Seasoned racer Arnon Dagan from Israel has been a stalwart of the PWA scene for well over a decade but he is a man of many talents – musician, tester for both RRD and Neil Pryde and a fresh role as a husband and father. John Carter caught up with Arnon for an insight into one of the professional tour’s most interesting characters and Israel’s foremost windsurfing competitor.
BACKGROUND I have never had any plans in life. I am not that type of person, I just go with the flow. I started windsurfing relatively late compared to a lot of the racers on tour. Guys like Ross Williams and Gonzalo Costa Hoevel both started much earlier, I did not windsurf until I was fourteen. I am thirty-nine now, so I have been sailing for twenty-five years. My parents live on a cliff which is about half an hour away from the nearest beach at home. Mum was a headmaster of one of the best music and art universities and high schools in Israel and later on became the head of culture in our city. She is now writing books and giving lectures and tours in Israel and around the world. Dad was self-employed and had a business of fixing car speedometers. They have a sea view of the Mediterranean but we could not access the water from the house, despite this we spent a lot of time in the water. Israel is a sunny, warm place so a perfect place for watersports.
COMPETITIVE NATURE I was always into sport and very competitive at school. I loved sport and music. They were my two things in life when I was young. Any type of competition was appealing to me. Once I found windsurfing I was obsessed and all my other sports were put on the back burner! When I learned, windsurfing was quite popular in Israel, especially clubs that were established with Olympic windsurfing. My brother ‘Ori’ brought this massive windsurf board to the beach and we tried it and both fell in love with the concept straight away. A lot of kids were surfing in my local area and I was interested to learn to surf but we checked the surfing guys and they were only up on the board for one or two seconds and then they were back down. We calculated that the longest rides for the surfers were about 10 seconds on the waves. We then went to another spot where there were guys wave sailing and they were going in and out riding waves and the action just never stopped. That looked way more fun to me so we decided to learn to windsurf. I followed my bigger brother and we started out on a lake. That was it for me. After the first metre I was hooked. At the time I was really into all sports, tennis, soccer, and ping pong, anything to do with a ball. I was top in all sports at school in my year. I was always the group leader and captain of the teams in any sport but there was nothing close to windsurfing after my first go on the board.
THE DREAM I spent a lot of time just hanging in my local windsurfing shop I was so into it. I begged them to give me a job and eventually the owner let me work there. I worked for a guy called Ilan Eliyahoo who supported me and taught me how to go upwind. Once I had the job I had access to all the gear since we were doing demos at the local beaches. At that time there were a lot of competitions in Israel and I quickly realized that I was very competitive. Very early on I won the Israeli championships and went on to try my luck in Maui.
Every windsurfer back then wanted to go to Maui and that was my dream as well. I was around twenty when I finally made it to Hawaii since it took me a good few years to save the money. I had to work for that money, washing dishes, whatever I could. When I arrived it was summer and there were no waves. The only thing to do was the Maui race series. My friend Jamie Lever and I knocked on the doors of every company and finally managed to borrow some equipment. That is when I became really hooked on racing.
Back in Israel, aside from wave sailing in the winter, my favourite thing to do was to take out my race gear and do huge jumps and loops with it. There was not really freestyle then and it was boring to just blast around. I wanted to go fast and just jump and loop. I was on these plastic unbreakable Tiga boards, so we just did forward loops for fun.
I started my race career with slalom because Israel and the Maui race series lead me down that path. I did a few world cups but had no chance because all the other guys were on custom gear. Then suddenly slalom died, there were no more events but I did at least get a glimpse of how it worked. After a whole year in Maui I returned to Israel with an amazing custom slalom board and knowledge about all the best fins and how to tune my gear.
After slalom faded out, Formula started and it seemed like I had the natural build for it. I was fast straight away and felt comfortable racing the equipment. Fanatic picked me up as a team rider and I started full time on the Formula circuit. When slalom came back I had a bit of an advantage. During the first year I was ranked fifth in the world straight away.
