G-42 Blog

Full on

2011-06-02T21:29:00.000-07:00

Day 2 of the Costa Brava PWA slalom event. When you hear people like Dunkerbeck and Albeau mention that it was crazy, you can pretty much figure it was. Crazy, in fact, might be a charitable description. And yet these guys are charging. Well, some of them. It's nice to see pros getting bounced out of jibes like the rest of us when things go ballistic.

Albeau killed it, by the way, just like he did the day before (when it was merely blowing really hard). I like his understated commentary at the end, where he nonchalantly explains that he "managed some good starts, good control, and good jibing", hence winning both eliminations. In some of the footage, you can see that while world class sailors around him are bouncing out of their turns and barely holding it together, he's charging.

It's neat to see Albeau and Dunkerbeck duking it out on the tour this year. These guys are the ultimate power sailors. There was an article in Windsurfing Mag last year bitching about how guys in their late 30's/early 40's squatting at the top of the rankings don't make racing all that inspirational or aspirational for young sailors. BS - they're the freaking silver back gorillas of the sport, and any young gun trying to take over will have to be prepared for a pretty full-on battle. At least that's my interpretation (and the fact that I'm 41 and racing in a local fleet dominated by someone a few years older would surely not introduce any bias...)

Slalom object lessons

2011-05-17T09:48:00.000-07:00

Go ahead, watch that video - it's good stuff. What you're seeing there is a fairly ho-hum PWA slalom race, right? Relatively big gear, and the camera being way up and away from the action, together with the distortion that and the long lens produce, makes it look less than exciting (side note - when will the PWA actually figure out that for less than a couple grand, they can put gopro cams on the buoys and a bunch of the boards and really produce some awesome content that shows why slalom racing gets your pulse to race at 180+? Oh well, I digress...)

While it's less than compelling viewing for the non-racing public, for racers, this thing is gold. Let's take it in order:

The Start
Albeau and Angulo near the pin, Dunkerbeck and Dagan closer to the boat, but all are hitting the line at speed. Angulo is just a wee bit ahead of Albeau, actually looks like he might have been the first to have crossed the line; he's fast, so he should be able to completely control Albeau - luff him up a bit, get to the mark ahead of him. Dunkerbeck takes advantage of the fact he's not fighting anyone (Dagan is not a threat to him), so he rolls them both. As they're coming into the first mark, he's basically won the race - proving again that a good start is crucial. There's a bit of a gamble - his line was a bit longer (the pin is usually a bit closer to the first mark, otherwise everyone would bunch up at the boat). It wasn't super windy, so he could translate the little bit of upwind advantage into speed (that, and as mentioned he didn't have to worry about a competitor close by, just focusing on going fast - which he did very well, to no one's surprise...)

First Jibe
Dunkerbeck reaps the rewards of being first at the mark - he picks a clean line, has undisturbed air and water, and gets to exit at speed, consolidating his lead. Look at Albeau and Angulo jibing behind him - these guys are world class, but their exits aren't anywhere near as fast. That's because they have to deal with disturbed air and water, as well as having to pick a line not optimized for acceleration after the transition but for competitive positioning. Albeau looks almost like he's going to roll Angulo - but he doesn't; instead, he pushes up on Dagan, takes a higher line, and gets the inside on the jibe. That positioning, along with a cleaner exit and somewhat more effective pumping allows him to roll Angulo after the jibe. Yes, there's a bunch more reaching and jibing - but at this point, the top 2 are decided.

Jibe 2 & 3
Second jibe shows again that winners make their own luck - Dunkerbeck is way ahead, gets to jibe without pressure, and consolidates his lead. Albeau is behind him, but solidly ahead of the three sailors duking it out behind him. He, too, gets to jibe free of pressure, which keeps him close to Dunkerbeck. Notice, however, that the three guys behind them are jockeying for position - look at Angulo weaving and getting off the gas a bit coming into the jibe. Not sure if that's a bobble (maybe induced by some stray chop) or an attempt to close the door on the guys behind, but that puts him and the other two even further behind. At this point, the guy who led at the start is a distant third. Look at the separation between the top 2 and the next three going into the third jibe - they're practically in a different race now. Even though Albeau hits a lull on exit, he has plenty of time to pump out of it keep way ahead of the pursuers (whilst Dunkerbeck again reaps the rewards of leadership in clean air way ahead - on entry into jibe 3, Albeau was in striking distance; upon exit, Dunkerbeck has just gotten himself the heat as long as he makes no mistakes).

Reach to Jibe 4 through Finish
It looks like the drama is over - Dunkerbeck and Albeau consolidate their 1-2 finish positions with flawless (and somewhat conservative) sailing - Albeau is too far off to challenge, so he's smart, not charging too hard. If Dunkerbeck falls, he'll get him; if not, he'll stay well ahead of the pursuers. Dunkerbeck knows that, so he just brings it home (look at his stance - he's not riding it on the ragged edge any longer).

Among the pursuers, though, the reach into jibe 4 is full of drama. Dagan attacks Angulo; Angulo takes him up, then dives down for speed to get some separation, then really takes him up going before going into the jibe. So Dagan is forced into a higher line, which he translates into an inside position at the mark. Given that the final reach is pretty far off the breeze, that shouldn't matter too much - except that Angulo isn't getting going very quickly.

At this point, though, the camera leaves these two to follow the leaders, missing something interesting. Only once the first two have finished does it pan back - revealing that Dagan has rolled Angulo. How the hell did that happen? Did Dagan capitalize on his lower weight to get going faster out of the lull at the mark? Did Angulo make some sort of mistake? Whatever it was - the guy who led off the line is now in fourth, and Dagan, who looked like despite a brilliant start he just didn't have the speed to hang with those three, just got himself a notch in his belt with a top three finish.

Dagan's performance in all of this is probably the most impressive - he's way lighter than the other three, and he looks like he's not quite as fast in a straight line (probably because of that). So he can't start at the pin - he'd get rolled by the big boys for sure. But starting higher up is not great for him either - being light, it's hard to translate that extra bit of angle into extra speed, so he's not likely to roll any of the big guys. If there'd been a big gust coming through on the first reach, the other three would have probably just put lots of distance on him; instead, he was able to hang with them. And then he just sailed a really nice, flawless, technically and tactically strong race. He kept pushing Angulo, putting on pressure, provoking mistakes, all the while staying clean himself. And at the end, he was rewarded for his persistence with an opening and took advantage of the opportunity.

Windsurfing is not a great spectator sport - it's too far away, it's hard to tell what's happening. This race is a perfect example of that - it's just not very compelling footage unless you are a racer and know what's going on. Imagine, however, that we had a video feed consisting not just of the camera high up on shore for the overall view, but also the above mentioned gopros, or perhaps handhelds on jet skis near the jibe marks, or panorama cams mounted on the marks. A few grand of equipment, two hours of editing (smells like a job for a windsurfing-addicted communications/broadcast student needing an internship project), and a bit of commentary by the sailors collected over a beer while watching the footage along the lines of "check out how he's pushing me up right there..." - presto, content compelling enough for prime time.

Too bad that the excess luggage charges apparently don't leave the PWA enough cash flow to make that investment. Perhaps a bake sale? Meanwhile, I'm getting amped to go racing next month.

There's just no substitute

2011-05-06T20:19:00.001-07:00

There's that rush you get when you're planing along, flying the board on the fin. It's the purest form of sailing - your body an integral part of the system that converts wind power into velocity. The efficiency of modern windsurfing is staggering - in conditions like today's, on my formula gear, 10-12 knots of breeze are enough to propel you along at over twice the windspeed. And it feels easy and exhilarating, just cruising along.

With modern slalom gear, in 20-25 knots of breeze, speeds around 35 knots are doable in open water. That used to be world record territory for any sail powered craft back in the 80's - yet here we are going that fast any decent slalom session like the one I had last week. Talk about a rush.

Meanwhile, the freestylers are pushing the limits with tricks so intricate, I get dizzy watching, and the wave sailors are charging so hard, it's staggering. But for me, it's still purely about that sensation of power and motion.

I've been windsurfing since I was a kid. Back then, the sport was stand up sailing (hence that bumper sticker that's been around since the 70's). In those days, feeling the force of the wind transformed into (at the time, much slower) motion was pure magic - and it still is. Whether effortlessly cruising, or holding on for dear live on a speed run on the ragged edge of an epic wipeout - there's just no substitute...

Gotta love these guys...

2011-03-28T13:29:00.000-07:00

As if a fully powered slalom session for lunch wasn't enough to put a big smile on my face, I was treated to a spectacular visit by a very playful pod of Harbor Porpoises (see image for what these little guys look like; photo by Erik Christensen via Wikimedia Commons). It's not rare to see porpoises in Puget Sound and Bellingham Bay. Usually, you spot one or two, sometimes a whole pod - but they usually go by in the distance. Today, as I kept going back and forth on the same 1/4 mile reach (trying to maximize my jibes - gotta practice when you get the chance...), however, a pod of six or seven of them were just hanging out playing in the same spot for almost twenty minutes. They'd go upwind, then turn around and surf the swell downwind, and once in a while they'd breach, usually when I got close.

I'm not one to anthropomorphize animals, but you can't tell me that these guys weren't out there having fun. They were playing, clearly enjoying the sheer thrill of velocity - and the similarity between that and what I was doing was pretty striking. I guess we water people all have a bit of marine mammal in us...

Rites of spring

2011-03-22T16:39:00.000-07:00

The first flowers are poking their heads up; some trees are starting to bloom, and slowly but surely, temperatures are creeping upward here in Bellingham. The skiing on Baker is still great (the base on Pan Dome is 273 inches - which is considered a normal amount up there for this time of year...), and there still are powder days to be had - but it's becoming clear that spring is on its way, and daylight savings time only adds to the manic energy that takes over this place when the light returns with a vengeance and people start shedding layers.

Today, however, marked that very special rite of spring - the first session without a hood (or gloves for that matter). It was an honest 50 degrees out. Yes, feet are still kind of chilly (water temps are around 45-46F all winter long, not much colder than in the summer - unless there's a bunch of melt-water coming down the rivers...) - but all very doable. Makes a difference, too, in how you approach your sailing - when you're not wearing gloves and can get a real grip on the boom, and when you don't feel sort of isolated/muffled under a hood, you tend to sail more aggressively.

This tends to be a good time of year for sailing up here; lots of fronts moving through, not a lot of eel grass to worry about yet. A couple months of this should get me ready for Gorge racing season - can't wait!

On life-affirming stupidity

2011-02-13T08:45:00.001-08:00

I don't have any small b&j gear. I just don't get to sail it enough to make the investment. There's only one day or so every winter where I'll be out there on my small slalom board and 6.1, picking my way through the somewhat chaotic terrain on Bellingham Bay, and wishing I had a 4.2 Hucker and a jump board. For this winter, yesterday was that day.

The wind chart (courtesy http://nwwind.net/ - big shout-out to Mike Sumpter for this amazing service to the PNW wind tribe) pretty much tells the story (the Locust sensor is most representative of what's actually happening on the bay). Since it was ebbing, the water was stacking up pretty nicely, too. One of these days, I want to get Dale out here on a day like that - would be fun to see what he would do with those incredible port tack ramps.

So it was a short session; sailing slalom gear in those conditions is a bit like taking a pair of downhill race skis through a mogul field. Not exactly fun, and you never really get to equilibrium. But it sure makes you feel alive. There's just something life-affirmingly stupid about this kind of thing - I still can't quite wipe that slightly crazed grin off my face...

On deflating kites and the relative strengths of FW and slalom gear

2011-01-18T20:53:00.000-08:00

The Lord of the Wind Showdown in Los Barrilles (Baja) got some pretty intense coverage. Lots going on, tons of good racing and freestyle/big air for both boards and kites. And, of course, a bit of friendly rivalry. David Wells of Waterhound summed it up as KP deflating the kites in the headline for his daily news digest (to which you should absolutely subscribe - it's a rather excellent daily dose of water-sports related news). Here's his write-up on it, and KP has a good report up as well.

The thing I find remarkable about this is that everyone seemed to be surprised that Kevin was able to hold off the kites downwind, whereas nobody really commented on the feat he pulled off in getting out from under them after the start and beating them to the windward mark. That held true both for the comments you heard from folks who were at the event, and on the local Pacific Northwest windsurfing newsgroup.

Conventional wisdom has it that kites suck upwind, but rock on a free downwind leg, going deeper and faster than anything else. But all last year, the kite racers have made tremendous strides in upwind performance. They've come to the point where in racing with the Bay Area formula fleet (probably the strongest amateur fleet you'll find in the US), they've proven that they can make it to the windward mark with the lead pack. Sure, they tend to foot compared to formula sailors, but with the edge they have in speed, they still put up very respectable VMG.

And it's been proven again and again that unless conditions are absolutely ballistic, FW beats big slalom gear going up - even modern big slalom gear. So you have some of the world's best kite racers on the most up to date gear. And then you have Kevin, who's easily their equal on the windsurfing side. He's riding a big slalom board and an 8.5 Ezzy Infinity. No disrespect to Dave Ezzy - but that sail is not really known as a course slalom upwind powerhouse. And still, Kevin pulls out from under the kiters after the start and beats them to the windward mark - that's an impressive performance, both for the rider and for the gear; it's amazing how versatile big slalom gear has become.

And then there's the downwind, and everyone seems to expect a massacre - but it doesn't happen. Kevin stays in front. Impossible, is it not? Except it isn't. Something funny happened in kite evolution in the last few years. Racing kite boards have become very wide with very fat tails, and they run very big fins - a trend similar to the evolution of formula boards. And downwind is all of a sudden a bit harder - I had several kiteracers tell me that in rough water, going downwind can be pretty character building. Yes, they are still way faster off the breeze than FW - but that's where another interesting thing has happened.

Big slalom gear has become an amazing downwind weapon - not just downwind as in downwind slalom (somewhat broad reaches), but downwind as in deep and fast on a free downwind leg. We've seen this in the Blowout, where Bruce started going out on his 8.2 and big slalom board three years ago. On the top half of the course, I was able to stay with him, even pull ahead once in a while on my 9.9 and FW board. In the corridor, when the breeze picked up a couple notches, it wasn't even close - he went just as deep as I did, but way faster.

I've tested this since then with others - and when you're fully powered on a big slalom board, and the water is somewhat rough, not only are you more comfortable than your buddy on FW - you're also making your way downwind a lot faster.

This all leads me to thinking about the SF Classic. That race has a couple small triangles on the top of the course, usually in lots of breeze under the bridge (with a weak spot on the inside mark where everyone is slogging for a bit). Then there's lots of broad and beam reaching all the way down to Berkeley. If you didn't care about placing well in the upwind Challenge that starts as a time trial with your finish in the Classic, if it was pretty windy, and if there were a big ebb helping you out with the upwind legs under the bridge, that race just might call out for big slalom gear. It would certainly be worth the experiment - and it would be a hoot as well, since all that reaching across the bay would actually be fun instead of being strictly character building. If I get a chance to come down for that this year and the conditions are right, I might just try that...

US Nationals - Day 3

2010-07-22T20:48:00.000-07:00

What a day - a bit of everything, which is just why racing is a lot like life in general. The RC announced that we'd do a noon start for long distance, then run slalom at 3. That was met with a healthy sense of skepticism on the beach, as the fog was deeply entrenched and the breeze was light. Sure enough, though, with the onset of the ebb the sky cleared quite a bit and the wind picked up, and we had a sequence scheduled for 12:30. After two general recalls caused by much of the fleet over early (hey guys - lay off the coffee in the morning, will ya?!), the black flag went up, John Craig read the sailors the riot act, and around 1 we rolled got off a good start. The course was a short upwind to a windward mark off Presidio Shoals, a downwind through a gate off Point Blunt and down to a leeward mark off Treasure Island, then the upwind back through the gate and finishing in front of the St. Francis clubhouse.

I got excellent port starts each time, including the third one that counted, so I was stoked. I made it to the windward mark in something like 7th or 8th - stoked again. The picture above, one of many taken and made available - again - by Shawn Davis (go by pictures - the guy is great, and he's providing a real service to our little community!), shows me going upwind off one of those starts. The downwind was a bit rough, as the breeze was light, and since we had to pass inside the stationary mark off the St. Francis, jibing out into the better breeze was not an option. I lost maybe a place on the way to the club, but was in excellent position and feeling pretty good about things. Then I jibed, and I was pumping to pop the cams, one of them did pop a bit too much - right off the mast. This was the one that had popped off the mast in my crash yesterday, and in all the bustle to repair the board I neglected to check it.

If you look closely, you can see the lip of the cam body bent out of shape and the roller on that side pushed inside - subtle, but enough to make the cam pop when jibing the sail with the outhaul all the way released. I tried to use my foot to nudge it back into place while planing out of my jibe - and of course ended up swimming. I tried the same thing again after the next jibe, with the same result. By now, we were in the rough water between Alcatraz and the city front, and while I was doing OK on starboard (with the cam to leeward, the sail was plenty bagged out), I was losing angle and speed on port. Not good, but I figured that swimming to fix it was even slower, especially since with the outhaul off, it was likely to pop again. Between swimming after my mis-begotten cam repair stunts and my slow/high line on port, I ended up losing a bunch of places - it seemed like the whole fleet was going by me. At the leeward mark, when pushing back up, I noticed that I was way off the angle of the guys in front of me - whom I'd easily outpointed earlier. Plus on port, the sail was off-balance with the cam to windward in the sleeve - making the ride through the steep chop off IT even more uncomfortable. At this point, I'd had it - I dropped the sail, cranked on the outhaul, opened the sleeve zip and, after a fair amount of grunting and cursing, got the cam back on the mast - where it happily stayed until the end of the race, assisted by outhaul tension. The rest of the upwind was great - I picked up something like seven or eight boards - mostly through good speed and angle, but also three at the end by calling an aggressive layline to the finish (with a good assist by the ebb).

I ended up somewhere in 20th or 21st - which dropped me down to 18th in the formula standings (the long distance counted for two heats). At the top of the fleet, Phil McGain apparently owned this one.

And then we actually did start a slalom competition. The fleet was divided into groups of around 8 sailors each; each groups will sail five heats to qualify sailors for the final round, which will then run another five heats. Things got a little flukey, with the southerly off the hills messing with the westerly flow through the gate close to shore where the course was laid. This was OK for the first round of heats, though, and when things got way too light, the RC pulled the plug, with the qualifying rounds to continue tomorrow. My heat went off with decent pressure; I was on 8.2 and my 42 fin, which gave me good speed. Combined with a clean start, I got to the first mark in first, with CRad and Tyson Poor giving chase. Things were getting light, and I had to pump like crazy out of the next three jibes to stay ahead. Then, just before the fourth jibe mark, we hit a big hole. Tyson was right behind me, setting up higher. I tried to push up to make sure he didn't sneak inside me, but didn't have the power to make the happen, with the small-ish fin smearing off. So I had to take the jibe wider, and he did his catlike smooth jibing thing too get to the inside, then simply out-accelerated me and carried it into the finish for the bullet. He definitely earned that one - kudos to him.

This shot, again by Shawn Davis, was the first jibe after the start during practice before the racing. You can see that it's getting suspiciously flat there on the inside. I was scurrying around getting gear ready after my heat, testing out a bigger fin to see if it was controllable in the puffs (didn't want to be caught again unable to push up to jockey for position at the mark), so I didn't witness much of the other heats. Notable result of the day, however, was Fiona Wylde getting a second in the women's heat - nice going and an excellent performance, especially when you remember that she's only 13 years old. Did I mention that I'm really proud of our Gorge juniors?

Tomorrow will probably bring at least one or two course races early, and the hopefully a bit more slalom. There's also supposed to be a freestyle competition, which should make for great entertainment - the level of the assembled freestylers is pretty amazing and should make for great viewing, even if I can never figure out what those tricks are.

US Nationals - Day 2

2010-07-21T20:55:00.001-07:00

Wow, I'm tuckered out. Tough day at the office, but also some really fun and challenging racing. We started a bit late as there seemed to be trouble with the windward mark; that kind of thing is pretty commonplace in racing, but at the St. Francis, it's notable, if only because it pretty much never happens. These guys have running races down to a science, and after that little glitch, everything was back to the usual precision. The delay gave the breeze some more time to fill in, so by the time heat 1 got under way, I was glad I was on my 9.1.

I had another good port start; a bit further down the line than I would have liked, but the starboard starters were charging down the line and really pushing it, so I looked for a gap near the boat, found one, got clean air, and was off. Being low didn't bother me, as the ebb was stronger outside. Then the gun sounded again and the general recall flag went up -or so I thought. Instead, that was the flag for the individual recall, and as I was slowly tacking and getting ready to head back, I realized that everyone else was still charging. Oops - that probably cost me something like a dozen places, as now I got stuck in the dirty air of the guys who had done their homework and knew their flags. Oh well, another lesson.

As I was making my way to the windward mark, I was slowly working my way back up through the fleet. At the mark, I was coming in pretty hot just as MacRae was pinching up to it after having called a pretty tight layline. As I was going by him, I thought I had enough space, but then I got hit with a puff as I was passing him, my fin lifted me out of the water, and I got launched over the bars, taking MacRae out in the process. What a bummer - taking anyone out is because of a stupid mistake is bad enough, but doing that to a friend and teammate is even worse. Luckily, nobody got hurt, no gear was broken, so we got back on our boards and went on. He was definitely extremely gracious and forgiving about the whole thing. The picture below shows the moment just as I'm about to go over the bars, with the clew of my booms then getting tangled up in MacRae's rig. Bummer. With all that, race 1 ended up with in 20th place. Not really what I had in mind, but better than a DNF (which could have easily happened given that incident at the mark).

That picture, by the way, is another one of Shawn Davis' shots. The guy does great work, and he spends hours on the boat to get these pictures of us (I'm getting seasick watching the boats bob around like that, plus it's *cold* out there). So if you're racing this event, or you're sailing at Crissy Field, be sure to check Shawn's site and be extra sure to buy any shots you really like - support your local sports photographer!

Race 2 saw a bit more breeze, and while overall the ebb was decreasing, there was a lot of lumpy water around - classic Crissy Field voodoo chop. After a general recall (for real this time) I got another good port start with clean air and made it to the windward mark in the top 10 - needless to say, I was stoked. On the way down, Steve Sylvester was chasing me, and at some point we came up on a ferry boat. He went low, I went high - and then realized what he was doing - while I was bouncing around on the steep side of the wake, he got the smooth side and left me in the dust. Yep, experience is not a disadvantage in this sport. I reeled in a couple of people on the second upwind, then was forced to foot off at the leeward mark due to traffic at the rounding, leaving the door open for a couple others to get me. In the end, it was 12th, with a reversal of yesterday's photo finish with Eric (he got me then, I got him today). This was more like it.

Then came a long break, as the RC had to wait for two large container ships to come through the eastern shipping lane on their way to Oakland. Man, those things are big! The breeze had picked up another notch, but now it was starting to flood at the start line and over much of the course. I ended up starting on port and having to duck almost the whole fleet, but got clean air again. I made a decent layline call, overstanding just enough to be comfortable that I would avoid having to double tack in the flood and came into the mark hot. I passed Fernando Martinez at the mark, as he had under-stood the mark and was struggling around it. Accelerating down the course, I did a quick tally and found that I was definitely in the top 10 - yeah. And then I got a huge puff just as I hit some steep/short chop and went over the handlebars - hard. David Well, who was following, reported feet pointing straight up, and just before I hit the water I heard the sickening crunching sound of carbon getting smashed by a hard object - my mast split the nose of my board open (the impact actually knocked one of the cams off the mast - never had that happen before). No injuries, though, so that was lucky; I retired from the race and hustled back to shore for a quick combat repair, but the RC called racing for the day after that heat - good thing, because I had only applied the first layer of super-glue and glass when it would have been time to get back out.

Tomorrow we'll most likely run long distance to Treasure Island and back, followed by another course race or possibly slalom (wouldn't that be cool...). Off to bed now - I'm pretty much wiped out. Instead of moving up from 14th (results here - Waterhound should have a report up soon, too), I've now slipped down to 16th. Tomorrow should bring three scores and another throwout - we'll see where that goes. I'm pretty happy with my speed, and my tactics on the course seem to be reasonably effective as well. Just have to cut down on the mishaps a bit ;)

US Nationals - Day 1

2010-07-21T07:29:00.000-07:00

Nationals got off to a good start yesterday. Conditions were cold, foggy, and a bit gusty. Nice big fleet, including a great group of juniors. David Wells has excellent coverage at Waterhound (if you haven't checked out that site, you really should!), and Shawn Davis not only has his usual professional-grade pictures up for viewing and purchase, but also graciously makes them available for embedding (that's where that picture above came from).

I had an interesting day. Usually in big events, I get myself buried at the starts until I find a way to pick my way through the chaos later on. Yesterday, I had four excellent starts (all on port), but then had a bit of difficulty carrying that through the heat. Race 1 was an unmitigated disaster - after rounding the top mark in the top 10 (I was stoked!), I gambled on the Southerly coming off the shore for the downwind and then got stuck in a hole on the inside that was hard to see coming with the confused water state there; then I way overstood the windward mark on the second lap, ending up in 28th.

Race 2 got a little better; not quite so good out of the gates, having to dive under a bunch of guys pointing higher than me, and generally not really putting it together on the course, but moving up to 18th. Race 3 saw me in the top 10/12 until the first downwind mark. Then I made a bad call, trying to squeeze inside of Bodner. Not sure what possessed me, since he tends to point a bunch higher than me, so he probably would have climbed up and pinched me off anyway, so I should have just taken the wider lane and passed him. Instead, trying to squeeze by on the inside, he closed the door and the nose of my board made contact with his clew, and I had to do my spins to exonerate myself from fouling him. That dropped my back into 15th, but at least things seemed to be getting better.

In race 4, I changed down to my 9.1, and that made a huge difference. All of a sudden, things felt right, and my angle got a little better (I had been footing and going fast compared to the guys around me all day; now I was still going fast, but not losing quite as much angle anymore). I got another great start (helped partially by the easier handling of the smaller sail) and managed to just not make any real mistakes all race long. I was pretty stoked to finish 8th in this pretty heavily stacked fleet (that one actually came down to almost a photo finish; I was reeling in Eric Christiansen on the way to the line, and when we pushed into the finish, neither he nor I knew who'd taken it).

