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The large choil is something fairly common on Busse family blades...a bit of visual trademark if you will. On the smaller blade lengths yes the choil will remove some of your cutting edge and arguably serves less of a purpose.

However, the real benefit of a choil is that it allows you to "choke up" on the blade to retain better control of the cutting edge. The usefulness is more significant on the larger blade sizes (>=6")especially if it is your one and only camp knife.