With a fast approaching storm this morning, the 3 fleets rushed to get a race underway but unfortunatlly the squall caused some huge chaos and the fleets were sent back to shore. Once everything passed, race 3 got underway with the rsx and kona/techno 293 fleets starting and finally another race for the formula fleet. I had the chance to port tack the fleet but didn't quite pull the trigger in time and ducked the first 3 guys at the pin. Off to the right side I banged the corner and was looking good until I sat parked in a lull as the left side crossed ahead. From there it was catch up trying to gain as much tactical advantage over the next 3 legs picking off 1 board at a time to finish a strong 3 just catching Fernando at the last gybe in front of the finish. Schurman was OCS with Micah and Paulao taking a commanding lead. .
Thanks to MiamiWindsurfing for the photos By the time race 4 started the breeze was down to 10-12k and I was looking for all the power my 12.3 had and 72xxs kashy would give me. Booms high, outhaul bagged and harness lines long. I even tried my mast track back to 42" from the front fin screw. Again a port start with the whole fleet charging the line except for Micah coming down fast on starboard. I gor off the line well and off to the right corner with speed but backing down 2x to clear the weeds on my fin In the light stuff it's important to remember that your laylines are further than normal. I tacked and came up short having to tack another 4x to round the top mark. At that time the top 3 were gone and I struggled to catch the 4 boards who rounded just in front of me to salvage a 6th, pumping hard all the way to the finish. So with only 4 races complete I find myself in 3rd as we need 5 races for a throwout. Both Micah and Schurman are sitting deep both carrying an OCS. Paulao and Fernando have sailed the most consistant and thus are in the top 2 spots. Mondays forecast looks dismal but anything can happen.
A quick report from day 1 in Miami @ the caviliga regatta. All the usual characters + some new faces at the first regatta of the season. The formula fleet got off to a late start but managed 1 race in the breeze with Schurman BRA999 taking the bullet just infront of fellow Brazillian BRA3333 and Buzianis in 3rd. I managed to stay in front if the rest of the rest of the fleet with the winds building up to the mid 20s. A quick break for lunch on the barrier island was all it took for the breeze to calm down as sailors began to shift gears into light wind mode. Most of the fleet was still on their 10s and 11s struggeling for power. I managed to sail pretty fast but in the wrong direction as I banged the right corner, tacked and game over. Not enough time for a recovery with just a 2 lap race. Buzianis got the bullet but was osc. Finally we tried to start a 3rd race in little to no wind and it was abandoned as most of the fleet never got planning. Tommorows forecast looks decent with 15-20k. Steve USA4
The northerlies continued all week with more formula and slalom sailing on the SF Bay. Even some time at fort point catching the outside break but the lee of the south tower on a NE breeze throws a big shadow. Jean got sucked in for a good 5 min before having to paddle out. The best breeze was in the middle of the bay but the swell and sunshine under the gate were temping. It was this time about 4 years ago I got sucked out the gate on a big ebb tide and rescued by the coast guard. Needless to say, I keep a better eye on the tides. With a northerly or NE breeze, the marin headlands shuts down most of the wind under and outside the bridge.
Fridays afternoon slalom session was lit on the warp 7.3 and 105l slalom board in 12-22k A bit too much power with the 42 cm fin when it gets above 16-18k but Jean, Andre and I got some amazingly fast runs from anita rock to the presidio shoals & out the slot. See the 2nd 1/2 of Jeans winter sailing video below.Saturday saw the breeze fill in late but I got 2 solid sessions in with the warp 11.0 and ML10. Im beginning to get a better feel for the sweet spot on the board. Downwind feels the best with the board working really well in the outside, chicken and double chicken straps. Thanks for Dwells @ Waterhound for the photos and Jean for the headcam videos. Also check out the photos of Wells sailing his kona at ft point on sunday. http://plminteractive.com/jmphoto/proofs/10_01_10_ftpt_wind/ Despite trying the 7.3/slalom combo just wasnt enough to get up there
Wednesday Jan 6 got me back on the water again after 3 weeks of being landlocked! The sheer sensation of tracking a formula board upwind @ 25k is truly spectacular. Under the golden gate is even more fantastic. The ML10 felt more dialed in with the 10m rig as the 15-20k NE gusts filled into the beach @ crissy field. I ran my track @ bit further forward than before with 114cm to the front fin bolt. Downwind it was fantastic. The board tracks well and really goes deep with the chicken and 3/4 chicken. I wish I could say the same about my gybes and tacks. My hands and feet only lasted about an hour on the water before turning a useless numb.
