Hatteras Videos

As usual, we had a blast at the ABK camp in Hatteras the last 5 days. We had a nice mix of light, medium, and strong wind - here are a few videos, starting with a planing upwind 360:

A bit of light wind freestyle:


On the medium wind days, we got to try the foil demo gear from the ABK van. Fortunately, they had shorter masts that worked well with the water depth at the camp location in Waves. Here's a video where I prove that I can spin out a foil, too:


Nina, of course, did a bit better on the foil:


Plenty of wind in the forecast for tomorrow - mid-30s in the morning, dropping into the 20s after noon. We'll have a skippers meeting at Ocean Air in Avon for the ECWF Hatteras at 10 am - hope to see you there!

ECWF Cape Cod and Hatteras

Ladies and gentlemen, get your race gear ready, and polish your freestyle tricks - two East Coast Windsurfing Festivals are coming up in September and October! Both will include racing, freestyle competition, demo gear, a raffle for participants, and lots of fun!

The first ECWF will take place in September at Kalmus Beach in Hyannis, Cape Cod. The planned date is September 15 and 16 (with a social event on Friday evening before the action), but if the wind forecast looks bad, we'll move the ECWF Cape Cod to September 22-23rd, so that the demo gear from Fanatic and Duotone can be tested in planing conditions. This will be the sixth year in a row for the ECWF Cape Cod, so register now and join the fun!

The second ECWF this year, the first annual ECWF Hatteras,  will be run by Mike Burns at Ocean Air in Avon, NC, in the week of October 20-27. We are very excited to have an ECWF-style event at one of the best windsurfing spots in the US! The huge amounts of fun we had at Mike's original ECWF events on Long Island were a major reason why Nina and I started the ECWF Cape Cod in 2013. Chances are good that we'll have one day of high-wind racing and a day of light-wind racing, plus a day of freestyle competition, in Hatteras, since competition will take place on the days with the best wind between Monday, 10/22, and Thursday, 10/25. You can register for the ECWF Hatteras at www.ecwindfest.org/register_hatteras.php. Hope to see you there, and at the ABK camps on Cape Cod and Hatteras a week before the events to learn new tricks!

ABK Camp Hyannis Questions

The ABK windsurf camp in Hyannis is coming up less than 4 weeks (Friday 9/7- Sunday 9/9/2018). This post contains some of the questions we are often asked about it, and (more importantly) the answers.

• Is an ABK camp right for me?

If you are a windsurfer who wants to get better or learn new things, or if you want to learn windsurfing, the answer is "Yes!".

• Will it be over my level?

No! ABK camps are for windsurfers at all skill levels, from "never before" beginners to experts working on freestyle moves and loops. There are typically 5-6 groups of different skill levels, and you'll be in a group with windsurfers of similar skills. There is usually  at least one group that works on jibes and tacks - be it to learn how to jibe without falling, or to tack a smaller board, or to plane through jibes.

• What are the temperatures like? 

Typically, air temperatures are in the 60s early in the morning, and in the 70s during the day. It may get a few degrees colder if we have northerly winds, or on occasion reach the low 80s. Water temperatures are usually in the low 70s or high 60s (currently 75-80ºF).

• Do I need a full wetsuit?

You may not absolutely need one, but it's probably a good idea to bring one, especially if the weather is on the colder side of the range. It may be warm enough for board shorts and lycras, but keep in mind that students typically spend time in the water in the morning and in the afternoon. Also, you may fall more often than usually since you'll be working on new things!

• Will it be windy?

September is usually a pretty windy month on Cape Cod, so chances are high that you'll get at least one day with enough wind to plane during the three-day camp. In 2017, we had 2 windy days (5 m sail for lighter sailors, 6 m for guys like me). In 2016, we also had planing conditions on two days; in 2015, one day; in 2014, two days.
Note that there's tons of stuff to learn even in light wind that will help your high-wind sailing. For example, my lovely wife learned how to get into the back foot strap on a light wind day.

• How big are the waves?

Kalmus has a reputation for being choppy, especially on very windy west-southwest days around high tide. However, the ABK camps usually use several options to allow campers to learn in less challenging conditions. Depending on wind direction and skill levels, some or all groups will often sail on the Lewis Bay side (which is not available for windsurfing in the summer, but becomes available after Labor Day). More advanced groups sometimes sail across the channel to Egg Island, where the water can be perfectly flat even in very strong wind - perfect for working on jibes, 360s, Vulcans, and more.

• What can I possibly learn in 3 days?

That will depend a bit on you. Typically, windsurfers with less experience or those working on brand-new skills can progress more quickly than windsurfers who have sailed for many years without instruction, and then have to unlearn bad habits. I am a slow learner who falls into the second category, but nevertheless, I learned to plane through my jibes within a couple of days during my first ABK camp. My lovely wife, who learns faster and had fewer bad habits to unlearn, learned these things in her first ABK camp in Hyannis:

1. The light-wind helicopter tack.
2. Consistent water starts. She had done a few before, but usually would be totally exhausted when she got up. The ABK camp fixed this for good.
3. Planing in both foot straps (she had learned how to get into the front strap at a previous ABK camp in Bonaire).

These skills were pretty solid - she had no problems sailing in 30+ mph wind on Maui and in the Gorge a few months later. As I said, she is a fast learner, and other campers may learn less, but usually, everyone goes home happy with new or improved skills at the end of a camp.

• How many windsurfers and teachers will be there?

Typically, there are about 20-25 students in the ABK camp Hyannis, and 4-6 teachers.

• How about food at the camp?

