Fellas,
There is already a thread on here about the new Cressi Gara Professional fins (
NEW CRESSI FINS (Gara Professional) ), started by 'Spaghetti' about a year ago, and added to quite recently - although I'm not sure how far they've got with their discussion, as it appears that nobody could actually get their hands on a set of the fins in question for a long while.
My interest is quite recent, as I just bought a pair of these fins last week - although I am probably not the best person to ask for a review, as these are the first set of full-foot pocket, long blade fins that I have owned, and I will be using them for spearfishing rather than free-diving.
After a bit of research I initially intended to buy a pair of the 'softer' Cressi 3000 LDs, as I would be spending a lot of time (up to 6hrs) finning on the surface of the water, and would rarely dive below 15 meters. However, when I went into the shop to buy these fins I decided to test them by hand against the Gara Professionals. Next to each other, in the shop, the LDs didn't seem to be any 'softer' than the Professionals - in fact, the professionals seems to be more flexible throughout the whole length of the blade, as opposed to the LDs, which were only flexible towrads the tip (or so it seemed in the shop). Basing my decision upon this, I walked out with the Garra Professionals.
I took them down to Portland (in the UK) to try them out, but the sea was blown out, so I dropped into The Fleet instead (a sheltered tidal lagoon of varying depths, but with quite a strong current at the time I jumped in, and quite cold too).
I found the Gara Professionals to be very stiff, heavy, 'clunky', and difficult to 'control', as well as being hard work on my legs and ankles - they certainly seemed too stiff for what I need, anyway.
As I said, I'm probably not the best person to ask, for the reasons I have already pointed out, as well as for the unfavourable conditions in which I took them out (and you can add to that the fact that I was also trying out for the first time my new 7mm Omer Cayman wetsuit, with insufficient weight!).
I've been doing a bit of complaining about the fins on my local spearfishing forum, but have been advised to persevere with them by people who know more about this than me, and to see what happens. To that end I'm gonna stick with them for a while, and will let you know my thoughts as I progress - you never know, I might just fall in love with them.
Anyway, that's my contribution for now.
Would love to know what other people think of them, and how they compare to other fins on the market.
All the best,
Gaz D
P.S: If it turns out that I cannot get on with them, I would appreciate some advice about a more suitable, 'soft-action', full-foot pocket, long fin, that I might get on with.
