Tandem Kanaha

Just a nice day of trying the tandem board

Broke Da Foot

Well, I have been windsurfing pretty much full time for 29 years and I finally broke a bone doing it.
Classic tale: Was going out for a super high wind session and split a beer with my buddy Carter. Oh I was feeling pretty frisky out there in 25-30 perfectly set up on my high wind gear.
Beer has a way of making one overconfident. I was hitting every windblown lip I could find, and feeling like a hero.
However, what my happy beer influenced mind had failed to act on was the unusually tight back footstrap on my old high wind board. Well I sure noticed it when I went for a relaxing wipe out on a failed aerial landing and as I leisurely fell back, my foot which would have normally swiveled out of the back strap, just stayed there and I heard a distinct CRACK, CRACK, CRACK.
Ouch.
The worst part was having to sail in, and crawl up the beach like Tom Hanks.
So now I do my sail design from the beach for a couple of months.

Hot Sails Maui Welcomes Martyn Ogier

By Tom,

It is no secret that I like to go fast and like to make faster sails and fins. I have done most of the development myself with some help from Diony. I have been looking for the right team rider to help me develop the sails and promote the speedy side of Hot Sails Maui. I am proud to Announce that we have found the right person for the job and will be working with speed sailor Martyn Ogier from Guernsey.


Martyn shows us his commitment with a really fast haircut!

Martyn is actually an old Hot Sails Team rider who competed for us back in the early '90s. He is very quick and has already topped 40 knots on his old Hot Sails Maui XTR 6.0. According to my research: "the island record of 42.09 knots (was) set by Martyn Ogier in 1995."

Martyn will be joning GP3S and he also has competitive speed sailing plans:

"The plan for 2009 is to compete in as many comps as possible. I have been told the 2009 dates will be out early next month but going on 2008 comps there was Gruissan France mid March, Port St Louis France end of March early April, Fuerteventura, July, Greece August, Weymouth England Oct, Namibia Sept Oct and Ireland Nov December."


Martyn braves frigid winter weather for this action shot

Keep up to date with Martyn's adventures on his new speed sailing blog:
Martyn Ogier

And if you have not already bookmark this one for Channel Island magic:
Vive La Breeze

Why I Break Booms

By Tom

I am still experimenting with the Go Pro camera and different mounts for it. This one turned out to be eye opening! Until I saw this video I had no idea of how much the boom was flexing whilst I was sailing. This is an Alloy slalom boom in action. I stuck this together really quickly so no soundtrack or fancy editing!

JSA

By Tom,

As I mentioned before we got the new wide angle Go Pro cameras. I promised you a video so here it is! Nothing exciting, just sailing along at Kanaha on a light-wind day.




So it was a good session right up until the end. I had left my boom at home and grabbed a boom from the shop. It was a sample boom that I knew was made with the wrong grade of tubing (as I had broken all the other ones!). Still I just wanted to go for an hour, I was sure it would hold up!

It took me about an hour to get back in and came in half a mile downwind which turned out to be opposite the shop. Dave saw me walking back up to get my car and offered me a ride. I forgot to turn my GPS off and it recorded the Journey. In the race between Dave and me, I won! In fact the van trip came in as 13th fastest run with a lowly 27.5 knots! So I broke a boom but I beat a van!