The Kalmus snack bar is right at the camp site, and offers surprisingly good food at reasonable prices. Theoretically, you'd also have enough time to drive 5 minutes into town, but I don't recall ever seeing anyone doing that.

• When should I register? 

Register now! The ABK camp Hyannis usually fills up. Since the student-to-teacher ratio is fixed to ensure high-quality learning and teaching, Andy often has to turn people away who try to register in the last days before camp or on-site. But if everyone registers early, it is often possible to get another ABK teacher to come and to add another group. So register now! See you at the camp!

Anti-inflammatory Andy

Windsurfers know that windsurfing is good for your health. Science is still playing catch-up with our knowledge. In one scientific study that was published just a few months ago, the researchers found that feeling awe lowered the amount of inflammatory cytokines (specifically, IL-6).

When my lovely wife read about this, she right away said "Andy is anti-inflammatory". She was talking about Andy Brandt, and thinking about the windsurf session we had a few days ago at Frisco Woods in Hatteras. After sailing for an hour, Nina stopped to take a few movies of Andy windsurfing. Here's one where Andy makes the Donkey Jibe look easy:
Here's another awe-inspiring old school freestyle move, the Free Willy:

We had been working on the light-wind version of the Free Willy just a few days earlier during the ABK camp. The light-wind Free Willy is not nearly as impressive, but it's still complicated enough to really confuse me. But with plenty of demonstrations and help from Andy, I finally go the move, Yes, only the light wind version, but it still filled me with pride and joy - two other emotion that will lower cytokines and inflammation.

I followed Andy around a bit that day, and he threw several perfect loops right in front of me. It got me motivated enough to try several times, although none of my tries even was close. But I'll count just getting myself to try as a big success. I had a bit more luck on my runs back in, where I worked on the Carve 360 with both feet in the straps. Early tries were close, but a bit wet:

After getting a couple of tips from Andy, I was able to carve through without getting wet:


Even though I understand the 360 pretty well, I would have never come up with the small adjustments that Andy Brandt suggested myself. As usual, they were spot-on, and following his suggestions made all the difference.
Funny enough, I ended up being better at the 360 in the straps than I am when I take the back foot out of the strap, even though the move is a bit harder in the straps. The likely reason? Bad muscle memory! When I take the back foot out of the strap, the entrance is almost identical to a jibe entry, and I have practiced bad ways to jibe for decades before my first ABK camp. The entry for the Carve 360 in the straps feels quite different, since you have to through your weight forward much more to compensate for the feet being further back. This setup I learned only last year, with immediate corrections from ABK instructors, so I never practiced the wrong way. It's so much easier to learn it correctly right away!

Of course, learning things correctly at ABK camps is one of the "secrets" why Nina has gotten so wicked good. She worked on getting into the straps in switch stance while planing in Hatteras, and was quite happy with her progress. Thanks to tips from ABK instructor Eric, she got quite comfortable getting into the straps switch while planing. She jibed out most of the time, but in her last run of the day, she ducked the sail switch for a Reverse Duck Jibe in the straps - a very cool move indeed. I don't have video of her doing this move, but Andy Brandt demonstrated it during the brief video session:

I'll leave you with a last video where Andy makes the Spock look easy:

Big thanks to Nina for taking the movies, and to all the ABK instructors for another fantastic ABK camp!

Andy and Caesar movie

At the ABK camp Cape Cod in September, Andy Brandt and Caesar Finies gave us a little demonstration what light wind freestyle can look like. Conditions were not ideal, with gusty winds from 5-20 mph; furthermore, both Andy and Caesar were on unfamiliar boards. That did not keep them from putting on a great show - here is a short video:


It's interesting to see the rather different styles in direct comparison. Andy does a lot of "old school" tricks like fin-first upwind 360s that are technically quite difficult, but take 10-15 seconds to complete. In contrast, many of Caesar's tricks are sail-throws or sail-body movements that take only a second or two. In the 10 seconds that one of the "old school" moves takes, Caesar strings together a whole bunch of different moves, often mixing simple ones like sail-body 360s with hard ones like Jaw Breakers and Ankle Biters. Andy's style is super-clean and very technical; Caesar's is fast and furious. I'm just glad that this was a demonstration, not a competition where we had to pick a winner! Many thanks to Caesar and Andy for showing us what you can do on a windsurf board in light winds.

ABK camp Hatteras starts in 2 weeks!

It's only two more weeks until the ABK camp in Cape Hatteras starts on May 5. If you have not signed up yet, do it now! There a only 6 spaces left, and they often fill up quickly. The last few weeks in Hatteras have been very windy - most weeks had at least 4-5 day of 20+ mph winds. This pattern often continues well into May. Rooms at a rental house close by are (probably) also still available; it not, renting a house there for a week is cheap, and you can probably still find other campers to share it with.

The location of the Hatteras ABK camp in Waves, NC is one of the best locations to learn windsurfing and improve your skills in the world. The water in the sound is warm and shallow - you can sail half a mile or more, and still touch ground when you fall. You can leave your gear rigged on the beach for the duration of the camp - or if you need to rent gear, several local stores have great rental gear.

If you've never been to Hatteras, check Dean's video:

Hope to see you there in a couple of weeks!

More fun!

Here are some of my favorite ways to have more fun windsurfing:

1. Sail at a great spot
2. Take a windsurfing vacation
3. Learn something new
4. Participate at a windsurfing festival

This spring, we are lucky - we get to all these things! We'll combine a few good things with out annual spring trip to Cape Hatteras in North Carolina.