2 times outside the gate to the red nun before finding a wicked eddy amongst the afternoon flood tide and having to unwind ourselves from the lee of the south tower. No chance of finding any swell @ft point. USA13 and I ran a skewed Friday night course A in the NE breeze for some power reaching between Anita and X. My thigh muscles were pretty useless after that.
No I havnt given up windsurfing just yet...just adjusting my schedule a bit to accommodate some new goals. During this off season, I will be concentrating a bit more on my architectural career vs windsurfing. I'm hoping to knock off a few off the ARE exams this winter and over the next 2 winters (and leaving the summers for windsurfing) so that I can become a registered architect. Yes, there is more to life than windsurfing...something I never thought Id say!
Nonetheless, I was super exited to pick up my new ML10 formula board a few weeks ago at the Lab in northern Californian. Its always a fun trip up to see the maestro Zajicek and his lab in full action. There are various states of formula boards and slalom boards in mid construction. Blanks of foam perched on the wall, waiting to become a finished product; boards vacuum wrapped to the rocker table halfway to their life and finally sitting their on the main table was the lightest formula board Ive picked up... 7.8 kg of pure craftsmanship. Honestly Id rather give my $ to no one else knowing the hard work and dedication that goes into building a custom board. Seeing the other repairs he does to production boards, I noticed the inconsistencies, sub par work and materials that go into production boards and ask myself if its really worth it. Sure, it might be cheaper but Ive learned the lesson before...no one wants to blow out a fin box in the middle of a regatta or have their foot go right through the deck of the board. When you buy a ML board, you know its going to be exactly like the one produced before it and exactly like the one produced after it. You cant say that with a production board! I only managed 2 sessions in very light winds on the new board before leaving for the holidays . It did seem to pop up on a plane sooner than my old 160 and go pretty damn fast but its going to take some adjusting to find the sweet spot in terms of angle and speed. My goals this season are simple: Improve my upwind angle. Something Ive been struggling with for several seasons. I gave up quite a few positions at the Worlds and even losing the US Nationals because I couldn't match my competitors angle upwind. Furthermore, Im going to be putting some different sails into the quiver this year to see how it helps the program. Ill stick with what I know works well- the north 10.0 and will be trying out the NP evo2 10.7. Not much traveling on the agenda this season so Ill leave the 12.0 out of the equation and concentrate on racing in SF.
So if you dont hear much from me over the next few months, its not because I'm not thinking about windsurfing every moment just like you but rather the mechanical, plumbing and electrical codes are currently taking up their spots on the top of my brain. In the meantime you can follow what sessions I do get at http://twitter.com/usa4
We lost an icon in the sport of windsurfing this week. Bill Weir of San Francisco succumbed to a year long battle with brain cancer. Like everything in life, he gave it everything he had up until the last minute. We knew Bill as a great waterman. His passion for windsurfing went beyond racing as he was an ambassador for the sport- always bringing new people in with his zeal and enthusiasm for the sport and life. He even went on to document the sport of windsurfing with an amazing film on the beginnings of the sport. His van and music were icons in the StFYC parking lot for as long as I can remember.
