Lena Erdil is three-times PWA slalom vice world champion and recently moved to Germany from her Turkish homeland. We catch up with her as she reflects on the German windsurfing scene, starting an Olympic campaign and working for Starboard.

Photos: Sven Jürgensen // 7PIXELS // @hanok_upnorth

This feature was originally published in our November / December 2020 issue.

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FOILING

Since all the PWA slalom events were cancelled, I used the time to get more into foiling and started training on the new iQFoil equipment in June. Who would have thought that Covid-19 could give birth to an Olympic dream!

I have not been motivated to train on my slalom equipment without knowing when the next event will be. For me slalom sailing is all about racing, competition and working towards a top-level performance for the upcoming world cup events.

What I love the most about foil racing is the new challenge it holds. It’s like starting over again, there are so many things I need to learn and train for, and also of course new goals to set and achieve. I’m stoked that at least we have had a couple of foiling events so that I could compete and test my level. For slalom I’ve been racing with a lot of the same girls for many years, of course new faces are always joining, but I know the level. For foiling the two worlds of Olympic windsurfing and professional windsurfing are meeting, and it’s really cool to see so many talented girls on the racecourse.

Course racing was completely new to me, so I made a lot of tactical mistakes, but when things went my way I managed to score some really good results as well. So it showed me that I have some potential in this new class and really motivated me to keep learning. The level in the ladies fleet is already really high and it’s really fun too to race in an even bigger fleet than I am used to; I hope I will be able to keep pushing my foiling game.

I also love the fact that you can have fun with only 1 set of equipment in such a big range of conditions. In slalom you always need to choose the perfect board and sail combo, this is definitely a nice change. Of course the light wind range of foil gear is so nice too, now I’m loving sailing in super light and gusty winds, whereas before those days would have been just write-offs.

WORKING IT

At the same time as starting foil racing I have taken on a couple of part-time jobs to help me get over these difficult times financially, so I have actually been extremely busy the last few months.
One of the jobs I’m working on is for Starboard’s new apparel brand – SOMWR – you can check it out at www.somwr.com . The fashion industry is the second worst industry for the planet (after oil), SOMWR wants to change the way products are brought to the market, lead by example and actually have a positive impact on the planet rather then just offsetting the pollution we cause. I’m super excited to be a part of this new brand behind the scenes.

I work part-time in Starboard’s windsurfing marketing team too, so I mainly write e-mails, ha ha, but all jokes aside you better make sure you subscribe to our Tiki newsletter on the Starboard website! Together with Oda Johanne we put together a lot of Starboard’s digital content. It’s really fun to work behind the scenes at Starboard, I love the company’s philosophy and really admire Svein’s drive at growing and pushing forwards the environmental agenda of Starboard each year, while also staying loyal to their windsurfing roots of being innovators and pushing the sport with always new and better designs.

At the beginning of the year, myself and a good friend of mine launched a new online platform for windsurf girls called “MyWindstories”, www.mywindstories.com, we offer windsurf coaching for girls and had 3 camps planned, but due to Covid-19 only 1 could take place at Leipzig In Germany. It was really awesome; we had great conditions, wind and sun, and a nice safe lake with flat water. I love teaching windsurfing in girl only groups, as the spirit is always so supportive amongst each other. Furthermore, on our website we share inspirational stories on our blog and have a forum where women windsurfers can exchange experiences.

TURKEY

I haven’t been back to Turkey for nearly a year and have missed it a lot. Even when the borders reopened after being closed due to Covid-19, I didn’t want to go through quarantine with the iQFoil events coming up in Switzerland and Italy. I miss my windsurfing centre in Bodrum and the beautiful conditions we have there, 15-20 knots almost every day and deep blue warm waters, and not forgetting the amazing food and of course my friends and family there. I actually can’t wait to go back and am also really looking forward to foiling in Bodrum; the peninsula has so much to offer and sailing from one bay to the other is going to be so much fun.

POINT-7

I am a team rider for Point-7 and normally my job is to kick ass on the PWA slalom course! I was training from January to March full-time in Tenerife to be able to finally win myself that elusive slalom world title, having come close on several occasions. Having dealt with injuries over the past year, I was so motivated to give it everything, but except for a race in Germany, it has been almost impossible to do my job for Point-7 this year. The sails look and feel amazing and I am so gutted that I haven’t been able to show them off more often this year.

HIGHS AND LOWS

Lows of course are my injuries, I am so sick of talking about how it impacted my career without having been able to truly make the comeback I was hoping for this year. Also losing my shot at the world title while following Sarah-Quita around a wrong course in Denmark a few years ago, that was really pretty low, but I guess it wasn’t meant to be. I’ve been 3 times PWA vice world champion in slalom now and while those are of course highs and achievements I am extremely proud of, I of course would have wished them to be firsts instead.

Other highs include actually everything around life as a pro windsurfer, I am aware of the privilege it is, and have been enjoying especially the travelling side of things and of course wave riding. Participating at the Aloha classic event in Maui 4 years ago was also definitely a high!

The world speed record attempts in Namibia are also experiences I would count as the highs of my career. Even though I didn’t get the record over 500m in the end, it looks like to this day my 2 second top speed is still the highest female top speed ever posted on the GPS speed rankings!

WINDSURFING LOVE

Like every windsurfer ever asked the question of what they love about windsurfing, I would have to say it is the feeling of freedom that it offers. But there are actually many other things that I love about windsurfing, for example how versatile it is and all the different kinds of feelings other than freedom and connectedness to nature that it has to offer. I love the feeling of winning a slalom race, making that perfect top turn on a wave or flying full speed in only 9 knots of wind on an almost glassy water surface when foiling. They are all different feelings, but offer so much satisfaction and pleasure while feeling powerful and in control over the elements. I guess that when things go right the good feelings you get from enjoying your sessions is the reward for all the work you have to put in to get there. So I love how rewarding it is, and of course I love the windsurfing community around the globe, who are always so welcoming and happy to connect with other windsurfers and share the stoke on and off the water.

GERMANY

I am actually based in Hamburg at the moment. Hamburg itself is not the best for sailing, but I have quite a few spots within 1 or 2 hours drive. I’ve been sailing a lot in Kiel, as the German sailing federation is based there, and has been offering some coaching for people training to compete in the new iQFoil class. I moved to Germany because of love, my boyfriend was finishing his masters in Hamburg last year, so I wanted to be able to spend more time with him. But at the same time I am actually German (my mum was German and I grew up in Germany), so it was a way for me to reconnect with my other home country. Also last year while coming back from my injury I wanted to get as much racing training in as possible before the next PWA events, so the German racing tour was a good way for me to do that.

I have learned that Germany is quite divided when it comes to windsurfing between those who live in the north and get to sail on the sea, and those that live more centrally and in the south, who are mainly relying on their local lakes for sailing. Lake and river sailing was actually a new world to me, I wasn’t aware how many lakes and rivers there are in Germany that people actually sail on in great numbers on a regular basis.

Maybe because of the world cup and other events in Sylt I had an image of the hardcore North Sea storm riders in my mind when it came to windsurfing in Germany. In reality the vast majority of the windsurfing population is probably sailing on their local lakes and only going to the sea and other spots around the world during their holidays. In fact almost all the small lakes I’ve been to have their own little windsurfing clubs and locals following the forecasts to get out there when conditions allow. Summer season is shorter then you would expect as the northern part of Germany is actually already quite far north! For the northern windsurfers, Denmark is extremely popular for quick windsurf trips, especially due to the better wave conditions that you can find there within only a few hours drive. On the other side of Germany, the many sailors living in and around Munich have resorted to regularly driving to Lake Garda, as the wind consistency here is simply way higher then on the local lakes. Another observation that I found extremely funny is that quite a few Germans use extremely old windsurf equipment, not 10 years old, 30 years old! I wasn’t aware that stuff still existed and here I have seen people using it on multiple occasions. In all seriousness, I haven’t really found an explanation as to why they would do that to themselves, especially since the more modern equipment is so much easier to ride, and lighter!

In terms of competition, the German Windsurfing Cup is very nice, with 4-6 stops a year and a mix of slalom, course racing and wave sailing. Interestingly all stops are in the north, so most riders from the south don’t come to these events and prefer for example to join the Swiss Windsurfing Cup. What else is interesting about a big windsurfing nation like Germany, is that the Olympic side had completely died off by 2020. Now with the introduction of the iQFoil equipment, interest is resparked, but with no national team and structure in place, it’s taking this big nation a lot longer then its neighbours in Europe to get involved.

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Christian Mueller, event organizer of the Engadinwind Event in Switzerland has just released details of his latest project which involves windsurfing in powder snow, alongside speed riding, snowboarding and snowkiting.…The X-project!

The X-project is unique in the world and embodies a combination of different sports in the breathtaking snowy landscape of the Engadine Mountains in Switzerland. Windsurfing in powder snow alongside speed riding, snowboarding and snowkiting.