On the way to Hatteras, we'll stop by the Kashy/WET Windsurfing Festival for some racing. This year, they'll have some Kona boards for rent, which should be lots of fun, regardless how much wind we get. Nothing better than a windsurfing race to show you the limits of your skills!

We'll pick up Nina's sister Edda on the way, and then arrive just in time for the ABK clinic in Waves. We have done ABK camps at a bunch of different spots, but Hatteras is my absolute favorite. Why?

• Miles and miles of flat, shallow water, perfect for learning
• Great wind - usually a mix of planing and light wind days, with more planing days
• Our own windsurfing gear right next to the water
• A two minute walk to the clinic site, and evening video reviews in the house where we are staying

We have done ABK camps in Hatteras every year for a few years now, and always had a blast. The fun continues after the camp - there is always a pronounced uptick in our skills afterwards, which makes windsurfing even more fun. We also really like that staying in Hatteras is dirt cheap - generally less than $200 per person and week for a room in a great house close to the water. That's about the cost of one night in one of the nicer places on Bonaire! Food is also cheap - with a fully equipped kitchen and plenty of cooks, there's no need to go out. So most nights, we just stay in, talk windsurfing all evening, and drink beer.

There's still plenty of space left in the ABK camp from May 5 - May 9. If you've never been there, you should definitely sign up if you can get the week off! The house we are staying in is full, but there are usually several ABK campers who get together and rent another house close by that they share.

If you can't make it to the ABK camp in Hatteras, how about joining the ABK camp in Corpus Christi, Texas, from April 24-27? That's another fantastic location for an ABK camp. The one year we did this camp, we had planing conditions every single day, and that's not unusual for Corpus in the spring. The rental gear at the clinic site is great, and there's plenty of shallow water perfect for teaching and learning. The Corpus Christi camp usually fills up, so reserve your spot soon! Or check the ABK camp schedule for other camp locations.

Sunset on Cape Hatteras

Light wind freestyle on small boards for ... speed and planing jibes!

Nina and I attended the ABK Clinic on Cape Cod last weekend. It was a great clinic - we learned lots of new things, met old friends, and made new friends. The weather was almost perfect - sunny, with air and water temperatures in the low 70s. Warm enough to be comfortable, cold enough so we could wear long wet suits to reduce scrapes and bruises from climbing back onto the boards. And that we did a lot - except for the morning of the first day, we had light wind for the entire camp.

I had discussed here before what finally convinced me to practice light wind freestyle on my 110 l Skate, instead of big monster boards: the amazing progress I had seen others make within a year. This time, my Skate initially felt big, after spending most of the summer on a 77 l board. But when the wind dropped and it was time to practice heli tacks, upwind 360s, pile drivers, and their various fin-first and clew-first variations, the board got small again very quickly. It took me a few hours of practice before I could do the tricks I had done last year - but then, I had not practiced any light wind freestyle for months. But the board grew on me again, and I did a few tricks I had never done before - nice! Not surprisingly, Nina picked up a few more tricks than I did, and can now do a few variations that I can't. That was just of time, anyway..

We stayed an extra day on Monday, since the forecast promised planing winds, and I really wanted to work on the spin loop. Alas, the wind remained light again - so Nina and I practiced  sail chi. We eventually got the ducking for switch duck jibes and duck tacks on land, definitely progress (which, however, did not translate to the water, which was a bit choppy for my taste).

As Andy has correctly predicted, we went sailing again today. One reason was that the forecast and the early wind readings looks good; a second reason was that I needed to get away from work after having to deal with a rather saddening task this morning. We decided to go to Fogland because the drive is shorter, and the wind readings there looked better when we left.

When we got there, the wind had just picked up, and we could see some white caps in the bay. Nina was excited to try Vulcans, switch planing, and Flakas, but I just wanted some speed. So I cut the chatting with Fred and Sue short, and went out on my Warp 118 l and Matrix 7.0. Then, something pretty amazing happened:

If you look at the speed graph at the bottom, you can see that I planed through my first 7 jibes - I don't think I have ever planed through 7 jibes in a row before. On a regular day, I'd be perfectly happy with 7 dry jibes in a row! The conditions were quite nice, with flat water near low tide, but the winds were not so strong that planing through jibes was trivial: according to the iWindsurf sensors, wind averages during the runs were 17 mph, and gusts 21 mph. I think the meter readings may have been a couple of miles low - but I'm still very happy with the top speed I got on the one downwind speed run I did. On a "normal" good day in Fogland, I typically get speeds that are maybe 30% faster than the wind speed. This is the first time I got a speed that was 50% faster - cool!

I stopped after a few runs to talk to Fred (that's the other Fred), who had just arrived. By the time he left, the wind was going down, and the rest of the day was a mix of schlogging and mostly marginal planing, with a little basic light wind freestyle mixed in.

Still, these first 10 minutes today were just fantastic. I have no doubt whatsoever that the 2 days of light wind freestyle practice were responsible. The Skate 110 for me is an "almost sinker" - I really have to watch where I put my feet and weight to not drive the board completely under water. Working on tricks like upwind and downwind 360s in light wind for hours has hugely improved my feeling for the board trim and my sail handling. That has paid off big time in better jibes and better top speed for the given conditions. Did I mention that I was pretty amazed about todays top speed for the relatively low wind? I just could not wait to get home and plug the data into the computer to make sure they were no artifact.

One thing that amazes me is how fast and dramatic these improvements were. In total, I probably spent less than 8 hours practicing light wind freestyle last weekend. During our 6 weeks in Maui, were I sailed 37 days and perhaps 2 hours each day on average, I was constantly working on more control and better speed, but my overall gains there were maybe similar. I probably should have taken a lot more time to work on freestyle, and in particular light wind freestyle, there!