I spent countless sessions with him at Fort Point and on the Friday night course at StFYC but they all seam like a distant memory now. In my first years in SF, he pushed me more than anyone else, owning the Friday night course but always available for a "debreifing" in his van after the racing. That was his course and we all knew it. When I was finally able to beat him in a Friday nite series, I was so damn happy. I had so much respect for the guy.
He was larger than life and always fist to the mark.
We'll miss you dear friend.
Godspeed on the journey ahead.
A memorial service will be held @ 3:30 pm Monday October 12th @ the Saint Francis Yacht Club (adjacent to Crissy Field). More info @ http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/billweir
There will be a brief service to honor Bill, followed by a reception at the yacht club.
In lieu of flowers donations can be made to the Surf Rider Foundation and Save the Bay Before the service you are still encouraged to walk along the beach at Crissy Field and enjoy the beautiful place that Bill called his second home.
With a September 30st deadline for the 2010 ISAF Formula board registration, we're beginning to get an idea of the boards for next season. Looks like at least 7 or 8 new models to choose from for the upcoming season which really highlights the strength of the class! Healthy competition always brings the best forward. The development lately over the past few years has really evened out with most of the shapes either leaning toward light wind performance or control as it gets windier. But can 1 board still do it all? In 2008, the class rules were changed so that boards needed to be registered at the beginning of a 2 year cycle. Weve just completed the 08/09 season and the new boards for 2010-11 will be class legal to race starting Jan 1. Board manufactures needed to register their boards by Sept 30 or face missing out on the next years. Picking a board largely depends on where you'll be racing but remember you can always change rigs and fins to accomodate the conditions. Industry leader, Starboard took the idea of that releasing 2 boards is better than 1, but unlike F2 last year, they are making both available at once: A heavy rider board and a light rider board. Its a bit of slap in the face at the formula rules (which limited new designs to a 2 year cycle) but kudos to them for making the best available to both heavy weight and light weight riders. The difficult decision will be which one to choose! Early information suggest the LWR is based of the 160 shape that worked so well in the breeze and the HWR is based off the 162. Gaastra will also have a new board and should be excellent as usual with the developmental input of Ross Williams and Arnon Dagon. Their 2008/9 board was one of the easiest to tune from the beginning and did not seem to be so fin sensitive like the other boards. There's not much known about the status of the F2 program with their lead designer Patrik Diethelm bailing ship after last years financial insolvency in the F2 group. The word is little change and new graphics for the 2010 board. Look for the continued legacy of light-wind performance form F2 and maybe another Diethelm board from Patricks own label! The all new 2010 Black Machine by Exocet will really benefit from the input of one of the best testers and forces in the industry- Gonzalo Costal Hovel. He has been living and breathing formula and slalom for the last few years and really knows his stuff. Expect the best! With ARG-3 graphics on the hull, Im not to sure this will be popular with the Brazilians!
Legendary Bay area shaper, Mike Zajicek has also been busy making not 1 but 2 boards for the upcoming season. His signature line will have a an improved version of the L8 with longer rails and a broader nose and no doubt, almost all of the SF fleet will be one! One official run downwind in the bridge to bridge race and the thing was flying. Expect a comfortable ride with standard double chicken for the SF voodoo chop. The lightest weight and best constructed formula board on the market! He's also been commissioned to shape the new JP Formula board. All indications suggest something very similar to the ML10 but maybe a bit bigger in the tail for the likes of Buzianis or Albeau. The "race deck" is a new feature with raised padding under the front footstrap for better control. See more PR here.Finally there's 2 new boards from Carbon Art....780 and 820. They've made some sweet slalom board and even cleaned up at the US Nationals this summer in the Gorge! With a radically different tail and NO CUT OUTS, these 2 designs should be interesting! Additional info on the Carbon Art boards at their forums
Sean put together a nice collection of photos of the new starboard and exocet boards shown at the Worlds in Santa Pola. Check out the photos at AUS120.com
You’ve got to love these images from the 2009 Formula World Championship in Santa Pola Spain that really capture that spirit of modern windsurfing racing. With nearly 100 boards from around the world competing, the class is continuing to grow and develop after 10 years of evolution.