A dream comes true with a project that has been planned over the years. For the X-project, we brought together the world’s best athletes from a wide variety of sports and shot a film in the dreamy mountains of the Engadin, Switzerland, creating amazing and never before seen images.

The unique thing about the X-project is the combination of different sports in the snow. In the history of winter sports, these sports have never been combined in this way. The pictures and film recordings look surreal, yet you can feel the rush of riders. The X-project shows fascinating images and opens up new dimensions in winter sports.

Levi Siver from Maui and Balz Müller from Biel in Switzerland draw the “X” into the pristine powder snow slopes with the snow windsurfing gear in the Engadine Mountains. The windsurfing legend Levi Siver is one of the world’s best big wave windsurfers. In his home town of Maui-Hawaii, he surfs the world’s biggest waves in Hookipa and Jaws.

The Swiss representative Müller is a pioneer in foil sport. He is the reigning Windsurf Foil World Champion and won the Wing Foil World Cup in Tarifa earlier this year.

The athletes of the air in the X-project are Maxime Chabloz with the snowkite and Ueli Kestenholz with the speed rider. Maxime Chabloz is a multisport talent and Junior World Champion in Freestyle Kitesurfing and at the same time Junior World Champion in Freeride Skiing. He also made his breakthrough with the men category and won the first Kite Freestyle World Cup in Brazil. Ueli Kestenholz is also a multisport legend and is a multiple World Cup winner and Olympic participant in alpine snowboarding.

He has also won the X-Games twice. After his active time as a snowboarder, Ueli Kestenholz has transitioned into a speed riding pioneer and is one of the world’s best speed riders. The X-project team is completed by the Austrian snowboard freeride legend Flo Orley, who was active on the Freeride World Tour for over 10 years and has won various tour stops. His greatest successes are a Vice World Champion title on the Freeride World Tour and the victories at the legendary Engadinsnow Freeride Contest.

Media X-project

Christian Mueller                                                                                  

phone:     +41 79 309 3000       

e – mail : media@positivelines.com

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In a year of change from our November/ December issue, Finn Mullen reflects on how some tweaks in kit and perspective have altered his windsurfing and sessions for the better.

Photos Katie McAnena // Billy Mullen.

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We were a motley group of elder students – senior workers pulled in from various company outposts around the world for some management training, mostly forgettable. Except for one gem. It was meant to be a classroom discussion, but it clearly wasn’t. “Can all arguments be resolved?” – was the ironic title of the topic for debate. “No”, said the lecturer moderating, “they can’t”. And with that, the appeals for a voice of compromise were shut down, 5 minutes in. I looked around the classroom as heads nodded, some bowed indifferent and some shook with frustration. The lesson? There’s always a different view, whether we choose to see it or hear it is another matter.

PERSPECTIVE

Lately, we’ve become more aware that one person’s entertainment can be another’s angst; viewpoints shift and evolve. The idea of restoring normality in a pandemic is appealing, but eulogises the old normal in spite of its flaws. Covid-19 has given us a sharp reminder of how much we took ‘normality’ for granted, though some changes it has brought about have been for the better. Outdoor sports have boomed and windsurfing hasn’t been immune from the surge. Some inner-city roads have been turned into exercise zones as swathes of space have been given over to walkers and cyclists. On the face of it a good thing, but what if you’re not so able-bodied? Before rezoning, those same spaces might have been your only way to get to somewhere easily by car. It’s all about perspective.

Ask professional windsurfer, Red Bull Storm Chase veteran and lover of big waves, Dany Bruch, about why he couldn’t stop smiling after sailing for 90 minutes in Germany a few weeks ago, in by his own admission, average conditions, and he’ll tell you about how it was his first sail since February. That’s when his young son took seriously ill and how Dany and his wife have been in and out of hospital with him since. Bruch junior is getting better now thankfully. “You never know how strong you are until being strong is your only choice.”, wrote Dany on an Instagram post, quoting Bob Marley. It’s all about perspective.

CHANGES

This year hasn’t gone to plan for any of us. I’m writing this at the start of a second lockdown and while for obvious reasons I haven’t been able to windsurf much in 2020, strangely, I have never enjoyed my windsurfing more. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, mushier, and more prone to moments of life-affirming joy at just holding a boom, no doubt. But more than ever I take the view that any windsurfing is better than none, so every day on the water is a good one.

LESSER-BATTENED

Continuing on the less is more theme, my views on lesser-battened sails have also undergone a change, having recently added some 4-batten sails to my quiver. When 3 and 4 batten sails first emerged on the market, I assumed these would be designed for the purist wave rider in cross-off nirvanas. That was then and this is now, where many 4-batten designs have control and versatility at their very core. And certainly PWA events at Pozo, the ultimate onshore control test, have no shortage of 4-batten designs being used in battle. They have an ease of use for most sailors that makes them worth a second look if you have dismissed them as being too specialist before. But it’s not just in the waves that they are finding application, brands are coming out with 4-batten camber-induced freeride foil sail designs, and 3-batten wave sails are having a resurgence as lightweight wind foil engines for enthusiasts seeking the ultimate in minimalism and purest ‘free-foil’ experience.

GOING SOFT

Inspired by the ‘battenless’ designs of wings on foils, I decided to take the reduced batten count movement to its obvious conclusion and experiment with a one-batten ‘soft’ sail on my wind foil board. It’s a sail that I use for messing around on my windSUP, for making the most of non-planing breezes. But a foil blurs the lines on what actually are ‘non-planing’ winds, especially if you can work the foil up with your legs to augment any wind power. Wings do this well as you are so mobile and dynamic on the board, having no fixed rig to work around. What I wanted to test was if the ‘baggy’ nature and reduced weight of a soft sail allowed you to be more physical with your body, especially your legs, to work the foil up in light winds. And it does! Sure the draft on the sail was moving around like a bag of frogs, and it by no means gave the lovely controlled and stable flight of a foil sail, or any modern sail for that matter. But it did offer the ability to work the rig and foil in a different feeling way for light winds, and whilst the low-end was endearing, the top-end had all the virtues of an umbrella in a gale, making for an interesting rodeo when the meekest of gusts hit. But that was kind of the charm of the thing, reacting to all its many foibles and nostalgically remembering the wrestles with soft sails from decades before. I’m pretty sure vintage car owners don’t go out in their cars to experience all the refinements of the latest in auto design. Sometimes it’s about the warts and all feeling, or just having fun varying your windsurfing experience. The mash up of modern and old highlighted just how efficient foils are. Even when paired with the most sluggish of partners, foils can still lead a dance. The experiment cemented my view that foils sit firmly at the top of the food chain for windsurfing efficiency.

FLIP THE SWITCH

If there’s one thing 2020 has taught us, it’s that we can change things up pretty quickly when needed. While we’ve had to abide by new rules and regulations, we’ve also ripped up quite a few conventions along the way too. Messing around doing stuff like putting soft sails on foil boards isn’t just good for the soul, it helps us get in that mindset of experimentation and change, vital for progression.

A friend of mine, strapped for cash, spent many years surfing his wave board, complete with footstraps and all, and actually learnt to surf pretty darn well on it. He got quite his pick of waves, nothing to do with the volume and length of his board, though that helped, but more to do with every surfer in the lineup staying away from the lunatic surfing a windsurfer with a roof rack strap for a leash! These days we have the luxury of boards designed for a range of uses – from windSUPs to 4-in-1 foil boards, the inspiration to mix it up is built-in. Earlier this year, 2 x world champion surfer John John Florence stuck fins into the track boxes of his foil surfboard and proceeded to surf the strange setup completely against the board’s design brief, but in the manner you’d expect from one of the best in the world. The video of the ensuing session of course went viral.

EXPERIMENT

My next experiment is to throw fins into the twin fin box tracks of my wind foil board and see how it goes. It will be a homage to the HiFly ‘Madd’ boards of yesteryear which tried to champion twin fins in a freeride setup. And I’m pretty sure the results will be terrible, but there’s nothing wrong with a bit of ‘Top Gear’ style anarchy now and again. Maybe it will be a good setup to just practice sail spins and transitions on in light winds, or maybe it will be good for the kids to muck about on. We may all be confined to our local spots for a while to come, but there’s no reason why we can’t experiment with our kit setups or technique and make the familiar unfamiliar.

WINGING IT

When I ‘wing’ in surf, one of the most enjoyable things to do is park the wing in neutral and just glide on the waves. It’s an addictive feeling, but why only in swell I thought? Surely with a bigger front foil on my local lake I could still glide with the wing in neutral by using a bit more leg power to pump and keep the ride going down little bits of chop. And I did, and it felt even better than in the sea because I was doing something different. The only thing stopping me was my own blinkered thoughts. Convention is good for convention, but for moving sideways in water, whatever your board craft, a little bit of alternative thinking can bring you a long way.

KEEPING IT FRESH

Seeing things with fresh eyes, means seeing more. Just as we have found new ways to work  and live in a pandemic, we can find new ways to windsurf if we want. The variety of modern kit out there means you can really dial into the type of equipment that maximizes your local spot. Swiss sailor, Balz Müller, has practically rewritten the rulebook on what is possible on a lake. Whether it’s winging, foiling or freestyle, he is turning in pioneering world-class performances on distinctly normal looking freshwater lakes. The only boundaries are our own.