So, next time you have the opportunity join an ABK Clinic, stop worrying about the wind and sign up already! You'll definitely learn a lot of new stuff, and maybe some light wind freestyle is exactly what you need to get faster and better at your jibes.

So, once again, thanks to Andy, Brendon, Ed, and Meredith for a super clinic, and for working their obscure, but highly effective magic to create better windsurfers.

ABK Camp Bonaire video

We were at the ABK Freestyle Camp in Bonaire last week, and had a lot of fun. This was the first time we went to a freestyle camp; our other camps had been regular camps. The difference is that the overall level of skills is higher - no beginners, but a lot of windsurfers who work on advanced moves like Donkey jibes and Vulcans. Here is a video with clips from the camp, and statements from 4 campers:


Great camp. The wind was better than in our previous camps in March. I was planing every day, with only two light wind afternoons in 7 days, and just one day where I used a sail larger than 6.5. Some of the things I worked on:

• Loop crashes. Just one day, when the wind was strong enough to be fully powered on a 5.6. I think we had about 7 campers trying loop crashes, many for the first time. Noone got hurt, no equipment got damaged - so this part of Andy's approach definitely works well. However, I have not gotten to the point where I am in the air and the tail is fully out of the water, with the nose pointing down. Something always throws my timing off when I go for a loop crash. Maybe some bigger waves and more practice would help - we pretty much practiced the flat-water version.
• Backwinded jibes (planing). I managed to get to the other side with the board fully planing, but I did not (yet) figure out to carve downwind from the backwinded position. Fun crashes, though :)
• Duck tacks (non-planing). I had a lot of fun working on duck tacks on the first light-wind afternoon. I used a big board so I could concentrate on sail handling, and managed to throw and catch the sail properly maybe 5 times, including 2 successful complete tacks. Really not so easy pushing the sail into the wind neutrally from the boom end, but the fun part is that you can make all kind of fun other tricks if the sail goes somewhere else - switch stance duck jibes, behind-the-back sail 360s, and sail-body 360s. A lot more fun than trying to plane in marginal conditions.
• Push tacks (non-planing). If you're spending a lot of time sailing switch stance, anyway, the push tack is a logical thing to do. Funny thing was that I did ok as long as I just concentrated on the sail and foot pressure, without even thinking what exactly I was going for. As soon as Andy pointed out that it was a push tack, and I started thinking, I also started falling. Sometimes, the brain just gets in the way.

The board I was using most of the time was a JP Freestyle 107. It's a nice board, but I hard a hard time planing through my jibes on it, even on the windier days. Looking at the GPS records confirmed that the Fanatic Skate carves a lot better: my best minimum speed in a jibe on the JP was about 6.8 knots; on the Skate, I can often get minimum speeds of 9 or 10 knots. The Skate also has been about 10% faster under similar conditions, although that may be partially due to fin differences.

On a couple of windy days, I also took out a JP Supersport. However, they were seriously underfinned, and gave me lots of spinout problems. Some of the smaller freeride boards had much longer fins that the Supersports. I later discovered that the Supersport with the best fin was the 100l board; but by then, I had already switched to the freestyle boards, which were just way more fun to sail.

Of the sails I tried there, I loved (again) the Gaastra Pilots. They have a very large range if you adjust the outhaul, and are just easy to sail. I heard a story that a Gaastra-sponsored team sailor liked the Pilots so much that he wanted to use them in competition, but was not allowed to, since that's Gaastra's low-end sail.

I also sailed an NP Combat (ok, no surprise) and an NP Fusion, which I hated. Of the Ezzy sails I used, I like the 7.5 Freeride, but hated the 7.5 Infinity, which just seemed extremely heavy (but then, it did not help that the water level was very low when I tried it, and I did not have a chance to plane even with the 7.5).

Compared to the last 2 years, the gear at Jibe City has gotten a lot better. I saw exactly one boom with torn wrapping, and I think it was replaced while I was there. It's easy to see that the place is now managed by a windsurfer. There were lots of positive changes, and this trend will certainly continue. I'm already looking forward to my next Bonaire trip.

2 weeks in Hatteras

We just returned from 2 great weeks in Hatteras. Coming back to the cold weather in Boston is a bit depressing, so I'll just list some more or less random thoughts and observations.