At this point, Paolo dos Reis, who came in second at the Worlds, is leading the event ahead of Phil McGain, who's looking lean and strong and seems unaffected by sailing a 5 year old board and not having done any formula racing or training for several years - quite an impressive performance. Wilhelm Schurman (reigning lightweight world champ) is rounding out the top 3. Seth Besse is putting in an impressive showing as well, placing fifth, right between visiting formula rock stars Aurelien and Fernando.

Our Gorge juniors are doing really well with the challenging conditions; their racing is just as competitive with each other as what's going on at the front of the fleet. Great group of kids, for sure. They sure have reason to be proud of themselves.

I'm sitting in 14th right now (4th Masters). Today's plan is looking for two more course races early, then a long distance race counting for two heats in the standings (it wouldn't be SF Bay without long distance). The RC has been doing an awesome job running the heats, keeping us out of the shipping traffic, and setting the course to be fair despite the serious shifts in wind direction. And the St. Francis Yacht Club has once again rolled out the red carpet (nothing quite like a sauna after a day on the bay...).

Wonder what the guy at the rental counter would have said...

2010-07-19T17:35:00.000-07:00

You know it's regatta time when heavily overloaded rental cars start showing up at Crissy Field. Roof racks? We don't need no steeenkin' roof racks!

Got to SF yesterday, met up with the rest of the Gorge Cup fleet today. Good showing - five juniors (Fiona, Alyson, Ben, Jay, Alex), MacRae, Tavis. Bunch of Gorge freestylers down here for the Nationals as well; some of them might even do slalom. Went out today for a few runs with MacRae, Fiona and Alyson to shake out the legs. The girls were doing great despite the gusty/flukey conditions (the fog was well inside the bay today).

The fleet is pretty stacked with visiting rock stars and hot local sailors. Looks like at least 50 sailors. Racing starts tomorrow; Waterhound should be the best bet for good coverage.

Gorge Cup - DaKine Downwind Slalom

2010-07-17T18:28:00.000-07:00

Excellent day of racing at the Event Site. We ran round robins (let's see, heat one is A-B, heat two is C-D, heat three is ADHD...), so everyone got to race a ton. The course was set really well with no super tight or broad leg. Conditions started out with raging high-wind slalom (I was lit on 6.2, Bruce and MacRae were on 5.4 and not lacking for power either).

Split into four fleets, we got two complete 6-heat rounds off. The wind got quite a bit sketchier then (I ended up using the 7.1 and the big board - which turned out to be a good decision), and we got four heats in the third round before we had to call it a day.

The juniors did great; Jay Watermeyer in particular showed that it's time to move up to the men's fleet (probably right after Nationals), but most impressive were the younger kids who really showed that they learned a lot yesterday at the clinic, and who were relentless despite the challenging conditions. These kids are definitely ready for Nationals.

Bruce won the day (yes, it's still his river). Jac LeRoux sailed very consistently, with good speed, good starts, and solid jibing and tactics to edge me out for second; I ended up in third, with MacRae breathing down my neck - very tight points standings between the three of us, reflecting the very fun, competitive racing.

Now off to SF for Nationals. I can sure use the rest day, even if it's spent on the road. So far, this little adventure is shaping up great.

Results and pictures should come up soon on the VMG Events site - I'll link from here when they're availalble.

2010 Sailworks Junior Clinic

2010-07-16T18:18:00.000-07:00

What a great bunch of kids - Bruce put on his annual junior clinic today, shortened to one day due to this year's compressed racing schedule with Nationals in SF next week. It was cranking windy this morning, making for epic slalom conditions - and the kids just ate it up. Tons of jibing practice; with a kid-to-coach ratio around 2:1 or so, there was lots of opportunity to interact, and there was some marked improvement and lots of learning. After lunch, things slowed down a lot with the breeze becoming really patchy, so we were all glad we got out on the water early. These kids will all be racing in the Gorge Cup tomorrow, and unlike us coaches, they'll of course be fully recovered ;)

Kudos to Bruce for the time and effort he put into this - it's definitely a great service to the future of the sport. These kids rock - and most of them will be at Nationals next week. Can't wait to see them continuing to excel!

Just a little bit further...

2010-07-13T12:27:00.000-07:00

Go ahead, click on that picture. That's BP, slogging out on his smallest slalom board (my guess is about 75 liters) and 5.4. And it's not an optical illusion - he really is in the water up to his butt. At this point, he's been at it for about 7 or 8 minutes, displaying good balance, a fair bit of determination, and good slogging technique. This was taken Sunday, and while there was a lot of moaning at New Beach (the launch to the west of the Event Site, which was closed to windsurfers for a charity kiteboarding and SUP event) because of how the wind had died, it was still going off up at the Hatchery; in fact, Bruce was on a full plane about one minute later in, and wasn't seen until riding a lucky puff back down from up there well over an hour later.

I sailed for about 4 hours on Saturday in multiple sessions on my 6.2, slowly growing my high-wind slalom cojones back (I was still a bit sketched out after breaking my ankle last summer in those conditions). The wind meter at Swell City read 20-40, and that about summarizes the conditions pretty well - up at the Red Nunn off the Hatchery, there was never a moment where I wouldn't plane, but there were plenty of moments of holding on for dear life. Slalom sailing in rough water and big winds can be character building, but it's a hell of a lot of fun. What's more, there were those sweet patches of smooth water for hero jibes right above Wells Island on the OR shore, as well as the occasional well-formed swell that would make for beautiful mach-speed broad reaches starboard tack from Wells Island all the way back to the launch.

All in all a great day of sailing; can't wait to do it again soon. Things are getting pretty jam-packed here in the next few weeks - junior clinic on Friday, Gorge Cup on Saturday, then Nationals in SF next week. Looks like summer is finally here ;)

Family picture

2010-07-10T22:24:00.000-07:00

Good day of sailing in Hood River. Got a chance to use every piece of
slalom gear I own as conditions built during the day. Warm enough to
sail in boardshorts, too - gotta love the Gorge.

2010 Blowout

2010-06-29T06:47:00.000-07:00

An interesting one. Good breeze at Stevenson, so I rigged my Exo 71 and 8.2 NXsl. Bruce was going slalom as well, as were MacRae and Jay Salzman. Jay Watermeyer was going slalom with an 8.5 Retro, and Sean Williams and Aaron Cardwell went formula. As we watched the conditions fill in some more, MacRae and I commented about how either we or the juniors were making a mistake here, as it seemed they were rigging awfully big...

Blasting around to warm up/tune up, the gear felt great; maybe the 40 fin was a touch small to track off the breeze. Then, after a jibe, I hit a plastic bag, went over the bars, and ended up putting a hole through my sail. Luckily, Bruce was able to help me out with a loaner 8.2, so I still got on the water in plenty of time for the start. Phew.

Start didn't go off until 11.15, which was worrisome - but the breeze held at Stevenson, and it was a really nice ride all the way to the narrows. Bruce was leading; MacRae and I were fighting it out for 2nd position at this point. Fun ride.

Coming up to the Narrows, it got light, but we were still planing. And all of a sudden, there was Jay Watermeyer, showing good speed and, through the lulls, passing both MacRae and me and catching up with Bruce. Looked like he made the right call at this point - but surely, once we got to Viento, things would become interesting. Except, they didn't - there was some slogging through the Narrows, then a bit of breeze coming into Viento, and then the wind just died. At this point, Bruce and Jay were up front catching the occasional remainder puff, MacRae and I were slogging and falling further behind them, and Aaron and Sean were catching up on their formula stuff. The next 40 minutes or so were character-building, as there was hardly any breeze, interspersed with the occasional lucky puff that would shuffle the standings a bit. At times, MacRae and I were less then 200' from each other, with one of us able to pump onto a plane and the other just dead in the water. Aaron and Sean slowly passed at this point, and as the little puffs allowed them to plane up sooner and milk it longer on their big gear, they soon dropped us.

Finally, we make it to the corridor, and the breeze fills in from downriver (as I see Bill C. approach from behind, with a whole host of sailors at his tail). I'm lucky to catch it before MacRae, who's a little further to the OR side at this point, and get to ride it from there. At this point, one of the aluminum clamps on my front boom end shears off as I pump out of a jibe; the boom gets a bit wobbly but seems to hold - so from now on the mantra is to sail smoothly.

The conditions cooperate with that - it's breezy enough to maintain a plane, but things are really tame, so no undue stress is put on my boom. I ride the rather weakish breeze down the corridor to the Event Site, reeling in Sean but not Aaron, and breathe a sigh of relief to make it down there without the boom giving in (phew again), finishing fourth overall, 2nd Master, in 1.52.24. Almost 50 minutes slower than last year - yep, that was about the amount of time spent slogging and doing the hula, pumping like made for every little puff. At the start, I was joking with some of the SUP racers (who did the course from Viento) that they should look into putting sails on those boards, since it made the whole thing a lot easier. In the end, given all the pumping, there were times when SUP'ing would have seemed like the easier way to go ;)

Results at the VMG web site - I'll post a link to pictures as they become available. Overall, I'm pretty stoked with this year's race. Kudos to our juniors - three of them finishing in the top 5. Jay, Aaron and Sean all made smart gear picks (and didn't let the choices made by Bruce, me, or MacRae influence their decisions). Then they proceeded to sail really well, definitely earning their top finishes. Way to go, guys - time to drop the junior classification and sail in the men's fleet!

Speaking of juniors - the younger Juniors starting at Viento sure had a rough time of it. It was windy there until just before Bruce came through to lead off their rabbit start - and then it died on them with a vengeance. They had all rigged for the expected windy conditions in the corridor, so they certainly had their work cut out for them. Way to stick it out - they all showed a lot of perseverance that day.

Honorable mention for the most impressive finish to Pieter and Chris, who went on a Gemini tandem. As they were planing through the finish line, they entertained the beach (fully packed - it was Windfest) with a well-choreographed dismount. Nice crash, guys - I haven't sailed a tandem since the 80's, but seeing the front sailor taken out by the rear rig like that sure brought back some memories.

Winner of the day, however, was Dale Cook, whose baby daughter was born that morning - congrats Sonya and Dale, and welcome Bella!

Object lesson on barging - Any questions?

2010-06-16T15:26:00.001-07:00

Check out this screenshot from a video taken by Jean Rathle. Then scroll down to the video. Watch from about 2 minutes in and witness Steve B. taking out Al M. Steve was definitely barging here (pretty common thing in formula fleets). You'll notice that in his race report, Steve doesn't really dwell on things here - he clearly recognized he fouled Al (which is why he did his circles), and because it took him a while to sort things out after the yardsale, he had a crappy race.

Not to pick on Steve here; he's a seasoned racer, and he tried to walk that fine line between not running into people and not being over early. I'm sure he would have pushed up (and taken the OCS) rather than crash - if he could have. But it looks like he either didn't see Al, or things were happening too fast for him to process and react. Same with Al - it's pretty clear that even though he's looking up, Steve was in his blind spot and caught him completely by surprise, so he never had a chance to take evasive action, and while he apparently had a remarkable recovery to take second in that race (way to go, Al), I'm sure he realizes how lucky he was that nothing more serious happened.

I said above that barging is pretty common in formula fleets. It's also a pretty risky strategy - if you're coming down the line at speed, fully lit with the fin loaded up, you have limited ability to take evasive action. So if someone pushes you up, you often can't go below and around them, and you end up going over early instead. If things go wrong in your evasive action, you're now forcing the other guy (who has the right of way) to take evasive action and mess up his start. Or you crash, which is really slow under the best of circumstances, or could get someone hurt if you're not so lucky.

For slower fleets (keel boats, slower dinghies), barging almost never works - you can pretty much rely on someone to come up below you and push you hard, and in competitive fleets, bargers will get pushed into premature starts almost every time. In formula, that's a bit different - there's a serious risk in pushing a barger up, and as Rob Hartman used to point out, swimming is indeed the slowest point of sail, and who wants to get hurt or get their gear smashed up and sit out the rest of the regatta?

That has led to barging being ubiquitous in formula racing - especially in local races (big, aggressive fleets at major events tend to close the door at the boat, so bargers usually don't even get a chance to run down the line - they end up peeling off to avoid getting pushed into the committee boat). And sometimes, that can lead to a situation where if you set up for a proper start, you end up getting screwed in the process - so even seasoned racers might choose to be part of the happy parade of bargers zooming down the line at speed.

Just remember that when you're barging, you're taking a pretty significant amount of risk. S&*t will happen sooner or later when you barge, and if it does, you had better be prepared to bail. Don't count on the people below you to just acquiesce and be cowed - sometimes, they'll push back. I don't have a problem with racers taking risk, as long as it's reasonable given their skill and the conditions (Steve B., for example, can usually be counted on to be in control, so I wouldn't hesitate to push up on him a little - if that makes him OCS, tough luck, and I'm sure he wouldn't complain about it).

Just as long as we all remember that at the speeds we're going, and given all the pointy/sharp/hard bits on our gear, cutting it too close can have some pretty nasty consequences. It's not a contact sport, after all.

Gorge Cup - 2010 Season Opener

2010-05-24T13:18:00.000-07:00

Victoria Day weekend in the Gorge - and just to make all those visiting Canadians (plus your humble narrator from Bellingham, which is nearly up there as well) feel right at home, the Gorge was dishing out frontal conditions - gusty winds, clouds (we kept waiting for rain, but were spared), and chilly temps (I doubt it broke 50 while we were racing). Participation was a bit low, as most racers still seemed to be in hibernation - I think we got all of twelve people onto the water. Hey - where were you guys?

After feeling out the top of the course, I decided to go with the 9.1 to ensure survival up there, knowing that it would be a bit sketchy at the bottom, especially downwind. Hoping for the lucky puff on the inside was not going to be an option. I started on starboard for Race 1, but was a little further down the line than I wanted (it's been a long time since last season...). Bruce was the only port tacker to clear me; MacRae and Jay had to duck. I stayed in the breeze and made it to the windward mark in 2nd behind Bruce. He went inside, I jibed off to stay in the breeze. Apparently, being mayor of the Event Site does buy you the private glory puff whenever you need it, as he was still ahead of me at the bottom rounding, and we held those positions for the second lap. On the second upwind, I noticed that I was able to stay in clean air on the inside of Bruce, climbing a little on him but going a wee bit slower. That's a new one, as usually he pinches a bit more. The big fin I ran must have had something to do with that. On the second downwind, the guys following ran into some light spots, so it was Bruce comfortably in first, me in 2nd, and then Stephane and MacRae.

Race 2 then turned up the lottery factor a fair bit. I was again starting starboard, and I was alone on that side of the course except for Fiona. I positioned myself right at the boat, since it had gotten really patchy, and I didn't want to be too far out. Good thinking, but not sufficient - the wind at the boat shut off, while there was a puff at the pin end propelling the port starters over the line. I didn't get planing and over the line until something like almost 10 seconds after the horn. Then, however, I got a fair bit of breeze, made a lucky call to tack early instead of taking my chances on the inside, and made it from almost dead last at the start to 3rd or 4th at the windward mark. Skittish about the light patches on the inside, I jibed off and rode the breeze all the way down through the channel. That did get me to the leeward mark in 2nd, but just before getting there, the breeze shut off on me.

As I was slogging the last 20 yards to the mark, I was joined by MacRae, Tavis, and Jay, who had gone inside, but then jibed off as things got light and found breeze in the channel as well. We all rounded in one big cluster, and this is when things got downright aerobic. Being furthest to windward, I didn't quite have enough power to get onto a plane and to be able to bear off for the reach around the bottom end of the course. MacRae waited for the second puff, pumped up, and was gone, along with Jay, starting the upwind leg well ahead of me. The second lap saw is in those positions, and while I was working it pretty hard on the final finish reach, I couldn't quite pass Jay.

Races 3 and 4 were similar in that the start was highly influenced by erratic holes and puffs, and we all tried to make the best of it. Bruce was the most consistent in that endeavor; he did get buried in the start of one of those heats, but through smart sailing got himself back to the front to finish the day with four bullets. I switched to my 9.9 after race 3, when it seemed that the big gusts at the top of the course had abated a bit and the holes at the bottom gotten even bigger. That made things entertaining at the windward mark for the last heat, but with all the pumping throughout all those races, I must have been a bit oxygen deprived. I think I finished the day in 3rd after MacRae - we'll see when Scotia puts up results at http://vmgevents.com/.

Overall, not a bad way to start the season - we got four heats (which were plenty challenging given the huge range of conditions), I didn't break any body parts (which is how I'd ended last season, on the first day of Nationals), and everyone had some good stories about hard fought battles on the course. And while I thought that I really wanted to do another one at the end, especially as it seemed that the breeze was filling in, a mere 45 minutes of slalom sailing made it pretty clear that I was pretty much running on empty, so when the wind crapped out, I decided to call it a day as well.

The course was set out a little further, with a short first and a longer second upwind leg. That made for more tactical options than usual (I started starboard every race and usually made it to the first mark within striking distance of Bruce - the usual course layout tends to create a lot more port favor). The races were well run, Scotia was her usual textbook example of cheerful and friendly effectiveness and efficiency, and it was good to be out racing again.

Speaking of racing - there's a bit of a movement afoot to put a lot of emphasis on slalom this year, with lots of round robin heats of downwind slalom being run. Round robin downwind slalom is a really nice way of getting away from the Gorge box course, which seems to scare off some racers because of the mild upwind leg and tack involved. The reason for that format was to allow large fleets to race together, thus avoiding the sitting on shore involved with running slalom eliminations. Round robins get around that by allowing small fleets of sailors to race (so there's no giant pile-up at the first mark), but still making sure everyone gets to race everyone else during the course of the day. Look for more news on that soon - but be sure to get your slalom or freeride gear out, whether you've been racing with us yet or not, as it's going to be a lot of fun.

Tuning up

2010-05-01T21:27:00.001-07:00

It's May, and the first Gorge Cup of the season is only three weeks away; good thing conditions have been pretty good lately, with remarkably good southerlies. And yes, that really is a 9.1 - after five seasons with a 9.9/10.8 formula quiver, I've relented and added a smaller size. After all, Nationals are in San Francisco this year, and those guys race formula well into conditions that would have us switch to slalom in the Gorge.

Early on in today's session, it was pretty marginal for the small sail, but after having it for well over a month, I was really looking for an excuse to finally try it. Turns out, besides being a real pleasure to sail, it has remarkably good low end. I had observed Bruce using his very effectively in patchy conditions before, but I had just chalked that up to his efficient sailing style. Maybe I need to reexamine my bigger-is-better credo.

And just as I was starting to feel a little chilly in my short-sleeved suit, I spotted my friend Dale McKinnon in a small runabout. Dale's a pretty inspiring local fixture, having rowed the Inside Passage at close to age 60 (see here and here for some background - she's also quite a character). Her current project, however, is to coach a guy from the Seattle area in preparation for a swim across the English Channel (he got really close on his first attempt, which was also coached by Dale) - and here he was, doing laps in Bellingham Bay (water around 48F, air a little cooler) in his speedos. I somehow felt pretty toasty after seeing that...

Going to my happy place

2010-04-27T14:51:00.001-07:00

Every windsurfer I know seems to have a favorite set of conditions, matched with a favorite set of gear, resulting in a favorite kid of session. It's that sort of Goldilocks state, where things are just right - not too this, not too that on any scale, just pure windsurfing goodness.

For me, that happy combo is slalom sailing when fully powered on my Exo 71, Sailworks 7.1, and Finworks 40, and it happens in that magical slot right around 25 knots - a little more if the water is flat, a little less if it's bumpy, but the gear has so much range that really anything between 20 and 30 knots or thereabouts results in bliss. Add some radiant sunshine, brilliant views of Mt. Baker, Canadian Cascades, and the Olympics to the Southwest, and some good wildlife viewing (witnessed a seal catching a small seabird for lunch - that was a first...). Mix in the fact that during spring, the weeds are still pretty subdued here while temperatures are nicely moderate - presto, I'm in my happy place. Life can be pretty sweet sometimes...

Rites of spring

2010-04-12T19:31:00.001-07:00

First session of the season in short sleeves; always a big deal here in the Pacific Northwest. Amazing how much more agile one feels without all the extra neoprene. Made me downright adventurous - ended up doing tacking and jibing drills for well over an hour to shake off that rusty conservative winter mode. Tired now; time for a well-refrigerated barley beverage...

Doing the hula

2010-03-26T16:20:00.001-07:00

This was taken today by Belligham Herald photographer Andy Bronson. He introduced himself as I was rigging, and I guess he liked the line about me taking a liquid lunch. Hard to tell from this that once out of the wind-shadow on shore, I was perfectly powered up on my 7.1. Nice big swell to jibe on - would have made for great port ramps, but I'm still holding off a bit on impact until the ankle is fully back to normal. The flip-side of that, however, were nice smooth troughs on starboard, allowing for going warp speed in what otherwise tends to be pretty rough water. Nice way to spend an hour on a Friday. Given that it was published on the Herald web site, I'm glad I didn't have to cancel any appointments with the old excuse of having to go to a "board meeting"...

Saturday slalom

2010-02-27T12:57:00.000-08:00

exhilaration
board chattering over chop
sheet in and send it

Stoke - both vicarious and direct

2010-02-17T17:27:00.000-08:00

The picture on the left is of Lindsey Vonn, who today won the Olympic women's downhill in Whistler, just a few hours north of here. Her team mate Julia Mancuso won silver. I'm stoked about this for all the obvious reasons (I'm sure you've seen some of the coverage on Ms. Vonn; without any personal knowledge of her, it's probably still safe to say that she's an amazing athlete and has worked very hard for this).

The reason I'm so stoked about it, though, is that the head coach of the US women's alpine team is windsurfer, fellow Sailworks rider and Gorge Cup racer Jim Tracey. You see, Jim is one of those quietly competent people; on top of that, he's a very good coach and one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet.

Jim has been volunteering as a coach in Bruce Peterson's junior race camp since its inception a few years ago. I got to take part in that this past summer, and it was one of the most rewarding things I've done in this sport, plus it was just a blast. What you have to understand, though, is that for us assistant coaches on the water, things were easy. We helped the kids out a bit, tried to reinforce points Bruce was making, and generally got a lot of stoke out of sailing with that many bright, inspired, energetic kids. Jim, however, spent most of those days shooting video for later analysis, either from the boat or, at one point, from the hot asphalt roof of a warehouse for hours on end. And he was stoked to do it.

When someone who is that committed to his vocation meets with the ultimate success in his chosen field, with two of his athletes at the top of the podium at the Olympics, it confirms that things are well and the universe does work the way it's supposed to. And hence my vicarious stoke today - congratulation to Jim and his team on what's a tremendous success.

And then there was the direct stoke experienced today, right here on Bellingham Bay, where I got to partake in steady 18-20 knots from the North, served up with brilliant sunshine and spring-like temps in the mid-50's. Perfect weather for the 9.9, it was a goldilocks session all around. Not too light, not too cold, and not too windy to where things would have been hard on my still-recovering ankle. Sweet.

Back - sort of

2010-02-07T20:43:00.000-08:00

After over 6 months of serious withdrawal, my surgeon just cleared me for windsurfing as of last week. And as if someone had flipped a switch, the very windsurfer-friendly El Nino winter we've had (mild temps, lots of breeze) turned into what feels like early spring with even milder temps and no breeze whatsoever.

Friday, I finally seemed to get a chance to go sailing, with gorgeous weather, temps in the mid-50's, and a nice southerly around 12-15 knots - perfect formula weather, basically, and about as perfect for a first session since that day in July as I could have asked for. But then this is windsurfing, not indoor soccer - a sport that depends very much on the favor of the wind, aka that most fickle of mistresses.

And so I made it out to the launch just in time for the breeze to back off mightily, and while I normally would have recognized the signs of convergence pretty much immediately, my optimism, fueled by over six month of dry spell, propelled me out (because surely, it will fill back in - there's still a southerly gradient here), only to then leave me stranded a few hundred yards out with glassy water and the occasional 2 knot ripping gust off-shore requiring me to swim/paddle back (you know it's pathetic when you can't slog home on formula gear).

I ended up getting a ride from our local SUP maven (thanks, Beau!), whose example inspired me to do what I should have done to begin with by taking out the Kona and getting a nice SUP workout. My coming to my sense was rewarded with a spectacular bald eagle flyby and some curious seals stopping by for a visit. Not a bad way to spend some time on the water. I guess it's a good sign that I'm back to living by the wind forecast, though - means I'm back to being a real windsurfer (rather than one sidelined by injury and working really hard on my zen skills...)

Contact - Send me an email

2010-01-01T15:46:00.000-08:00

Getting just a little bit cranky...

2009-10-23T16:51:00.000-07:00

So I broke my ankle on the first day of Nationals back in late July. Or, more precisely, I broke the fibula right at the ankle. Clean break, non-displaced. No big deal, as every medical professional I talked to assured me. No way was this going to keep me off the water for more than 6 weeks, at the most. Except that's not quite how it went down.

After five weeks of being completely non-weight bearing, the bone was showing some pretty promising healing, and I got a walking boot. Since then, the fracture has continued to heal, but it's still not done, well over 12 weeks later. Turns out, the fibula doesn't bear a lot of weight, so there's not enough compressive force to really get the bone properly motivated to fuse all the way. Meanwhile, if you do put weight on it, there's all kinds of odd micro-movement and twisting, which then apparently slows down what healing there is.

Not that it matters much, as it turns out that the high ankle sprain I gave myself in the process of breaking the bone was the more pernicious injury anyway. Those apparently take around 16 weeks or so until you can really load up the joint again, and that's if things go really well. In my case, however, there's the unfortunate bit (quite literally) where the ligament that connects the tibia and fibia at the front of the ankle, when getting sprained, managed to tear a few fragments off the bone. One of those is now sitting in the recess of the joint, right next to the ligament, aggravating things in there and keeping the inflammation fresh. That might all go away in the next three to four weeks (that's the working assumption for now), or it might need some surgery to clean things up. The 3 months I haven't sailed since that first day of Nationals is easily the longest single period without windsurfing that I've gone through in 30 years.

Meanwhile, fall in Bellingham has been remarkably mild in temparatures and pretty darn windy. The local kiters have had to pull out their 5 and 7 meter kites a few times already, and I stopped counting the number of days that would have been nicely powered slalom conditions due South, with good swell in the Bay.