Our native shores can be explored with just the same sense of adventure that we normally reserve for foreign sands. Exploring your own patch is more a challenge of overcoming pre-conceptions that the familiar brings. It’s seeing the nuanced beauty, discovering local history, perhaps pouring over nautical charts and nautical pilot books to really dig into the coastal currents and features that define your home spot.

And particularly as winter bites, if you’re struggling to find motivation, then have a look at all the research being done into the benefits of cold water sea swimming. Anecdotally people report its effects as ranging from helping beat depression to giving an energy boost that feels like 10 espressos! And recently researchers from Cambridge University have been investigating if it may protect the brain from degenerative diseases like dementia. Just think of all those positives next time your swimming after your kit in December! But in all seriousness, to make the most of our home spots over the coming months we need to make friends with the cold, and one of the best ways I’ve found is just keeping your body accustomed to it, be it swimming, surfing or SUP’ing when we can’t get our windy fix. And let’s not forget we have a season ticket to the greatest gym in the world – the beach! And best of all, in winter it’s uncrowded, perfect for socially distancing! Sometimes it’s too easy to look at where we windsurf as having no attraction when it’s not windy, but for some people it’s their idea of heaven for a run or walk on the beach. And with good reason, studies have shown how important coastal spaces are to our wellbeing. “We find people who visit the coast, for example, at least twice weekly, tend to experience better general and mental health,” said Dr Lewis Elliott of the University of Exeter in a recent article. I think he could be onto something, next on my list of experiments is to evaluate the effects of large dosages of coastal visits and subsequent immersions in various states of wind. In the name of science, I hope to overdose as often as possible!

BOOM TIMES

Alongside a reset in attitude I’ve added some fresh kit too. The current state of design excellence in windsurfing means that there are no bad conditions, just the wrong kit. And whilst it has involved some investment in new gear, the return has been excellent. I’ll highlight some of my stock picks.

In case you haven’t noticed it, and let’s face it, we have all been a bit pre-occupied of late, the humble boom has been having something of a makeover. Swooning over my brand new ‘skinny’ one, I’m reminded of how booms used to be these hulking great diameters of forearm pumping, muscle bulking, arms of steel devices. And apologies if you still have one, but in their modern wave and freeride guise they have been on a diet, and are a lot healthier for it – ‘skinny’ booms are here to stay. By ‘skinny’, I mean reduced diameter and this varies from 24.5 to 27 mm and everything between, depending on how skinny you want to go. Personally I prefer the lower end of the scale, and it’s because I find I can keep a better hold of the boom without having to grip it with all the strength of a free climber holding onto the north face of the Eiger with one hand. There’s an adjustment period where you end up with callouses in strange places as your hands and fingers rest on different places with virgin skin, but it’s a pain worth enduring as apart from just less physical forearm effort, the narrow grip encourages you to ‘surf’ the boom. By ‘surfing’ the boom, I mean moving your front and back hands up and down its length, which by virtue of the lesser diameter and lighter way the boom is gripped by your hands, is easier to do with a ‘skinny’ boom. And be it wave riding or the humble tack and gybe, there is virtually no manoeuvre that can’t benefit from moving your hands more, or faster. I could rest my case on that point alone, but the skinny boom has a particularly timely benefit heading into winter. Gloves are a pain windsurfing, but they are certainly less of a pain when used on a skinny boom as the reduced diameter doesn’t cramp your forearms as much. If you’re writing to Santa this Christmas, I’d put a skinny boom at the top of the list, and 2 skinny booms at the bottom. Honourable mention also to the ‘booms’ of wings which are also easier to use in winter with gloves, as wings require less strength to hold onto than sails, something to think about for the colder weather ahead.

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WINDSURF MAGAZINE #402 APRIL 2021

All Aboard: Profiles of Ricardo Campello and the Moreno Twins, Guadeloupe boat trip, Tested – 2021 6.0 Crossover Sails & 130 Litre Freeride Boards, Traversa at Nazaré, Ross Williams, Harty on physical energy saving, Waterstart tips, Foil tuning, Cornwall waves.

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Digital format.
(Prices include delivery anywhere globally 10 times a year.) Digital edition available now, print edition in shops and with subscribers soon.

Cover: Takara Ishii airs out at Scarborough Beach, Cape Town.

Photo: John Carter.

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THE MORENO TWINS
Daida & Iballa Moreno are some of the most incredible athletes windsurfing has ever seen. They give us an insight into their lives and winning ways. 

BOAT TRIP
Live the boat trip dream vicariously as we join Tristan Algret for a voyage exploring his native island of Guadeloupe with Pierre Mortefon and photographer Robin Christol.

RICARDO CAMPELLO
Three time PWA freestyle world champion, Ricardo Campello, reveals what has made him one of the world’s best windsurfers.

HOME ALONE
Ross Williams has been a busy man of late with a new business and baby. He tells us more about his change of direction.

POSITIVE ENERGY
John Carter tells us why a session at the Bluff, Cornwall with Timo Mullen and Ian Black, was just the tonic for the ills of our times.

IQFOIL KNOWLEDGE
PWA slalom star, Lena Erdil, is a recent iQFoil convert. She shares some interesting tuning, technique and tactical tips from her winter training. 

LIFE OF LUCAS
Lucas Meldrum has ambitions to step up and win the British pro wavesailing title; he tells us more about his windsurfing.

NAZARÉ PORT
Thomas Traversa became the first person to windsurf Nazaré at size in port tack conditions. He tells us more about the groundbreaking session.

GEAR SHED

2021 130 LITRE FREERIDE BOARD TEST
The latest freeride designs, in one of the most popular board categories on the market, are evaluated by our test team. These include;

FANATIC ULTRA BLAST 130,
GOYA VOLAR PRO 130,
JP AUSTRALIA SUPER RIDE 124 LWT,
RRD FIRESTORM 120 LTD,
SEVERNE FOX 140,
SIMMER STYLE MONSTER 126,
STARBOARD CARVE 125 WOOD,
TABOU FIFTY 125 TEAM.

2021 6.0 CROSSOVER SAIL TEST
The test team put a selection of 6.0 coastal all-rounder engines under review. These include:

DUOTONE SUPER STAR 6.2,
GA SAILS HYBRID 6.0,
GOYA BANZAI X PRO 6.0,
GUNSAILS TORRO 5.7,
LOFTSAILS PURELIP 5.7,
NAISH FORCE 5 5.7,
POINT-7 F1E 5.4,
RRD MOVE 6.2,
SEVERNE GATOR 6.0,
SIMMER STYLE ICON 5.9.

TEKKERS

PETER HART MASTERCLASS – ENERGY CRISIS
Having to quit a brilliant session early because the tank is empty is deeply depressing. Harty suggests how, where and why your energy reserves are being wasted.

JEM HALL – RIG RECOVERY
Jem gives us tips to get the rig out of the water efficiently for waterstarts.

BOARDSHORTS

LATEST & GREATEST
Welcome to ‘latest and greatest’, a land where all is new, and new is news.

LOWDOWN – STARBOARD CARVE 2021
Starboard’s popular Carve range of boards have had a redesign for 2021. We get the lowdown on their fresh freeride shapes from Svein Rasmussen and Remi Villa.

SITTIN’ ON THE DUNNY

EDITORIAL – ALL ABOARD
There are more ways to windsurf then ever before and many different types of windsurfers; it’s a good thing and all are welcome aboard says the Ed.

AFFAIRS OF THE HART – THE NOSTALGIA TRAP
What is this desire to relive a bygone windy era? Harty talks to one particular obsessive.

Get your 

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This will entitle the Class to five (5) official world titles, which will be distributed between the youth (U19) and junior (U17) age groups.

iQFOiL Youth & Junior is a One Design Class which allows youth and junior sailors to compete using a very similar package and racing similar formats to the senior Olympic discipline, allowing them to develop the skills and techniques that they will serve them well in their future Olympic campaigns.

Starboard is delighted to announce the iQFOiL Youth & Junior Class’ acquisition of official World Sailing. This marks a big leap in Windsurfing for young windsurfers, as they can learn to foil, compete and progress through their youth careers (all the way up to U19 World Championships) on the one board.

The first U19 World Championships is set to take place in July 2021 and will enable young iQ Foilers to compete for one of the five official world titles that are up for grabs.

Svein Rasmussen, founder of Starboard.