1. Small board light wind freestyle: boards grow 5 liters per hour! We had a couple of light wind days during ABK camp, so I finally spent a few hours doing light wind freestyle on my Fanatic Skate 110. Within two days, I went from feeling like a total beginner to making most of the tricks I could do on a bigger board, including tacks, heli tacks, various jibes, boomerangs, and switch stance sailing. Some of these tricks improved a lot, since the smaller board enforces more precision. Just like Andy Brandt said, the board seemed to grow 5 liters for every hour of practice. And yes, practicing light wind freestyle on a small board will improve your feeling for the board and your sailing in stronger winds.
2. How to make 80 l boards seem big: sail a 62 l board for a while. I took our my F2 Missile speed board on a couple of days where the wind was good. Day 1 was a bit frustrating since weeds inevitably caused spinouts after a few hundred yards, but day 2 with a weed fin was great. I also got the opportunity to try an 80 l RRD Slalom board, which felt amazingly big and easy to sail after the 62 l board.
3. Fanatic Free Wave boards are fast fun. I love my Skate for freeriding and carving, but when I got a chance to try a Fanatic Free Wave 95, I loved the board even more. It felt comfortable from the first moment, and it was turny enough for some wave riding in the small Hatteras swell. I also got my top GPS speeds for the day on this board, without ever getting the feeling that I was close to the board's top speed. I later also got to try a Fanatic New Wave Twin wave board, which was fine, but to twitchy for my taste. The Free Wave 85 is on my wish list for next year.
4. Going fast requires skill, too. On several marginal days, I did well freeriding my Skate with a 7.0 Gaastra Matrix, staying on a plane longer than I though possible, passing most other windsurfers, and getting reasonable GPS speeds. When on the F2 Missile, it took a few hours to get comfortable on the board. The board handled the chop at 25-30 mph winds quite well, but my speeds were limited. Andy took it out for just one run and easily passed my best speed for the entire day, despite not using the harness lines and being on this board for the first time. He later explained a few things that I need to change, both on the equipment setup and in my stance, to get better speed. I'm dying to try it, and hope we get some more nice days here.
5. 360s are fun. I finally got my first carving 360, after working on it for about 5 or 6 days. I almost drove the ABK guys crazy by getting really close for a few days in a row. On the upside, nobody doubted that I finally got one when nobody was looking. I'll have to practice it some more, this seems like a fun trick.
6. Learn to loop in Hatteras. Some very good windsurfers get the speed loop in the first few tries, but for less talented and more hesitant folk like me, learning it involves a large number of crashes, including some catapults where you are ripped out of the straps, and the rig may be ripped out of your hands. There's a decent chance that you damage the nose of the board in the process, which I did early on. I think I had some hidden damage that was revealed when running aground while sailing fin first to shore - I had a 5 inch break line on the underside of the nose afterwards. But the best board repair on the East coast is in Buxton, at Fox Watersports. I got my board repaired within 2 days, for $80, and it looks like new again. The loop, however, will need a few more tries.
7. October in Hatteras may shorten your sailing season. We had many days with air temperatures in the 80s, and water temps in the upper 60s/low 70s. Back in Boston, air temps are now in the 40s, and water temps in the low 50s. That's a bit depressing, and makes it hard to go sailing here again. If we had remained here, we would have gradually gotten used to the colder weather, and kept going until early December. Now, going back out the first time will be hard. But then, I sailed about 300 miles in the 2 weeks in Hatteras, despite a few off days and several light wind days. And if you typically stop sailing in October, then a week or two in Hatteras is a great way to end the season.
8. Long board racing is fun. We used one of the light-to-marginal wind days for long board racing. Lots of fun, quite a different skill set, great addition to the camp.
9. We love you guys! Lots of thanks to Andy, Meredith, Brendon, and Tom for inviting us stay another week. It was also great to meet Coach Ned, Jake, and all the other guys in the house and at camp. Can't wait to see you all again in January, and we'll certainly miss those of you who won't be in Bonaire.

Three great days

We just returned from a wonderful three-day ABK camp in Hyannis on Cape Cod. The weather participated only partially. On the upside, we had two sunny days and one cloudy and cooler day; but we had planing-level wind only on one day, and there mostly in the morning.

The camp was quite a bit bigger than last year, with about 20 campers and 4 instructors (Andy, Brendon, Tom, and Ed). It was nice to see two other Foglanders there, besides Nina and myself. Compared to last year, the skill level in the top group was a lot higher. Four surfers (Cliff, Niko, Martin, and Graham) were doing tricks I had never even tried - great to watch.

For me, the highlights of the camp were:

1. Meeting old and new friends.
2. Andy Brandt's loop lecture .
   
3. The guest lecture by Chris Eldrigde.

As the title of this blog might suggest, I have been thinking about the loop for a while. I've looked at plenty of YouTube videos, online and magazine articles, discussion forums, and so on. I must give Andy credit for getting me to think about the loop - before last year, I thought that was way out of my reach and/or my level of risk tolerance. The first loop lecture I heard from Andy then convinced me that (a) my concerns about getting hurt while trying the loop were justified (several campers who had tried it had gotten injured), and that (b) it is possible to learn the speed loop without getting hurt, given the right approach.

However, all the approaches I looked at seemed to have some shortcomings, as I discussed in a previous post. So I was in for a nice surprise at the newest ABK loop approach. It combines the best elements of previous approaches into three steps, marked by learning to crash in a specific way. It keeps Andy's focus on using sail steering to turn the board, but adds very specific directives. I did the first two steps during camp - the first one non-planing, the second one planing. This is about as far as I had gotten with Remko's approach - but when trying to follow Remko's approach, I ended up being pulled out of the straps in a catapult that did some minor damage to the board, no fun. It's quite possible that this was because I did not have the perfect wave that Remko had for his movie. But with the couple of details that Andy has added, the planing pre-loop crash ended perfectly harmless and fun. I did not quite get all the parts together, but it seems that just a few more tries will get me ready for the third crash, which then gets pretty close to the real thing with a waterstart ending. Judging from just the lecture and the first few tries, Andy has really done magic here by removing (most) risk, adding clear steps and landmarks, and making the loop seem very attainable even for more cautious surfers.

Another highlight of the camp was a guest lecture by Chris Eldridge. Chris is one of the best non-pro windsurfers in the East Coast - check out his videos if you have not seen them yet. He talked about how to learn the Flaka, and also briefly talked about a few other tricks when they came up in the discussion. In his opinion, learning the Flaka and the Grubby is a lot easier than learning the Vulcan, so it makes sense to learn them first. That's quite different from what Andy Brandt and many others think, who are convinced that the Vulcan should be the first new school freestyle trick. Both sides present many good arguments for their view - the difference in opinion may be caused by a difference in attitude, risk tolerance, and patience. It seems that the Vulcan is better for patient and technical windsurfers, while the Flaka may be better for the impatient who'd rather commit to something a bit wilder than try something many hundred times before it works. The best advice seems to be to try it both - some windsurfers may be better of with the Flaka, others with the Vulcan as their first trick.