This year’s world championship saw many professionals dominate the top positions, despite the class being dropped from the PWA circuit a few years ago. Several Olympic class windsurfer coming fresh from the RSX Worlds in England earlier in the month were also pushing the top of the fleet. It goes to show that sometimes you can have it all with professional, amateur and Olympic class windsurfers racing together.
The worlds was a huge event this year with more organization than Ive ever seen at a regatta. For every racer there must have been another volunteer, police, or security officer there with the typical Euro/Spanish organization when you ask who's in charge- everybody says "me!" Everyday they had breakfast and lunch for 150+ people. There were 3 huge tents for the sailors and their gear, a beach tower for the press and huge stage for the opening and closing ceremony. The top 16 men and 3 of the women split the 30,000 euro prize money.
The racing is what draws most to the class and this year it was tight. The pros are always f' fast but it the rest of the amateurs that are catching up. Just behind the front pack from 15th-30th were some very fast sailors mixing it up but with the typical light wind conditions, there were a lot of mixed results on the scoreboard. Going into the last race, it was a challenge between Steve Allen, AUS-0 and Woijek Brzowski, POL-10. Steve had won all 3 Euro Grand Prix's this summer in Poland in the light breeze while Woijek (and the rest of the Poles)are known for cleaning up in the breeze. As luck would have it for the Aussie, the last and deciding race, was run in just 10-12k favoring the lightwind specialist. That worked as well for Martha Hlavaty POL-111 as she was able to take advantage her RSX training and finesse her way to the podium in 1st followed by Allison Shreeve, AUS-911 in 2nd.
We ran 12 races over 6 days with racing usually commencing at 2-3pm when the seabreeze kicked up but Santa Pola is known for doing anything and everything. Most of the racing was done in 10-15k with few races in only 8-10k. Day 4 saw the big breeze come in with 25-30k but the RC deemed it too unsafe after only 2 races and the safety boats picking up plenty of carnage around the course. We ran a single fleet throughout the entire regatta with all 80 boards on the line at full speed. Getting off the line was at a premium or else you faced digging your your back through a big middle pack in a short 20 min race. For all 12 races, we ran a double windward leeward course with an offset at the top mark and a gate as the leeward rounding and finishing downwind at the beach.
As always, the gear is still a big part of the game in the Formula class. Its what draws some of us to the class. Being able to match your board, sails and fins to your body type, sailing style and location is what windsurfing has always been about and why one design classes never seem to work. Putting together a kit that works well for San Francisco conditions is much different than the typical euro conditions we saw at the Worlds. The Euro sailors with the light wind sets up definitely had an advantage. As always the NP sails were going very fast with light EVO2. Most were on their 12.0 and 10.7s. The MauiSails 12.0 seemed like it was really going well in the light to medium breeze but not so with their other sails in the quiver. This year, most of the fleet had wide boom ends for their big sails and some have custom booms widened in the mid point. The gaastra sails look very consistent throughout their quiver with even some new ideas being tried. The north's seemed very good when powered up but I hardly got the chance to put everything in the top gear. As for the boards, there was a big variety. What worked in the light wind didn't necessarily win the heavy wind. The F2 Z and 162 because of their size had the advantage in the light stuff but became a handful in anything over 16-18k while boards like the 160 really didnt come alive till at least 14k. Boards like the 161 and the gaastra seemed to fit the middle gap. This year, like the past few years, custom fins have made a big difference in a sailors kit. Most of the fleet is on the kashy xs fins with the lighter air boards demanding more powerful fins like 83 or 76cm cut down to 70. A few guys at the top of the fleet, as well as most of the Estonians were using a new Z fin- excelling in the light air. The Polish have also got a new white fin that's going well. Also, quite a few IFJU fins as well as a limited number of VMG fins. No matter the kit, whats important is to find the right tuning. There are so many variables from 1-2cm of downhaul adjustment, mast track position, boom height, fin stiffness and rake... endless ways to tweak your kit.