“Starboard’s goal is always to grow windsurfing and sailing, while getting everyone on board for ocean protection activism. By creating a clear pathway with aspirational equipment, we invite sailing clubs around the world to get on board to initiate or expand their windsurfing programs. Together with World Sailing and classes like Kitef oiling, Techno, Optimist and Laser, we can get more people into our sport and increase the retention rate in sailing. My Optimist friends in Norway are excited about the potential of the iQFoil junior class as their next level of sailing, and I am excited to see integration within the sailing community, 54 years after Jim Drake and Hoyle Schweitzer gave birth to our sport. FYI, we use the iQFoil 85 with the optional center box / fin to teach entry level windsurfers at our HQ test center.”

iQFoil Class Manager and former PWA Foil World Champion, Gonzalo Costa Hoevel

“The iQFoil Junior equipment is so attractive that it will make loads of kids jump into windsurfing as we have seen with America’s Cup Stars windsurf foiling on the iQFOiL Senior equipment in their free time. Young sailors can have their first foiling experience at a much younger age and at a much more affordable package than what they were used to. I think we will see a great growth in our beautiful windsurfing sport. Exciting times for the iQFOiL Youth & Junior Class!”

iQFOiL Youth&Junior Class Website

Equipment Website

The post IQ FOIL YOUTH & JUNIOR TO RECEIVE OFFICIAL WORLD SAILING CLASS STATUS appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Surf Club Keros have made a motivating and inspirational video regarding the current global situation, from the perspective of a surfer.

“We are amphibians. We live on the water, we live on the land. We outwait the grey and the cold, knowing that soon, we will meet again, with the people of our tribe, at the places we love. Very soon, it will be summer again, as the summer in our hearts”.

www.surfclubkeros.com

The post WE ARE AMPHIBIANS: SURF CLUB KEROS appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Earlier this year, Ross Williams ventured deep into surfer territory and became the first person to windsurf the famous surf break of Freshwater Bay on the Isle of Wight. It’s a rocky right-hander, sheltered from the wind beneath huge chalk cliffs and a tricky place to sail. Luckily for us, John Carter was there to capture the action and tell the tale of how it all went down!

Words Ross Williams // Photos John Carter

This feature was published in our November / December 2020 issue.

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OFF LIMITS

Some breaks are simply off the cards for windsurfing and Freshwater Bay on the Isle of Wight would certainly fit that criteria. It is similar to Honolua Bay in Maui, a quality surf break pretty much sheltered by headlands and usually packed with surfers. A few years ago, Maui all-round waterman, Zane Schweitzer, sailed Honolua on a rare set of conditions, so I guess using that as inspiration you could not completely wipe the possibility of windsurfing Freshwater Bay off the cards. Having said that, I have never seen anybody windsurf the bay or even consider it during my thirty year windsurf photography career and time living on the Isle of Wight. In a west or west-southwest wind, the go-to spot is Niton, which holds a good wave and boasts side to side-offshore wind. In most wind directions, ‘Freshie Bay’ as we locals call it, would either be very onshore and horrific, or sheltered by the huge cliffs that block the wind.

As surf breaks go, Freshwater Bay is the jewel in the crown of the Isle of Wight’s surf breaks and boasts a peeling right-hander beneath the scenic chalk cliffs of Tennyson Downs. Even for surfing, Freshwater Bay ideally needs north winds, a solid groundswell, a low tide and when those conditions all line up it can get pretty busy, if it is not too big. To be fair, I rarely head over to Freshwater when it’s windy, it simply is not on the radar or a spot you would normally consider.

Over the past year or so Ross has been in a Whatsapp group with local kitesurfer Tom Court who rides for Duotone. Tom was brought up in a house that overlooks Freshwater Bay, so he usually knows when it’s firing. Reportedly Tom has kited the bay a few times, but as for whether it would be possible for windsurfing was another matter. One thing is for sure, it would need to be howling windy to even consider sailing the bay. Light winds would mean a tonne of surfers and unless it was blowing at least a force 7 or over, I very much doubted any wind would get in under those huge cliffs.

SUMMER STORM

After the lockdown was over for watersports, it did not take long for Mother Nature to reward the patient sailors who had admirably stayed off the water for nearly two months with a rare summer storm. Gales and a decent swell were set to provide firing out of season conditions right across the country. With that insane forecast, I knew Ross would be frothing to get back on the water and most likely would be camped out all day at Niton, so I sent a message the night before, to see if he was up for getting some shots.

LET DOWN

His plan was to start early to catch the outgoing tide at first light, which was around 5 a.m., and he was setting his alarm for 3:30 a.m. I was not quite sure if I was keen to go that early, but made sure my gear was packed and ready to go if I got an early message in the morning. At 5:30 a.m. my phone beeped with a message to say Niton was not good and Ross would try again later and message me if it turned on. I waited patiently for the call, but heard nothing by 1 p.m. in the afternoon. Then a message came through that Ross had scored Niton but had forgotten to take his phone…doh! It seemed like the day was done and dusted for me and I might as well make other plans. Then at 4:30 p.m. I had another message to say Ross was heading back to Niton for a second session. I was on the verge of not bothering, but decided I had nothing to lose and re-packed the car and headed over. By the time I was at Niton at the bottom tip of our diamond shaped island, Ross had already been and gone!

THE BAY

The next message was a bit weird – “Niton looked good but I am going to try and sail Freshwater Bay for something different!’ I have known Ross for probably twenty years, but never heard him mention sailing Freshwater Bay once, so this was certainly a first. I was actually not sure if this was some kind of joke or stitch up, but decided to continue driving all the way to the very western tip of the island. As I drove up ‘Military Road’ on the west side of the island, I could see it was howling windy with plenty of swell, but looked pretty onshore as I worked my way towards Freshwater. By this stage I had no expectations at all that I would be shooting any shots and that this rare summer storm had slipped through the net.

FRESHWATER

The town of Freshwater and its bay are one of the most picturesque beaches on the Isle of Wight. At the bottom of the chalk cliffs are caves which are exposed at low tide, which according to local history smugglers used to use. There also used to be an arched rock on the left-hand side of the bay, but it collapsed during a big storm in 1992. The downs to the right of the bay are named after the landscape poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, a famous British poet from the Victorian era who lived in Freshwater and roamed the downs for his inspiration.

IT’S ON!

‘Military Road’ takes you past popular surf beach Compton, before working its way up and over the white chalk cliffs that approach the tiny village of Freshwater. Up over this hill you get an amazing panoramic vista of the sea and down below I could see solid lines of swell marching towards the rugged coastline. marching towards the rugged coastline. A few minutes later I was at the reveal where you got to see Freshwater from the top of the hill as you descend down into the narrow bay. I could see Ross’s van stationed at the front of the small parking lot in front of the Albion Hotel, but more importantly I could see his bright red sail heading out through the water towards the waves. The first two things that struck me were that it was a very low tide, and also the wind looked just slightly side-onshore, and despite being a bit light on the inside, Ross had plenty of power once he was just behind the waves outside the bay.

OUTSTANDING BEAUTY

With Ross flying around catching waves, I scrambled to organize my equipment, knowing this was something pretty rare and that I would probably not get the chance to shoot a session like this for years to come. Not only is Freshwater Bay an iconic surfing wave, it is also in an area of outstanding natural beauty, nestled in a bay between the huge cliffs of Tennyson Downs. So, to capture the session, I was already thinking that the shots needed to show the location just as much as the action. Obviously with the cross-onshore wind blowing in the bay, the wave was not looking beautiful like it does on a classic surf day, but still with blue skies above and the incredible backgrounds it was still looking very special.

FIRST TIME
I decided to shoot from the rocks on the right-hand side of the bay to kick off with, and a plan to dash over to the cliffs on the left-hand side to grab some wider scenic images later on. Tom Court was also on hand with his kite and joined Ross on the water to grab a few waves. The tide was on its way in as the session developed and I could tell it was becoming trickier for Ross to navigate out of the bay with the wind shielded by the cliffs. Out the back there was still loads of wind and Ross was able to catch plenty of waves on this inaugural windsurf session in the bay. Meanwhile I was charging around like a man possessed trying to capture as may angles as possible of the windsurf session in this awesome location.

Finally, Ross was done after a sweet session in this new spot, having clocked up plenty of waves and discovering the potential of this right-hand surf break as a windsurf option. An outgoing low tide would be ideal if we ever get another chance and of course a bigger swell, but for now we settled for the opportunity we got, especially after all the frustration of lockdown!

ROSS WILLIAMS

“I thought the bay was sailable, but suspected the angle of the wind would be too onshore. In a west wind, Niton at the bottom of the island is my ‘go-to’ spot! I knew Freshwater would be nice for photos, but it would be difficult to sail. On this day, the wind was dead west, so it was coming perfectly down the cliffs. It was actually consistently windy, but a little onshore so not the ideal direction for perfect wave riding. It was a wind swell really, so who knows with a proper groundswell. It is a place where you need to dial in your timing and maybe sail it on the dropping tide to make the wave punchier. It was still surprisingly good fun. I am fairly sure I am the first person to wave sail there. I definitely will be back there if I see that forecast again. It is a nice option to have on that forecast. The scenery there is amazing. The white cliffs are really dramatic and there are so many angles to shoot from. The sailing is quite technical as you are quite close to the rocks. I was on an 88 litre Tabou Da Curve and a 5.2m IQ Wave, but I would have preferred the 96 litre Da Curve to keep me going through the lighter patches.”