With just half a day of good wind, I did not get a chance to try the Flaka (I should do the upwind 360 on a freestyle board first, anyway). Instead, I worked on carving 360s, and did get closer than before. The video analysis was really helpful here - it showed clearly that I did not push the rig far enough to the back (just like Andy said...). On the first lightwind day, I learned the push tack the ABK way - that is, one-handed, left-right-left. Much easier this way that what I had tried before, worked great on the big board.

On the last day, I tried to do some lightwind tricks on my freestyle board - tricks that I can do in my sleep on my huge old board. Very frustrating - took many tries just to do a heli tack without falling, and the few I did were ugly and out of control. Andy first send me to downsize my sail, and then sent me back to the basics - practice backwind sailing before the heli tack. That took a few tries and help from him, but I eventually figured it out.

So, why do lightwind tricks on a small, sinking freestyle board if you're not Andy Brandt? Many reasons - here a a few:

• Two guys in the camp, Martin and Graham, who only use small boards, improved a lot during the last year, even though they sailed less than I did. Graham is young, so he'll learn faster, but Martin is almost my age.
  
• After sailing small boards in Maui and the Gorge, where big board were just not an option, I noticed that my skills on big boards had improved a lot. For example, I can now plane on perhaps a meter less sail than before in the same conditions. Looking at the really good guys who can plane on much smaller boards and sails, there is still plenty of room for improvement.
• It's not really that hard. Ok, I pretty much did start from scratch, pulling the sail out like a beginner and sometimes falling while doing so. But less than 2 hours later, I was getting used to the board. The sailed popped out of my water and into my hands almost like on a big board, backwinding was almost easy, and other things started to work better, too. For a couple of hours, that was quite a bit of progress.
• Andy says so. Funny reason, but experience tells me that doing as Andy Brandt says is a good strategy, even if I something seems counter-intuitive. A lot of times, the understanding comes a few minutes or days later.
• Speedsurfing: Since dedicated speed boards are wicked small (my F2 Missile is 62 liters), balance practice on smaller boards for the non-planing moments seems like a good idea (even if freestyle board are huge compared to speed boards).
  

So, if you happen to see me doing lightwind freestyle on my small freestyle board and looking like a fool, be patient - there is hope that at some point in the future, I may be able to do the things that better surfers like Martin or Cliff can do now. And while the water is still warm, falling a lot is really not a bad thing. The most fun-falls where the pre-loop crashes, though, which can't even be done on a big board.

ABK camp Cape Cod coming up

The ABK camp in Cape Cod is coming up - Andy Brandt and his crew will be in Hyannis on September 10-12. ABK camps are the best way to improve your windsurfing, and to have more fun on the water. I have written about the ABK camps that I have attended in Bonaire in 2009 and 2010 before, so I won't repeat what I wrote. However, I never blogged about the Cape Cod camp in Hyannis that we attended last September, so here are a few details:

Since the camp took place after Labor Day, the beach was almost empty, except for the maybe 15 campers. The camp took place at the far end of the parking lot, and we sailed in Lewis bay. The ABK team had rented a big truck, and brought salad and sandwich stuff for the lunch breaks. In the evenings, we used the truck to store our rigs, after just taking of the booms - very convenient.

For the lessons, the campers were divided into three groups, based on skill levels. Typically, we would have a theoretical walk through whatever techniques a group was working on at the beach in the morning and again after lunch, and then practice the rest of the morning and afternoon. This sometimes included simulator exercise. Here's what my lovely wife learned in the three days:

1. Day 1: waterstart. She had done some waterstarts before, but was not comfortable doing them. Sometimes, getting the rig into position would take her 10 minutes and leave her exhausted. Therefore, she sometimes did not surf when it was really windy.
   She practiced waterstarts with her group on the first day, when we had nice strong winds. She learned all the tricks needed, and got really comfortable with waterstarts. Good thing, too, since she needed them for our trips to Maui and the Gorge this year, where she often was overpowered on a 3.6 m sail.
2. Day 2: footstraps. Before the camp, Nina was surfing only in the front foot strap. She sometimes tried to get into the back strap, but it rarely worked. As a result, she was going only about half speed, and occasionally got catapulted. Even though day 2 was a light wind day, the ABK folks taught her how to get into the back foot strap on a smallish board by hanging down on the boom. The first time we went windsurfing after the camp in high winds, she was in both straps the entire time, speeding along and having a blast. I had to work really hard now to catch her...
3. Day 3: Heli tack. The heli tack is a fun and useful trick that Nina absolutely wanted to learn. She had tried it on her own a bunch of times, after looking at online videos and instructions, but with limited success. At the end of the third day of camp, she was nailing the first heli tacks, and happy as a clam about it.

At our favorite windsurfing spot in Fogland, several of the regular windsurfers have commented how much Nina has improved in the last two years. Without a doubt, these improvements are mostly due to the three ABK camps she has attended. I have noticed similar levels of improvement in a lot of other campers after even a single camp - although many ABK campers attend as many camps as possible, since each camps brings new skills and more fun.

So - what are you waiting for? Sign up for the camp at abkboardsports.com/camps/details/186! Hope to see in in Kalmus soon!