There were also a few changes at this year at the AGM. The ranking system will now reward excellence vs the previous system which rewarded participation. The ranking now will be annual-starting and finishing each year at the Worlds. Another big change came with how we will run the qualifying series in Championship events. 4 races will be used as a qualifying series and your result after 4 races will be carried forward to the Final Series(Gold/Silver) as the first race. Furthermore this can be discard-able after the 3rd race of the final series (ie QS result + 3 FS races = 7 and second discard according to Championship Rules). Finally the class voted to enforce sail numbers starting at next years championship regattas. Everyone must have white backgrounds and black sail numbers. There were quite a few people complaining this year that they followed the rule which they thought would be enforced while others with white numbers or hand drawn numbers on their sails were getting away with murder on the line as the RC had a harder time calling them OCS than the sailors with the proper white background and black number! It is a small technicality but will cost you if you don't oblige.
Here's a 2 other videos from BEL-6 and AUS-120. Enjoy!
With just minutes to spare before the last possible start at 5pm on the last day of the championship, the RC managed to squeeze one last race off which ultimately determined the fate of both the men and womens fleet.
Both Allision and Wojeck were winning their fleets by the narrowest of margins and let victory escape them. Another hour and the conditions would have suited them but sometimes in sailing, luck is a big part of the game.
The conditions were testing us all day with the offshore breeze and seabreeze fighting each other. Finally at 4:30pm, we got 10-12k on the course and headed out. Under the black flag, I started on port with the top guys as I wanted to get to the right side where the clouds were filling in. I ducked most of the starboard tackers and began to foot to the favored side. Sure enough by overstanding a bit I was able to lay the top mark ahead of the pack and managed a strong downwind. The next upwind was really lightening up and I really made a big effort to overstand again to mantain a plane while the guys that tacked too early struggled to get going. With Sean and Adri on my tail I held on and finished on a strong note- especially as the conditions were not in my favor.
Overall pleased with regatta but as always so much to learn. Next year, I'm really going to focus more on my weakest area- lightwind and make a big effort to overcome the things that have been holding me back.
Getting ready to fly back to SF today after a long night out on the beach celebrating and letting loose.
As always the Spanish know how to throw a good regatta and am even better party!
Windsurfing is such a fickle sport. Some days you're the cats meow. Other days you cant find your way out of a box. Today was one of those days.
Nothing seemed to go my way to matter how hard I tried. Every shift, I found myself on the wrong end of. Every sail choice was the wrong one. My fins were going backwards. With 2 throwouts, I might have well slept in till 4pm and got a fresh start.
You'd think at the World championships I would have figured these things out...or at least stayed home but then again you never know if you dont try.
I never really found my groove and struggled the whole day in the middle of the fleet. We ran 4 races on a double windward-leeward course- finishing downwind just in front of the beach. The wind was pretty shifty with no side constantly paying off. I went left. I went right, I even went up the middle a few upwind legs
In race 1, I took the 11.0 and 70cm kashy which seemed to go backwards. I didint have any power or angle upwind. I came in totally frustrated and was just about to switch to the 12.3 for race 2 when the wind jumped up to the mid to upper teens so I settled again for the 11.0 and got a bit better angle with the increased pressure. Getting buried at the start didnt help as the port tackers plowed right through my line! In these short races, once you get stuck in the middle of the pack, its really hard to get out as everybodys got similar speed and angle. In the 3rd and 4th race I switched down to the 67 kashy as the chop was building and wind up to 18-20k. With some better angle and speed off the wind, I was feeling better but still stuck in the middle with no where to go.
With one more day to go, there's still a chance to finish strong and any opportunity to learn something is worth it. Up in front its the usual suspects who are making it look easy. Steve USA-4