The post FRESHWATER BAY: ISLE OF WIGHT appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

An interesting insight into what went on behind the scenes at the 2022 Starboard photo shoot in Tenerife! Introduced by Nico Prien.

The post STARBOARD PHOTO: SHOOT BEHIND THE SCENES appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

From our November / December issue, reader Peter Callas shares a light-hearted story of ‘buying’ secondhand kit.

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I am a currently a university student, so when purchasing windsurfing equipment, price is often the deciding factor. This leads me to spend a considerable amount of time sifting through the online second-hand market via the mediums of Facebook marketplace and eBay searching for sweet deals.

The challenge

After some particularly vigorous catapults, and one too many homemade nose jobs on my old board, I decided that it was time for some new gear. I buy only the latest and highest quality equipment (cough, cough), so I set myself a massive budget of £30. To put this into perspective, this same amount will buy you a grand total of two Dakine foot straps or 1/100^th of a 2020 starboard phantom race board. They say that you get what you pay for, but I was going to completely ignore that and try out some of the cheapest kit available on the Internet!

Finding ‘the one’

After scrolling through a few pages of ancient gear on eBay, I focussed my attention on Facebook marketplace. Adverts on Facebook are often misleading when it comes to the list price, so it is always worth reading the description to find the true cost. One listing in particular commanded a price of £5,000,000, which was ever so slightly out of my budget, but I clicked on the advert anyway on the off chance that there was a deal to be had.

Scrolling to the bottom of the item description, I saw what every bargain hunter dreams of seeing –  ‘GARAGE CLEAR OUT. TOO GOOD FOR THE TIP’ One short trip to Bognor Regis later and I was in possession of a vintage AHD slalom board for the grand total of £0!!!

Disclaimer: please check the equipment is seaworthy before using. It might not actually be too good for the tip.

The board

I was now in possession of an AHD Exocet special edition 265. According to the manufacturer’s warning sticker, it had 70 kg of buoyancy, which for some reason was mostly concentrated in front of the mast track and had been shaped into a lethal looking point at the nose. The slippery deck was clad in a stylish cream livery, which matched my Granny’s front room wallpaper. The deck pads were also far from luxurious; they had started to degrade, which left black marks all over my feet and provided about the same amount of cushioning as a damp paper towel. To sum it up with an Indiana Jones quote: ‘It belongs in a museum!’

Sink or swim?

When I arrived at Hayling island west beach I was slightly nervous to say the least. I had checked the board for damage and I had been told by the previous owner that it was watertight the last time he had used it, five years ago! At only 70 litres, it was the smallest board I have ever owned. I weigh about 85 kg without a wetsuit and I was quite apprehensive given the inconsistent wind conditions on the day.

I nervously left the safety of the beach and entered the water to attempt the maiden voyage. With a large portion of the buoyancy concentrated in the nose, my technique had to be adapted slightly, but after a shaky first attempt I was up and going! With such a thin deck, centreline discipline was vital, but sure enough the nose slowly rose out of the water and I glided majestically onto the plane.

For a board that is older than I am, it was surprisingly fast and I started to cruise easily over the south coast chop. The long pointy nose protruding from the water took a while to get used to, but surprisingly it handled lumps and wavelets with ease and overall gave a wobbly but fairly comfortable ride.

The issue of turning around though started to become quickly apparent. I had an idea of coming in close to the beach to show off a nice gybe to onlookers, but that was hampered by the thin and slippery deck. The geometry unfortunately meant the board turned about as nicely as the Poole harbour chain ferry, so I didn’t manage to impress my audience of dog walkers on this occasion. The lack of grip on the deck was rapidly frustrating my efforts and it eventually culminated in a very scary moment where one leg slipped either side of the board and almost caused a nasty accident. I took that incident as a sign to promptly end the session, and headed into the beach to have a well-earned cup of tea in the car.

Overall, I achieved my goal of new kit on a budget and I didn’t have to be rescued which is a bonus! Some kit really does belong at the tip, but every so often you find a hidden gem, so keep your eyes peeled and maybe one day you too can own an AHD Exocet special edition 265!

The post PETER’S PURCHASE: READERS STORY appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Luca Meldrum talks us through the quiver of boards and sails he will be using for the 2021 season!

For more info on the products click below:

www.fanatic.com

duotonesports.com

k4fins.com

The post LUCAS MELDRUM: MY 2021 QUIVER appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Starboard are very excited to share the news of having signed one of the most exciting talents the windsurfing world has on offer: Antoine Martin from Guadeloupe. Photos by Jerome GGPiks Nadessin.

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Having won the most prestigious PWA event, the Aloha Classic on Maui in 2019, he proved his potential to reach the very top of the world rankings once more. After a solid overall performance he finished the PWA 2019 Wave World Tour in overall 4th place, so just outside of the highly contended podium. The Aloha Classic was the last event the competition world had on offer before Covid struck. You can rewatch the thrilling final here. On this backdrop our excitement becomes understandable, we simply can’t wait to see Antoine compete on our Ultrakodes!

People who know Antoine, know that he stands out from the crowd because of his no fear attitude, crazy jumping, big wave surfing and for taking the hardest slams like it’s nothing! Here is one of his wipeouts in Jaws. The 27-year-old who grew up in the Caribbean in Guadeloupe surrounded by waves and palm trees just sent us his announcement photos hanging in a palm tree with his brand new UltraKode, ready to take on the next big swell with his new weapons.

Antoine about his transfer to Starboard: 

“I just received my new weapons for the season. The brand new UltraKodes! It’s exciting times ahead as I just joined the Starboard Dream Team. I am really stoked about that! After so many years on JP/NP this is a huge change and new challenge for me which I am really looking forward to. Let’s write a new story!

I try to do my best to do what I love, and windsurfing is my life! For my training, I try to sail as much as possible. But besides being on the water I like boxing and skydiving too. In the springtime, I live on Maui to sail starboard tack waves and I spend time in the Canaries in the summer for port tack waves.

What drives me the most in windsurfing is to push the limits! Either it is a competition or a crazy session. I am looking for the “zone” where you find excitement and peace during the session. I love to travel and discover new spots with my friends. I love the lifestyle of windsurfing as I can be on the ocean every day.

In 2019 I had a great season finishing overall 4th place in the PWA Wave world tour. The high light of my career was winning the last PWA event at Hookipa, Maui. It was the best moment of my life. That was special to me because my first international contest was the Aloha Classic Pro Kids in 2006 in Maui. Now, years later when I won the event in 2019 I realized that my dream came true!

It will be a great time being in the Starboard team and help develop the wave gear, make good content and try to have great results. My first ever windsurf wave board was actually a Starboard!”

The post ANTOINE MARTIN JOINS THE STARBOARD DREAM TEAM appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Meet the new Naish foil range – the Jet, Jet HA, Wind/Wing, and Kite foils. Our modular system allows you to mix and match to create your perfect setup for your exact needs. With our expansive new range, you’re sure to find the foil to match your style.

More details at: www.naish.com

The post NAISH NEW WING-SURFER, HOVER WING FOIL AND FOIL LINEUP appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

JEM HALL

MOVE ON UP – WINDSURFING TECHNIQUE

FOILING AROUND

From our November / December 2020 issue Jem Hall shares his reflections on learning to wind foil.

Photos Radical Sports Tobago // Carsten Müller //Eye Sea You. 

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I would like to share with you my reflections after learning to wind foil over the last 6-7 months. I will be looking to reflect how it can help your windsurfing as the very mention of this term can polarise opinion. I, perhaps like some of you, was a tad suspicious of this new potentially ‘no harness’ sport, but this year, as Norwegians say, ‘I went all in’. Foiling for me has been fun, deeply engaging and kept me sane in ‘these times’. It also reminded me of the benefit of trying something new – “if you don’t go, you won’t know!”  

The positives 

 If you are still sceptical about foiling, perhaps it would help if I shared how I see foiling boosting your windsurf skills. This is not only from what I have felt, and reflected on, but also what I have seen on the water in Tobago, Rhodes and around Oslo.

• Time on the water – foiling is best in lighter winds, so it gets you to the beach more, and then if the wind really comes up you are already there, ready to windsurf. 
• Pumping – this is very important for more flight time. This skill is not the best in most windsurfers, so foiling will really boost your sail pumping and leg pumping, because if you do not do it right, you will not get up on the foil. 
• Fronting up – when you are up on the foil the majority of your control will come from pulling down hard on your front arm and pushing down on your front leg. These actions will also really help your regular blasting.  
• Eyes wide open – as you can get up in such low wind speed gusts, you will become better at looking upwind to see these and spotting the lulls that follow them. In general I have found myself way more tuned in to reading both the water and wind whilst out foiling.  
• Oversheeting – this has very bad effects on your flight, and foil gybes, and will see you touching down a lot. Whilst windsurfing you are less punished for this action, but it is one of the hardest habits to get ‘rig wrestlers’ to lose.  