ABK Camp Bonaire 2010

We back from 8 days of windsurfing in Bonaire, with a 5-day ABK camp. Still trying to get the energy level back to normal after the typical post-vacation cold & sadness, this time worsened by coming back to a flooded basement...

The camp was, as usual, great. We knew about half of the 15 campers from previous camps, and it was nice to meet old friends and make new ones. The two days before the camp and the first 2 days of camp were low wind - barely planeable on large gear on Tuesday. The wind finally picked up on Wednesday, which was a missed blessing - instead of taking the afternoon off to recover, we went sailing all afternoon. I paid for it on Thursday and Friday, when my legs refused to do what I wanted.

For my wife, the camp was a great success. In addition to a few light wind tricks, she learned the Power Jibe. Her non-planing pivot jibe had been ok before the clinic, but she had tried starting a jibe planing only a few times. She got her first jibes the first day we could plane, and at the end of the week, she had a success rate near 100% on one side, and close to 50% on the other side. She did not quite plane through, but she usually kept at least some speed. All that on a 98 l or 107 l freestyle board (at home, she has sailed 116 l and 135 l boards). Very nice progress, thanks to the great teaching of Andy, Derek, and Brendon. Here's a video of one of her earlier jibes:



My own progress was less impressive. In light wind, I learned to do an upwind 360 with board steering (I had done some with sail steering in really light wind before, but sail steering did not work anymore when the wind picked up to almost planeable). When the wind picked up, we first worked on the flip jibe, which is well suited for the big sails we had to use. I almost got it, but just almost. In the next session, the wind had picked up a bit, so we tried carving 360s. Again, I almost got it, but always fell in the last part. To my defense, I was on a 105 l freestyle board for the first time - at home, I usually use a 120 l board with a big fat fin. Getting used to the freestyle board took a couple of hours, since my usual approach of pushing the fin to get going does not work with 22-26 cm freestyle fins. Once I got used to the freestyle boards, though, I loved them, and did not want to sail anything else (except for a 135 l SSX a couple of times when I needed a big board & sail to plane).

I sailed two freestyle board, a HiFly 105 l Twinstyle with 22 cm fins and a JP 2010 107 l with one 26 cm fin. The HiFly was my favorite, hands down. The shorter fins were great at low tide, where the JP sometimes scratched the ground. The twin-fin spinouts were also a lot softer and easier to correct than the single-fin spinouts. Why do they still make single-fin small boards? Seems like almost everything for waves now has 2 or more fins. But I preferred either board to all other boards there, as long as the wind was strong enough (18 knots) to let me plane on a 6.5 m sail. The freestyle boards are just ridiculously easy to sail, and jibe very nicely. Took me a few tries to tack them, but that eventually worked ok, too.

The last couple of days, I worked on chop hops and loop pre-exercises. According to Andy, I got the board about 2 feet up into the air on my not-so-good side, but that did not really feel like much at all. The other side felt quite a bit better. The loop pre-exercises were basically pivot jibes in the straps, first non-planing and then almost or barely planing. We discussed the various approaches to the loop at camp. Two or three windsurfers at camp had gotten injured trying to do the loop by crashing onto their equipment - injuries that took several months to heal. Andy pointed out that the pre-loop exercise from the Tricktionary promotes 2 bad habits that can actually increase the chances that you end up on your board: 1. moving the sail forward instead of towards the water on the windward side, and 2. jumping towards the front/leeward side.

With three booked windsurf trips in the next few months, hurting myself in a bad loop attempt would be extremely stupid, so I decided to stick with the safe, but slower, approaches that Andy and Remko have outlined. I did not get further than step 2 of the 4 steps, and did not yet connect the flat water hop with the pre-exercise. Part of it was lack of energy after too many borderline days. I'll have to pick it up again in better conditions in Cape Cod, Maui, Hood River, or Cabarete later this spring and summer.

Needless to say, I did not make any progress on trying Grubbies or Flakas vs. Vulcans. One thing that impressed me a lot was a slow-motion Flaka by one of the Danish blondes near the beach, though. She barely jumped the board, turning it perhaps 30 degrees, and pushed it around the rest of the way, at minimal speed. Not impressive for its fanciness, but very impressive as a move where you can't get hurt.

The one thing that I did try a couple of times was taking the front foot out of the footstrap at the beginning of the jibe. On the 79 cm wide JP SSX 135, which has the straps all the way to the outside, putting the foot into the middle seemed natural. However, it felt bad during the jibe, much less comfortable than in the strap. Perhaps because I've done hundreds or thousands of jibes with the front foot in the strap, and just a few with it out. I'll try a few more Spennie's way, but I think I'll probably stick to jibing with the front foot in the straps.

The best way to improve your windsurfing

I just came back from a week of windsurfing in Bonaire (well, it's been a week now, but due to post-holiday depression, it seems like just a day).

Just like last year, I had signed up for a week of "camp" with ABK Boardsports. This year, my wife also joined the camp. We both had a blast - ABK camps are the best way to improve your windsurfing skills, have tons of fun, and meet nice new people.

I have been windsurfing for almost 30 years now. That does not really show in my skills - I took several long breaks, each lasting 5-10 years, where I did not surf at all. I picked it up again about 8 years ago, and have taken regular windsurf vacations in Cabarete, Margarita Island, and Bonaire. At home, I usually sail in Fogland, RI, or Cape Cod. 

