Since Maui i am at home in Tirol / Austria. We had -20°C
already around new year. There isn't that much snow, but it is
quite cold... Well Friday and Saturday, 4th and 5th of January,
there was "Foehn" here in Tirol. Strong wind from the south - it
lets the temperatures get positive, the snow melts and usually
it's pretty nice almost spring-weather for a few days.
However, it was not really inviting to go windsurfing, as we had
just around 6°C, but i was not sailing since a month, so it was
upon time... Check out my video from those 2 days...
{youtube}gRFEUBy1Wto{/youtube}
Don't have many moves there...it's really hard to film
yourself...believe me... :)
The weird thing was, on the first day, the lake (Achensee) was half
on ice! I was just sailing a few meters next to the around 10cm
thick icefield. On Saturday, just one day later, ALL the ice was
gone...hmm...maybe not gone completely..it was broken apart and
building a 5 meter wide belt along the shoreline....
First day i was on my 5,2 360Free and IStyle 94, the wind was more
constant than on the second day, when i was on 4,7 with the same
board.
It is not really fun to sail, but actually - it reminds me of
several really great sessions in winter at our lake. For example, I
did my first 3 flakas on 26th of December some years ago at this
lake!! Will never forget that...
Keep windsurfing...
ciao
Rossi
PWA Sylt 2007 - The biggest event of the year
03 October 2007
A little report from the PWA Worldcup in
Sylt:
After we arrived from Dahab/Egpyt, we put
all our equipment in my car and drove 14 hours straight to Sylt. It
was raining every now and then, but that's how it is in Sylt. The
opening ceremony was big and and with a lot of spectators, like
every year. 10 Days time to do races in Wave (Men and Woman),
Slalom and Freestyle. According to the wind-conditions it was
decided which discipline to do. In the beginning the
Race-management decided to do Woman Waveriding - Nayra Alonso won
in really difficult and quite light-wind conditions. In low winds,
Slalom was held and we had the chance to do a Freestyle double
ellimination. The first day of Freestyle, the wind was sideshore
from the right and it was picking up pretty fast - I was on my 4,7
quite on the limit. Unfortunately i lost against Cheo Diaz
(Venezuela) - he had a quite good heat. Well - some surprises were
up as well - Tonky Frans went into the finals - he was sailing very
good. There was a very very close fight for the title of the world
champion in Freestyle. Kiri Thode from Bonaire, Gollito Estredo
from Venezuela and Marcilio Browne from Brazil were fighting for
the title.
Well - Tonky kicked Kiri before he could
reach the finals - Brawzinho came 4th after Ricardo Campello - so
the World championship was still open. Gollito could win the Single
elimination - Few days of no wind and hoping for the Double
Elimination - and on Friday we could go on. The conditions were
very very difficult, the wind was side-offshore, so very gusty and
quite strong on the outside. 1-2 meter waves coming straight in
from the sea made moves going out very hard. All the guys were
struggleing with the conditions.
I was up against Mr. Schenk from Germany -
and guess what - i had the worst heat in my whole carreer... 3
moves in 6 minutes, that's really bad!! :) Anyway, shit
happens...
It was late and getting dark already, when
the last heats of the single were up. Kiri had to advance just one
or two heats to become freestyle world champion - lot of pressure -
and he was finally beaten by Antony Ruenes from France. For lot of
guys on the beach that decision of the judges was quite
questionable, as Kiri had a lot more moves - but that's how they
decided. So the fight was just between Marcilio and Gollito - due
to Gollitos 7th place in Fuerteventura, Marcilio just had to
advance one place more - it was the heat against Ricardo Campello -
loads of pressure on Marcilio - but Ricardo was crashing several
times - which made Marcilio Browne Freestyle World Champion
2007.
Right after that heat, the wind dropped
and there was no more wind - until the last day, when the direction
changed to westerly - straight onshore. A great final of the double
ellimination - Tonky Frans against Gollito Estredo!! - Tonky could
win the first final - as Gollito won the single ellimination, that
meant one more final - the conditions were really hard - and this
time Gollito teached Tonky who's the boss - With a Burner
onehanded, Ponch into Flaka in those hard conditions and loads of
other radical moves, Gollito won the Worldcup in Sylt - a pitty
that he couldn't defend his title from last year.
Well - After 10 days of Sylt - a great
Event with 180.000 visitors - the biggest event in the world-, we
drove home, 12 hours, 1200km from Sylt to Innsbruck/Tirol/Austria.
It's still warm - not bad - hope the winter waits a bit till it
drops in....