To add insult to injury, with the ankle being what it is, I'm pretty limited in the amount and types of exercise with which I can distract myself. It got so bad the other day that I seriously got my low back out of whack doing way too many sets of single leg hopping on the stairs. I'm sure I'm just a real joy to live with right now, which is a cross my loved ones have been bearing with remarkable grace. My wife did, however, helpfully point out that by the time I'll be ready to get back to sailing, the water will be cold enough to have a very beneficial anti-inflammatory effect on my ankle...

Hydroptere takes it

2009-09-08T14:37:00.000-07:00

Yep, those French guys have gone and done it. Hydroptere, that rather sophisticated and pricey foiling tri, just set a world record (subject to ratification) at 51.36 knots over 500m. Wow, and congratulations. Reading the article on sailworld, I couldn't help but be stunned at the efficiency displayed - 51.36 knots (with peaks around 55 knots) in about 28 knots of breeze. Pretty sweet, that. Yes, kiters and windsurfers can go almost as fast for way less money, but we need quite a bit more breeze to do it. The race continues...

Fins for sale

2009-08-02T08:13:00.001-07:00

End of season blowout. These are all high-end Finworks fins, in proven construction. Here's what's available:

46cm slalom pro; this is a slightly larger version of the 40cm fin on which I won last year's Canadian Nationals. The 46 is perfect on bigger slalom boards, with sails 8m and up. I love it on my Exo 71 with an 8.2, only changing down to the 42 once it gets a bit furry. Great range, upwind bite, and remarkable speed. Like new, $240.
70cm Formula Pro - race proven formula fin. This is what I use on my Exocet with the 9.9. Great balance of low drag and power; definitely a go to fin for these kinds of condition. Also works well as a powerful fin for 11m and up on narrower tailed boards (i.e., F2, Exocet, and Starboard through 2006, Roberts through 2007). Good condition (very minor nicks) - $275.
70cm Formula Pro prototype - slightly stiffer version of the Pro. This would suit you better for really flat water conditions, and for narrower tailed boards. Will be really fast, but will not allow you to grind as much through choppy water. Like new, $300.
70cm Formula Pro prototype - extra soft version of the Pro. If you're a bit lighter, then this will give you the same performance envelope as the regular Pro does for someone at my weight (around 200#). Lighter sailors often can't put enough pressure on the fin to get it to bend (and then foil) the way they'd like to. This fin will address that. Like new - $300.
70cm Formula LT - this model is my go-to fin on 10.8 and in light air (I don't really use a 12, since we don't race those conditions on the West Coast). Works great as a light air power fin, but has remarkable range and control when things pick up a bit. Doesn't feel nearly as draggy as some of the other big fins people use these days. Like new, $300.
70cm Formula LT +14 - this is a slightly thicker-foiled version of the LT. If you're stuck in a place where you constantly sail 12m sails on wide-tailed boards (like the new Exo, F2, Starboard 161/2, etc.), you want this fin. Yes, it's a little draggier than the LT, but if you're trying to get off the line in really light and flukey conditions, you care mostly about power to grind, and this fin has that in spades. Like new, $300.

You can get in touch by sending me an email through my contact page: http://www.g-42.com/contact

Jibing...

2009-07-31T15:31:00.000-07:00

Sitting on my rear end with a busted ankle, I came across a photo spread in windsurfing mag on hero jibes. And it occured to me that a full planing jibe, especially in choppy conditions, tends to be one of those things that people "work" on for years. The reason I'm using those quotes is that it seems most people are stuck in a bit of rut with their jibes; they've internalized some of the conventional wisdom on jibing, and they're focusing on those things, but they never really seem to get rid of their weak spots.

For me as a racer, jibing is a pretty important tool. And when comparing my jibes to those of people like, say, Bruce, or the pros, I find much left to be desired. I have, however, noticed that there are a couple of things that over the years have made a huge difference in my jibes.

Since the "how to jibe" articles always give you the whole package, and since that seems to overwhelm people, here are two things to work on in isolation. Together, they make a huge difference in the quality of a planing step jibe (which, if you want to go fast, is really the only viable thing to do). First, look at that first picture above. This is in the middle of the carve, in the process of oversheeting (and, if you want, laying down) the sail. Be sure to look at the picture in full size, and focus your attention on the area below my front shoulder. If you look closely, you can see that my lats and obliques are engaged. That's because I'm pulling *down* on the boom with my front arm with all my might.

The jibe instructionals in the mags often talk about a straight front arm while oversheeting; the reason they do that is to get you to use the weight of the rig to keep the nose of the board down, not only keeping you from bouncing out of the turn but also engaging the front of the rail. If you're freeriding and only moderately powered, that's fine; if you're in race mode, and you're lit out of your mind, that won't do. Instead, you'll need to get pretty aggressive not only on bending your knees and getting your body weight down and forward, but also actively transfer your

weight onto the rig. That will require active participation rather than just passively letting the weight of the rig take care of things - hence the

engaged lats and obliques.

So then you're onward to stepping your feet and shifting the sail. Look at the second picture (courtesy of Arnaud, who took this at the Blowout).

The jibe exit is the thing lots of sailors completely neglect - they just disintegrate. Here are some key pointers for a poised exit:

Legs are still bent - if you're standing up tall in this part (or really any part of your jibe), you'll just end up getting pulled over the handlebars at some point. You're about to flip the sail and sheet in/power up - you had better be braced for that with a low center of gravity.
The front hand might have moved forward on the boom - but it's still pulling down. Not as extremely as during the carve, but you're still adding to mast base pressure.
Your gaze is forward, towards where you're going. If you start looking at the boom to see where your hands need to go, you're pretty much guaranteed to fumble the exit. Look ahead while aggressively shifting the sail.

There you have it - downward pressure on the front hand during the carve, and a poised exit. This applies on formula and slalom gear alike. If the mantras you've been saying ("bend the knees", "nose to nose", etc.) haven't fully solved your jibe issues, try working on these two things to see if they make a difference for you in aggressively committing to your jibes.

USWA Nationals - Day 2

2009-07-25T12:23:00.001-07:00

More typical Gorge slalom conditions than yesterday's wild ride. The Men/Masters and Grand Masters fleet were split into Gold and Silver fleets, so finally all the top sailors got to compete against each other. Bruce Peterson dominated Gold Fleet racing - straight bullets, except one OCS (he and James Dinnis were both called over early in Heat 10), and a 3rd in Heat 11 where he got buried at the start and clawed his way past a bunch of pretty fierce competitors to challenge the leaders. James Dinnis was charging hard and giving Bruce some keen competition. MacRae Wylde and Chris Prior pushed hard as well and were always mixing it up there. From the Bay Area contingent, David Wells and Steve Bodner were contending with the leaders; Steve took the bullet when both Bruce and James were over early.

Bruce and James provided very instructional sailing all day long. They both had great speed and displayed great starting acumen (they were both over early once - in slalom, if you're never OCS, you're simply not pushing hard enough). Bruce tended to own the advantaged position at the pin end of the line; that move works only if you can be confident that you have enough speed not to get rolled even by people running at a broader angle from above. And both did some beautiful jibing.

There was a bit of contrast in technique, though. James was pulling wide, g-force laydown jibes in the Anders Bringdal tradition. Bruce, on the other hand, varied his technique, but usually made his jibes a bit tighter, especially the exit, while not giving up any exit speed. In the rare instance that he's not the first going into a mark, that usually allows him to get inside the other guy and get up front. In today's racing, that played out only once between him and James, after a start that resulted in a general recall. James was ahead getting into the first mark (before they figured out that the fleet had been recalled) and did a very fast, wide, laydown jibe. Bruce went into the mark a bit higher and wider and exited right at the mark, getting by James on the inside. That's when they both sheeted out and went back to the boat, having noticed the recall, so we didn't get to see that one play out. Would have been fun to see if Bruce could have punched through. It certainly set him up well for the second jibe (as the second reach is tighter, and he had a higher line).

Those jibes were what allowed Bruce to recover from (uncharacteristically) getting buried in the last heat of the day; he made up a lot of ground against a bunch of pretty fast sailors. It's hard to pass on a reach - but Bruce was able to sneak by people on the turns. I guess the lesson is to work those transitions (yes, including tacks - the one tack on the outside in the Gorge box slalom/M-course format tends to be a great opportunity for those who have their short board tacks down solid).

In the Silver Fleet, Torsten Tabel and Jeff Fagerholm were duking it out; in all of the melee, though, one sailor truly stood out. Ben Bamer, after having sat out the first day in the wild conditions (they just don't do slalom in Berkeley...), lined up with the field on his formula board and 10.0. We've seen people do well on Formula gear in the Gorge slalom in the old days, when the upwind leg was more significant, especially on light and patchy days. Friday, however, was nothing like that - the slalom sailors got close to being able to tack right on the mark, and the breeze was pretty filled in (no one was using anything bigger than 7.1, I believe, with most sailors on 6.0-6.5). Despite the lower board speed of that setup, the wider jibes required, and the control issues when power reaching, Ben stuck with the slalom guys; I'm sure that was really good strength training...

The juniors and women's fleet showed a lot of good close racing. Jay Watermeyer is clearly leading that field with strong, consistent sailing; Aaron Cardwell and Alex Nielsen were duking it out for second. There were a lot of really tight races between those three, with Jay usually getting a bit of an advantage through tighter jibes and clean tacking.

Marion Lepert led not only the junior girls, but the women overall as well, with Alyson Fromm in second for the juniors (and still in front of some accomplished, older racers). And then let's not forget the fact that those two (ages 13 and 15), as well as Ben Grodner (age 13) raced all day on Thursday and finished their heats despite the truly crazy conditions. And the Technos came out today, too. It certainly wasn't their kind of conditions, and the kids had to work it pretty hard to get those big boards around the course in what for them were very windy conditions. They all showed some serious guts, though.

And that really gets me to the main story of these Nationals. Between the junior fleet and the Technos, there are 22 sailors age 17 and under on the water. That's out of 68 competitors so far (there are a bunch more in the wings waiting for Formula, as they don't have slalom gear or don't race slalom). These kids are energetic, enthusiastic, and they've all displayed enormously quick progress in their skills. Personally, I'm incredibly stoked to be part of a sport where an experienced guy in his mid-40's can dominate a fleet, and where a bunch of young guns are charging it this hard. Despite the bummer factor of having to sit out the rest of the regatta (and, actually, the racing season) with a cast on my leg, that makes me feel pretty good about things.

I won't be able to report on Saturday's or Sunday's racing, as I got an opportunity to hitch a ride home today (with my left foot in a cast, driving a standard and pulling a trailer for over 300 miles just didn't seem like such a good idea). The forecast for today was for Formula conditions, and despite earlier predictions of a stifling heat wave, even Sunday looks like it will have raceable conditions. Check the VMG Events site for results. The slideshow below has some shots from the junior/women's, silver, and gold fleets that I took from the bluff before I needed to get my leg elevated and iced again; there are links to more pictures at VMG Events.

USWA Nationals - Day 1

2009-07-23T22:14:00.000-07:00

Today saw the windiest slalom racing anyone here in the Gorge can remember in a very long time. I had a real struggle getting my big (and only) 71cm wide slalom board to stay on the water, despite running a 6.2 and a 34cm fin. Bruce was racing his (probably sub-80 liter) small slalom board and a 5.4 - and was LIT. We were racing in age groups, so he ran in the Grand Masters, and I ran in the Men/Masters fleet, with the juniors and women getting their own start (the Techno 293 fleet wisely sat this one out...).

In the Grand Masters, Bruce dominated the fleet, and in the Men/Masters, James Dinnis (of Carbon Art fame) did the honors. If we get a chance to have a final rounds to determine an overall slalom winner, it will be a treat to see those two battle it out. I'll probably get a chance to watch that, too; after three heats of pretty deep finishes (5, 14, 6), struggling with the ballistic conditions on my big board, I finally got a good start with James and Chris Prior in the 4th heat. I nailed my first three jibes, and while James was out of reach, Chris seemed within striking distance as I locked in for the reach to the offset mark and the subsequent tight reach to the start pin to go into the second round.

I'm not quite sure what happened next- I only know that I went over the handlebars in what people on shore called a pretty spectacular wipeout and somehow came down with my left foot coming down hard on the sail (and, probably, beneath it the board). It felt like having twisted my ankle, and in the water, it was pretty clear that something was wrong as I couldn't even kick to swim into waterstart position, much less tolerate the pain of getting that foot up on the deck of the board to get going. Instead, I body dragged to the beach, a bunch of helpful folks got my gear and helped me out of the water, and when 30 minutes of icing failed to numb the pain at all or keep the swelling at bay, it was clear that I should get this looked at. Now it's splinted, with two fractures in the fibular - so I'll be off my left foot for at least a few weeks.

Racing continues tomorrow - since I can't do much else right now, I'll be on shore watching. Pretty bummed at this point, but then again, it's a clean bone injury that required no setting or surgery, and there doesn't seem to be serious damage to the ligaments beyond a mild sprain. And if I had to get hurt windsurfing, it couldn't have happened in a more supportive environment; not only did folks take care of all the logistics for me (thanks, Shelley, Michel, MacRae, Amy), but within five minutes of the injury I was being taken care of by an RN, a PT, and a podiatrist (thanks, Amy, Jay, and John), and then given rides to and from the ER (thanks, Ellen).

The slideshow below shows a bit of action from the 4th heat, as well as the result of me not having much else to do other than take pictures of my bum ankle afterwards... Not sure if the pictures do the conditions justice - it was furry out there. Darren told me later that gusts at the boat reached to 40; apparently, for the last heat, it picked up even more.

US Nationals start today

2009-07-23T08:29:00.001-07:00

Yes, the Gorge can be a windy place (nope, that flag didn't get to look like this by just gently sagging off its pole...). We've had really good luck with the wind in the last week and a half. All of last week, I got to sail slalom every day, including the blowout. Monday, all the forecasts except Temira's were blessedly wrong, and we had great Easterlies at Stevenson all day long into the late afternoon (pretty much unheard of) for the junior race camp. Tuesday, Westerlies were back, so the camp moved back to the Event Site with great conditions. Lots of enthusiasm and hard work and fun - those kids are awesome, and if we could bottle that kind of energy... (I'll have a separate write up on the camp soon - it's pretty much claiming its spot as one of the highlights of this season already!).

Yesterday was registration day for the US Nationals, and the Event Site is slowly filling up. Lots of juniors, most of them freshly tuned up after the camp, and a bunch of familiar faces from all over the place. The Kerns are here from Florida, we have a few East Coasters, Charles and Chad Allen from Corpus Christi, Chris Prior and Bill C. from BC, and of course the Bay Area contingent. Yesterday saw full-on slalom conditions at the Event Site, and a bunch of the Bay guys were out getting used to their slalom gear. Lots of fun and big smiles all around.

Looks like today we might actually run some slalom - the forecast is looking promising for that. Tomorrow and Friday look a little lighter, so there should be some good course racing, and Sunday looks like we might get hit with a heat wave and no breeze - but the forecasts have been pretty fluid, so I for one am thinking it's entirely possible we'll get a whole four days of racing.

Major kudos to Bruce Peterson of Sailworks, who jumped in and saved the regatta for several sailors who had chartered gear. The chartered FE rigs didn't arrive as planned due to some logistical snafus, and Bruce stepped up and helped folks out with a killer charter deal that can't come anywhere close to covering his cost, not to mention time and effort. In addition, there was a parade of sailors getting help with all kinds of odds and ends and repairs at the Sailworks loft yesterday, and they all got help, regardless of what brand they were on. Way to go to support the sport!

Blowout - results are up

2009-07-21T07:02:00.000-07:00

Results are up at the VMG Site. Note Tyson Poor in 5th and Casey Hauser in 7th. Note also Mark Dix in 6th - on a ten year old sail and a probably 15 year old board. So, what's your excuse, since "I'm not a racer, I do freestyle" and "I only have old gear" obviously won't fly anymore ;)

Thanks to Arnaud Lepert for the picture - this one's actually from the Blowout. I think that's at Viento, mid-jibe (that's the only required mark rounding between Stevenson and the Event Site - so the whole "I don't do courses" doesn't count either...). Dear sponsors, please note the prominent display of the distinctive black Exocet board, as well as the Sailworks, Finworks, and 2ndWind logos ;).

2009 Gorge Blowout

2009-07-19T08:55:00.001-07:00

What a fun race - normally, the Blowout is known as an epic downwinder from Stevenson to the Event Site. That's roughly 17 miles upriver, and since there often is pretty light breeze in Stevenson, and there often are big holes in the wind around the Narrows (just west of Viento), you usually end up massively overpowered once you hit the corridor east of Viento on whatever gear you had to choose to make it through those light places.

This year, conditions were more even - or maybe it only seemed that way, given the incredible range of the gear I was using. Last year, I had serious gear envy; Dale and I had both been running formula gear (Dale on 9.1, I on 9.9), and Bruce, rigging away from the crowd, surprised us on the start line with his big slalom board and 8.2, then proceeded to sneak through the light spots, leave me behind like I was standing still in the windy corridor and almost got Dale. This year, with my Warp Slalom 71 and 8.2 NXsl, with a 42cm Finworks slalom pro, I was properly equipped to overcome that gear envy - and I was amazed at how well this setup was doing compared to the formula gear near the start (where I had to milk it a bit and pump some to battle for clean lanes) - but once it filled in a bit, it was one long, fun ride down to the Event Site.

The committee-boat-as-rabbit start in Stevenson came off pretty cleanly - big holes on the Washington Shore, so it paid off to foresake some of the usual advantage of starting down the line and stay in the breeze in the channel. Within a few minutes, Dale was ahead, Bruce in second, with me and MacRae following. The formula guys (Stephane, Jay, Britt) stayed with us for a while, until things picked up a bit a few miles upriver. Until Viento, and even afterwards, there were a couple times that I actually crossed in front of Bruce, and I had speed and angle with him, but most of the time he was clearly ahead. Home Valley was really windy, and things were patchy and squirrely around Dog Mountain, with Bruce doing a better job of taking advantage of the opportunities in those conditions, slowly but surely putting a bit of distance between us. Meanwhile, MacRae was an ever-looming presence behind me, charging hard and sailing ever consistently with good speed and clean jibes.

Jibing around the mark at Viento (where the first sailor, Dale, served as the rabbit for the start of the Junior Blowout), I got a big kick out of seeing the juniors take off - Allyson, Ben, and Fiona were leading that pack and looking really strong. The big surprise came in the corridor; approaching Swell City, instead of the expected spray fest, the wind was actually pretty light again. The rec sailors were mostly slogging on their 4-ish sails as we came through, and it wasn't until past the Hatchery, towards the bottom of Wells Island, that the breeze picked back up.

Bruce got pretty close to Dale there for a while, but got a little too aggressive about the Oregon Shore at the bottom of the course I think - looked like he got briefly parked in lulls a couple times. In the end, Dale won in 59.07 (pretty close to the course record, I think), Bruce was just behind him (I think the gap was less than 20 seconds!), and I came in 3rd at 1:01:10. MacRae wasn't far behind either in fourth. Full results and some pictures should be up on the VMG Events site soon (I'll post a link when they're up). Full disclosure on the picture above - that wasn't actually from the Blowout, but was taken a couple days earlier by my wife on the same spot on the Event Site jetty where she was helping finish competitors during the race. Since I was on the same setup, it seemed appropriate to use it...

There were 56 competitors in this year's edition. Some standouts:

Marion Lepert (13!) ran the full course and won the women's division well in front of Farrah Hall. She ran an Exocet Formula board with, I believe, a 7.2 Sailworks NXsl. Oh yes, she also kicked quite a bit of grown-up male rear-end in the process. To the credit of all those men she beat in the race, they all were genuinely stoked for her.
Ben and Allyson, who won the boys and girls divisions, respectively, of the Junior Blowout - and looked really strong in the process. Allyson, by the way, was out sailing some more shortly after finishing, taking advantage of the beautiful conditions.
Fiona, who completed her first junior Blowout - on a Starsurfer. She was hanging with Allyson until around Swell City, where she got tripped up by a gnarly barge wake and really wrenched herself a bit. She persevered, however, and finished the race, displaying some serious grit.
Jay Watermeyer won the junior division on the full course from Stevenson in a pretty convincing manner.
The juniors in general; I'll have to check the results when they come on-line, but I suspect that almost 1/3 of the fleet was under 18.
The freestyle guys - Tyson Poor and Casey Hauer, sailing unfamiliar slalom gear and doing very well, thank you very much. Tyson was later seen sailing at the Event Site some more - again on his slalom setup. Perhaps we'll see more of these guys on the course soon?
Pieter Botha, who gets the McGyver award for the day. He sailed a really nice, solid race all the way down to just before the Event Site, then broke his mast. He then disconnected his base, stood on the board, and held the rig, aiming for the finish. It was slow going, but he made good steady progress; then, 50 meters or so before crossing the line, a kiter dragged his stuff right into him and Pieter got entangled in the lines - so he ended up swimming for a while to get his gear liberated, then had to swim around the kiter, and by now was downwind from the finish line so he had to swim/paddle back up and around the mark. I'm sure he expended more energy on that finish than he did on the whole rest of the race, but he sure showed some serious determination.
Pepi, who managed a top 10 finish - on a Prodigy!

A note on gear choices; a few years ago, the front of the fleet switched from slalom gear to formula gear for this race. This was before my first entry, but I'd speculate that with the slalom gear of the time, the formula stuff just had way better range, allowing you to survive the big breeze in the corridor and just trucking away from the small gear in the light spots. Last year, Bruce in 2nd and MacRae in 4th demonstrated that modern slalom gear with its big range can equalize that gap in the light stuff, and is still way faster when it's windy (last year, I was in front of Bruce until we got into the corridor; from then on, it was simply no contest).

My experience this year was a bit of a revelation. Yes, it's a bit of work in the light stuff - but given that they had to run sails smaller than 10m to ensure survival in the windy spots, the formula guys didn't have much angle (and certainly no speed) on us in the light stuff near the start. Turn out, a big slalom board with a big sail has tremendous glide. And once you get into the breeze and swell, the shorter outlines and curvier rockers of today's slalom boards do a lot better than formula boards - and tons better than those long, flat, narrow slalom boards of years gone by. And while deep downwind runs through large swell with big gusts can be a bit hair-raising even on modern slalom gear, there's a lot less resistance than when you punch a formula setup through those kinds of conditions. Sure made for an enjoyable ride.

Next up are Nationals Thursday through Sunday. The forecast looks great. Before then, I get to help out at Bruce's Junior Race Camp Monday/Tuesday - the kids are already displaying an enormous amount of stoke, so I can't wait.

Gifts...

2009-07-06T08:46:00.000-07:00

"What an ugly morning!" says the old lady to her husband as they're walking their dog at Marine Park here in Bellingham. It's about 7am, and I'm derigging after something like 1 1/2 hours of very powered up 7.1 slalom sailing. Sure enough, it's raining sideways, the sky is grey, and the bay is churning with whitecaps and some pretty sizeable swell. Funny thing - there are quite a few characterizations of the morning so far swirling through my head, all of them pretty much diametrically opposed to her assessment. Which would explain why, as I hear it, I break out in laughter; they give me a look, then walk on.

25 knots is a gift no matter when, but here in Bellingham, in the middle of summer, it's sure to make me hum all day long...

Efficiency...

2009-07-02T18:40:00.000-07:00

Had a short session on the lake today. No whitecaps in sight; at the end of the dock at Lakewood, I measured right around 8 knots. Took the 10.8 and my Finworks LT, and wouldn't you know it, with a bit of pumping, I popped onto a plane and was able to go upwind at a pretty good angle. There were a number of people who couldn't believe it (a bunch of dinghy racers and sailing instructors, who all have dabbled in windsurfing or maybe are even teaching it). When the wind picked up another knot or two (now you could actually spot the occasional whitecap if you looked upwind, especially since it was so sunny), the whole thing turned from being work to being downright fun.

I'm often told that Formula sailing isn't real windsurfing. But the amazing efficiency of the gear (and it's ready and very reasonably priced availability in gently used form) sure makes it a pretty compelling thing to do in those nice light summer thermals. Other than an 18' skiff or similarly technical (and expensive) performance boat, I can't think of anything that's faster or more exhilarating to sail in the kinds of conditions most of us get most of the time.

And that efficiency provides its own thrills - it's fast, fun, affordable. And no matter how far modern slalom gear has come (or modern freeride gear), none of it can provide that sensation of power in that little wind. Racing the stuff makes it even more fun - but just going out for a cruise is pretty sweet as well.

The picture was from last year at Squamish, in similar wind speeds (courtesy Gwen l'Hirondelle). Yes, if I raced in these kinds of conditions, I'd probably get a 12; but just to get planing and go upwind, the 10.8 is already pretty optimized. Yes, I like stand-up paddling. I also like longboard sailing on my Kona. And I can even see teh appeal of light air freestyle. But given that I like going fast, in light air, there's just no substitute for formula...

GorgeCup - June 20

2009-06-22T09:54:00.001-07:00

After two super-windy GorgeCups with at times epic slalom, the forecast for Saturday was calling for more of the same; alas, the clouds had pushed inland a bit further than predicted, and the Event Site was right on the bubble, with some big gusts coming through, but also some larget holes over much of where the slalom course would have been. That made it an easy call for the RC to run formula.

The course was a short upwind to a port rounding, downwind to the start pin for another port rounding, a reach around the boat, an upwind to a second, more distant upwind mark (and another port rounding), and then a downwinder to the start pin and a reach to the boat to finish (the picture, courtesy of Scotia's camera being used by Rick on the boat, shows me and MacRae reaching for the finish. At this point, I'd say we were comfortably powered; things would get more entertaining later on.)

That course layout, along with a significant port bias to the line, limited tactical options. Pretty much the whole fleet started port (with that short upwind leg, even if there'd not been as much port favor, the extra tack was too much penalty to try anything else). There was plenty of space to lay the mark with one jibe, so again no incentive to try something different on the first downwinder, and the reach at the bottom was pretty much a drag race. Tactics, then, came into how to position at the bottom mark for the longer upwind leg - pinch off the rounding to take the inside line, or duck people above to foot for speed and gain clean air, then pinch up from there?