• Tacking – foil gybes are hard, so you will do more tacks at the start of your journey and we all know how useful this is for your windsurfing too.  
• Gybing – do all the right actions in a foil gybe and you will get either a dry gybe or the amazing feeling of a full foil gybe. A lot of these actions will massively improve your regular carve gybes. 
  

Foil foibles

Learning to foil, and getting better at it, has given me amazing sensations and also some bizarre moments. I would like to share some of these with you:

• You may not yet be a ‘whooper’ on the water, but when you get stable flight on the foil, I dare you not too. I found myself really shouting after great blasts or completed gybes.  

• When you are up above the water it feels amazing and you feel so high. 
• On your first sessions you realise that you have not uphauled a lot for a while, and so you have to reacquaint yourself with this. 
• After blasting around on the foil you will think it is windy until you come to waterstarting and realise that it isn’t.  
• In my focus to not kick the foil when waterstarting, I moved my body position forward and then found myself with my front leg going through the harness line.  
• After using long harness lines for years, when I first started using the necessary shorter lines, I was terrified and felt glued to the boom. This will pass! 

• Foiling is quiet and so when windsurfers ‘sound’ really close to you they are not. 
• On some crashes the foil comes up high and makes a certain noise and this is the time to correct it or get ready to get launched. This had me laughing a lot.  
• Foil gybes tend to be wide, and with quite a lot of momentum, and mid gybe when you have to make the foot change I was having some crazy internal dialogues, as I knew there could be a trip to the water coming up soon.  
• In my first sessions I was so proud to be up on the foil that when I came to the beach I forgot to anticipate dropping down and grounded the foil. This is not cool, even though I thought I was. 
  

Jem’s foiling gems

I am not a practiced foil coach as yet, but here are a few tips I think will help both your windsurfing and foiling:

• Pumping – look to improve this and aim to keep the arms straight and look to row the rig and don’t oversheet the sail.  
• Early straps – practice getting in the straps non-planing on your bigger windsurf board so that it is more assured once you come to foil as this is where you will be starting from on a strapped-up wind foil board.  

• Embrace the tack – when you are learning to foil and just looking to get control and consistent ride height, know that gybes are hard, so tack.  
• Unhooked – I preferred to be unhooked in my first 10 sessions on the foil as it ensured I was not either under or oversheeting, and that I had more control and could react quicker. Windsurfers could definitely be stronger and more efficient if they were great at sailing unhooked.  
• Straighten up – being over the board and having straight legs is the stance required for foiling. If you are used to being low and out then this will feel weird at first. Embrace it and know that the higher boom and shorter harness lines helps you adopt this stance.  
• Soft is fast – after getting comfy with your stable ride height, it is time to boost your speed and this is achieved by softening the legs so they are straight but not locked. This was a breakthrough for me and is described well in one of Sam Ross’s fantastic foiling videos!   
• Footsteering – after getting plenty of stable runs on the foil practice steering up and downwind unhooked to feel how to steer and how to use the rig too. This feels good and will help your gybes, same too on a windsurfer.  

• Precision – be conscious that the foil can be quite sensitive so be extra precise when moving hands and feet. 
• Starts – whilst uphauling is de rigueur I preferred to do the light wind waterstart with my front hand on the mast. This got me up and forward on the board away from the foil. Again, this is a fab move for both sports.  
• Game plan – know that a foil really flies upwind, so early in your flight plans learn to go downwind in the cruisey sail open style or you really can get stuck upwind.  
• Harness work – practice hooking in and out a lot. It will really help your gybing and your all-round confidence and stability.  
• Enjoy the falls – they will happen and are not as bad as they look.  

• Drop down – be confident and focussed in your foil gybes and bring your ride height down to become more stable.  
• Depth – remember that when you drop down from foiling, if you are close to the beach the foil will hit the bottom. In general all wind sports stop too close to the beach and without enough control / style. Better to be safe than sorry with a foil and stop further out from shore. 
• If you are windsurfing with beginner or improver foilers, do not get close to them and race them, as they can be moments from ‘detonation’. 
  

Summary 

 I learnt over a week in Tobago, with its medium winds, flatter water and depth at high tide, an hour a day gave me huge momentum. Thanks to Josh for his time with me out there! With this in mind, I strongly recommend getting some coaching. I continued at home through spring and summer, as with global lockdown I found myself at home. I had good and bad sessions but loved the journey so much and was often humbled by the experience.   

Foiling could be like skiing in that you learn it whilst away and then have more sessions on future holidays, or do it at home and discover it will triple your water time and fall in love with learning again.

Kit and tuning: 

Board choice – I mixed up my learning on both a foil ready freemove board and the short dedicated RRD foil board, the pocket rocket. I liked both, but I enjoyed feeling different foot positions on the Pocket Rocket without straps attached. Try both setups if you can.  

Foil choice – the early lift foil was what I went with, as I wanted to get out in lighter winds and with smaller sails. There are lots of options on foil types and designs, so think about what would favour your style, the conditions you want to get out in and what sort of wind foiling you want to do. 

Sail tuning – I tuned a lot in the water, as it is a faff to get in and out with the foil. More outhaul as soon as I was too powered up and vice versa for less power.  

Setup – initially I used my original long lines and regular boom height, but then after Harty’s piece I went for a higher boom and shorter lines and this is much better. Thanks to Peter and Sam Ross for all the tips!   

Mastfoot – as per normal windsurfing, moving the mastfoot back and forward by a few cms made a big difference. Utilising more tuning on the foil sessions will see you more likely to tune your mastfoot position in normal windsurf sessions. 

Conditions: 

I found it much easier in flatter water, as the board is more stable for easier foot movements. I suggest looking for a good deep flat water spot to learn and improve at.  

The majority of my improvements came in medium powered conditions. I learnt a lot with less power and drank a lot of sea when overpowered.  

When it gets windy it is surprising how small a sail you can get onto and then feel comfortable and carry on learning with. 

RRD boards, wetsuits & softwear, Ezzy sails & Black Project fins sponsor Jem Hall. Get him live and direct on one of his highly acclaimed coaching holidays, visit www.jemhall.com for more details. You can also follow him on twitter / Facebook / Instagram. 

The post MOVE ON UP: FOILING AROUND appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Club Vass are gearing up for the 2021 season!

With summer around the corner and the pandemic being well managed by the UK and the Greeks, we’re highly optimistic that we’ll soon be blasting across our favourite bay.

Our top team, including Ollie Scott and Max Rowe are already winging their way to Vassiliki to prepare the Club as well as all our brand new 2021 kit from Severne, Fanatic, JP, Goya & Duotone. And talking of wings, we’ve got a great selection of Wind & Wing Foil equipment from Slingshot for this summer at Club Vass.

There’s still space in June, one of the best-kept-secret times to be in Vass; it’s warm, windy, the kit’s box-fresh and you’ll have the bay virtually to yourself. Time to book your space in the sun…

0844 4630191    clubvass.com

The post IT’S NEARLY TIME: CLUB VASS appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

From our November / December issue we featured top freestyler and wave sailor, Antoine Albert, who hails from New Caledonia. He tells us more about his home spot and why he decided to turn pro.

Words // Antoine Albert // Photos  John Carter // Valérie Mouren.

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ORIGINS
I was born on the 12th of April 1994 in France, but I moved to a French island situated in the Pacific Ocean called New Caledonia in early 2003 with my parents and my little brother. This is where I grew up and where I live during the off-season from competition. I lived on a boat with my family from 2005 until 2012, when I had to go to France to start my studies, like 90% of Caledonian kids.
I started windsurfing when I was 6 years old through my parents who are themselves windsurfers. I then began to train at the windsurf school of my home spot, the ACPV club in Sainte-Marie bay, Nouméa, where the 2019 PWA slalom event happened. When I was 12 years old I went to France, in Martigues, for my first French Junior Championship. It was slalom racing on Bic Techno 283 one-design gear and I managed to finish 6th in the U15 division. I was the youngest of the fleet, but I quickly get bored of racing. There was a big group of kids at our club having fun with learning tricks and pushing each other to get better, and also looking at the older generation doing loops, spocks, flakas and other old school moves. This is pretty much how I started freestyle with my father’s wave board when I was around 9. Also as a Caledonian windsurfing kid we don’t really have the ‘wave option’, as the wave spots aren’t access friendly because you need a boat to get to the reefs, so it takes usually a full day, costs a lot of money and takes a lot of energy!

As a group we were all frothing on freestyle and it was a constant competition between us in and out of the water. We’d say stuff like, “Have you seen my move?” or “I did it first try!!” or some kind of teasing like this. We all wanted to beat our friends and were dreaming of the moves at night and then explaining our visions on land. So naturally I gravitated to freestyle competitions, it was the next logical step. All our group was motivated by the yearly Caledonian freestyle championships, we were really into it and that was my first step into official competition.

I first got into wave riding when I was 10. Upwind from the ACPV club we have a big reef system, it’s flat water in the middle of it, so you can freestyle there and then on the edge of the reef it’s wavy when it’s windy. It’s only local wind swell, straight onshore, slightly port tack jumping and tiny waves. I went to the outer reef in Ténia for the first time when I was 13 through a surf camp organized by Pierre-Yves Leroux (ex coach of Colin Sifferlen who competed on the PWA). It was super scary, but I found out that I love waves too ha ha.