Freestyle Results after 1 Double
Elimination:
1. Jose Estredo
2. Tonky Frans
3. Marcilio Browne
Men’s Slalom Racing Results:
1. Antoine Albeau
2. Bjorn Dunkerbeck
3. Kevin Pritchard
Unfortunately no result in the Mens Wave
Sailing - just a spectacular Supersession,... But stay tuned for
action from the wave-event in Tiree happening now...
All the best
Rossi - AUT 256
Some pix - Photos by John Carter / PWA
TRICKTIONARY - Promotour France
10 August 2007
After Belgium, we started directly for
another trip
The TRICKTIONARY (see www.tricktionary.net ) promotour through the
north of France!
Do i need to say more than - 3000 kilometers, 16 shops, 5 days?!
That was lot of work, unfortunately we had no time to go
windsurfing there - although there was some wind during the time we
were there.
From Belgium we went pretty much straight to Brest, to visit Exocet
at their headquarter. We could see all the office and the
storage-halls and always felt really welcome, thanks to Armand,
Frank and Jean. Also had some talk about the next generation of
Freestyle boards in the Exocet-range with Jean Marie - and changed
some details on one of the recent prototypes.
After Brest we drove a bit to the south - visiting some shops in
Aurey and going to Quiberon for some surf. After that back to Brest
where we met our best shop of the trip - swelladdiction.com -
Mathieu just opened his shop in Brest and is distributing our book
very well.
So far so good, time to head home - on the way we visited all the
shops on the north coast of France. Passing by in Perros-Guirec,
Caen, Cabourg, Langueux, Granvillle, Le Havre and
many more - finally spent one night in Le Havre - hoping for wind
on the next day, but unfortunately the weather changed and the
thermic wind could not develop.
So we started our way home to Austria, passing Rouen, Reims, Metz,
Strasbourg, Karlsruhe, Stuttgart, Munich.
After that trip - basically just driving and searching the spots
(shops), it's nice to get back home.
...and prepare for the next one... :)
Pix from the trip
by Sandra Schennach and Michael Roßmeier
FUERTE NO WIND to BELGIUM NO WIND
04 August 2007
In the first double elimination in Fuerte,
Marcilio Browne "Brawzinho" from Brazil was winning in front of
Kiri Thode from Bonaire - I made a 13th place - was kicked out by 3
times world champion Ricardo Campello after advancing two heats.
Everybody thought we'd do at least two more double eliminations -
but nobody thought about "calima" - coming straight from the
desert, it delivered 46°C for 3 days and disturbed the
tradewinds - so there was no wind at all for the rest of the
competition - while all the riders (and also judges and the
organisation) were on standby with sometimes 15 minutes time till
the first heat - for 8 hours a day!!
So that 13th place sets me to the 17th place overall in the current
2007 PWA Freestyle overall ranking.
On 31st of August my flight from Fuerte to Munich was landing at
11pm - Sandra picked me up and we drove to Bredene in Belgium for
the EFPT Event there (800km!!) - next day 2pm we arrived. There was
no hurry at least - as already at the skippers meeting the
organizers told us that there's most probably not goin to be any
wind.
This is the first competition where nobody of the riders did not
even rig my sails!!
So actually just continuing what we did in Fuerte - waiting waiting
waiting - The competition is over now and there's goin to be a big
party tonight. Most of the riders can't wait till they get home -
as waiting sucks after a while somehow....
Pix from Fuerte
Credit: PWA/John Carter
Fuerte Action - 1st double
28 July 2007
Didn't really update for quite a long time... however arrived in
Fuerte on 24th of July - this time everything was quite relaxing
and easy - no troubles with the luggage - easy transfer with my
friends who are in Fuerte for "Tiroler Wochen" :) We have an
appartement in Solymar in Costa Calma - like a lot of other riders
of the worldcup. Today we started with the single elimination at
around 11 - in the first round i had Cheo Diaz from Venezuela - it
was a tough heat and somehow i wasn't feeling really safe, so i
lost. In the further Single some of the top guys were elliminated
pretty early - most impressive heat was when Marcilio Browne won
against Gollito and Anthony kicked Kiri! I was in the 3rd heat of
the double elimination, set against "Boro" - E18 from Spain - I had
some good moves, including a onehanded ponch and a puneta into clew
first puneta and could make it to the next round, where i should
meet my good friend Tine Slabe - SLO6 from Slovenia. Tine kicked
Normen Günzlein in the first round of the Single elimination
and he likes strong winds... However in my heat we both crashed a
lot - but Tine more - so i advanced to the next round where i was
about to meet Ricardo Campello V111 from Venezuela - 3 times world
champion... My heat was not too bad and i was very close until
Ricardo pulled off a huge Shaka and a perfect Shoveit Spock
afterwards... So my place for the first competiton day is the 13th,
a good position for the eliminations in the next days... Pix by
Michal Kosmowski (www.mkinteractive.pl)