That calculation only really came into play when rounding in very close proximity. On the first heat, I found Chris Prior and Bruce ahead of me by about 50 yards at the mark, with Chris pinching and Bruce footing; having nowhere to go on port tack that would provice clear air, I tacked off - and the lighter air and lack of current on the inside cost me big time, so it became clear that wasn't really a viable option.

The only place to worry about tactics, then, came into play with the layline for the upper windward mark (as you were quite far out when you had to make the call, and there was a lot of current, so people tended to overstand the mark a bit), and then on the second downwind - as the inside had lighter breeze and some big holes, it was a matter of either jibing off pretty soon to stay with higher pressure (but battle the current a bit more) versus going to the inside for flat water, no opposing current due to the eddy, and just hope to either dodge the holes or perhaps get the golden header puff off the shore.

The first couple heats had some light spots; most of the fleet were on 9.9's or 9.1's, and Bruce was looking for power on his 9.1. Chris Prior took full advantage of that and took the first two heats from him, with me coming in 3rd; Bruce then went up to his 9.9 and took the remaining heat (with the exception of #5, where both he and Chris were OCS). Chris showed that he's definitely a force to be reckoned with, giving Bruce some very spirited competition throughout the day.

The two of them were spot-on in their starts for most of the heats; Chris had amazing angle, while Bruce had his usual good angle paired with really good speed. I got myself stuck in the wrong place on the line several times, having to foot off for clear air and as a result missing out on the inside of the lift on port tack. That usually resulted in the two of them rounding windward first, and from there it was a parade to the end. Through the day, I found that I had good speed and, when I had things together, good angle upwind. My starts were not so great, so that's the next thing to work on.

After four heats, the breeze was definitely coming up a bit. We took a bit of a break, with Darren contemplating switching to slalom. There was a lot of pressure coming up the river - but by the time he had to make the call, there were still a bunch of holes on the course. Darren therefore made the only possible call, which was to stick with Formula; sure, the puffs were getting pretty massive, but running slalom at that point would have resulted in pretty inconsistent racing.

At the start of heat 5, however, the breeze definitely picked up a bit. Unfortunately, I ended up getting lifted out of the water on the first beat when I hit some stray chop just as a big gust came in. The crash that followed must have caused quite a splash; it took me a while to get out from under my gear and get myself sorted - at that point, there was no one left behind me, and it took me the whole race to claw my way back up to fifth (which, due to Bruce and Chris having been over early, turned to 3rd).

The breeze kept building for heat 6, and for #7, things were going positively ballistic. I stayed with Bruce and Chris throughout the course, and at the bottom mark, I was able to shoot out to leeward of them, footing off for clear air. Bruce was up and ahead; Chris was pinching on the inside but losing speed in the steep chop, and I had a clean lane below Bruce with good speed. Next time I looked back, Chris actually tacked off to look for smoother water inside. Usually, that would be a really bad idea; by now, though, it had gotten windy enough that the swell in the channel was getting really lumpy. I was having a pretty challenging time keeping things together and attempting to keep the foils working. Bruce, having switched back to his 9.1 a couple heats back, was clearly enjoying the easier handling of the smaller sail. When I tacked at the layline, things got really entertaining; spray was flying everywhere, and I ended up going sideways a fair bit. Chris made it to the mark at about the same time as I did, but I had the benefit of being fully up to speed going around the mark while he was pinching, so I got by him and was able to pull away a bit on the downwind, finishing that heat second behind Bruce (a nice end ot the day's racing after all 3rds).

Normally, going to the inside should have cost Chris big time, but as crazy as things got out in the channel, it was the probably the smart thing to do and almost worked out for him. If I had bobbled my tack, or had I not been able to hold it together after one of those spinouts on the long hairy starboard tack across the channel, he would have been long gone. The conditions out there on the last race sure made me feel good about investing a bunch of gym time into crosstraining, as it was pretty much a matter of grunting through it at that point.

Special shout-out to Ben and Fiona, youngest sailors of the day. Both of them finished all but the last heat (and #5 and 6 were getting pretty furry already); quite an accomplishment to get big formula boards around the course in those conditions when you're that small. Here's a picture (again, courtesy of Scotia and Rick) that puts things in perspective a bit on the size issue:

I got to do a little slalom sailing afterwards, which was nice. Given how tuckered I was after racing (especially those last few heats), and how windy it had gotten by this time (I was way maxed on my 7.1; a 6.2 and a smaller board would have been a much better fit), it ended up being a short session, but definitely some good practice ahead of Nationals next month. Interestingly, when I ran the course on my slalom gear, I found that my angles weren't that far off. Sure, upwind I was going a bit lower, and it might have required an additional tack to make the uppwer windward mark. Downwind, though, I was definitely going faster, and as long as I stayed in the breeze, at about the same angles (oh, and it was really fun rather than character-building). Food for thought for next month's Blowout.

Thanks to Scotia for organizing another flawless event. It sure would be nice if we could turnout up a bit; some of the usual suspects have been absent this season (yes, we know who you are, and we're planning interventions...) Some nice pictures taken off the boat by Rick during the first few heats (when things were still very civilized...): http://gallery.me.com/scotia#100059&view=grid&bgcolor=black&sel=54

More slalom action

2009-06-07T09:57:00.001-07:00

Another Gorge Cup, and more slalom racing (full disclosure, the picture is actually from the last Gorge Cup; since it was pretty much the same cast of characters and all the same gear, that didn't seem entirely inappropriate...).

Conditions yesterday were challenging -there was a lot of breeze, but it was frontal, not thermal, so there were some really furry gusts, but also some big holes to deal with. Bruce dominated, except for one heat (where it looked so windy that he took his 6.2 and tiny, 75l (?) slalom board and did really with his blazing speed and g-force jibes until he hit a hole, at which point he did the hula with the water reaching up to his belly button - hey, fat boards rule!).

I was on the Exocet 71 with my Sailworks 7.1, and that combo feels really good. It's got great glided through the holdes, can be pushed upwind, but still has very much competitive speed on the super-powered reaches.

MacRae and I had some really spirited battles for second place; I got him in the the end by something like a point. He once again sailed a very consistent set of heats, with really solid starts, good speed, and very reliable jibing. Jay put in a solid day as well. And then there was Sam Bauer, who just moved up to a more modern slalom board from his ancient Mistral - and got a bunch of top 5 finishes. I'll take full credit for that (as it's my Exocet 67 from last year he's riding now) ;)

The course was a bit modified from the usual box slalom, de-emphasizing the upwind leg a bit and making it possible to pretty much hit the mark on that, so there was less need for layline tactics on where to tack. This might be a good compromise for Nationals, as the out-of-towners usually aren't used to the upwind component, but a pure downwind slalom often turns into a bit of a follow-the-leader parade. The course felt a bit squished this way, but part of that was the way it had to be laid out to work with the oscillations in the breeze (yep, it was frontal for sure...). With a more reliable thermal, Darren should be able to stretch it out a bit more.

All in all, another great race day - we got in seven heats (and timed it just right - I sailed a bit after the last heat, and at that time it got flukey - there was still huge gusts, but the holes were now becoming pretty permanent on the inside marks). Racing conditions were a bit tough and character building; perhaps that's why the turnout was a bit low (or maybe those folks just went east instead - things were apparently classically Gorge nuclear out there). Seems that with the new, bigger slalom gear, those kinds of conditions can still be really fun to race (it just adds an element of challenge to the equation instead of making it frustrating, as it did in the days of narrow sinky boards and not-as-rangy sails).

Again a good junior contingent; Alex and Jay had a spirited battle (this time, Jay took it), Alyson finished EVERY heat (right on!), and Fiona came to race for the first time ever, negotiating the full course for the first two heats on her Starsurfer and a 2.5 before having to rush off for a soccer game (she actually stayed out at the boat after finishing the first heat, ready to go again).

Pictures and results probably pretty soon at http://vmgevents.com/gc/index.htm - Scotia again pulled off flawless organization, and Darren ran a tight series of heats. For all of you still on the fence about coming for Nationals in July - it's going to be awesome!

Gorge Cup - race report

2009-05-25T21:49:00.000-07:00

5/27 upate: Pictures, courtesy Michael Hildreth - Nice shot of a start (Bruce below me, MacRae above me), and a great study of what a jibe looks like when done too tentatively (notice weight too far back, sail not aggressively enough sheeted in).

First Gorge Cup of the season on Saturday, 24 May - and wouldn't you know, despite the fact that it was not only a race day but also a holiday weekend, it actually blew! We had 9 heats of very powered up slalom, with some pretty furry gusts.

After having been way late to the start in heat 1, I clawed my way back up to 3rd after Bruce (on form, as usual) and MacRae, who set the tone for his performance that day by being on it at the start and executing flawlessly throughout the race.

In heat 2, I managed to be on the line with speed at the gun, following Bruce through the first three jibes. He was on a smaller board, so I was hoping to maybe get by him on the upwind leg - but just before I got to the offset mark at the bottom of the course, I had one of those wipe-outs where everything happens so fast, you don't even know what happened. All I know is that I got sent, and that in the process I hit my left thigh on something - hard. It hurt like hell water starting, and when I got on the board, my leg just sort of buckled, so I went in and sat out the rest of that heat with an icepack stuffed under my wetsuit leg.

I got back out there for heat 3, and while the adrenaline (and icing between heats) kept the pain at bay, my leg was awfully weak, which didn't serve too well in overpowered reaching, making my way through the chop to the start, or jibing. The racing was still fun, and at times it was even reasonably tight. MacRae continued to have a stellar day, taking two heats from Bruce (he joked later that he'll just retire now that he'd such a golden day; my take is that this is the result of lots of practice and his great, go-for-it attitude) and placing second in the others (except for another bullet in the last race, which Bruce sat out). The recipe was always the same - he was right there at the start, had good speed down the straights, made solid jibes all day long. Way to go, MacRae!

I ended up with a bunch of 3rds and a fourth, plus a couple deeper finishes (usually following a bad start or a fall). Interesting note on gear choices - it looks like most guys have upsized a bit. Jay is running an iSonic 111; I'm on my Exo 71 (118l); MacRae is still using his three-year-old 105l F2 (and he's clearly tuned up on it). Bruce was going for a smaller board for a few of the heats (two of which he lost to MacRae) but also experimenting running his 6.2 on a bigger board.

So yes, the bigger boards can be a handful in the big puffs, but they sure come in handy on the short upwind, or when tacking after that leg, and they don't seem to carry too much of a speed penalty. And while they don't jibe as tightly and quickly, they make up for that with faster acceleration out of the jibes, especially on the inside if the breeze lightens up a bit. At the time, I kept thinking that maybe I would have been better off on something smaller than a 71cm board and a 7.1, but on the drive home it finally struck me that - duh - I was working on 1 1/2 legs, so no wonder that things seemed a bit out of control.

I'm pretty stoked with how the day went, and two days later, I'm actually walking almost normally again (and might be completely pain-free if I hadn't decided to go sailing today - but hey, it's Memorial Day, and it was breezy and sunny...). Great way to start the season - lots of breeze, a well-organized event (Scotia really has this down to a science - Nationals this year will be awesome!), a well-laid course and tight start sequences (way to go Darren - again, Nationals should be great), and a ton of racing taking full advantage of the conditions. Strong performances from the juniors (Alex and Jay were seriously pushing some of the seasoned racers; Alison did a great job getting into slalom, and Ben was inspiring in his tenacity), added to the happy picture.

Results (and maybe even pictures - Michael Hildreth was out on the point with a _very_ big lens) soon at the VMG site.

Off to do some racing

2009-05-23T07:43:00.001-07:00

After light Easterlies last weekend led to cancellation of our season opener, it looks like we might have better luck today. This morning, there are bright skies and a good breeze in Hood River, and the forecast looks promising - perhaps even slalom potential. Should be a good time!

Dialing in the slalom stuff

2009-05-13T21:27:00.001-07:00

That s&^t-eating grin on my face to the right (as captured by Shawn Davis) pretty much says it all - I'm pretty happy with my slalom gear this year. I got my new Exo 71 just before my trip to the Bay Area, where it got put to good use on both the 7.1 and the 6.0, and since coming home, I've been able to sail it with the new 8.2 a couple times.

Some observations:

The board is almost stupid rangey - 8.2 feels really comfortable, and I'm sure it can easily pull off a 9.0. And it's really tuneable - when sailing it with the 8.2, the biggest fin I had at hand was a 42 (very sweet Finworks slalom fin - keep your eyes peeled for more on these soon). That's a bit small, but just moving the base forward an inch put everything into very nice balance. The board shines in 7.1 conditions - chop is eaten alive, and you can just keep on pushing. It's everything that I loved about the 67, but even more point and shoot.
The new 7.1 Sailworks NXsl is sweet. The previous 7.2 was an amazing sail. The 7.1 takes that to a higher level. It's still got the same range, but even better control at the high end, and more potential to juice it up for when it gets a little lighter. It's definitely an evolution on the 7.2, not a radical departure - and that refinement really shows. This is my go-to slalom size (last year, I raced all slalom on my 7.2), and I'm really stoked about this one. I'm surprised by how tuneable things are on the downhaul - the sail doesn't get all draggy if you let out a 1/2" of DH - it just powers up more. Lessons learned from the Hucker, I guess. And when you flatten it out for high end, it gets super slippery - but remains pumpable out of the jibes.
The 8.2 NXsl is remarkable. I've had a ton of fun on it in pretty marginal conditions, but when the wind picks up a bit, it doesn't feel that big. It's got the same happy demeanor as the 7.1, just in a bit bigger. This is a great companion for the new breed of bigger slalom boards. I was a bit surprised that I actually found some speeds around 32 knots in my track log - not bad for an 8.2 and a 71 liter board in open water, I'd say (especially since I wasn't really doing speed runs - this was just letting it fly off the breeze a bit on the way back in). This sail, together with the 118 liter Exo, is fully raceable in conditions that, if on formula, would still see me on my 10.8.

This Saturday is the first Gorge Cup - or maybe I should say, this Saturday might be the first Gorge Cup, as the current forecast is for light Easterlies. Hopefully, that will change (fronts move fast this time of year). Cross your fingers for raceable conditions.

Battle at sea...

2009-04-25T07:13:00.000-07:00

The St. Francis Yacht Club and the hardy racers of the Bay Area fleet never cancel racing. It just doesn't happen. At the 07 Nationals, we raced the final two heats in conditions that caused the race director to issue stern warnings to people, as well as send competitors in against their will when they were floundering at the start line. But they don't cancel racing.

Make that they very rarely cancel racing. Last night's Friday night race didn't happen. It was blowing somewhere around 30, with a vicious ebb throwing up some pretty big voodoo chop, and when John Craig (said race director) asked the assembled (and fully rigged) crowed of racers whether they wanted to race in this, only one hand (Jean's) went half-way up.

Instead, I got to test just what the upper limit of my Exo 71 is. The board did remarkably well in overpowered 6.0 with a 34 (a 36 would have made for better jibes - that is a pretty wide tail on that board, after all). With that much range, Exocet isn't doing itself any favors - people just won't be going out and buying multiple boards if each of them has that much range. Good for the consumer, I guess (and so, in the long run, good for Exocet). Lots of fun was had as most of the guys took out their slalom or freeride stuff. Much tailwalking and hilarity ensued, along with white-knuckle maching reaches through the troughs (usually ended by some stray piece of chope throwing up a ramp where there hadn't been one a second before - gotta love Crissy on an ebb...)

The pictures don't do the day justice, as it was pretty tame on the inside 200 yards or so, which pretty much exhausts the effective range of my little camera. For a reality check - David Wells (blue Aerotech) was on a 5.7 and an 84l freeride board; Jean (red Aerotech) was on a 5.0 and a 78l wave board. It was windy...

Today's CalCup will be in Berkely - lots of wind expected for that. After that, it's time to drive home.

That's more like it!

2009-04-22T22:36:00.000-07:00

And just like that, the heat wave is over, the marine layer has reasserted itself with a vengeance, and after a long day of pretty interesting sessions on database performance tuning, I got to play with my new slalom toys. Crissy was showing off its normal self, with voodoo chop caused by a nice strong ebb going out against some pretty stiff breeze.

I got to try my new Exocet WSl 71 (yep, another black machine) and my new Sailworks NXsl 7.1. Normally, I try to only dial in one piece of new gear at a time, but since I couldn't bring my old board with me for lack of space in the car, there was no alternative. The 71, however, behaved just like the 67 - I set straps the straps in the middle position, put the base at 135cm, put in my 40cm Finworks, and the board felt like an old friend from the first reach. Jibing is as friendly and transparent as the 67, but with better speed throughout the turn (bigger boards are nice that way).

At times, the combo should clearly have been too large, as it got pretty darn furry, but giving the sail a bit more downhaul and moving the boom down an inch made things manageable. Lining up with the guys, it seemed that the large board did not incur a speed penalty in the heavy stuff - and the way it glides through holes and accelerates out of the turns bodes well for the upcoming slalom season. The 7.1 is a nice refinement from last year's sail - it's got a bit more shape down low and is way more pumpable - but when you're lit, it just goes into low-drag mode and keeps going faster. I'm psyched - I don't get nearly enough time to tweak my slalom setup, given that I don't get to sail slalom much at home, so having gear that's this plug and play is a real blessing. If you're looking for new slalom kit, you should take a good look at Sailworks and Exocet - it's working for me.

At one point, I took a short break and shot some pictures; unfortunately, the haze and flying sand/spray on shore made it pretty hard to capture anything exciting. It was fun sailing with David, Steve, Jean, as well as Royce and Robert. Glad to see there's a bit of a slalom scene at Crissy - the spot is so perfect for it (if you don't mind getting your fillings rattled on port...)

Tomorrow's another day of cramming my head full of information, hopefully followed by a quick session with the Berkeley crowd. Then it's on to Friday Night racing at the St. Francis, the Calcup on Saturday, and then the long drive home.

SF heat wave

2009-04-20T22:16:00.000-07:00

I'm getting to indulge in the geek's dream this week, attending the MySQL conference in Santa Clara - which just so happens to be conveniently located in the Bay Area, home to some of the most reliably windy conditions anywhere on the US Mainland, as well as what has to be one of the most competitive local racing fleets anywhere. Of course, the Bay Area is having a bit of a heat wave right now, so when I rolled into town on Sunday, Crissy Field looked more like a Mediterranean beach than its usual wind-battered, fog-covered, self. The Bay, meanwhile, was far from displaying the usual voodoo chop, and thousands of people were roasting in the sun as temps reached the high 80's.

Today, after a long day of tutorials on data warehousing in the morning and scale-out/scale-up of transaction systems in the afternoon (yes, Karryn, I took copious notes...), I escaped the Silicon Valley heat sink and made it to Crissy Field. At that point, a wee bit of sea breeze was starting to build, and a lone kite racer got some rides. Soheil was there as well, and we both rigged 10.8's.

It took a bit of slogging, but I finally found a patch of breeze and a rip that went against the massive flood to get me towards the South Tower; Soheil went in to wait for a bit more breeze (hey, he gets to sail here every day if he wants to, so his sense of urgency is probably a little less than mine...). I was rewarded for the slogging and the pumping with a glorious sunset session close to the Bridge - nice steady sea breeze, glassy water, not a whitecap in sight, and tons of porpoises feeding on the rip lines. After 45 minutes of bliss, the breeze started to fade, so I started the journey back.

I got to shore just in time before the breeze died totally; Soheil (who had come back out when the breeze filled in a wee bit) actually had to paddle back the last 100m or so. Forecast for tomorrow is for more of the same (but a bit stronger), with the marine layer coming back on Wednesday, which should produce some solid breeze. I hope that comes true, as I've got a brand new Exocet WSl71 to dial in, along with a new set of Sailworks slalom sails.

For Sale - Spring 2009

2009-03-30T12:16:00.001-07:00

The new season is starting, and here's your chance to get a great deal on some well-maintained, high-performance gear. Check out details at http://g-42.com/FS_Spring2009.html and take a look at the slideshow. Besides what's advertised, I also have a bunch of smaller items - from adjustable outhaul setups (for those of you who like cam cleat setups rather than the super smooth Sailworks system), miscellaneous extensions, etc. Can deliver in the greater Pac NW (Seattle, Vancouver, Gorge), am planning a trip to the Bay Area in mid April - so you might not even have to worry about shipping (which can, however, also be arranged).

If the recession's got you down, this may be just the stimulus you need to kick the season off in style without breaking the bank.

Kona time

2009-03-06T08:25:00.000-08:00

Came across this shot of my (then) 2 1/2 year old looking very old school on a Kona that Pepi at 2nd Wind had graciously loaned us for a couple days last summer in the Gorge. Which instantly reminded me of all the fun we had with that board. The reason we got it was that Jen was frustrated with the on/off sensation she had with our big wide beginner board - she loved the stability, but she'd gotten it planing a few times, and now she'd tasted blood and wanted more. And getting a 100cm wide barge planing requires a bit of active participation (especially with a 5.0). What's worse, for a beginner/low intermediate, the barge is an exercise in frustration when it's gusty (as it often is at the Event Site) - in the lulls, you're slogging (which is about as exciting as watching grass grow, and doesn't feel all that comfortable); when a gust hits, you get slammed. Until you have it planing, you never feel effortless.

Enter the Kona - still on that same 5.0, the Kona would just smoothly get going for her. In the lulls, she was happily gliding (as opposed to slogging) along, going way faster (and feeling way smoother) than on the wide board. And when the puffs came, the board would just accelerate a bit more, ever so smoothly, and if it was sustained, she'd find herself planing for a bit. The whole thing was pretty effortless. She loved it!

So now I was curious and took it for a spin as well. And yes, that gliding sensation was really nice - big time reminder of what made me fall in love with windsurfing in 1979, before there were short boards. And getting it planing, the ride was incredibly cushy - definitely more Cadillac than sports car. Overall, it was a hoot - and very pleasant and relaxing. Couldn't help but get all nostalgic. No wonder the Kona is inspiring such an exuberant following. As a racer, I spend a lot of time on formula and slalom gear. I absolutely love that on-the-edge feeling you get when you're way overpowered and just pushing it to the max. But there's something about just cruising along. It's an aspect to the sport that's long been missing - kudos to Exocet for so successfully bringing that back.

Another year - right on!

2009-01-01T12:21:00.001-08:00

This coming year will mark 30 years of windsurfing for me (yep, I started when I was a pup). It's been a great ride, and over the decades (whoa, sounds odd to put it that way) the sport has given me so much to be grateful for. Lots of exciting experiences, lots of personal growth, lots of physical and mental challenge, and just tons of all-out fun. It's not one of those things that provide instant gratification - I assume every windsurfer would heartily agree with that (even those who live in places where warm waters and reliable winds prevail; not that I'm jealous or anything given the uncharacteristically cold and snowy December we had...).

May the New Year bring you lots of breeze, great sailing, and lots of opportunity to enjoy what to me, after all these years, is still the most amazing and thrilling sport I can imagine - Happy New Year, everyone!

Epic high speed freestyle

2008-12-05T07:54:00.000-08:00

http://www.sailrocket.com/live/?q=node/78

Sailrocket is an ambitions project to make an experimental sailboat (I cringe at the term, given that this craft bears about as much resemblance to what I generally think of as a sailboat as a Lamborghini does to a Yugo) go world record speeds. For a long time, there's been an interesting dual development on the speed circuit.

On the one hand, you've had attempts like Yellow Pages and MI and (significantly larger and more open-ocean oriented) Hydroptere using pretty sophisticated technology and rather intricate and complex designs to balance the physics in an efficiency game - meaning they have tried to push the boundaries of lift/drag ratios on all foils and played with ways to leverage their righting moment to produce high speeds in reasonably low wind speeds (Sailrocket just produced 52 knot peak speeds in roughly 25 knots of breeze).

On the other hand, you've had the windsurfers and, recently (and with spectacular success) kiters, play a completely different game of simplicity and brute force. Yes, the wipeouts for them have been spectacular, too, but they don't involve a 20 foot craft looping - just a good old fashioned endo or teabagging at very high speeds (and no doubt a lot of pain). Kiters have learned to harness an advantage of their platform, which is that kites generate vertical lift - that allows them to use boards so tiny, they make windsurfers' speed boards (at 45 cm or less width) look monstrous. Pair that with their tiny fins, and they could not only reduce drag, but they could also find smoother water w/o fear of things getting too shallow. Pair that with the geometry of the whole setup giving them more favorable leverage, and it's hard to see windsurfers catching up.

So far, the simple brute force approach has the edge, with Yellow Pages in 93 the only efficiency play in the long list of first windsurfers, then again windsurfers (Maynard and Albeau, really, as they were in a class by themselves), and now kiters that have held the outright record.

What's becoming obvious, though, is that there's a middle ground. The kites are taking a page from the "boats" in that they optimize low drag by employing vertical lift to reduce wetted surface (only, they do it by simply having their kites drag them up while accelerating, as opposed to using hydrofoils to get a hull out of the water). They're also employing leverage for their righting moment - only they do it by decoupling the airfoil from the sailor/craft package via long kite strings as opposed to utilizing outriggers. So they're doing the same things, but radically more simply (and thus, one might argue, more elegantly). Which allows them faster and cheaper development cycles (tuning kites is a matter of a simple recut and some tweaks to line geometry; shaping a new kite board or producing a new fin takes a matter of days and investment in the hundreds of dollars, not tens or hundreds of thousands).

The kiters have thus managed to push the solution space boundaries by one-upping windsufers on simplicity while at the same time gaining on the efficiency front (note that they're making record runs in lower wind speeds - which means they've got a feedback loop going that gives them more chances at records). To get another crack at the outright record, windsurfing will have to figure out how to play the efficiency game - but still retain its simplicity (or else it will be cost-prohibitive and run into the issue of slow development cycles that seems to be keeping the boats from keeping up with the kites). That means truly exotic hydrofoils and outriggers and such are probably out. Perhaps launching from a moving boat (to allow for smaller boards) might work (hey, it's what they do with speed record aircraft so they don't have to have big draggy wings); that seems to make the need for super high and consistent winds only worse, however, and will further cut down on eligible venues. Aircraft carrier-style catapults probably add a bit too much complexity (but might produce some spectacular YouTube moments...).

Fun stuff!

