Screen Shot 2015-03-26 at 3.04.52 PMThe Royale: AKA “The Weekend Warrior” is the best class V spray skirt ever made. Big water chargers- this one’s for you.The foundation of the Royale is IR’s proprietary “fin” shaped rand designed to make maximum contact with the rim and resisting implosion to the very end. In addition to the rand shape, there are two sticky rubber patches under the deck on the sides to provide additional implosion resistance. The deck neoprene has also been extended 2″ past the rand (like on the Klingon) to offer unsurpassed dryness on a variety of rim shapes. In the high wear areas IR uses the most expensive and strongest 4-way stretch kevlar available, and all of the seams are glued, taped and stitched. They also have studied dozens and dozens of the most popular rims to dial in a fit that will accommodate a very wide range of boats, which wraps up why the Royale has taken our ‘What more can you ask for?!’ category for 2015! Does every paddler need an expensive whitewater sprayskirt designed to survive the stoutest of drops? No, of course not. But for those of you who do, we think you’ll find the Royale to be an essential piece of paddling gear.