SWELL TIME

A big swell of 3.8 metres and a 15 second period from the south-southwest was forecast for Saturday 6th of June 2020. It turned out to be 6 metres in the sets, with some good trade winds around 20 knots and a big low tide. The west side of New Caledonia is the best spot for these kind of conditions, where there is a little island called Ténia up north from Nouméa, the capital. To go to Ténia from Nouméa you have to drive up north with a boat and all the gear on a trailer for around an hour and fifteen, then put the boat in the water and navigate for around 30 minutes to the spot in a very choppy lagoon. On the way to the spot on Saturday, I was a bit nervous because the tide was super low with a lot of exposed reef, so if you crashed on the first part of the wave, or if you got caught inside, you would break everything and find yourself in hell, because the reef is as sharp as a knife and fully alive. The day before I had come for a warm up, as the swell was a touch smaller, but still pretty gnarly, knowing that Saturday should be bigger. When we anchored the boat there was already a few guys out. I had got a ride on the boat of my friend Yoan Despujols (a local charger) and I was the first to rig up, opting for my 4.5 Goya Banzai with my 70 litre Goya custom setup with MFC quad fins K300 13 cm / 9 cm (there’s more info. about the boards and fins I use on my YouTube channel). I went to the peak, took the first wave of a huge set, but I was a bit too deep and the wind was quite light. I tried to exit over the lip, but the gear got stuck in the wave while I flew over the top. I’d attempted to escape doing a kind of air, but was way too late, and ended up jumping over my rig out of the footstraps. I now had to deal with the second one behind, which was even bigger. I duck dived under the whitewater, but get sucked down with it. Luckily I didn’t stay too long underwater. I swam out of the spot while my friend Yoan picked me up with the boat and we went to the channel looking for my gear. By a miracle, it was all in one piece.

I kept on sailing for 4 hours after that, building confidence during the session with proper carves and a couple of airs. I was amazed by the width of the swell; sailing over them was like hiking a hill with a long curve at the top. The waves were so powerful and fast with big barrels. There was good vibes in the water, everybody was super respectful and looking after each other, it was great!!

Definitely a day to remember!!

GOYA

I’m psyched to be part of the Goya freestyle development team. I’m very lucky to be able to do that and work with legends like Francisco Goya, Keith Teboul and Jason Diffin, who are super easy to connect and work with.  I benefit from their experience and knowledge from all those years working on making our sport better, more fun and more accessible. It’s so interesting for the passionate windsurfer I am. I have learnt so much about the materials, designs, shapes, manufacturing etc. and how our sport works basically. Also I’m more aware now about the feelings I like in my gear and how to attain them.

Since I joined the Goya team I have had the chance to meet Francisco Goya and he has become a really good friend since. He has such an amazing vision of life, always stoked, always smiling and having such a huge knowledge about windsurf gear and the feelings it gives. It’s so easy to develop the gear with him, sometimes I struggle to explain clearly how I feel about a board or a sail, so I just ask him to try and pay attention on, for example, putting more or less pressure on his front foot or see what the sail does on the water with more or less trim. And after just a tack he can tell me straight away, “Yeah I see, it’s because the rail is like this or the sail is like that”, I mean, he clicks in so easily it’s amazing. I remember him last year during the Goya dealer meeting in Tarifa, we were doing a wave testing day in Los Caños de Meca with proper conditions and I was sailing with my 70 litre custom wave board for reefs, set up as a thruster (10 cm / 15 cm). Francisco was curious about why I liked the board and how fun it was looking because it was kinda similar to what they were shaping for Kauli. I answered him and just asked him to try and have a couple of waves with it to also feel what the board was like. The wind was a bit light and Fran is a pretty tall guy, he was like, “Well, I don’t know, it’s a bit small for me and I’ll never be able to reach the peak with such small fins, but the board looks so fun, ok I’ll try. He went out with the board sinking to his knees, reached the peak without a problem and took the first wave, did like a sick tail blow, straight into an air and finished with a taka right on the section to close the wave out. He came back to the beach fully smiling and said, “It’s a touch small for me, I struggled with it, but it felt right like how I thought it would.” I was like, well ok, but you just destroyed that wave and everybody had their mouths open on the beach, but you say you struggled… I wish I could struggle like you too then ha ha. He’s a super fun guy!

GOING PRO

When I first started the tour I was preparing for the exam to enter merchant navy school and train to be a captain. It was a tough year because it’s an entrance exam which means you have to beat the other people to gain a place on the course. I was working a lot on maths and physics, not windsurfing much compared to the guys doing it full-time. I didn’t get a place, so next I studied for a two-year degree in thermical and energies engineering before graduating with a bachelor of mechanical physics. During those five years I was not 100 per cent focussed on windsurfing, that’s why I was struggling during events. It’s hard to do both – a job / studies and sport, because both take a lot of time and energy if you want to succeed. That’s why after graduating and joining the Goya international team, I decided to be a professional windsurfer and focus only on my sport.

Now, sometimes when I’m at home, I do some private windsurf coaching, but being a professional athlete is already a full-time job with training in and out of the water, gear development and travelling, so there is not much time to do anything else. It’s a kinda strict way of life, especially with our sport depending on the weather, you can never schedule anything without the risk of missing a session. I guess in other sports you can work part of the day and practice your sport in the other part, not thinking about the forecast or whatever.

COMPETITION

My first PWA experience was in Fuerteventura in 2012, I entered it thanks to Sarah-Quita a.k.a. SQ, a.k.a. the Queen of windsurfing, who convinced Annika (in charge of the event organization) to give me a wildcard. Sarah-Quita is the nicest person I have ever met, straight away we became very good friends and she even gave me one of her carbon extensions because my one was all twisted.

Arriving in the mythical Sotavento with all the top riders there was for me a living dream!! New Caledonia is really far away from the rest of the world and it’s pretty expensive to get to, so it’s super rare to have pros visit. I watch all the Kuma Movie freestyle videos and had only seen the pros before on them or other videos; I was so excited to be able to talk and windsurf with them, it was unreal.

I didn’t expect Sotavento to be so hard to sail, when you watch the videos it looks nice and flat with perfect ramps gently coming your way. The reality is that it is super choppy and the ramps are straight offshore and super close to each other. You actually need a lot of practice and experience to perform there. Also my quiver at that time was pretty small – an old 4.8 freestyle sail and a 4.0 wave sail. No 4.4, no 3.8, just one board and one boom. I didn’t manage to pass any heats, it was tough for the inexperienced kid I was! As the years passed by I learnt to be more ready, be confident, have the right gear and know what and what not to do.

Overall competition is quite stressful, especially in freestyle, as with only 2 to 3 events a year, you can’t mess any up otherwise you sink in the rankings as the level is extremely high. But I can’t complain as it’s my choice of life. If I’m bored or not happy with it, I can quit and go find myself a job.

TRAINING

When I’m home, for my training out of the water I go at least five times a week to the gym. Out of those 5 times I have 3 Thai boxing sessions, one cardio workout and one functional movement session for mobility and muscle building. I stretch every day and sometimes I go to the gym to use their rollers, balls and other massage / stretching gear, this minimises my risks of injuries. I also surf a lot and do some hikes in the Caledonian mountains.

My windsurfing training in freestyle happens at the ACPV club, there are various spots around the bay where I can find dead flat water, hard choppy conditions and mellow choppy conditions etc. I try to set goals for the sessions and watch videos from other PWA freestyle riders online as I mostly sail alone at home. Otherwise I train with the boys between events at the competition spots or on other various trips.

For waves, I watch tonnes and tonnes of surfing videos and WSL heats, that inspires me a lot for how-to connect sections and do different type of turns and stuff. I also watch videos from my favourite wave riders and get inspired by their style and positioning on the wave. Then I try to recreate this on the water.

Overall I try to spend as much time on the water as possible – wave, freestyle or foil depending on the conditions.

KIT

I’m 170 cm and 65 kg. In freestyle I ride the Goya Bounce in all sizes from 3.4 up to 5.4 when the wind is extremely light and use the Goya Air 89 litre with MFC GE freestyle fin in 20 cm. For waves I ride the Goya Banzai in sizes from 3.1 to 4.5 and occasionally 5.0 during contests.  For boards I mainly ride a 70-litre Goya custom, which I can set up as a quad or a thruster. It’s designed for more powerful waves, but I use it as soon as I can even in slower waves because I love the way it turns. I have a 75-litre Goya custom quad, super fast and skatey for slow mushy waves and production Goya Custom 4 Pro 68 and 74 litre for jumping. My wave fin setup is 10 cm / 15 cm MFC TF custom for the thruster (my 15 cm is narrower than the production) and MFC K300 9 cm / 13 cm for the quad. All my custom boards are 214 cm. I really love short boards as they fit better in hollow waves and also in the car ha ha.