Liquid Lunch Checklist

2008-11-20T14:00:00.000-08:00

Lots of wind - check (beginnings of liquid smoke, and not too off-shore, so the slog/swim to the windline was only about 5 minutes or so)
Reasonable temps - check (air and water both right around 50F)
Appropriate gear - check (5.0 and 80 liter board; a bit overpowered but good)
A reasonably well-timed hall-pass - check (rare, as lately wind has either happened at night or when work interfered in all sorts of nasty ways)

==> Nothing standing in the way of a great session, right?

Except after about 20 minutes of hunting all over the bay for a patch of water that wasn't too infested with driftwood, I bagged it for safety's sake and made my way back to shore. The flooding we've had here in NW Washington lately has left a lot of dead wood in the water, and with up to chest-high swell and lots of confused chop (not too mention the spray flying everywhere), it was exceedingly hard to spot those obstacles. Bummer!

Hopefully, this stuff will settle down on the beaches soon.

For Sale

2008-10-15T12:27:00.000-07:00

Exocet Warp Slalom 67

My 2008 slalom board - 105 liters, 67cm wide, and about the most nicely balanced slalom board I've ever sailed. Sweet spot is around 6.5-7.5, but it extends well down to 5.8 and crazy water with a slighly smaller fin (like a 34 or even 32 G-10 fin). It also works well with an 8.2 and a larger fin (like a 42cm carbon Finworks). I won the slalom in the Canadian championships on this board because of its range, speed in the flat stuff, and control on the outside (where the eddy line was pushing up the voodoo chop). The guys I was racing either had the speed, or the glide and angle, but never both - so I had more degrees of freedom.

If you're looking for a slalom board to race competitively, at a killer price, this is it. If you're looking for a fast board to freeride, its ease of use makes this one uniquely accessible (and ensures you don't ever have to worry about your buddy passing you because he has a faster board). This is also one of the nicest-jibing boards I've ever sailed.

The board's in great condition (one repair on the deck, but that never sucked water since it happened at the beach - that's where the Sailworks sticker is visible in the photo) and comes with super-comfy DaKine straps. I can arrange shipping at cost; we can figure out local arrangements anywhere in the Pacific Northwest, and maybe even the Bay Area (have a trip coming up in April) ---> $1,095.

Also: late 80's/early 90's F2 Lightning racing longboard, complete with all parts (yes, the mast track works and has been adapted for M8 bolts, so you don't have to worry about the proprietary F2 steel pins). This is the World Cup edition with the carbon center board. I picked this up from someone who had it in his garage unused for over 15 years, so it's in unbelievably great shape (no soft spots anywhere). I thought I'd come down for City League races in Seattle, but found that the drive was just prohibitive. ---> $300.

Update: here are some pictures of the Lightning (yep, it's the big one; yep, it's in great shape; yep, the track is fully functional; yep, it's the carbon centerboard, and the gaskets are in great shape; yep, it the newer version with the PowerBox fin; ...)

Send me an email through this contact form to find out more: http://g-42.com/contact

50.57

2008-10-04T20:25:00.000-07:00

Damn, those kiters really have hit their stride now. At theLüderitz Speed Challenge , Sebastien Cattelan of France broke the 50 knot barrier. Rumor has it that this means the canal won't open for the next round of Masters of Speed - I could see how that might be true, as it would be harder to get sponsorship together and get people to commit that much time and money if there's no more chance at being the first to break 50.

Congratulations to the kiters at Luderitz - those are some pretty awesome performances. Given how quickly they were able to push their speeds up to those levels from where they were just a few years ago, there's been a lot of very rapid development in that sport. Good on them!

I wonder if this will spell the end of the speed rush windsurfing has gone through in the last few years, with several well-organized record attempts and a bunch of grass roots GPS-based informal competition. I also wonder what it will take for windsurfing to reclaim the outright record - it took Maynard and Albeau a lot of time, money, and R&D to get to 49.09; kiters just blew right by them, and physics seem to be on their side at this point. Seems like the current gear and technique combo needs to be tweaked a bit to get back in the game. The sailors have been trying to do the same thing vis-a-vis windsurfing (check http://www.sailrocket.com/ or http://www.hydroptere.com/ to see some of those attempts - none of them successful so far) Perhaps we'll end up seeing some crazy foiling windsurfers with funky outriggers to get on top of the physics here - but given the state of the industry, I'm not sure where the funding for such extensive R&D would come from. Incremental improvements to the current design paradigm seem to have run into the law of diminishing returns.

49.84

2008-09-22T08:28:00.000-07:00

American kite- and windsurfer Rob Douglas (from Boston, I believe?) just broke A2's outright record. 49.84 knots over 500 meters in a shallow bay in Namibia. Check out the video - that's pretty damn fast. 50 knots is awfully close. Remember Albeaus's run, at 49.09, and how even the tiny chop on the canal caused so much chatter on the board, and you can see why the kiters might have an advantage here, now that their kites have come such a long way in efficiency. The upward force from the kite allows them to use tiny boards (whereas windsurfers need them to be at least big enough to where they can waterstart). Perhaps if we can figure out a way to jettison part of the board, or get some sort of running start off a boat or something...

Congratulations to Rob (and his coach Mike Gebhardt). Alway cool to see someone push the limits like this!

29 years

2008-09-04T12:43:00.000-07:00

It was in September of 1979 that I first learned how to windsurf. I was all of 9 years old, the gear was heavy and kludgey and monstrously awkward and slow by today's standards. I learned on a tiny little pond that I could have swum across in all of fifteen minutes. Even now, 29 years later, I remember the incredible rush I felt when, after repeated uphauling and flailing and stalling, the stars aligned: I sheeted in, and a little puff got me going. I had sailed Optis for 3 years at this point, so I knew about the feeling about being driven by the wind - but the immediacy of the experience was different.

From that moment on, I was hooked. The thrill of catching the wind and feeling its power come through your body, transformed into motion, is something that has never let me go to this day, and probably never will. To me, this sport is release, zen practice, plain fun, competitive outlet, and so much more.

This summer, as we were out on the water in the Gorge, my daughter Hope (now 8) and I were on a raging plane on the Start together; as we were coming into the Event Site, after almost hollering herself hoarse, she looked up at me and said: "Dad, I really get it now!" That week, she'd been doing the Big Winds kids' camp, had felt the wind in her hands, and now she had experienced the adrenaline rush of skipping over the water on a full plane. I don't know if she'll ever be hooked the way I have been; at that moment, though, windsurfing, often seen as a lone individual's pursuit, was a bridge for connection - a shared experience between father and daughter, her window into a part of my soul, and mine into hers.

Squamish pictures

2008-08-11T11:58:00.001-07:00

Update:

Gwen l'Hirondelle made some nice shots available as well - they're now part of the updated slideshow embedded below (click on it to get it to display in bigger size). She spent a lot of time during the weekend hanging out on the spit in clearly suboptimal weather, producing a lot of nice pictures - and she has graciously agreed for them to get published in support of promoting a great grass-roots event put on by the Squamish Windsports Society. That's just one example of all the great SWS volunteers who contributed to making this event happen. Thanks, Gwen - and thanks to all the volunteers for a great weekend!

David shot some pics of the slalom on Friday off the end of the spit and has graciously agreed to let me post them. I especially like the fact that in all the shots where I do appear, I'm leading ;)

The original gallery is posted at Elliot's site - thanks David for taking the time to take pictures when you could have been out on the water, and thanks Elliot for creating a neat community resource for the Pacific Northwest boardheads!

Canadian Nationals - Day 3 (final)

2008-08-10T21:47:00.000-07:00

Phew - good exercise. The clearing weather didn't quite make it up Howe Sound, so the temperature gradient was actually reversed (w/ Vancouver warmer than Squamish, and Squamish warmer than Whistler). At least it didn't rain anymore after 8 am. Winds were pretty light, and really flukey. We ended up doing three heats of formula late in the afternoon, but more so we'd have something to do rather than because we thought it would be good racing (I guess we didn't want to sit on shore like the kiters, who in their frustration were resorting to building a gigantic floating rail for sliding tricks).

Since it was so light, we couldn't even lure out most of the racers, so it was just Chris Pior, Carey Caronni, and me. Interestingly, we were all on roughly the same sail sizes (10.7's for them, 10.8 for me); I'm about 25 pounds heavier than Chris, and Carey is quite a bit lighter than that again. The first heat then was finished in order of weight, with Carey managing to squeeze out Chris (who then took the next two). It was an interesting experiment, as the physics of the whole thing became apparent - anytime we pumped up on a plane after transitions, I'd need a few more pumps and lost more ground upwind to get going. It didn't help that my light air fin had fallen victim to a submerged piece of wood while checking out the course - to get any kind of pressure and rail the board, I had to resort to hanging off my uphaul.

Good exercise, for sure - we might have been a bit chilly when we left the beach, but we were dripping with sweat when we got back (Rob had at this time commandeered the PA system; when we were slogging in on the last puff of breeze, I distinctly heard him say something like "better you than me"...).

Results are thus firmed up - I won the slalom before Rob and Chris; Chris won formula with Carey getting second and me third. Phil won freestyle.

It's unfortunate we got such atypical weather on Saturday and Sunday; nevertheless, it was a fun event. The slalom on Friday was about as good as it gets (we got nine heats of slalom bliss) - just for that it was worth coming up. And even though for us spoiled West Coasters the conditions on Saturday were light (and Sunday even lighter), the Europeans would have just put on their 12's and called it great racing. For me, it was that one race a year where I wished I had a bigger rig (which is a cost-benefit analysis that doesn't really justify the investment).

There's talk of some more grass-roots racing at Squamish, as Rob and Chris were recounting the glory years of slalom racing there; the place certainly has that potential. For anyone who likes to race slalom, if the overall weather pattern is right, it would very much be worth the drive even from Seattle or even the Gorge.

I'm hoping to get some pictures to post in the next day or so, as there was a very friendly couple shooting with rather nice equipment and promising to make something available that would showcase the racing we had.

Canadian Nationals - Day 2

2008-08-09T19:37:00.000-07:00

Lots of sitting in the rain and waiting this morning, with a front pushing through and making things feel more like March than August here in Squamish. Winds picked up a bit in the afternoon, and we got ready to race Formula. First heat got delayed as the breeze shifted quite a bit and we had to change the course to avoid turning this into a reaching match. Then, as we were about to get the second heat off, we had to pull the committee boat off station, as a big freighter was coming in and the boat was anchored right in its path to its berth. I was kind of glad that one didn't go off, as the wind had just dropped quite a bit while we were already in the sequence.

After a bit of rigging frenzy we all had our biggest sails up and were ready to go. We got three races off in light and shifty breeze. Current from the river added to the mayhem. The way the current played, there wasn't much latitude for tactics, as you had to get to the right side of the course to ride the current upwind, and the left side of the course to get downwind faster by not having to fight the current. Chris Prior took three bullets; I took three seconds. He's 25 pounds lighter than me, and he skillfully took advantage of that by getting good angle upwind and planing right through the holes up and down the course. Since I couldn't match his angle off the line, and since the wind was getting flukey on the right side of the course in the third heat, I tried a starboard start and actually led him through the first lap of the course; the lead I had built up at the windward mark had pretty much shrunk to nothing at the bottom though, and in the further dropping breeze, he got me on the second lap.

After we were all derigged and had eaten, the wind all of a sudden picked up; with the ramps created by the ebb, it would have been a good bump and jump session. After all the pumping, though, none of us were much in the mood. Tomorrow's forecast is for less rain and fewer clouds; hopefully that means a thermal push with a bit more sailable wind than today.

Slalom results so far actually do have us very close. After nine heats, I'm in first with 14 points; Chris and Rob are right there with 15 and 16, respectively. Yesterday's freestyle was won by Phil Soltysiak; he was really head and shoulders above the other competitors, landing quite a few pretty sophisticated moves despite the rather challenging conditions (river chop, gusty/shifty winds). He also did very nicely in the slalom, using his board handling skills to stay right in the game despite, as he put it, not being a slalom sailor.

Canadian Nationals - Day 1

2008-08-08T21:03:00.000-07:00

9 slalom races (5 in the morning/mid-day; 4 in the afternoon after a break during the freestyle competition). Cool event - windsurfers and kiters both have their nationals right next to each other on the spit in Squamish. Wind went from OK powered 7.2 in the first round of heats to nicely lit-up for the last four. Tight competition in the top three, with Rob Mulder and Chris Prior showing good speed and great starts, as well as solid jibing (apparently Rob hasn't been sailing much at all this season; goes to show that this whole practice/training thing must be overrated...). I had three bullets, a second, a few thirds, a fourth, and one OCS. None of us can figure out the standings at this point other than that the three of us most all be within a couple points of each other. Great racing, for sure, with a wicked fun five-jibe downwind slalom course set by Rob and Chris (and heats spooled off with great precision by Harry and John Darling on the boat).

My 40cm Finworks slalom fin (about to be released - keep your eyes peeled) is working great. When you're lit and sending it, it just sort of goes away into low drag mode; when you're looking for power or needing to point a bit to jockey for position, it's right there, ready to get pushed on. Very nice - you just can't get that kind of performance out of a G-10 fin.

Tomorrow's forecast looks a bit sketch, so it might be shifty formula (or we might just all hang out and BS in the rain). Sunday should pick up a bit again. Of course, weather changes quickly around here.

Lots of people are taking pictures; hopefully some of that will be available to put online.

Gorge Challenge - more pictures

2008-08-07T15:40:00.001-07:00

Thanks to Pete DeKay for making these available:

Gorge Challenge - Day 3 (final)

2008-08-04T06:10:00.000-07:00

Sorry - something went wrong when I downloaded pictures off Scotia's camera yesterday afternoon, but all the files are garbled, so I can't serve them up here. Hopefully we'll get some going; Pete DeKay was taking pictures of the awards, so we should get those online somewhere soon, I hope.

Meanwhile, here's the course we ran Sunday - Darren mixed things up a bit with a pretty slalomy formula course - Start, round A to port, B to port, Start Pin to starboard, Finish Pin to starboard, A to port, B to port, Start Pin to starboard, finish.

Conditions started out pretty tame, with some people joking about rigging their 11's to make the breeze come up. When we got on the water for the first heat, it was very nice 10m formula racing, and while it filled in a bit more, I was very happy on my 9.9 for the day. We got five races, which I finished 2, 2, 4 (fell at the jibe at the bottom of the course - in this fleet, you can't as much as sneeze without being passed, much less fall, which makes for really fun racing), 3 (Derek pulled off the first really successful port start of the day), and 1.

And that last one had a bit of a story to it. After Derek won the windward mark in heat 4 after starting on port and having to duck almost the entire fleet, it became apparent that maybe the advantage on the right side of the course had gotten big enough to overcome the starboard bias on the start and make it worth letting most of the fleet cross, so I went for a port start on the last heat. Stefan managed to squeeze in above me, with Derek and MacRae below me. Lots of frantic weaving through the crowd ensued, but when we were finally clear of the fleet and out in the channel, it became apparent that we were in the right spot. I made it to the windward mark in first, ahead of Bruce who was coming across from the OR side and tacked in my wake.

From this point, it was a bit of a drag race; I made it around the jibe mark, and the breeze was so filled in that I decided to jibe right there as opposed to taking it a bit further down. That worked out well, as I could lay the bottom mark, and set up to jibe just above it. As I came to the mark on starboard, Bruce came in hot on port and tried to squeeze by on the inside with a tight jibe. Any other sailor trying that, and I'd probably have bailed out to avoid a collision; instead, I just went for it and shot by below him to ensure he'd stay behind me. Unfortunately, the clew end of his boom clipped my shoulder. He decided he'd called it too close and DSQ'd himself, which, while being good sportsmanship, was a bit of a bummer as I'd hoped to hold on to that lead for another lap.

Overall, Bruce won both the formula (NRT) and slalom events, as well as taking the overall Gorge Cup title for the year. I placed second for the formula piece and ended up in sixth for the slalom - I'd hoped for a chance to redeem myself a bit there, but by the time the conditions were filled in enough to run slalom on Sunday it got a bit too late to switch formats before the awards and banquet. Probably just as well - as we were sitting down for the excellent food, I couldn't help notice that it was perfect 7.2 wind out there, and neither I nor any of the racers I sat with had any itch to go out and sail more.

One highlight of the day was the new formula weed fin design sported by Peter DeKay, who ran into a submerged log between those dolphin-style pilings on the Oregon side. The attempts to remove that fin from the box entertained folks at the Event Site for over an hour, with as many as six people wielding all sorts of tools to attempt to dislodge it. Bruce put on an impromptu board repair clinic (Hot Stuff superglue and accelerant and 4 ounce glass makes for very quick layups - combat repairs have just become bomb proof).

Check the VMG Events site for complete results - and while you're there, start memorizing the names of some of those juniors, who are moving up in the fleet. This is a pretty strong contingent of young sailors, and having seen them put in the work during the Sailworks Junior Race Camp all week, I'm pretty impressed.

Overall results show that this surge of juniors is coming none too soon; for the season, the top 5 consist of 4 Masters and one Grand Master. I guess in this sport, age groups are affirmative action for the young - hopefully the current crop of juniors will change that. Seeing how Steve Sylvester in the Bay Area still dominates a bunch of guys in their 20's at over 60, it's safe to say that experience is not a disadvantage in racing windsurfers. Pretty sweet, if you think about it, that there's a sport where up to three generations can be truly competitive with each other (and that doesn't involve checkered shorts and country clubs).

Now back to work for a week (work, yeah, I knew there was something I needed to take care of...), then off to Squamish for the Canadian Nationals next weekend. Wow, the season is coming to a close - not sure I'm ready for that. In the Gorge, it's been a fun season of very well organized racing. Scotia is a nation treasure, pulling off some of the finest events anywhere. She'd putting on next year's Nationals in the Gorge, and she's got some pretty big plans, so plan on showing up next July - it will be a blast.

Gorge Challenge - Day 2

2008-08-02T20:18:00.000-07:00

Whoa - 15 heats (both formula and slalom) in two days - we're getting a lot of racing in. The day started with quite a bit of breeze, but the clouds made things a bit inconsistent (especially on the inside), so Darren called for Formula. Different course today - short upwind leg with a starboard rounding (port starting made no sense with this setup), followed by a downwind around the start line, a longer upwind (which meant that there'd be some tactical calls to be made), and then a downwind finish off the boat. The first heat was pretty windy; it picked up from there. Heats 2 and 3, however, still had big holes in some spots, so slalom was still not indicated. Heat 4 got downright furry. I had a 3rd, an OCS, a 6th (I'd started in the 3rd row, being a bit gunshy after being over early, then had to claw my way through the fleet), and a 2nd.

At this point, despite all the jokes about how that would instantly killed the wind, Darren switched format to slalom to take advantage of the conditions (and to avoid the carnage that seemed inevitable with formula gear in those conditions). We got 5 heats in, and Darren called things off after that to avoid running us in the now somewhat fading late afternoon breeze. Things were pretty lit up on the 7.2; I placed 5th, DNF (after a gnarly collision with Derek on the line - took a chunk out of my favorite fin, but both of us got off without injury or any other damaged gear, so we both felt pretty blessed), 7 (after a spectacular wipeout), 3, and 3.

I'm sitting in 2nd for the formula part of the event; slalom has me in 6th at this point. Forecast is strong for tomorrow, so hopefully more slalom and a chance to move up a bit. Time for fin repair and some stretching now. Scotia already has results up (anybody ever wonder how she does it all?).

The level of competition is pretty high, especially in slalom (you can tell the Gorge locals have had a pretty windy summer so far...). Special mention, though, has to go to the Juniors who are not only racing their FE gear in some pretty epic conditions, but are also running slalom (some of them on FE stuff). Especially impressive are the three youngest competitors (Ben, Allyson, and Marion) - lots of spirit, and each of them is a stand-up sailor. Right on!

Gorge Challenge/FE Northamericans - Day 1

2008-08-01T20:19:00.001-07:00

Quick update on the day - I'll try to post something each night. Check the VMG Events site for the NOR and schedule, as well as results and such. Conditions were interesting today - lots of breeze, with clouds pushing through the Gorge. This definitely had a frontal feel to it, not the usual Gorge thermal gradients. Darren set up for course racing; the course contained one reach at the top, one at the bottom, with A fleet going for two laps and juniors and sport going for one. This all seemed like a really good idea at the time (the forecast wasn't really promising too much...).

The wind kicked up a notch, so I went out on my 9.9, set up for moderate conditions. That seemed fine as I ran the course prior to the first heat. When we all lined up for the start, though, the wind picked up some more - which made the whole experience a bit hair-raising at times (I added a bunch of downhaul before the second race). We ran three course heats, with Bruce taking bullets in each. After getting a pretty bad start on port, I was fighting for second with Derek (who's bet on starboard paid off big) in the first heat when I misjudged my layline for the second windward mark (I didn't notice that the wind had gone way South - so I got headed big time into the mark and lost a bunch of places when I had to double tack). I ended up fifth in that one.

On the second heat, we now had a big bunch of port starters. I had to duck some starboard guys, which then put me in bad air from people who'd started behind/above me. After some footing off for speed (kind of exciting when you can barely keep the board from flying off the water), I made an aggressive call on the layline and worked hard to get myself back into second, which I held all the way to the second windward mark when I hooked the anchor rope - and lost a bunch of places to end up in 7th. Heat 3 saw me starting on starboard, which worked way better - I was pretty much Derek and me chasing Bruce around the course, with me finishing second.

Because conditions had been pretty furry throughout the morning, Darren called a break at this point to reset the course for slalom. I was a bit concerned (as things seemed to get a bit light and holey on the inside), but there seemed to be plenty of breeze all over the course. We got three heats completed in increasingly light and shift conditions, running our standard Gorge slalom box course (there's a pretty significant upwind leg in this one). I ran my 7.2 and a 42cm fin, looking for good angle. The first start resulted in a general recall (seems like for the first slalom heat of the season, we were all a bit jumpy).

We managed to run 3 slalom heats in the increasingly erratic breeze (it's not so much that the breeze was dying - it was more that the holes on the course got bigger and bigger). Heat 1 worked pretty well for me until I stuck my rail in the third jibe - I ended up fifth for that one. Heat 2 worked pretty well - good start, following Bruce around the course; as we struggled with a light spot for the upwind leg, we got a warning shot across the bow in the form of Stefan, who was riding formula gear and managed to squeeze into second riding right up to the upper mark (whereas Bruce and I had to foot way off into the channel to get an assist from the current). I passed him in the reaching part of the course, but he stayed on it, and the second upwind was pretty much a repeat of the first one, which got him second for the heat and me third.

The third heat got really flukey - Stefan won the heat on his formula setup (I had done the same thing to Bruce last year in similar conditions; this year, he was prepared, riding a bigger board and an 8.2 - but with the huge holes now riddling the course like Swiss Cheese, even that wasn't enough), Bruce came in second. I clawed my way back to sixth after losing a bunch of places (12th or so) when I parked myself in a hole after the third jibe (at which point I'd been in second) and got rolled by a pack of sailors who rode a puff down the course towards me. In that race, I actually ended up slogging the last leg into the finish...

I think that today was a great demonstration of the different priorities race directors have to deal with. Darren really wanted to secure good course racing and thus erred on the side of conservatism in the morning - choosing to run course rather than slalom even when it was blowing stink to ensure the event got a bunch of heats under its belt (and there's no better way to frustrate a bunch of racers than to call for slalom and have conditions deteriorate on you). Once we had three heats, and the wind was defying all expectations by continuing to build, he finally relented and changed formats - which was then rewarded by the almost instant deterioration of conditions. In a perfect world, we could set two courses and switch formats at the drop of a hat; too bad there's no such thing as a perfect world.

The 2008 Exocet Gorge Blowout

2008-07-27T20:53:00.000-07:00

View Larger Map

In her windblog, Temira called it "seventeen miles of downwind misery" and challenged her readers to "try it if your dare" - but most of the 50 or so competitors running the 26th edition of the Gorge Blowout had a great time. Winds looked pretty filled in all along the river on the drive up from Hood River, and quite a few people seemed to remember how windy last year was (more than one person was overheards saying that things looked "just like last year" with an ominous undertone...).

Dale and Bruce, who've pretty much sewed up the top two spots in the race for over a decade now (Bruce told me he has missed 3 out of the 26) split in their gear decisions, with Dale going for formula gear, and Bruce rigging (relatively large) slalom stuff. The rest of the fleet was similarly all over the map - quite few sailors on slalom or freeride stuff, a healthy formula contingent, and the intrepid Kona fleet (ranging in sail size from low 6's to Pepi's 9m). I went Formula, riding a 9.9 (Exocet Warp Formula 08 with a 9.9 Sailworks NXfw and a Finworks formula fin).

The combo was right on for me - right off the start, I was neck and neck with Dale for the first mile or so (we both chose to start at the Washingtong side, giving us the opportunity for a long deep reach to get away from most of the fleet; Bruce was a bit higher, apparently trying to roll us, but suffering from not quite enough breeze, so his angle was off quite a bit). As soon as we got into a bit more breeze, Dale (who was on a 9.1) started pulling away from me bit by bit (Bruce used to joke that off the breeze, we're all just Dale bait...). With Dale slowly but surely pulling away, Bruce (who was doing a remarkable job working his slalom gear downwind) stayed close. I knew that if I wanted to beat him, I'd have to pull away from him in the light stuff at the top of the course, so I pushed hard and led him for about the first quarter of the course until we got into a bit more breeze - and then he started catching up. From there until Viento, we basically traded jibes, depending on who caught a bit of a favorable header, or how much pressure there was (as soon as there was a puff, Bruce's slalom gear came into its own). We jibed around the mark at Viento (half-way through the course, and the start of the junior blowout) neck and neck - pretty cool after over 8 miles of racing downwind/upriver.

After Viento, conditions were a bit light for a stretch and I started pulling ahead just a wee bit; I hoped that it would stay lighter all the way through the corridor, but the pressure started building bit by bit, with the holes getting smaller and the puffs getting stronger. And sure enough, Bruce got past me in a big puff, and from then on, his advantage grew as we were getting into the almost furry conditions in the upper corridor - where I had to work it to hold on, he was able to just send it. By the time we made it to the top of Swell City (where people were sailing 4.5's at the time), it was clear that the wind was filled in all the way to the White Salmon Bridge and Bruce's lead would be unbeatable.

