will be a high-end board designed for serious paddlers and Naish team riders only. This isn’t built for the average paddler. The board is 15% narrower, which makes it faster but also a lot less stable.

The LE stands for Limited Edition, and apparently that’s exactly what they’ll be – very limited in production. A small number of retail orders are being taken now and are expected to ship around September/October 2012.

You’ll hopefully be seeing the Naish young guns (Kai Lenny, Jake Jensen, Casper Steinfath, etc) riding these at the 2012 Battle of the Paddle California.

Below are the first photos of the Javelin LE12’6″ and show Kai Lenny’s personal race board, which he raced to victory @ the Stand Up World Series Chicago on the weekend (that’s where these pics were taken).

In the pics below, the Javelin LE12’6″ is the yellow and black-ish, brushed carbon board. The board next to it is the Javelin MC12’6″, which is also yet to hit retail stores, but amazingly is already sort of obsolete (at least for the serious paddlers).

Naish’s 12’6″ Javelins compared:

Naish Javelin 12’6″ // carbon, 28.25″ wide, 260L volume (hit retail stores in late 2011)
Naish Javelin MC12’6″ //monocoque carbon, 28.25″ wide, 260L volume (late 2012)
Naish Javelin LE12’6″ // MC or regular carbon, 24″ wide, 201L volume (late 2012)

As you can see, the new LE board is 15% narrower and has 23% less volume. If the retail version hits with the MC version (like in this prototype) it should make the board extremely light, considering the 28.25 inch wide MC12’6″ is already down to 8-9kgs.

With other brands such as Starboard, Fanatic and Surftech (with their Bark Phantom) bringing out narrower and lighter boards as well, it looks like the SUP race board arms race is heating up…

**UPDATE: The 2013 SUP range is up on the official Naish website, confirming the Javelin LE12’6″ is 24″ wide and the Javelin LE14′ is 23 and 3/8 inches, both come in “Limited Edition Carbon” which we assume is somewhere between regular carbon and MC carbon in terms of weight.