The Option is a sweet, tough whitewater playboat. But, it is slow. It's a lot like an Esquif L'edge that way. A stroke will accelerate it quickly enough, but there is no glide. Of course what do you expect with an 8'8" canoe? You are supposed to use this boat on whitewater runs with lots of current. There it shines. With its short length, it's easy to fit into small eddies. What's more, designed by an open boat freestyle champ, the Option is a great canoe for surfing. It handles quite a range of waves and with its short length, if you start to carve off a wave, it's easy to bring the boat back around.
The Option's plastic is thick and sturdy. This seems like a boat that will last. I had some cracking trouble with Esquif Preludes (another canoe I love that has more speed), which is why I decided to try an Option. For rocky, creeky, class 3+/4 runs, the Option is the boat. It's even fun on the class 2 runs as long as there isn't too many flat sections.
The boat has great primary stability. This is a feature I'm growing to like. The Prelude has zip primary, which makes it a fun, responsive canoe. The advantage of the Option's primary stability is you don't have to be so much on your toes when you hit some big boils at the end of a rapid. The Option also has excellent secondary. If you like a stable boat, you'll like this canoe. Truth in advertising: I'm a 5'11", 160-pound guy. A heavier person may have a different opinion.
All in all, I'm very happy with this boat and have been paddling it for about half a year now.