I feel very lucky to be able to use custom wave boards shaped by Keith Teboul, specially designed for my size and style of riding. It personally helps me a lot to push my limits by being able to be quicker in the wave, having more reactivity under my feet and hit hollower parts of the wave or with more confidence.

I wish we could be allowed to use custom boards in PWA freestyle too as each rider is different in terms of size, weight and style, but we all have to be basically on the same board. Our freestyle production boards are truly amazing and work in all conditions, but sometimes I try to imagine in a perfect world being able to have this personal touch on the boards, or maybe a more specific board like the wave sailors do for certain kinds of conditions, like Sotavento for example, which is a very unique spot. Wave sailors won’t use the same board in Pozo and Cabo Verde, even if the wave production boards are working insanely good in a large range of conditions these days. The ratio between accessibility and performance is super high for production boards – super accessible but working extremely good. It’s the same for cars, but a production car is not similar in performance to the rally car Sébastien Loeb is using in competition, as he is pushing the limits of his sport as much as we do as pro windsurfers.

But the PWA and freestyle market isn’t allowing us to do customs, because of rules and the budget the brands have. Custom boards are way more expensive to build than productions and it isn’t worth it for the brand to do that. I don’t complain, I honestly love my freestyle boards, I just love to try new stuff ha ha.

IDOLS

As a kid my number one idol in freestyle was Kiri Thode with his super smooth and technical style doing crazy stuff in light winds that nobody else was doing. Then Kauli Seadi of course, super smooth, loose and technical in the waves but also a sick freestyler. Colin Sifferlen as well, as I grew up watching him sail. Marcilio Browne also – super explosive, fearless, and a master whatever the conditions and the spot. Those are really the styles of sailing I love.

COMPETITION

I’m competitive, that’s why I’m on the PWA and EFPT pro tours. I believe it’s a way to prove myself, show my skills and have a goal to my training and dedication. It also makes me improve faster and better because I always want to give my best during a contest.

My goal is to make a podium in the PWA and be in the top 5 overall in freestyle. I managed to reach the final four at the PWA Sylt event 2 years ago, so I’m sure I have the level. The plan is simple: train hard ha ha. Also I would love to compete in a wave event that is port tack side-off and logo to mast high on a reef break; wave riding only because that’s the type of conditions I train the most in and it would be cool to see what I could do in a contest – maybe not much ha ha.

TIPS

One time I was with a friend trying to learn how to shaka, I was maybe around 14, something like that, and was on the club’s beach, and Colin Sifferlen was there freestyling. During his break, we went up to him to ask for advice because we were struggling. He looked at us with a little smile and said super smoothly, “Shaka? Well, send it and it goes by itself.” I remember looking at my friend like, what? We do that already but it doesn’t work ha ha. He explained it to us with more details later, but it was a really funny moment and actually might be one of the best tips we got from the send it master himself!!

My best advice to other windsurfers would be to windsurf in all kinds of conditions, windy or not, because light winds are super helpful too.

LOCKDOWN

Lockdown was hard for me because I’m not the type of person who can sit at home forever if it’s windy and/or wavy, I’m too hyperactive and passionate for that. We had a 3-week lockdown with 22 confirmed cases of Covid-19 so far on the island. They closed the lagoon, meaning that you couldn’t confine yourself far away from civilization somewhere at sea, but still allowed people who were already on their boat to stay in bays accessible by roads, which is what I did with my parents. There were a lot of patrols with helicopters flying around and army boats chasing after anyone who was in the lagoon, it was scary.

ADDICTIVE

Windsurfing allows me to express myself, get creative and competitive. It’s also my way to have a lot of fun, travel the world and meet amazing people in the places I go to and now it’s my job. It’s super addictive and my life turns around it. As soon as there is a mini breeze, I can’t schedule anything, because there might be a chance for me to go on the water and windsurf, and I can even go in less than 13 knots now with the foil. This is why it’s so important to me and why I love it. I try to spend as much time as I can on the water.

Windsurfing has taught me how to organize myself, make decisions, and speak other languages, as well as patience, humility to nature and people, and a better control of my emotions.

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The PWA have just released this news update regarding the 2021 tour calendar.

Dear Friends

We hope you are all continuing to stay safe and well.

Since we published our tentative schedule just under a month ago, the progress towards the lifting of COVID restrictions has not progressed as quickly as we might have hoped. Although the long term outlook is still positive, we have been monitoring the situation closely with our event partners and there are a few changes that we want to let you know about.

Unfortunately, due to the ongoing uncertainty of current circumstances, the events in France, Costa Brava and Portugal have had to be cancelled for the 2021 season. In each case, local authorities have not been able to give any indication of if or when the ban on events might be lifted, and permission granted for the events to go ahead. That uncertainty has also led to commercial support being deferred to the 2022 season and has prevented other financial support from being confirmed in time for proper event planning to continue. Although postponing to later in 2021 has been considered, no viable options were available, making it impossible for the events to continue this year. The cancellations are purely due to the pandemic though, meaning that work done to realise the events in the 2021 season will not be lost, with all events expected to return in 2022.

On a more positive note, the Slalom World Cup at Tiberias in Israel, has been moved to 21st to 25th June which will give the event even greater assurance of great conditions. Many of the required permissions for the event to take place are already in place and we expect to be able to fully confirm the event in the near future.

The remainder of the calendar remains unchanged currently, and we must stress again that all events remain TBC due to COVID at this time.

We will bring you more news of any calendar developments as they happen.

Kind regards

The PWA

The post PWA 2021 CALENDAR UPDATE appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Fanatic have just released their new Sky Air Premium inflatable wing foiling board, perfect for travelling!

The Sky Air Premium – our travel friendly version of our popular Sky Wing models – no compromise on comfort and riding sensations, in a compact package! It comes in 3 sizes from 5’4″ to 5’10” and offers an incredibly stable flight. Our extra rigid Carbon plate directly under the riders feet, makes sure the foil follows every command instantly. The shape features a pronounced nose rocker making sure touchdowns won’t stop the fun.

SKY SOLBACH

“Of course the bottom shape and the rails aren’t comparable to a composite board. But there’s several things you can do to bring the behavior as close as possible to that of the solid Sky Wing shapes.

We’ve tuned the rocker line and added many features to give the Sky Air an easy take off and to make them feel very rigid and responsive under your feet and at the same time make them forgiving for touch downs, which saves entry level riders from falling off and re-starting all the time.

Ultimately the benefit of these boards is that you can fold them in half and pack your entire setup in a nice compact bag for traveling – which is something the composite boards cannot compete with. Of course the iSUP material itself is super durable and perfect for beginners/intermediates, keeping damages to a minimum whilst offering a soft and safe surface vs a more fragile composite board”.

DANIEL AEBERLI 

“The team and I tested quite a few inflatable boards for foiling and our conclusion was, if we do it for Fanatic, we need to do it properly and not just make an iSUP with a foil box, as our impression of simple designs with a box or tracks only in the tail wasn’t really satisfying to say the least. Designing a really solid carbon plate that stabilizes the entire area between the foil and the front foot was a game changer in the process.

We combined this with our most rigid inflatable technology and Sky’s latest outlines plus extra nose rocker. Still, we were missing the easy release, so we’ve added silicon rails to reduce the drag around the tail of the board. Footstrap inserts for 3 straps and last but not least the essential feature of a bottom handle, round off the riding sensation on the water and the comfort on land”.

More details here: https://www.fanatic.com/foil/our-world/about-us/news/detail/out-now-sky-wing-inflatable-wing-foiling-board

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Thomas tour continues his awesome guided tour series with his take of the wave sailing in Galicia, one of the most remote stretches of the Spanish coastline!

Thomas Traversa: “Let me take you on a little ego-trip to Galicia, one of the most remote part of the spanish coastline.   It is a place that I just kept going to during the last 20 years and it really has a special energy : the nature, the wind, the waves, the space… every trip there is a return to a part of myself”

Footage by: Mathieu Pelikan / SIAM images (camera & drone) Brendan Pyatt / UMI pictures ( old footage )

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Federico Morisio brings us an action packed video of the highlights from one of his best days whilst in Chile training for the 2021 season.

FEDERICO MORISIO: “In February, Chile didn’t provide as many conditions as I hoped, but as always, once it was on, the windsurfing sessions were simply unbelievable! The day I had is what I call a “Dream Day”, with a morning solo-session in Topocalma and then an incredible sunset session in Matanzas from 7pm to 9pm with offshore winds and just a couple of friends! I am super grateful for these days and moments. Thank you Chile for being so awesome! It’s time to leave though… and I’m sure that you guys will love my next destination…stay tuned!”

The post DAYS WE DREAM ABOUT: FEDERICO MORISIO appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.

Ever enthusiastic sailor, Nico Prien takes us on a guided tour around El Medano on Tenerife, he did not quite hit the perfect days but still managed to score some decent sessions on the water.

via Nico Prien

The post THE (ALMOST) PERFECT WINDSURFING SPOT: NICO PRIEN appeared first on Windsurf Magazine.