Dale won the race in something like 1:03; Bruce was about 2 minutes behind him (the stronger winds at the bottom allowed him to catch up a bit), and I came in 3rd (2nd Master's) a little less then 3 minutes later (I baubled my first transition of the race and actually dropped the sail on my second to last jibe in plain view of the Event Site - good way to keep the old ego in check...).

Results and pictures to follow - some standout performances, though:

Derek Nielsen came in fourth - here's a guy who's really stepped up his game over the past couple seasons.
Todd Selby, at age 17, did the full distance and finished really strong (I believe he was in 8th?), which won him the junior division for the full Blowout.
Marion, who is all of twelve years old, I believe, won the junior Blowout outright (that's right, she beat a bunch of teenage boys - I'm sure there were a few bruised egos...)
Ben, age 11, I believe, was the youngest competitor.
Shelley won the women's fleet - and placed very respectably overall.
Pepi won the Kona fleet and pulled off some very stylish looking jibes right before the finish as he was duking it out with another competitor for a photo finish.

Thanks to Exocet for supporting the event (US distributor Steve Gottlieb raced as well, placing second in the Kona fleet and showing good spirits despite having gotten stuck in the light air at the beginning on too small a sail and having to work pretty hard to get down the course). Thanks to Scotia for pulling off another flawless event, Darren for providing great race management on the water, and all the volunteers who helped out.

5 weekends back to back...

2008-07-22T08:37:00.000-07:00

This weekend marked the 2nd of five weekends of back to back racing for me - last week's Gorge Cup, this weekend it was the Harrison Blowout, next weekend it will be the Exocet Gorge Blowout (14 miles downwind/upriver from Stevenson to Hood River), the weekend after that (August 1-3) will be the Gorge Challenge, and to cap it all off there'll be Canadian Nationals in Squamish Aug 8-10. Not a bad run - hopefully conditions cooperate.

This weekends racing at Harrison Lake was really fun - Carey and Jackie Caronni have been putting on a weekend of racing every summer for a very long time now. Saturday's are scheduled for the Blowout (downwind race from the Harrison boat launch to the Bear Creek campground), with formula racing and some figure 8 fun slalom at the boat launch on Sunday. Harrison is only about 1 1/2 hours from Bellingham, so it's practically in my backyard. Still, this was the first time I've been able to go - for the past five years, there's always been some scheduling conflict for me.

Saturday's downwinder had to be canceled for the first time ever due to no wind (try that on for size - the event's been running since the late 80's, and they've finally got skunked on one of the days - who says lakes are flukey?). Sunday, however, offered up really nice conditions - super smooth water (hardly any fetch upwind), good breeze, and brilliant sunshine. The lake is amazingly clear (and nice and cool), and with the mountains all around, it's quite scenic.

We had three races on a pretty fun course - start slalom style off the boat launch, go deep downwind to a mark in the middle of the lake, round that and go way upwind to the upwind shore (where you had to figure out the tradeoff between the lift on shore vs. the slighly flukier wind), then beam reach to a mark below a few hundred yards below the start, and finish upwind. I was nicely powered on 10.8 in the first race, then switched to my 9.9 which was the right call for heats 2 and 3. I got three bullets (recovered from a really big crash right after the start on the third heat when I made a lucky call in favor of the near shore lift to lay the top mark with double tacking - sorry, Carey), Carey got three 2nds. Big shout out to Elliot, who came in third and race really well - maybe he should reconsider not taking his formula gear to the Bay Area.

After the racing, I got a chance to spend some time sailing with my kids (yep, both of them at one time - nothing like a 3-year-old whooping with glee and saying he wants to go faster...). Hope's getting quite good at handling the sail, and uphauling is no big deal for her anymore; she's looking forward to doing the Big Winds kids camp next week.

Huge thanks to Carey and Jackie - this was awesome, fun grassroots racing. They had the whole thing well organized, had gotten a huge box of very cool prizes and raffle items, and just spread the stoke all over the place. Great fun - I'll be back.

Next weekend is the Exocet Gorge Blowout (big shout out to Exocet for sponsoring this heritage event!). Check out Scotia's VMG Events site for details on that, as well as the following weekend's Gorge Challenge.

Da Kine Derby - July 14 Gorge Cup race report

2008-07-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

Originally, we'd hoped for slalom, especially since we had a two day window to run either on Saturday or Sunday. With the sudden emergence of a short heat wave on Friday, though, when the wind switched West again on Sunday, it wasn't slalom material (despite Bruce's best attempts to convince us otherwise, milking it hard on his 8.2 as Darren was setting the course). Instead, the call was for Formula, and that turned out to be the right decision, as instead of holey/flukey slalom of questionable quality, we got to do some really good course racing.

The course was short and fun - a quick upwind to the gate, round the jibe mark, back up to the gate, back down to the jibe mark, and reach for the finish (the juniors did only one lap). That made for an interesting combo - because the races were so short (only one heat in which the wind crapped out on us, took more than 8 minutes for the leaders; most were around 7), good starts were crucial. The gate added a tactical dimension - if you rounded to the right side of the course, you'd have two jibes and might overstand the jibe mark; if you rounded to the left side (and into shore), you might not make the jibe mark and end up with three jibes - and you pretty much had to make that decision as you lined up to start either port or starboard, as throwing in more than one tack would have taken you out of the race right away.

In most of the heats (especially early, when the start line was pretty long), starting on port was the ticket - you'd get into the current, flop over, then ride the smooth water on the inside all the way to the jibe mark. Later on, a shorter start line, along with a bit of Northerly slant to the breeze, mixed things up a bit. There were some great fights for position at the bottom mark as people jockeyed for the inside lane going up. Off the breeze, we had to occasionally go for close calls when going into shore and navigating around the large "dolphin" style pilings, which must have made for entertaining spectating from the Event Site bluff.

We had seven heats. Bruce dominated, winning 6 and then sitting out the last one. I had 4 seconds, one 3rd, and one 4th (horrible start on that one), and won the last one in Bruce's absence. MacRae, Jac, Derek, and Eric Sinclair all had some really good heats - it's fun to have close racing like that, with lots of little duels all over the course. I got reasonably close to Bruce a few times, but his solid tactics and consistent speed and angle left no doubt that he owned this one. It's nice to see that now that I'm tuned up on my Exocet and the Finworks fins, I'm competitive with Bruce on speed and angle (if you've ever lined up with him, that's not easily accomplished).

Speaking of gear - I'm pretty happy with my overall setup. The Sailworks sails continue to give great range, stability, and performance. My Exocet WF08 is a joy to sail with its responsiveness. And the Finworks fins are working really well - it's nice to have the confidence that you can push on the fin when you need the power, while still maintaining great speed and providing that smooth, predictable ride that allows you to push. I used a Pro all day and later let a friend test it while I provided a benchmark for him and he switched back and forth between the Pro and the fin he had raced all day; afterwards he actually accused me of sandbagging because the difference was so apparent. It took me a while to recalibrate things from last season, as I've made some pretty radical changes in my gear and haven't had enough opportunities to line up with tuning partners. At this point, I'm glad I did, as the investment seems to have been worth it.

One of the things I'm noticing is that my stance has changed quite a bit. I'm using longer and longer harness lines (roughly 26-28", as opposed to a max of about 24" last year). I've also been experimenting with a fixed (as opposed to sliding) spreader bar; while it doesn't give me that tweaked/twisted body position that I used to like for driving the board, the more squared stance seems to provide more leverage to really take advantage of the liftier and softer fins, so I spend more time flying the foils and less time tail walking. Still working on that one, but so far it seems to be a net positive, especially in slightly rougher water. Interestingly, that also seems to translate to slalom, except there I haven't really had a chance to test it against others, so it's just a matter of feel at this point.

A big shout out to Bill from Da Kine, who sponsored the event and provided not just a kick-ass BBQ dinner, but also a really nice array of raffle prizes. Thanks also to Scotia for again organizing a fun day of racing - she's a logistical power house and probably one of the nicest people you'll ever meet.

Next up for the Gorge Cup is the Exocet Blowout on the weekend of July 26/27 (date to be set based on forecast) - a fun downwinder from Stevenson to Hood River, which usually provides about 17 miles of highly variable conditions and is always good for epic stories.

I finally found the Meaning of Life

2008-07-13T07:52:00.000-07:00

and it's now in my coffee cup. You see, the blend of the day at Grounds Coffee here in Hood River (where I'm having breakfast this morning before hopefully racing this afternoon if the forecast holds) is called Meaning of Life (a robust Italian roast, according to the label). If only I'd known it was that simple ;)

Pre-race windsurfari

2008-07-12T13:31:00.000-07:00

This weekend's Gorge Cup is the Da Kine Derby (thanks to Da Kine for the support) - and to maximize our chances of running slalom, the schedule called for Blowout-like flexibility with the decision to race either Saturday or Sunday to be made based on the forecast. And that forecast looked pretty stellar by mid-week. After all the up and down and back and forth of the early Gorge season the North Pacific High seemed to finally settle into place, and iWindsurf was calling for solid Westerlies through Monday. My scheme was to get to Hood River by Friday afternoon, tune up a bit, and then be ready for what at this time looked like a Saturday morning skippers' meeting.

And then, just to drive home the point that Mother Nature doesn't work on a schedule, the forecast changed. A massive thermal low was settling in - resulting in a classic heat wave for the Gorge.

So the plan changed a bit -I got some more work done on Friday (conveniently, the little fires that erupted and needed to be taken care of didn't get in the way of time on the water...), then headed south to go sailing at Des Moines Beach Park (see map).

View Larger Map

Rick Martin was already there and rigging his 10.4. Rick keeps telling me that the place on most summer afternoons is just made for Formula, with steady breezes in the low teens, pretty friendly waterstate (no voodoo chop anywhere), and miles of water to explore. I'd have to agree - just peeling around on the 10.8 for a couple hours was a lot of fun. There was more pressure along the shorelines (both west and east), so I headed west towards the Pt. Robinson light, made may way upwind a few miles, headed back over to the east, and rode the pressure downwind along the shore making quick jibe after quick jibe. I had to stop myself from going back for more (the breeze was holding, and the views of Mt. Rainier and the surrounding coastlines sparkling in the sunshine were delightful), but with a big weekend of racing coming on, two hours seemed like enough exercise for the day.

BTW, the one thing to watch out for at Des Moines is the little shoal right off the launch north of the pier - you can sail around it, or walk out to and over it, but at high tide it would make for a great fin cruncher if you aren't aware of it. This is the venue for the Seattle City League races that are run Wednesday nights in late spring/early summer; too bad that those are usually later in the day when the breeze dies. I could see this being a fun place to race Formula.

This morning, after a good night's sleep, I got a really nice slalom session at Stevenson. I hit the water at about 7:30, among the first few people on the water. The iWindsurf sensor sits on the pier just east of Bob's Beach, and while it was well filled in out in the channel, the windline was about 100 yards off the head of the pier.
The low numbers the sensor showed until way later probably accounted for the rather low turnout; it wasn't until about 10 that there really was a bit of a crowd out there; by 11, the wind started getting a little flukey - nothing to slow you down on slalom gear, but there was a bit more slogging going on among the sailors on small freestyle gear. Excellent session, nicely powered on the 7.2 and my Warp Slalom 67 (about 105 liters).

So far, the sailing/driving ratio is already way more beneficial than for my last trip to the Gorge - time to stretch, do some work on my gear, and get ready for tomorrow; at this point, the forecast is for slalom conditions - I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Racing - the ultimate zen exercise (yeah, right)

2008-06-23T09:47:00.001-07:00

This is the wind graph for Saturday's Cog & Leaf Gorge Cup. We had a pretty decent forecast (15-21 in the afternoon), a sponsor (Sailworks - the cog part of the equation, and Roberts, hence the leaf), awesome trophies (commissioned by Bruce and created by MacRae, who is a metal working wizard and whose steel art is pretty cool), as well as arrangements for post-racing dinner (Mexican).

And a little after 3, the breeze came up. We all got on the water and checked out the course (same as last time, except the marks were more in a straight line, which would open up all kinds of tactical options downwind). Unfortunately, it died (with a vengeance) before we could even get a sequence started. As the day wore on and the wind continued to no-show, Bruce joked that the minute the first burrito was broken into that night, the breeze would come up.

Sure enough, at about 5:30 or so, with reports of no breeze anywhere within a 100-mile radius and completely flat pressure gradients, the race was called, sailors derigged and loaded their gear, Amy arrived with the food (yeah!), beers were cracked open - and the water started to show some texture. Darren and Scotia were game to run fun races as long as wind and light held out (thanks!), so a bunch of us got on the water (properly fortified with excellent Mexican food) to run fun races (since the event had been called, these couldn't count - so those excellent trophies are still waiting for a good use).

We got to run two quick heats before the wind got too streaky. On the first start, I started starboard with just a few others as most of the fleet expected the usual port favor and just wanted to get into the still-fast river current to take them upwind. I decided against that at the last second because of the northerly slant to the breeze on the Washington side and the big hole near shore (right around where you'd tack before hitting the eddy-line - the big current masked that hole, and I just sort of discovered it sailing around before the start). This worked out great, as the port starters, after clearing us, got knocked like crazy. I made it to the windward mark in first by quite a margin because of that and held on to it. With the streaky conditions, I was glad for my 10.8 and the big Finworks LT; not sure how Bruce managed to get his 9.1 around the course and get second- he must have some sort of anti-gravity device to get- that, or he really worked it, as he sat out the next one and let one of the juniors use his rig.

Second heat was different, as the breeze started filling in at the south end - so it was back to port starts. I ran the line for a bit to get away from the pack and have a nice pocket to leeward to accelerate, then came up over the line about 1/3 of the way in (Nikoka, on the RSX, was kind enough to keep the rather eager pack stacked above/behind her from spilling onto the line, so I got a clear lane). The first few Starboard starters, led by MacRae, cleared me easily, but when they tacked, the current and better breeze in the middle had already given me enough of a lift to where they were lining up with my wake. Jay got second, followed by (I believe) Mac Rae. And then it was time to finally bag it for the day.

As I talked to my 8-year-old on the phone while derigging the first time, her comment was that "it just wan't meant to be." Great perspective, I guess. I'm glad we got our little spurt of fun-racing in at the end, as that made me feel a little better about the total of 11 hours spent in the car that day. Hopefully, over the course of the season, the driving/sailing time ratio will improve a bit. Considering that the PWA guys all flew to Korea for a big slalom event and got completely skunked for a whole week with not a single result, this just goes to show that this sport will teach you some form of zen - whether you want it to or not.

Check that UJ tendon!

2008-06-14T18:04:00.000-07:00

After one of the heats at the Gorge Cup a couple weekends ago, I went to move my mastbase forward a bit. Looking down at it, with the pressure from the tackstrap and the angle of board to mast giving a fortuitous bit of visibility into the recesses of the lower base cup, I noticed that rip you see in the picture. Mind you, this was my back-up base (I tend to use a different one as a matter of preference), and I had replaced the tendon late last season as a matter of caution (I do that at least once a year). As I couldn't get my hands on one of those original (yellow) Streamlined tendons at the time, I got this one at a shop in the Gorge. Didn't worry about it too much - hey, it's urethane, not much to it, right?

I checked my main base (which I reverted to for the rest of the days' racing) - its Streamlined tendon (which had seen probably three times as much use) was still fine, with no cracks to be found even upon close inspection.

Lessons:

Not all UJ tendons are created equal - it appears that there's more to making a urethane tendon than one might assume, and that Streamlined has it figured out better than the other guys.
Check that UJ tendon - the crack was not readily apparent when inspecting the base visually; it was only when it was loaded and extended that there was enough distortion that you could actually see the crack, which was otherwise hidden by the base cup. So really get in there to see - don't just rely on it probably being ok.

Gorge Cup DQ Dip'n'Dash

2008-06-11T21:30:00.000-07:00

My first Gorge Cup for this season, the Dairy Queen Dip 'n' Dash took place May 31 at the Event Site. Derek Nielsen lined up Dairy Queen as a title sponsor for the event (way to go, Derek!), and he got to choose the course accordingly. On the left you can see what he came up with (according to Derek, that happened in the wee hours of the morning...).

It was a quick course, and I'd think the most apt description would be FW slalom - our regular upwind to mark A just off Well's Island, followed by a quick sprint around marks B, C, the start pin, and a reach to the finish - 4 jibes in all. Conditions were typical early season Gorge - pretty brisk breeze (especially up high near the windward mark - we could have easily raced slalom on 6.0's up there), and quite a few holes down low (which made any thoughts of actually switching to slalom a moot point). The current out in the channel was ripping, which together with the strong breeze and monster gusts made for really lumpy water up there (following Bruce around the windward mark in the first race was the first time ever I detected a hint of hesitation in his jibing; mind you, that was a "hint of hesitation" compared to the rest of us, who were flailing quite a bit). On the inside, there was quite a bit of back eddy, resulting in really smooth water.

Tactics were pretty straightforward - start on port, get into the current as quickly as possible, and then switch into slalom mode. At no point was I really pushing for downwind angle (even the broadest legs were not "free" in that way), so downwind tactics were what you would do in a slalom race - how to pass/cover on straights and in mark roundings (which, when traveling at mach speed on OP'd formula gear, can be extremely interesting). The rough conditions put a premium on board and sail handling and smooth transitions; the big current and shifty (both up and down and oscillating) winds made reading the layline at the top challenging.

Most racers were on 9's; I used my trusty 9.9 (since I chose not to have a 9 this season - hmm, maybe I need to reconsider that...), which resulted in serious handling challenges at the top.

Derek stepped up and performed great, being one with the course he had specified - he clinched second overall for the day behind Bruce (all bullets except race 7, which he sat out) and ahead of me by 1.3 points. I found that upwind in the smooth stuff, I was very much competitive on angle and speed, but that I hadn't nailed it in the lumpy stuff (I was losing angle on Bruce there). I also made a couple of errors on laylines - one such error ended up being rather costly - in the 7th and final heat, I thought I had the windward mark but missed it narrowly; the raging current moved me past it on the wrong side, so I had to sail a big circle around it. All that maneuvering in big overpowering gusts and large irregular chop and swell caused me to flounder badly for quite a while, losing 4 places in the process - very annoying. In hindsight, I should have been more conservative on calling my layline, or just given up on pushing for it a little earlier and just let the current take me up on the proper side of it (it's hard to beat around 5 knots of true VMG provided courtesy of the river with a couple extra tacks); but that just didn't compute in my at that point somewhat addled brain (wrestling the big sail around for seven heats had clearly taken its toll on my mental acuity).

Results at the VMG Events website - another well-organized race, a fun bbq afterwards, and a good time had by all. One thing this day made clear is why Formula sailing works so well for making sure you get a good event. Sure, at the windward mark, conditions were beyond what's reasonable for formula racing - but it wasn't dangerous, just suboptimal. And as a result, we had a full day's racing. We could have run slalom - and had a truly mediocre day's racing due to the large holes at the bottom of the course. It would have been no less challenging - but the stories told afterwards wouldn't have been epic tales of survival at sea (excuse the hyperbole) but lots of grumbling about not being able to plane through the holes at the lowest jibe mark. I'll take holding on over that any day ;)

Twisted

2008-05-28T13:41:00.000-07:00

Check out these two pictures (courtesy Emmett MacDonald) - same sail, same amount of downhaul, taken within 3 minutes of each other at the Friday Night race in San Francisco in April.

The obvious difference is that one of them is upwind, with the outhaul fairly tight, and the other is downwind, with the outhaul cracked off a bit, going deep. These two pictures tell the story as to why today's formula sails are so insanely rangey - upwind, there's good drive, w/o the leach going all soft and soggy; downwind, if you get hit with a gust or the board hits a wave and decelerates a bit, there's enough twist to prevent you from being pitched over the handlebars when the leach catches.

Earlier generations of big race sails were huge advances for their time - but there was a lot less range, and twist was a lot less refined. When I started racing in 99, the big sails could be tuned with low downhaul tension, resulting in great performance upwind but a scary ride off the breeze. Or they could be tuned with enough downhaul tension for the leech not to catch off the breeze, which resulted in great speed all around but horrible angle upwind.

Mind you, that night I was on a 9.9 when, reasonably, a 9.0 would have been much faster and more appropriate for all racers on the course except Big Ben Bamer (who later also confessed to his 10 feeling a little big at times...). With all that range, I can realistically get a away with a two-sail formula quiver. My 10.8 is powerful enough for racing in what, for West Coast standards, is stupid light air, while my 9.9 is raceable even when it starts blowing like stink. Sure, there are tradeoffs (I didn't much care for the lower upwind angle the bigger sail forces on you in survival conditions at this particular Friday night race, or in the last two heats of last year's Nationals) - but unless you race in the Bay Area a lot, it's hard to justify a 9.0 anymore, and unless you race in Florida or Europe, the same holds true for a 12. Guess it's time to buy Bruce a beer this weekend when I go down for the Gorge Cup.

Olympics - FOD?

2008-05-02T12:06:00.001-07:00

Starboard has finally officially announced their bid to be the supplier for a one design class for the 2012 Olympics. If they are successful, that would end the RS:X debacle (which was a great example of many well-intentioned actors creating a compromise so bad it's almost laughable...).

My understanding of the rules for the 2012 selection process is that it has to be a One Design class, and it has to be established by 2008. The question is whether FOD (Formula One Design) can actually establish itself as such a class - it's hard to see formula racers flocking to it, and the Olympic racers are a bit busy right now.

What I think Starboard got right:

Yes, full planing racing is more exciting, simpler, less costly, more representative of the sport, etc. - just like they claim.
Yes, the equipment exists (unlike the RS:X, which was just a bunch of proto-typed gear at the time of the selection - and the production stuff came in way heavier and with huge consistency and quality issues)
Yes, Formula is the most successful racing format around - and for good reason, as it's fun, challenging, and strikes a good compromise between those aspects and the feasibility of getting events to actually happen. Longboard racing is lacking on the former aspect; slalom is lacking on either the second or, if taken to the extremes of light-air slalom in 8 knots, the former.

What I think they got wrong:

Anyone else bothered by the assertion that with a 3-cam 11m, a 75% carbon mast, an alloy boom, and ONE standard fin, we'll have quality racing for a broad band of competitor weights in conditions spanning 6-25knots? I think it's safe to say that's over-selling the point a bit. To wit:

6 knots is highly marginal even with 12.5m rigs and super-powerful fins on today's wide-tailed boards. Even 8 knots is a bit sketchy. And since race committees tend to be somewhat liberal in interpreting minimum wind threshold requirements when there's a big event at stake. For China, given the conditions there, the 6 knot threshold will probably mean that they'll start racing as soon as the anemometer on the start boat comes up over 5 knots a couple times - and that would make for horrid formula racing (it makes for horrid racing on RS:X, too, but at least they didn't promise anyone exciting performance in that wind range, just that it would be doable).
On the other end of the spectrum, that 11 with a fin big enough to get going in under 10 knots will be a real handful in true 20 knots, and somewhere near uncontrollable for even most pros at a true 25 knots. So for a small surcharge on the equipment (a second rig and fin pale in comparison to the cost of travel and training for Olympic hopefuls), we could instead have real competition over the whole range. Seems penny-wise-pound-foolish to me.
What's up with the alloy boom? Trying to show some cost savings? Racing this gear at anything like an Olympic schedule, that boom will come up for replacement a fair bit - why not be honest and just spec carbon? Again, penny-wise...
And yes, the gear is cheaper and less complicated than the RS:X, but does anyone truly believe that the claim of useful hull lives of 4-5 seasons truly apply for Olympic hopeful-level use? Reality still blows away the RS:X on economic terms - why oversell?
Yes, there'll be less pumping than with the RS:X - but that's not saying a whole lot. Meanwhile, by enforcing one-size-fits-all and cutting off the big rigs, you can be sure that there'll be a ton of pumping if there's any racing anywhere close to the 6knots they're promising the organizers.
Oh, and then there are semantics - Formula originally referred to the notion that equipment was regulated only by numbers - Formula 3/1 meaning one board/three sails, etc. - with the intent being to strike a compromise between keeping cost reasonable while also enabling innovation and spanning a large range of conditions and sailors weights/sizes. The result is that at the last FW Worlds, the 1st and 2nd placed sailors (Antoine Albeau and Steve Allen) are almost 20kg apart in weight, yet they were racing very competitively - don't expect that if they both have to use the same size fin and sail. Formula One Design, on the other hand, is a bit of an oxymoron.

Don't get me wrong - I think this is a breath of fresh air. If windsurfing is to be Olympic, and if it has to be One Design , then something like this is the ticket. I find it ironic, though, that one of the slides refers to FW as one of the feeder classes (along with FE and Techno293) for FOD - it's more likely the top FW racers will keep racing FW (since the competition is fairer and the racing will be at a higher performance level in a broader range of conditions), but will "downgrade" to FOD for trials and Olympics-related competition.

On the whole one-design requirement, I'd have to say that it's pretty hard to swallow that one - it's not like every skier or bike racer has to be on the same equipment for fair competition. In the sailing world, one design is the accepted norm, so I guess as long as we're under their umbrella, we'll have to play by those rules (unless we somehow get the numbers and internal funding infrastructure to write our own meal ticket). Still doesn't make any sense if you ask me, though... ;)

Lunch is served

2008-05-01T20:00:00.001-07:00

For non-windsurfers, a liquid lunch is an understandably suspect proposition; for our little tribe, though, it's an art to be perfected if you're trying to live your passion while also having a career and a family. The ingredients are simple - a bit of flexibility in your schedule (it helps to be productive), gear readily accessible, a nearby body of water, and a bit of breeze is all it takes.

Unlike the other kind, this kind of liquid lunch can actually be a big energy and productivity booster - I usually have such a buzz going when I get back to working that I swear I'm functioning at a higher level.

Formula SUP...

2008-04-29T21:00:00.000-07:00

Windsurfing Mag had an article in the latest issue making the point that windsurfing "ain't pretty" - or as my wife puts it, it's the ultimate surrender sport (as in it will teach you to let go of your attachment to the illusion that you have control over things). Last night was an excellent reminder of that.