LIFE LESSONS Even after twenty five years of racing I am still excited about sailing almost every day. I feel progress all the time and don’t feel like I am stuck in a rut. A few years ago, I won’t lie, I felt like I was going nowhere and had a mental block that I couldn’t do well. I seem to have found my love for racing again and in the last few years I have never had any thoughts of quitting. There are new things to learn all the time and I feel I am reaching my peak again so that is the answer I guess. The only thing I kind of regret during my career so far is not writing a book about it. I really think somebody should because the things that myself Ross, Gonzalo, Benny Van Der Steen, Finian Maynard, Kurosh Kiani and many others have done is like a lifetime of unique experiences. Competitions help you evolve as a human being. They help you be more organized and eventually make racers better people I think. There are so many life lessons that you learn on tour with all the travel and the people you deal with. It has been so interesting and why I think we need to write something about this.
I am afraid to count how many competitions I have been to over the years. Hundreds of events; many times with the same people. Ross Williams is my best friend; he is the guy I like the most on tour. At the end of the day there are only a few friends you feel really connected with from the tour and Ross is definitely a lifelong friend. Also Gonzalo, Benny and Finian; all of these guys, we have all been together for over twenty years on tour.
EXPERIENCE There are a few young guys like Pierre and Matteo that are kicking our arses at the moment but myself and the other more experienced racers have evolved with windsurfing. In this day and age it is easier than ever to race and find the best equipment and tune it well. In the old days it was much more secretive and the equipment played much more of a role. There used to be no way to access the very best equipment but now it is all available to anyone. The new guys can pretty much go and buy similar gear to what we are riding. This is a wonderful thing because it makes the fleet much more competitive and much more even. In a way the old guys have lost a little bit of advantage so now we just have the experience on the water instead. With the equipment tuning the experienced guys get what they want in a shorter time. If I see a problem with my gear I know instantly what is wrong. I don’t need to waste time for too long, I see a problem and most of the time I can fix it. I know the remedial options and what to do.
TESTING TIMES With Neil Pryde I am now their main guy for testing their racing sails. It involves constant development year round. I have to go to Maui which is the best part of it. I work with Robert Stroj who is an incredibly smart guy and a great human being. I feel very fortunate to be able to develop the sails with him. I won’t become a millionaire from it, but it adds a bit more security to being a racer. With windsurfing there is no job security but the design side is something that I have to do and I want to do to be able to continue to compete.
I also work for RRD and I am the head tester for their slalom boards together with Andrea Rossati and Enrico Marotti. I work a lot with Antoine Albeau since we are both on the same sails and boards. Antoine is always involved in the final decisions on the sails, he always tests the sails and he is a very cool guy to work with. On the outside you might think that he is scary but once you get to know him a little bit better you realize he is not a selfish person. I find once equipment is working well for me, it works well for everyone. Antoine might need a bit more power because he is a big guy but that is about it. He would like maybe a bit of a stiffer mast than a lighter guy or a bit more powerful sail but at the end of the day he is also thinking about what is best for the brand. That is the way it works, it is very balanced. I have got to know Albeau quite well now and I really like him, I think he is a worthy champion.
ISRAEL With travel I have no problems at all being Israeli. It seems like they have a good relationship with many countries. I can’t really go to Arab countries but in the realms of my travelling I don’t need to go to these places. The rest of the world is fine and easy for me to travel to. When I go to the USA I get a 6-month visa straight away, which is more than Europeans do.
Becoming a pro windsurfer from Israel was very hard as there was no one to really pave and lead the way so I had to learn everything alone. Apart from that I always must have results in the excellent range to be able to keep industry sponsors as the market in Israel is small and doesn’t justify sponsorships. I have made myself very international over the years to cover for that. On tour I quickly found great friends and personalities; so yes I was always a bit sad to be the only one from Israel but with such cool people around it is not such a big deal. Today I feel unique and proud that I’m the only racer which ever made it from my country and I hope more will come. There are some talented freestylers from Israel – Yarden Meir and Adam Gavriel, which I hope to see more of on tour.
The problems in Israel are a very complicated situation and very hard to explain. Problems of land and religion are always hard to solve. At the moment we are stuck in one place due to stubbornness and fear of leaders from both sides. I truly hope we will find a leader which will be brave enough to lead us to peace. At the moment we don’t have one in sight.
MUSIC My music is nothing too serious. My family is very musical and I was taught to play the piano when I was young, however I became bored of the piano and left it like many people did. When I started travelling I was missing it a lot, so I now have a small keyboard I take to events when I can. I think I have a good ear and feel for music. It’s a hobby and something I love to play about with. I wrote a few songs and I got really into it a few years ago. I can’t do everything on top of my windsurfing. Had I not been a professional sailor maybe I would have been a musician. I don’t think I am that talented at music to talk about it too much! I would like to develop it more than it is now and there will come a time. I keep having crazy ideas for songs all the time. I envision things in a very strong way and quickly create themes around them.