I was stoked when after a good productive day at work, I found myself with hours of light left and a good southerly breeze - perfect formula conditions. I got out on the bay on my 10.8 and instantly ran into a bunch of weeds - way more eel grass than you'd expect this time of year. After a half hour of spending more time clearing weeds off my fin than actually sailing, I found myself a clear (albeit narrow) lane and started tacking upwind - I'd almost gotten to the point where I could see this as great tacking practice (yep, we're really letting go now...) when I noticed a big squall coming up the bay fast. Two minutes later, the wind died, and another two minutes later it started pouring rain, followed by hail. And the wind? Never mind that...

At this point, I was in the middle of the bay, with NO wind (no, not light wind - no wind...). I bobbed around for a half hour or so, looking for signs of texture on the water anywhere - none. All smokestacks in sight sent their plumes straight up, and calling the different wind talkers around the area confirmed it - I was stuck smack in the middle of the convergence, with no hope of any breeze anytime soon. So I derigged my stuff and started paddling with my mast. Since the water was completely flat by now and kneeling was less comfortable, I paddled standing up; don't know if this officially counts as Stand Up Paddling, and it sure didn't feel like the 'Sport of Kings' to me, but hey, after well over an hour of this, it got me back to shore where I launched (the Coast Guard came by when I was a hundred yards out and asked if I was the windsurfer being stuck that they'd been called about - nice to know people are watching...).

Are we letting go yet? ;)

Black and fast

2008-04-23T13:40:00.000-07:00

This is my first season riding Exocet boards (thanks for getting me on the program, Pepi!), and since I've actually had a chance to ride them a for a bit now, here's my take on how they're working so far, and what I'm expecting from them this season.

My slalom board for this year will be the Warp 67, which is a known entity (the shape's carried over from last year) and proven fast. I got to ride one last summer and instantly liked it - very rangy, fast, point-and-shoot, and just the perfect size for a one-board slalom quiver. More of an unknown, however, was the Warp Formula - if you've been following the chatter on the web, there's been lots of speculation about this one. Some of that was fueled by the unconventional look (to save weight, and probably also to distinguish it from the competition, the board's bottom is not painted, resulting in that sexy black carbon look - very distinctive, for sure). I've had the chance to take mine to the Bay Area and test it a bit, mostly in stronger conditions. Here's my take so far:

It's very light - all that gram-shaving is paying off, and it's not just a matter of looks. This thing is engineered beginning to end to save weight, from the straps (every bit the equal of Starboards race straps) to the non-finished bottom and the thin shape. To ensure it doesn't blow up on a hot beach, it comes with a canvas bag - which I'll surely use at the Event Site.
It's responsive and stiff - I was a bit sketched out about the low weight. At this point, I'm convinced that it's not achieved by skimping on materials. There must be a major amount of carbon in this board, as even with its rather thin shape and in big nasty water off Crissy Field and Treasure Island, it feels every bit as stiff as the best custom boards I've ridden. That came as a huge relief to me to see that Exocet had followed through on that promise.
It handles big winds and nasty water really well - this being one of the new breed of Formula boards with super-wide tails (83cm one foot off), I was a bit concerned whether this shape would work well overpowered and in choppy water. Sailing it at Crissy Field and in the central SF Bay off Treasure Island on strong ebb currents allayed whatever misgivings I had - this thing is a pleasure to run off the breeze even in nasty voodoo chop, since it's so responsive. You can always find a smooth line and follow it with rather tiny steering inputs - very user friendly.

So how does it perform? As far as I can tell, it's competitive, but that's based on rather scant evidence so far. Lining up with the Berkeley racers (always a good benchmark, as those guys are really well tuned even this early in the season), I found that I had good angle and speed going upwind in the lower part of the bay - this covered the range of 9.9 being reasonably to fully powered, with waterstate anywhere from reasonably smooth to pretty choppy. Only when we got up to Treasure Island (and I had a hard time hanging on to my big sail while they were all able to take advantage of the better pointing from their 9.0's) did I have to foot off a bit. But even then, the extra speed I gained offset the loss of angle (not at all to be taken for granted in those gnarly conditions), and that was my first session of actually lining up with anyone.

At the Friday night race at Crissy, the board had really good speed upwind (my angle suffered from being oversailed) and was fast and deep off the breeze.

So at this point, I'm pretty stoked on the board. It seems like it's a really good fit with my Finworks fins, and it appears pretty tuneable. It definitely performs well in powered and over-powered 9.9, and the Europeans on the forums are raving about how it does in light air (something that I'm definitely willing to believe - you can just tell by feel that using a more powerful fin and bigger sail will be a good combo with this platform).

What I've found comfortable so far (but haven't been able to really test out as to whether it's truly the fastest way to go):

Base at about 135cm from tail (+/- 1, based on waterstate)
Straps 2nd hole from the back (for both fore and aft straps)
Boom about eye height (I'm 6'1"/185cm and 205#/93kg)

Crissy Friday Night Racing

2008-04-22T14:36:00.000-07:00

At the end of my week in the Bay Area, I got to do the Friday night race at the St. Francis Yacht Club. If you've never done one of these - they're something special. The St. Francis is a rather well-appointed, big-time racing yacht club, but throughout the season, they let in both kiters (who have a Thursday night series) and windsurfers. I believe one of the reasons there's so much depth in the SF Bay Area fleet is that they get to race every other week. Note that half of the top ten formula racers at the 07 Nationals were racing on Friday.

The logistics on these events are pretty smooth - show up, pay your $15 drop-in fee, race. Start/finish is run from the deck of the St. Francis around stationary marks, and they run something like 5 quick WW/LW courses (sometimes with jibes required right off the deck to entertain the RC) in about an hour. The whole thing is then capped off with being able to use the club's facilities (showers and sauna - always welcome after a cold evening on the bay) and dinner in the grill room.

It had been a while since I'd raced one of these, and it was windy - the locals were all on 9.0's (except Ben Bamer, who at 230+ used a 10). Since I don't have anything smaller than my 9.9, I had to go down a fin size to my 68 to keep any semblance of control (it got a little wild at times...). Jay, by the way, decided to run his 7.2 slalom sail on his formula board since he, too, didn't have a 9.0 - this from the guy Pepi used to call "the Manimal", so it's safe to say it was windy... Several times, I had the whole board out of the water, holding on for dear life, and I was counting my blessings at the end of the night for only bobbled one jibe and having dropped my sail once.

The combo of a too-big sail with a too-small fin had the expected effect - I was going pretty fast, but couldn't point all that well. For the Friday night races, there's a big premium on getting an inside lane on port (everyone starts on port due to the geometry of the line) due to the lift on shore; footing off for speed is costly. I managed to compound that with being less-than-brilliant in my pre-start maneuvering (there's a lot of current there, and a lot of sailors milling about, and I was trying hard not to hit anyone).

I managed to pull out a fourth overall - mostly because of really good speed upwind (enough to make up my pointing deficit), pretty reasonable tacks, decent tactics, and pretty solid downwind performance (good speed and angle, and I managed not to blow up and take aggressive lines in several jibing duels). Overall, it was great fun and good racing. Of the three guys who beat me, two had done so in last year's Nationals (Seth had been 1st and Eric 3rd), and I managed to beat Ben and Al , who had both beaten me in the Nats (they placed 5th and 7th then, respectively) - so I'm pretty happy with where I am this early in the season.

Full results at the CalCup site (I was driving back home the next day when the locals were duking it out in their first CalCup of the year). Thanks to the St. Francis for hosting, the locals for being welcoming and competitive, and those who volunteered for RC duty (which surely had nothing to do with them wanting to sit out a windy one this early in the season, right?).

Tropical @ Crissy

2008-04-16T09:45:00.001-07:00

It's shaping up to be an awesome week. I'm in the Bay Area for a professional conference and decided to take my gear down with me to take advantage of the opportunity. So far, my week has been a geek's dream come true - get up early, get some productive work done, spend all day geeking out about databases, reporting applications, development tools, etc., then duck out for a session in the late afternoon, return, stretch, get some more work done, sleep, repeat. And the temps down here are feeling downright tropical compared to home (those 5 degrees extra air and water temps make a huge difference).

Jay Salzman is down here as well. We got some great slalom sailing on Monday (way juiced up 6.0 in choppy water - very pleased with how well the relatively big Warp Slalom 67 is handling those kinds of conditions). Tuesday, it was 7.2 slalom sailing (downright blissful), and then I just couldn't help myself and had to get out my new Exocet Formula Board despite the big gusts and nasty chop. Nobody else was silly enough to run formula gear in those great slalom conditions, so I didn't get a chance to line up with anyone, which meant I could just focus on getting used to the new ride.

I'll get a more detailed review of the board together once I have some more data to go on, but first impressions are good - it handled the chop well (surprisingly well for such a wide-tailed board, actually), felt light and responsive, and was fun to sail. Once it started flooding, the baord showed that it has really great glide. Seems like a good match with my Finworks fins, too. I'm stoked.

Now back to scaling out data warehouses...

Milestones - look Ma, no booties...

2008-04-06T07:59:00.001-07:00

What a difference a week makes. Last Saturday, I spent the morning sledding with the kids in our neighborhood (at less than 100 feet above sea level). This Saturday, I spent most of the day on the bay, sailing with no need for gloves or booties. That first barefoot session each season always seems like a milestone...

Formula Board for Sale

2008-04-04T17:52:00.001-07:00

Check here for details - rocking board, at a rocking price.

Albeau kills it

2008-03-05T23:56:00.000-08:00

So he really did it: Antoine Albeau has broken Finian Maynard's record. It wasn't a huge jump - only about a half knot - but consider that the guy has just flown back in from Florida where he placed 3rd in the Calema Midwinters - in super light conditions. So he's probably still a bit jet lagged, it's only his third session ever on the canal, and he dominates (Finian, who rules the place, didn't get over 46 knots - so it's clear the conditions weren't exactly a cake walk). Hats off. Tomorrow's conditions are supposed to be good, too - perhaps there'll be more news to celebrate.

Inching closer to 50 knots

2008-03-05T13:23:00.000-08:00

Antoine Albeau set a new 500 meter record today; I guess they're still trying to figure out whether it was enough of a margin over Finian Maynard's previous performance to ratify it as a new world record. It's definitely another step closer to the 50 knot barrier. Forecast for tomorrow is apparently good as well, so follow the action at Windsurf Journal's live event ticker. Damn, that's fast...

Sweet Saturday

2008-03-02T08:10:00.000-08:00

Got up early, got some work done and still was able to get down to the bay by sunrise. Perfect formula conditions for the 9.9. Sailed up to the South tip of Eliza Island and noticed a pronounced shift in the breeze, from SSE to SSW. Uhoh..., I thought, as that can often indicate a fading breeze here due to the convergence of battling post-frontal clearing winds from the Straits of San Juan (SW) and the Straits of Georgia (NW). Started my downwinder thinking I might end up slogging back a good part of the way - to be surprised and delighted with clearing skies and the SSW filling in nice and solid. The ensuing ride back was just perfection, with solid breeze, the sun sparkling off the water, the views spectacular, and to cap it all, a bunch of porpoises doing their dance in mid-bay adding to the exhilaration. Back home by 9, in time to have breakfast with the family and then go to the gym to share a workout with my wife.

Slalom 63 - PWA madness or stroke of genius?

2008-02-20T11:06:00.000-08:00

Check out the blurbs from the PWA's top-4 slalom racers on the new "Slalom 63" rules for the pro-tour at WindsurfJournal. Fun stuff. The Cliff Notes version - currently, the pros get to register 2 boards/4 sails for each event. That will change to 3 boards/6 sails for the season.

Interestingly, this is supposed to make things simpler and more affordable for the pros - to them, it's not a matter of how much gear you have, but how much gear you have to cart around while flying from event to event (which then results in huge excess baggage charges). Apparently, the top dogs have 4 or more boards and a full quiver of slalom rigs (sizes from as small as 5.0 for Pozo to around 10m for the light-air events like Korea - in .5 to 1m increments). While they only register 2 boards and 4 sails, most of them still bring everything everywhere, as the events are often close together (especially if they also compete in waves as well). And schlepping all that stuff gets expensive. Plus it makes it harder for new sailors to be competitive on the tour, as they have to stack up against those whole quivers. Sounds reasonable, right?

I find the range of opinions pretty enlightening. A2 gets off a good one-liner on weather forecasts - I assume he's trying to tell us he doesn't like the new scheme too much (nor the current one); of course, given that he dominates the discipline, his pithy comment on the restrictions providing a convenient excuse for bad results wouldn't really apply to him (he tends to not need excuses, and he seems not to hide behind conditions or gear when things uncharacteristically don't go his way - something to be emulated, I'd say...).

KP seems to think that as long as the rules are clear, it doesn't really matter which way it goes - cream will rise to the top and the outcomes will be pretty much the same. Valid point, I'd say. Micah thinks it makes sense b/c it's dictated by the market, although he'd prefer unlimited competition (presumably also taking away the restriction against non-production gear); given that this is the highest level of competition, I can see his point.

Bjorn Dunkerbeck is concerned about whether this will truly showcase the sport. To him, restricting equipment choice means that people will have to hedge risk - which will result in erring on the side of big. And apparently, he thinks that slalom racing on gear that's just a bit too big for the conditions is not sufficiently attractive.

And that's where the disconnect between what the PWA is doing vs. the reality of amateur/grassroots racing becomes really clear. Most amateurs have one slalom board, and probably at most two sails for each of those (that, by the way, was the original 4/2 formula...). That covers racing conditions for just about anything pretty well - not perfectly (as would be what AA and BD are after), but well enough to keep it exciting for the racers. But that's us amateurs - the pros can't live off putting on races that are satisfying to them; they need to create the most attractive spectacle possible to create value for sponsors and have media-friendly content to sell.

PWA (or, in its previous incarnation, PBA) racing went down the road of all-out competition with no limits before. In the halcyon days of the late 80's/early 90's, pros carted around giant stacks of equipment and made real money. An interesting thing happened - as the base of the sport evaporated after the boom faded away, the numbers didn't add up, and manufacturers no longer saw economic sense in supporting the pro-circuit (plus outside sponsors no longer thought of windsurfers as a demographic to reach, which made the pro tour a less desirable marketing conduit).

The current PWA tour is the result of a remarkable rebuilding process. There is a full calendar again, the racing is attractive, and the marketing seems pretty right on. This is still small change compared to most pro sports, but for a fringe sport w/o a huge halo effect (windsurfing is apparently no longer considered the cool, sexy new cutting edge sport), this is pretty good. PWA is forging ahead - good for them; but now the question is are they pushing too hard and making this whole thing unsustainable?

To wit - I'm a fairly committed amateur. I've been fortunate to get some support for pursuing my passion. Nevertheless, my racing quiver at this point consists of 2 boards (one formula, one slalom), and four sails (two formula, two slalom). Sure, I race on the West Coast - so I don't have to deal with 6-9 knot marginal conditions (so I can get away without the 12m), and I'm pretty big and reasonably fit (so I can hold down my big slalom board and 6.0 in most any conditions in which we'd consider racing). My quiver is probably a bit above par for the amateur fleet - so hearing pros whining about having to make do with suboptimal gear choices because they have to stick with the (rather open) restrictions on the PWA tour doesn't really bear a lot of resemblance to my reality.

Is that relevant in any way? Don't know - after all, in most sports, pros and amateurs are on completely different planes (both in terms of resources and performance). If I were making decisions for the PWA, I'd at least consider this point, though.

If the pro-circuit is too removed from the reality of the amateurs, it's losing some of the aspirational appeal and charm. So if you care about what windsurfers think (i.e., if you're marketing the pro-tour at least partially to the windsurfing public, either to create halo effect for products and thus drive industry sales revenue, or to have windsurfers buy PWA "stuff" such as dvd's and provide traffic for content that may at some point create ad revenue), keeping it somewhat 'real' might be important.

If, on the other hand, the goal is mainly to create the most spectacular content to plug into the bigger extreme sports consumer market (where the content is consumed by people who don't really engage in the activity itself, and where the revenue is mostly derived from advertising unrelated products to those consumers, or through some coolness factor), then perhaps keeping it real would be a mistake (as in the race for eyeballs, 'real' will lose out against outrageous every time).

For windsurfing, there's probaby something in between. PWA tried Super-X, and that died on the vine - so apparently pure spectacle didn't work (hey, it's hard to compete with made-for-TV spectacle where people engage in "extreme sports" stunts purely to generate outrageous footage with little apparent risk aversion). Before that, PWA tried Formula (which was driven by what was happening at the grassroots), and while they got lots of "good" (i.e., tactical, skill-driven) racing, it was a non-starter on the marketing front.

Jimmy Diaz, who runs PWA now, has a business degree. He clearly understands the trade-offs involved, and the incremental tweaking of the rules of the game are part of a process to figure out an optimization problem. The competitors seem to mostly get it as well. So far, this journey has been remarkably successful (as in having brought pro windsurf competition back from the grave). As they're pushing the boundaries, I'm wishing the pros well - it sure would be nice to see that what I consider the coolest sport ever can be successful at the pro level.

Flying the foils

2008-02-14T14:12:00.001-08:00

Last week, I had this rather nice and unremarkable session on Bellingham Bay. I started out with 10.8 and a "big" Finworks 70cm (more on the rather excellent Finworks foils in a future post soon), having plenty of power to plane and push it up or downwind at significant angles in all of 8-10 knots. Then the breeze started increasing to 12-15, and I changed fins down to a "smaller" 70cm. Worked like a charm.

My friend Dale McKinnon came out for a row and brought her camera (she was the the one to take the picture - thanks Dale!) - which was instantly rewarded with the until-then sunny conditions turning misty and dark. At this point, it was gusting into the low twenties, and I was seriously overpowered (the pic above was shot from behind the protection of a dock; the waterstate outside in the Bay no longer permitted sailing in any kind of control, and she would not have been able to take the hands off the oars for even a minute to pick up her camera out there).

I like this shot - it shows you just how efficient Formula gear can be in terms of reducing wetted surface (and drag).

Mirrors

2008-02-01T09:27:00.000-08:00

Took a quick 'liquid lunch' on the bay yesterday. Lately, we've been in the deep freeze, so temps in the high-30's (or about 3 or 4 Celsius) combined with 15 knots (so you can sail formula and stay mostly dry) are nothing to be sneezed at. I had a great time, and the little hail/sleet squall in the middle added comic relief to the whole thing. As I came back to shore, I noticed bright flashes coming from the picnic shelter; turns out there was a guy there taking pictures with a little point-and-shoot. Says the guy, as I come up the beach: "Dude, I figured I had to take a picture or no one will believe me that some crazy bastard was on the water in this stuff." Hmmm...

Crazy fast

2008-01-30T08:40:00.000-08:00

Looks like the kiters have done it - that's Tillman Heinig running well over 50 knots over 500m according to his GPS (so no, it's not a WSSRC-sanctioned record). There's some discussion in the community, with Finian Maynard pointing out that the run was over a curved course, and that the projected 500m speed was a little below 50 knots - oh well. Even so, I'm still very impressed by this; as somebody points out in that thread, when you have a running race, you don't account for turns, you only care about time over distance run, and in this case, 500m were covered at over 50 knots.

But check out that video a bit more closely - Tillman is going at warp speed in just a few inches of water, right next to shore; that takes some major balls. Good on him for making it happen for himself. I wish it had been a windsurfer, but hey, whether it's a kiter or a foiling tri or a windsurfer, I'm still stoked about it.

The next chance to officially break the all-out record and get over 50 knots, however, presents itself to a bunch of windsurfers: Driven by Wind, Dave White's even in South England, is looking at a spectacular forecast for tomorrow, Thursday. If that materializes, and if all the stars line up right, there's a pretty good chance one or more of those sailors will bag 50+ over 500 (on a straight course, with WSSRC observers and sanctioned video timing). Good luck, guys!

The view from home

2008-01-25T09:26:00.001-08:00

...or, more precisely, the view from Tony's porch, two houses down from mine. Tony took this a few weeks ago; this was my second session back on the water after recovering from my shoulder injury. I was out on my 7.2 Sailworks NXfw and my new Exocet Warp Slalom 67, and the combo worked exceedingly well even in the somewhat gusty and streaky conditions found on the lake (the board glides well through lulls and stays controllable even in the big gusts, and the sail is just so insanely rangey that it's truly a joy).

And that pretty much answers the obvious (at least to all my non-sailing friends and neighbors) question as to why I don't sail the lake more often. It's rare for winds to be anything other than really flukey due to the terrain all around. The hills don't outright block the wind (we get tremendous southeasterlies shaking the house all the time in the winter), but they do make it very inconsistent.

That said, sailing the lake does have its charms. The views are nice, safety is a non-issue, it takes me all of a minute to get to the launch at Bloedel Donovan Park, and my kids get extremely excited seeing Dad on the water from their own deck. On this particular day, the wind was SE, but too easterly to sail the bay, plus I only had a short window of opportunity - so instead of waiting for things to fill in from the south and squander my chance to sail, I had a pretty nice session and got back to working. Not a bad life ;)

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Winter

2008-01-22T11:57:00.000-08:00

The past few days, you could be excused for not remembering that this was the Pacific Northwest. It's been clear and cold. Sunday saw great NE winds coming down through the Fraser River valley (see graph to the right). I was flying solo with the kids, and the wind readings along with the brilliant sunshine had me thinking about finding a babysitter for a couple of hours. Taking the kids down to the Bay to play on the beach, I was struck by just how incredibly clear and beautiful it was (the Canadian Cascades looked like you could just reach out and touch them, and the abundant sunshine was creating the most amazing low-altitude rainbow in the spray that got blown off the chop). Perfect slalom conditions - except the temperature was right at the freezing mark, and with the wind chill, my desire to sail diminished rather quickly.

On Monday, we took advantage of the weather and the recent abundant snowfall on Mt. Baker coinciding with the holiday to do a family ski-day. It was a bit like Colorado without the lift lines (or the attitudes, for that matter). Gorgeous views, super-fluffy snow (and lots of it), and a good time being had by all. Fear not, however - nasty weather (and with it reasonable temperatures along with good winds) are back in the forecast for later this week.

Glimpse the future of windsurfing competition

2008-01-16T08:06:00.000-08:00

Dave White's Driven by Wind event is on in England. Big names, putting up big speeds in (so far) conditions that are well below what's to be expected from this place. Remember, this is where Martin van Meurs already broke 50 knots for short bursts (on a suboptimal day), so there's huge potential here.

I've been stoked about what these guys are doing for competition; while I'm of a racer than a speedsailor, it's exciting to me how events like this, and the awesome success of the gps grassroots racing movement, have revived interest in going fast despite the industry and press drumbeat over the past decade or so (you know all that drivel about anything to do with competition or going fast being uncool and devoid of 'soul'... - different issue, though.)

What gets me really excited about this one, though, is not so much that there's a record attempt at a great venue, with official WSSRC observation (and thus the potential for a new all-out record and an official 500m run over 50 knots). Don't get me wrong, that's really cool, and it adds yet another opportunity to what's happening at the canal in France.

No, the really sweet thing about all this is that Dave has gone out and done what I've been dreaming about for years - he's put a real-time display on the web. Virtual spectator-type technology has been available for a while now; it's made America's Cup coverage interesting to the average person (that is anyone not immersed in sailboat racing) by showing clearly what's happening on a course. In this particular case the appeal is more about immediacy (after all, we don't really care which of these guys is where on the course, we just want to know how fast they're going). But the fact that this event, without million-dollar budgets, has been able to put this together is (besides being a huge credit to Dave and his buddies) proof that the technology has come down to a price-point that makes it feasible for mainstream use.

Imagine real-time gps tracks, along with real-time footage from helmet/boom cams, all packaged together with footage from start/chase boat cams. We've talked about it for years; we're finally at the point where it should be feasible to put it together for real events, then use it (a) to present to crowds on the beach (think big events in Europe where people actually show up to watch even if they're not married to any of the competitors) and (b) to put together a package for channels like OLN or Discovery or ESPN. Can you imagine what that would do to make it clear to people just how exciting racing sailboards (even course racing, which is notoriously hard to follow for spectators) can be? Remember - this kind of presentation made the America's Cup exciting to watch - and those guys go what, 8 knots?

Good times!

Identity

2008-01-14T13:37:00.000-08:00

i·den·ti·ty (-dnt-t)n. pl. i·den·ti·ties

1.  The collective aspect of the set of characteristics by which a thing is definitively recognizable or known[...]

2.  The set of behavioral or personal characteristics by which an individual is recognizable as a member of a group.

[...]
Source: TheFreeDictionary

What are some of the things that come to mind when people ask you what you are? Not who, but what? What's your identity? For most of us, it's more than one thing - sure, we're all human beings. Then there are the roles we play (father, son, professional, etc.). And for many of us, windsurfer is a big part of that. It is for me - windsurfing being my passion, being a windsurfer is definitely a piece of that package that's my identity.

So when I was off the water for about 2 1/2 months with a bum shoulder, did that make me less of a windsurfer? Yes - I wasn't constantly behaving like a windsurfer (such as frantically checking the wind, keeping an eye on the forecast, trying to carve out time for a session, working on gear). Except when I still was (such as obsessing about gear choices for next season, reading windsurfing sites on the net, training in the gym to prepare for next racing season, driving by the bay on windy days to at least get a visual). So then it's really a No?

Funny thing, this windsurfing thing - once it's got you hooked, it's not like you're just dropping out while you're not doing it. There's something more to being a windsurfer than going windsurfing. I'm sure the same is true of other passionate pursuits, and it's what makes them different from pastimes and hobbies. The former are an outlet for something deep inside you - your personality, your character, your hopes, your self. If you're a passionate windsurfer, then that at least partially defines you, gives you an identity (or allows you to express you identity, more like it...). Whether you race, or live to sail waves, or spend hours working on your freestyle moves, you probably get what I'm saying. If, however, you think I'm completely off my rocker, then you're probably seeing windsurfing as a hobby or a pastime (or, also possible, you're right and I really am off my rocker...).

My injury was not severe. Within a week I knew that I wouldn't need surgery, and that complete recovery was virtually assured if only I put in the time, discipline, and work to heal up. Still, it made me think about what I'd do if I couldn't windsurf. I don't have an answer to that. I do know, however, that I'd need (and be able) to find another outlet for that passion. I don't know what I could find that would scratch that same itch, or even if that would be necessary - perhaps I could be just as happy and immersed in something not involving speed and water. I didn't have to really go there - knowing that I'd be back, the person at the gym working on his rehab was a windsurfer getting back on the water. I had the luxury of not having to solve the identity puzzle.