The XXL harness you tube video was based on a real life situation a very long time ago. With Kurosh’s brilliant editing skills it was just fun putting words together and the whole thing became a super funny thing to do during no wind days around the world just playing piano and guitar. We were scared it was too abusive but people seemed to really love it and took it the way it was meant to be taken: just humour!
HIGHLIGHTS I have had many highlights in my career and I cannot point to one alone but definitely a standout was organizing the Storm Rider competition in Israel together with Red Bull. It was a dream for my brother and I and it was actually the first Storm Chase before Red Bull went bigger on the concept. We waited for the strongest, most extreme forecast day and went for it. Right now I am a slalom sailor but I came from waves in the past. Our passion was to hunt down storms and this was the highlight when we started windsurfing. It was amazing to have Ross Williams and Josh Angulo in Israel. We did not ever imagine any sailors would come to our home spot. It ended up being an amazing event and it helped Europe realize what we had in Israel. The spot is called Bat Galim (Daughter of the waves) which has a reef break. But the location has a bit of everything from flat water to waves and works in lots of different winds. It is a really good place to windsurf and after twenty five years of travelling I think I am a pretty good judge of a decent spot! I think it is pretty close to being one of the best places in the world actually.
After I won the IFCA worlds in 2000 Red Bull picked me up and supported me for ten years, they were my first real sponsor and without them I would not have been able to have raced around the world for all these years. More highlights were winning some Formula competitions and scoring third in the world in Formula when all the best guys were there and we had 120 in the fleet. In 2014 I won Sylt which was also a dream of mine. I think of Sylt as the Wimbledon of the windsurfing world, at least organization wise. I was a bit lucky there but I have had plenty of bad luck in the past as well. I went over early in the last semi and if they had finished the final I would have lost the event. Thankfully the wind died and I won the title, but there was a lot of nervous waiting before I finally had the victory in the bag.
SPRITZING Spritzing is a racing term my friends and I came up with. It can be a lot of things. It came from hosing another racer and spraying water in their face as you pass them by. If you get rolled in slalom and a guy passes you and is clearly faster than you then that is what I call Spritzing! The thing you get is this spray in your face so you basically get spritzed! We now have re-spritzed as well. Which means you got spritzed, had the spray in your face but somehow managed to spritz the person back! This only happens once or twice a year.
SLALOM I think when we have the conditions like we did in Fuerteventura this year then slalom is at its best but you need to have the conditions. I would put in a beach start as well. I did a few of them and thought they were fantastic. I would put some jumps in as well. I have suggested it at the annual meetings. As I said before, I grew up jumping on slalom boards because it was boring to go straight. We go fast but I think it would be great to have this extra bit of adrenaline. I think super-cross was cool but it was too complicated with the freestyle moves. Just some straight jumps would be awesome. Slalom is awesome. It can always get a little bit better but I love it the way it is as well.
I like light wind racing as well. There is not much you can do about the way it looks unless you want to sit on the beach and not race at all. I grew up getting punished by the heavy guys when the PWA used to wait for 20 knots. Now we race in 7 knots I am kind of happy. I am biased because I am good in light winds. I enjoy light winds. I like the technical side of it, to tune right, to find the balance, the power and the body technique to lift the board and keep it there. This is what I am all about!
TRAVEL I do get sick of living out of a bag and all this time on the road once in a while but that has been my life. I am afraid of the day when I have to hang up my harness and have to stay in one place. Luckily I have found a wife who understands me and she is wonderful. She is kind of doing the same thing because she is a singer so it seems to work for us.
THE FUTURE I have a baby now so who knows how that is going to unfold. The future at the moment is full power with windsurfing as long as my body lets me do it. So far so good. I think I am stronger than I have ever been. I don’t know what it is but I feel I am getting stronger as I get older. As long as I am physically fit I would like to continue. I have a few things on the side that I am working on. I am coaching some Olympic guys in Israel and I am also part owner of a windsurf, surf and SUP company, ‘BG Surfing’, selling a lot of beginner equipment in Israel. I am trying to open some windows for the future. I cannot deny that my focus at the moment is fully windsurfing, I just can’t help it! It is in my blood!