In the last couple years, I've found that what creates identity in the sense of the second definition above (the group membership piece) is more about the passion than the actual outlet. I'm a windsurfer, but as a competitor I feel kinship with those who are competitive in all kinds of other things as well, whether they're triathletes or rowers or kayakers or soccer players - as long as they are truly into their thing so you can see them light up when they talk about it, I feel like we're members of the same tribe. Same goes for others who may not have a competitive bone in their body, but who are passionate members of the water tribe - surfers, swimmers, sailors, rowers, and with a bit of a phase change skiers and snowboarders.

Nonetheless, after a few good sessions (and no adverse effect on my shoulder), I somehow feel more settled. Sure - I'd be OK if I couldn't windsurf again; my identity is more rooted in the passion than in the activity itself. And surely, there'd be tremendous potential for personal growth in the challenge of finding something else that lights me up the same way. But there's a reason I've chosen that outlet (or is it more a matter of it having chosen me?), and for now, I'm damn glad that it's still in my life.

Sail on!

The joy of a crappy session

2007-12-29T21:25:00.000-08:00

I'm back. After 2 1/2 months off the water to heal my shoulder, I had my first session today. By any reasonable standard, it was just south of marginal - very flukey, gusty winds; temps hovering just above freezing (it started sleeting at the end), another failed glove experiment resulting in painfully frozen fingers, and the the wind started picking up with a vengeance and going completely offshore - so I was way overpowered on my formula gear on the outside, then struggling to make it back in through the big hole near shore. And the whole time, I had a big fat *$&#-eating grin on my face...

There's something about the sensation of windsurfing, skimming across the water, fast and weightless and effortless. It's been a long road; it's taken a lot of discipline to heal, train around the damage, stabilize the shoulder, and not give in too early and re-injure things. My PT told me that I had healed better and faster than I had any right to expect; he then grinned and added that being a little compulsive can come in handy sometimes...

It's good to be back. And if someone has any killer tips on gloves/mittens that actually work w/o cramping up your forearms or making it impossible to get a good grip on the boom, let me know.

Fast...

2007-12-15T17:07:00.000-08:00

Dave White, previous holder of the production speed record (he just lost that to Patrik Diethelm), is setting up a speed event in South England - Driven By Wind uses a sheltered stretch of water behind a sandbar. He'll set up timing equipment. This creates some nice competition for the Masters of Speed on the ditch in Southern France (which gave us Finian's current outright record of 48..7 knots), and Martin van Meurs has already demonstrated the potential of the place by breaking 50 knots on the GPS over 100 meters. Finian is getting a worthy adversary to play with, as Antoine Albeau has already shown he can be fast on the ditch even in suboptimal conditions by posting 46.55 knots on his first day there (see news item for November 21 as the Masters of Speed site).

Meanwhile, the kiters are getting closer and closer to 50 knots (hey, they can run in three inches of water - that sure makes for smooth conditions...), and the big-budget contingent is hard at work as well. Hydroptere already has the nautical mile record and had just been reconfigured to break 50 knots over the required 500m distance. Macquarie Innovation looks downright low-budget compared to that (until, of course, you remember that their budget is still probably an order of magnitude higher than even Finian's).

While Driven by Wind and Masters of Speed use WSSRC-certified video timing, there's a whole community of windsurfers using GPS to challenge themselves and their mates all over the world, posting their tracks and speeds on http://www.gps-speedsurfing.com/. And on the Maui Sails forum, there's some interesting discussion on the democratizing effect GPS has on speed, as well as what a nice competitive outlet it is for sailors all over the world. It's not ready for "official" records yet - there are some remaining precisions issues, and the GPS community operates on the honor system, with some rudimentary QA done on the data by the site administrators. But it's just a matter of time until someone builds a device that enables cheat-proof, high-precision tracks good enough to satisfy those outside the community, and lead to ratification by the WSSRC.

This winter sure seems like a good bet for breaking 50 knots - whether it be a windsurfer (most likely in my book), a boat, or a kiter. Long term, windsurfers are running into diminishing returns on speed gains - we'll probably have to come up with some innovations to defend the record against kites and boats, which seem to be on a steeper part of the learning curve. Ultimately, it's all good, though. Bragging rights vis-as-vis the kiters and sit-down-sailors are fun, but as long as people are inspired to go out and push themselves a little bit, it's all good.

The advent of GPS speedsailing, coming along at a time when there was finally a real push for records again, is creating energy that simply wasn't possible the first time speed was big. Sure, I remember the early days of speed, when windsurfers became the fastest sailing craft. Check Barry Spanier's account of those days to go down memory lane (or to marvel at it all if you weren't around the sport back then). And when 40 knots was broken, it was huge. But it wasn't as if people were going out and lining up on speed strips - the timing equipment was expensive, and it was impossible to cost-effectively run speed trials for the masses (the closest anyone ever came were probably the Gorge guys around Ken Winner's timing equipment and the 100m speed run on the Klickitat - Bruce has some great pictures of those runs on the wall in theSailworks loft).

Today, people are going nuts over GPS - and it's not just the dedicated speedsters. Anyone can go out on their slalom or freeride stuff and see how fast they can go. It's natural to want to see, and for anyone who's a bit competitive, it's a fun thing to do when there's nobody else around to compete with.

So strap on your GPS, point it deep, and send it - it's fun, and just like racing, it just might make your a better sailor in the process by giving you a reason to push yourself a bit. Plus whenever people see you come in from a session, they always ask the same question - "How fast can you go on that thing?" Showing them a GPS readout makes for a great conversation piece.

FW Worlds - lessons from Antoine's Domination

2007-12-03T10:14:00.000-08:00

The FW Worlds just concluded in Brazil, and the results speak for themselves. I think it's fair to say that Antoine Albeau pretty much dominated the event. If you look through the reports linked from the Formula Windsurfing website, and you watch some of the videos available through those links, or read some of Dennis Littel's or Steve Bodner's commentary, you'll again and again find comments to the extent that Antoine was just flying - comments made even by people like Gonzalo and Wojtek.

So what happened here? I think the short version is that Antoine is just a force. I raced the 2003 Midwinters in Florida, where he was using a crappy board (an outdated AHD design) in super light air (I was barely powered most of the time on my 12.5, and he was probably at least 20 pounds heavier than me at the time). He won that event, in front of people like Kevin Pritchard and Wojtek B. (who, if I remember correctly, was the reigning world champ at the time). He's been doing great in formula racing even in light air events like the 2006 Europeans and 2006 Worlds - both events extremely sketchy windwise, putting a heavy sailor at a severe disadvantage.

So Brazil served up some conditions you'd consider to be more to his liking - but it wasn't San Francisco style survival FW sailing. If you read Steve Bodner's reports, he rarely got into powered up 9.9 territory. Antoine was still using the 12.5 for most of the regatta. And he just took off on the fleet. He threw out a third, and his next throwout would have been a second. If he hadn't raced at all the last day, he still would have won - yet he came out and competed fiercely that day.

Prior to the Worlds, Windsurf Journal had an article that mentioned they witnessed Antoine testing a stack of something like 30 Deboichet formula fins in preparation for the event (not archived, it seems, so I can't provide a direct link). Is that's what's going on? Did the guy just out-fin everyone? Doubtful - for sure, he probably was the most tuned up, and he probably had some very fast fins that no one else had (that's the perk when you do fin development with the maker). But the top 10 were all on Deboichet or Kashy custom fins, most of which are truly custom and would be hard to come by for any of us (consistency and reproducibility of wet lay up-molded fins is a whole other topic, and one of the reasons I'm so stoked about working with Dave Lassila of Finworks...).

And sure, as the lead racer guy for NP, his NP's were probably more tweaked than anyone else's - but again, none of the top guys would have a hard time getting support from their sailmakers to get their sails to be exactly what they want them to be. That's certainly true of Steve Allen (a former world champ himself, and leading the pack charging after Antoine in this championship).

So some long-distance analysis can't really get stuck on gear - that's part of it, but it's a tuning thing more than the availability of magic silver bullets. And it can't get stuck on his size - as it wasn't THAT windy (Wilhelm Schurman, winner of the lightweight division, can be seen in some pics and videos using an 11.8 on one of the days - a day when Antoine got three bullets). And then you look at the fact that the guy fully dominated PWA slalom racing this year. And you have to take note that, on his first day ever on the Masters' of Speed canal in Southern France, he went over 46 knots in suboptimal conditions - and then goes on to say in the interview that he likes the speed 'racing' format better b/c it's more intense - I think we're starting to understand what's happening here.

Antoine has a lot of stuff going for him (or is making a lot of stuff happening for himself, more likely...). He's clearly incredibly talented. He's physically strong. He's well prepared and tuned. He's got a ton of experience. And, as can be seen from that comment about intensity after the speed thing (as if going 46+ knots wasn't intense in and of itself...), he's very much a competitor at heart (hey, the guy didn't sit out heats or events he didn't need to sail to keep his overall wins - why risk injury or equipment damage unless you're in it to compete, rather than "just" to win?).

But there's something else here - most competitors play to their strengths and minimize their weaknesses. Few seem to be able to convert weaknesses to strengths. There's nothing more logical than for a big sailor like Antoine to always sail larger gear than his opponents - reduce your weakness (that whole light air/heavy sailor physics handicap), and maximize your strength (take advantage of your ability to control big stuff when the breeze picks up). And most of them do it. But it seems like he's managed to do it to an extent that's truly astonishing - check out the gear registration for the event. This place is known to be windy. Like Albeau, Wojtek registered a 12.5. Unlike Albeau, he then went to 10.7 and 9.0 from there. Albeau went to 11.8 and registered 10.7 as his smallest sail.

That was more pronounced in the 2007 PWA slalom events (unfortunately, they don't seem to archive the gear registration pages for those events, so I'm going from memory here) - throughout the season, Albeau would register bigger sails and boards than both Dunkerbeck and Micah Buzianis in pretty much each and every event. Both of those guys are first rate slalom contenders, and the same size as Antoine. Yet they consistently chose smaller gear - probably to "insure" against epic conditions that would enable them to get on smaller gear when things picked up, and then use their size and leverage for out-of-this-world straight line speed. That used to clearly be Dunkerbeck's game plan (and if memory serves, he dominated the World Cup that way for a long time). Antoine has found a way to tweak control over his big gear when it gets gnarly to where he doesn't have a speed disadvantage, while also having ample power in the holes - and he dominates with it.

What's all that got to do with the average sailor, you ask? Nothing really - after all, these are racers, and we all know that racers are a different breed, right? Except, how many people do you see in your spot who always seem to be rigged for their strengths? If you look at big sailors vs. small sailors, you often find that the smaller guys are on relatively big gear, while the big guys are on relatively small gear - meaning the gear-size-gap between people of different size isn't nearly as big as you'd expect (and is it would need to be to equalize planing and control thresholds).

It's almost as if the big guys are so ecstatic when things go ballistic and they're the only ones able to hang on, they live for those moments and generally discount the misery that comes from too-small gear during the rest of their sessions. Conversely, you've got all those light sailors who are always the first to plane, and who seem to be using relatively large gear - as though they're so hooked to planing by a bunch of people slogging that they couldn't care less about getting blown off the water when it picks up.

In many ways, that kind of behavior is pretty natural - we all have our identity, and whatever confirms us in that seems to be accepted. If you're a big guy and you get blown off the water because you rig big, maybe it's not that conducive to your self image. Maybe a little guy can't stand the thought of some heavy sailor planing just as early. So you go out and play to your strength, and just completely write off the other side of the spectrum - after all, a negative outcome on that end is easily explained and involves no loss of self-esteem ("sure, I was bobbing while everyone else was planing, but hey, they're all pencil-necks...").

I've succumbed to this, as well. Check out this race report I did after the US Nationals long-distance day. You'll note that I seem to just accept the fact that I was under-powered, anticipating big breeze at the bottom of the course. Well, the other guys (especially the lighter ones) clearly were more appropriately rigged. But for a big guy, saying "I was under-powered" is pretty painless (hey, it's the wind after all). Admitting that I chickened out on rigging big (a risk a bunch of lighter competitors who were on the same size gear as me were willing to take) apparently didn't come to mind.

If that all seems like a bunch of psycho-babble, think again. Game theory has confirmed people's tendency to err towards things that confirm their bias, even if "objectively" they are creating suboptimal outcomes for themselves. Antoine seems to have broken through that - he's apparently confident that he won't get blown off the water even with bigger gear unless the whole fleet suffers the same fate. And in return, he's denying the lighter guys their light-air advantage.

So put that on the to-do list for maximizing your racing outcomes (or just having more fun on the water) - along with skill, determination, training, tuning, ....

Veteran's Day Storm

2007-11-12T13:24:00.001-08:00

The pic on the right (courtesy Dale McKinnon) shows what she saw from shore at Post Pt. today. Yes, that frothing mess of water is Bellingham Bay, a generally calm and peaceful part of the Northwest inland waters. Wind readings were off the charts at iWindsurf today (literally, as their new dynamic graphs top out somewhere around 50 mph). Airport recorded gusts around 60 knots; BCS showed peaks in the mid-70's mph range.

The pic was taken from shore at Marine Park - so her camera's vantage point was about 8 feet above water level. Clearly, the swell was well over head high. Mike Sumpter reported huge (100' high) spin drifts earlier in the day. Most of the guys apparently went to Cherry Point for some saner conditions. Not sure who that lone sailor is; might be Brett, taking his Bonzer for a ride.

It's been really windy the last two days or so. Yesterday and the day before, there was quite a bit of sunshine thrown into the mix as well. Oh well, back to taking care of that shoulder...

Rehab

2007-11-03T18:56:00.000-07:00

re·ha·bil·i·tate (rh-bl-tt)

tr.v. re·ha·bil·i·tat·ed, re·ha·bil·i·tat·ing, re·ha·bil·i·tates

1. To restore to good health or useful life, as through therapy and education.

2. To restore to good condition, operation, or capacity.

3. To reinstate the good name of.

4. To restore the former rank, privileges, or rights of.
(Source: freedictionary.com)

It's been four weeks now since I wrenched my shoulder. Luckily, since it's all just sprains, contusion, and a partial tear, the worst is pretty much over. A PT friend of mine from Berkeley likens inflammation to an angry bear - you just don't want to poke it in the eye, at least until it's all well-fed and calmed down (and that's probably where that little analogy breaks down - I have a really hard time seeing why you'd ever want to poke a bear in the eye, even once that's not-angry...).

My shoulder is now at that happy non-angry-bear state, and according to my PT here it's time to start poking it a bit with stabilization exercises while resting all the stuff that's not quite ready and giving it lots of icing/heat to get the blood flowing. Funny thing about my PT - he sized me up after talking to me during the exam, then told me that how quickly I'd heal would be entirely up to discipline or, as he put it, whether I can avoid being stupid. Now that there's not constant pain as a reminder, I'm starting to see what he's talking about.

And that's the program for the next three weeks or so - don't be stupid, ice/heat, and stabilize the shoulder while working around it to keep the rest of my body in shape.

Today, after a bunch of rain and ugly weather, there was sunshine, 55 degree air temps, and a nice 12-15 knot breeze on the bay. Since I'm a few weeks away from being ready to grab my gear and heading down to the water, I headed to the gym. Good motivation for sure.

Temporarily sidelined

2007-10-16T09:12:00.000-07:00

At the end of last Sunday's session, I had the windsurfing equivalent of a lift line injury in skiing (you know those stories - skied steep and deep for hours, then caught an edge in the lift line and got hurt). After 2+ hours of sailing, I decided it was time to go back in. Sailing along, I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention, hit a piece of kelp or something, and went over the handle bars. If I'd gone faster, I probably would have gotten thrown clear of my gear; as it was, my left shoulder smacked the mast while my arm was getting wrenched back. So it's a bit of a double-whammy - not only did I get hurt, I didn't even get an epic story out of it.

The whole thing was pretty painful, so it took me a while to waterstart and sail back. By the time I'd made it to shore, my left arm was pretty useless, so I ended up having to carry my board and rig up separately. It took two guys helping me to get out of my wetsuit. Tons of ice and ibuprofen seemed to calm things down, so I figured I'd sprained something, since the xray came back normal. Over the course of a week, while the internal swelling and inflammation has gone down a fair bit, there's still some distinctive pain and loss of range of motion. So yesterday I got an MRI; this should make it pretty clear whether I'm dealing with soft tissue sprains, or whether anything is torn and will require more than just another week of rest and a few weeks of PT/rehab.

Kind of weird how off-balance you are trying to protect one of your shoulders. Working out requires some serious creativity, as does daily activity. And it's still kind of hard to explain to my 2-year-old that dad can't wrestle with him for a while. I guess I jinxed myself when the Friday before, in a conversation with someone at the gym, I mentioned how favorable the risk/reward ratio is in this sport, and how I'd not gotten anything other than one minor case of whiplash in 28 years. Should have kept my mouth shut...

Windy...

2007-10-08T11:56:00.001-07:00

A good weekend for us Bellinghamsters. Temps in the mid-50's, a rocking southerly (the graph shows what happened at the north end of the bay, which doesn't get the benefit of the venturi generated by the SE pushing by the Chuckanuts), very low tide (meaning you could walk out to the windline, so no need for the usual swim/slog), and all that conveniently timed for a Sunday morning. It just doesn't get much better than that.

While participants in the first ever Bellingham Marathon were probably cursing the breeze, there was a contingent of 8-10 sailors off Post Pt., enjoying the playground Mother Nature provided with solid winds and big rolling (and, at times and in some places, surprisingly smooth) swell.

After years of rationalizing repeated beatings (here and here are some accounts of the not-so-painful ones; there were others which I simply refused to document...) received on slalom gear in these conditions, I finally took the hint and got myself a small freeride board. At 80 liters, it's a bit smaller than I would have wanted (slogging is still painful), but the price was right. The single rear strap, curvy wave fin, inset/forward strap positions, and detuned rails made for a very different sailing sensation. Just sailing along, it's pretty much effortless; you're just not going very fast. You can ride swells, and getting air is a lot less scary than on slalom kit.

The sailing style is the big difference. On fast gear, safety lies in holding the hammer down. If you back off, or god forbid sheet out, you start tailwalking and end up in a yardsale. Of course, that strategy is limited by waterstate, as the resulting warp speed will at some point lead you up and off a stray piece of chop - and the crater resulting from that tends to be pretty spectacular. The freeride stuff, on the other hand, allows you to back off when things get out of hand. The wipeouts come when you do try to push it - and find that the fin just can't handle it, so you're spinning out as your going at Mach speed through a trough. Different kind of sailing, for sure. Hopefully, we'll have lots of winter storms this season to help me get reacquainted with that ;)

The kiters at the north end of the bay were apparently passing the single 3m kite around the group to share. Of course, most of their usual crowd were down at Post Pt. windsurfing on 3.7's to 4.7's. I was on a 5.0 Retro, which was perfect at the beginning, and kept handling the building winds really well with a bit more downhaul.

As the front came closer, the clouds moved in and it started to rain - hard. That was right around the time most of the marathoners were gritting their teeth through the last miles of the race. Kudos to them for sticking it out; I certainly preferred being on the water in that weather.

In the paper...

2007-09-28T12:34:00.000-07:00

I got two articles in the local media - one in the Bellingham Herald (online version here), and one in the Whatcom Independent (it's page 10 of 19 in the pdf archived online). The Whatcom Indy put it on their center page spread, with a teaser reference on their front page. In the Bellingham Herald, it took up the better part of the front page of the lifestyle section, with a small picture and teaser on the front page.

I've gotten great response from these; there were several email from folks who used to windsurf, and asked about how to get back into the sport. Some others asked about where to learn, and how hard it would be, and wanting to find out about getting their kids into it. And then there've been people talking to me about it at the gym, at my daughter's school, and even at work (although, as someone pointed out, I shot myself in the foot with that one since now everyone will be suspicious if I'm not at my desk on windy days...).

Of course, this is all part of the master plan - soon enough, we'll have windsurfing taking over as the major mainstream sport in Whatcom County and everyone will be out ripping - right?

2007 season - lessons and goals

2007-09-21T19:56:00.000-07:00

I've been wanting to do a debrief for a while now, and the more I mull over the season, the more I realize that there's really no over-riding grand unifying theory - instead, there's a number of things that I've learned this year (or that have been reinforced in some way - sometimes it takes a while for those lessons to really sink in...) So here goes, in no particular order:

Physical Fitness
I'm in pretty good shape compared to the rest of the fleet - both in the Gorge and at Nationals. The difference is that, since I live in a place that doesn't allow for almost daily sailing, I don't get to build up that windsurfing-specific stamina. Whether it's the last two heats of the 10-round slalom marathon on the second day of the 3-day Gorge Challenge, or the last day of the Nationals when I was reduced to hanging on as my early season decision not to get a formula sail smaller than 9.9 collided with a solid 35 knots and voodoo chop on the course and my cumulative fatigue from the previous four days' racing - multi-day events just got the better of me this season. While there's not full substitute for time on the water (as windsurfing tends to be the best training for windsurfing - duh!) I've started aggressively working on my conditioning. I've been taking very careful notes of what's been aching to the point of immobility, and I'm adjusting my workouts to better target those things. Hopefully, that will bear some fruit next season.

Course Racing - VMG
The Gorge is a bit of an interesting place. Because we're racing with a reasonably small fleet and with long start lines, and because the water tends to be pretty smooth considering how windy it is, this opens a unique opportunity. You can, if you have enough board speed, get away with a super low-drag on-the-edge kind of tuning. For me, that meant my Roberts (with a relatively narrow tail) and very forward-raked R16's in Medium stiffness. That setup is way fast off the breeze, and upwind all it requires for incredible angle AND good speed (what a deal...) is a little bit of room to light up the foils before pushing for angle. That worked great for me all season in the Gorge, as I was right on Bruce's tail. It wasn't until Chris Prior came down for the Gorge Challenge and, with really good angle, started reducing my tactical options (and in the process edged me out of second into third) that I got a bit of a warning that this setup might have serious drawbacks.

Going to Nationals, however, made that very clear in the very first two heats - I simply couldn't play the high-speed game there, as (a) the course layout favored tactical degrees of freedom from grinding and (b) the rough water didn't allow me to take advantage of my speed all the way (it's hard to really light up the foils when you're flying off Crissy voodoo chop). Switching to Finworks fins made a huge difference on day 2 when I got a 4th and a 3rd place finish.

So the goal for next season is to find a better balance that allows me more latitude in my tactics - find better angle off the line so I can create my spaces to accelerate when I need them and can close the door on others, while retaining my boat speed edge. The fins are a key piece in that; tuning the whole package is the other.

Slalom
Downwind slalom is dead simple; to win, all you have to do is:

Nail your starts EVERY TIME - hit the line at full speed at 0, on the advantaged end, staying clear of anyone who might be OCS and could give you bad air.
Have ample boat speed to avoid being rolled, easily roll others, and stay out in front where you have clean air and undisturbed water. Be able to preserve that speed even in the holes.
Hit the mark first; set your line for the jibe to prevent anyone from cutting in on you.
Accelerate out of the jibe faster than anyone else, even if there are holes.
Repeat 3 and 4 until you finish (in first).

Really, it's that easy ;) Of course, optimizing for these success factors can lead to competing priorities. Sure, you want raw speed and super-fast jibes - that suggests going with relatively small gear and low drag (as well as good control so you don't bounce out). But you also need to punch through the holes and accelerate out of your jibes if it's light - which suggests more power and bigger boards/fins. And for Gorge box slalom courses, a bit of upwind ability is needed as well, also suggesting bigger gear.

Looking at slalom events this year, both in the Gorge and at Nationals, I'm concluding that:

I've gotten better at being aggressive on the starts; risking the occasional OCS, my starts have gotten more consistent, and I've started positioning myself a bit better. Gaining more experience has been helpful here.
I've gotten more aggressive at fighting for position within the heats, too. While that did cause me to crash in a crucial heat in the final rounds in the Nationals, I still believe it's the way to go - being tentative, for me, has led to at least as many crashes as being aggressive; you can't race slalom defensively and expect any level of success.
My jibes have gotten faster and more precise than they were in the past - I guess my slalom racing is finally catching up with my formula racing overall. The weak point is acceleration out of the jibe - the things for me to work on here are (a) getting a bigger board (and thus get better acceleration, as well as be more impervious to holes), and (b) working aggressively on my jibe exits (which is something I can do in the off-season when sailing slalom gear up here - you don't need a training partner to go through jibe drills, just a bunch of commitment and some breeze).
I've gotten faster - which is probably a direct result of just forcing myself to keep the hammer down anytime I'm out on my slalom gear, no matter how sketchy it might get. As a side effect, that's resulted in great entertainment for those sailing around me when I'm training, as the Bellinghamsters keep wondering why I'm out there on way too much sail taking big spills every so often...

It's been a good season - can't wait to see what next year will bring!

The wind's a fickle mistress...

2007-09-10T08:48:00.000-07:00

I met up with a reporter from the Whatcom Independent on Saturday morning. The plan was that he'd shoot some pictures of me sailing on the Bellingham Bay, then we'd have a little Q&A on windsurfing in Whatcom County, where to go, how to learn, and talk about racing a bit. The forecast wasn't all bad, so we met Saturday morning at 10 - except it hadn't filled in enough to get any good pictures (somehow, action shots of slogging on Formula gear aren't all that attractive, no matter how blue the sky...)

So we went for Plan B and bailed for Lake Whatcom, where I was going to give him a lesson. He was a great sport, and we got him on the Start, with me towing him on the longboard. Except as soon as we hit the water on the lake, the breeze there went from a lesson-perfect 3-5 knots to nothing (as in zilch, zip, not even a ripple on the water - sure made for stunning reflections of scenery on the lake, but that was about it).

We hung out for a while and talked, and then we had to bail since we both had other things to do. Of course, as I was driving through town with my kids a half hour later and went by the bay, I couldn't help but be struck with the irony of the bay now being adorned in whitecaps.

Nobody ever said this sport was supposed to be easy, or capable of being fit into a busy schedule for that matter. I'm sure it's making me into a better person somehow, though... ;)