For most people, including me, good instruction is essential to get better. I originally learned windsurfing at the University of Konstanz, which offered beginner classes at Lake Konstanz (Bodensee), and advanced classes at Lago di Como in Italy. In the Carribean, I usually took a few hours of private lessons - never quite as many as I wanted to, because the wind would often not play along, or something else got in the way. 

So, sadly enough, my jibe was still not good after decades of windsurfing. I'd usually make it to the other side without falling in, but with more fear than fun, and mostly without speed. This started to change during my first 5-day ABK camp last year. The wind was not so great, we played with light-wind tricks about half of the course. But in the 2 or 3 days that the wind was decent, Andy Brandt and his teachers gave me enough pointers to make a dramatic difference. After a day, I started to plane through my jibes. At the end of the course, I was looking forward to my jibes, because they were fun, rather than just taking them as a necessary hassle when it was time to turn around.

How did Andy fix what many previous private lessons, countless "clinic" presentations, and endless hours of practice on my own had failed? Of course, Andy or his instructors did illustrate jibe in theoretical lessons on the beach. But I think what really made the difference were just a few things:

• great feedback,
• focussing on just one thing at a time on the water, and
• consistency
  

2008: My first ABK camp

Bonaire is one of the best spots to learn to jibe (or to jibe better), because the water is just knee- to hip deep. If you fall off, you just beach start and try again. If the wind is marginal and cruising back up against the wind is difficult, you can simply walk. And the instructors can just stand at one point, let you jibe around them, and then tell you what you should change.

So, after my first couple of jibes, Andy called me over and (after telling me what parts I did well) told me to change just one thing. I did what he said, and - surprise! - things got a lot better. Then he'd call me over again, and tell me the next thing to focus on. The big things last year were to let the sail pull me up, into an upright balanced stance, and to do things slower. After I did both of these things, I planed through my jibes, even though the wind was just marginal. More importantly, I had a lot more fun in jibing. Being pulled into an upright stance, and then just coasting through the turn with no sail pressure, gave a totally new feeling of speed and control. 

All fine and good if things work in Bonaire on relatively big boards - but how did that improve my skills under different conditions back home? The real test came a couple of months later when I had a rare chance to sail my 96 liter JP board in 25-35 mph wind. I use this board just a few days every year - usually, I am on 120-200 l boards and huge sails to get planing in marginal conditions. Well, this day was much windier than usual, creating a lot of sharp, step chop even in Fogland's protected cove - but I discovered that I managed to complete most jibes even on the small equipment. The last time I had sailed small boards before the ABK camp, falling during jibes was virtually certain. Great!

The rest of the summer of 2008 was not so great, with just a few days of decent wind, so I did not get much practice. 

2009: My second ABK camp

When we arrived in Bonaire at the beginning of March 2009, we were greated by great conditions - 25-30 mph winds and (of course) plenty of sun. The wind turned out to be a bit too great for me - after just 2 hours of sleep during the overnight flight to Bonaire, and a 5 months break from windsurfing, the first day was more fight than fun. I was glad that I actually made it though one jibe - and that one was not very pretty.

The wind was a bit less the next day, and I did a bit better - but I still thought I had forgotten everything I had learned last year. When class began the next day, I discovered I was wrong. I just needed a few corrections to get back to good success rates. The first one was subtle - the position of the front foot after changing the feet. My foot had pointed too much to the outside, and not enough to the front. That was something I probably had done wrong before, but nobody had ever pointed out. Fix it, and - voila - much improved jibes. A couple more minor adjustments, and things were looking good again.

The next day, Andy started working on really improving my jibes. The goal was a nicely oversheeted laydown jibe. I needed to learn to push down on the boom after standing up, and pushing the sail behind me. I had to work on that a bit - I tend to cork my body when I oversheet. But in the end, my jibes looked pretty good on the videos we took in the afternoon.

On to the next goal: duck jibes.

We started on planing duck jibes after half a day of low wind, where we practiced low wind duck jibes, switch stance jibes, and a few more jibe variations. When the wind picked up and we switched to high wind gear, my second attempt to do a planing duck jibe (with a 7.5 m sail) worked. So did two more attempts in the next few tries. Then, when we started to work on making it better, I started thinking about how to do the jibe - and things fell apart (or rather, I fell a lot). For a few hours, I practiced the many different ways to fall when a duck jibe goes wrong, with a lot of high-speed falls. All good fun :) After working my way through falling in the different parts, I got pretty close to completing it again when Andy decided we deserved a break. He taught us the "fall jibe" - a practical way to turn on the spot that's pretty close to a jump jibe and a slam jibe. I did not care for the light wind version, but I love the planing fall jibe. Finally, a jibe where you are not only allowed to fall - you are expected to fall! That one was designed for me. I had a very good success rate right away, although my clew first waterstarts sucked at first. With a few hours of practice, they got better, and once again, I looked pretty good on the movies in the evening. Only when I looked at my GPS recordings for the afternoon did I discover a slight disadvantage of the fall jibe - stopping the board and falling in kills your speed :-)

So, I learned a lot in 5 days of camp: my planing jibe improved quite a bit; the duck jibe is almost there; and I learned the fall jibe, which is really handy in crowded situations, or when you need to jibe without loosing too much ground, or if you just need to cool off on a hot summer day. This seems to be the first step towards tricks like the vulcan, too - I see a lot of falls & fun in my windsurfing future. I learned a few more tricks for light-wind days, too, so I'll have fun on those typical summer days where the wind is not arriving as promised. 

What really underscored how great ABK camps, though, are was the progress I saw others make. Case in point: my wife. She participated in the camp for the first time this year. She's been windsurfing for more than a decade, but usually just a week or two in the summer, which means little progress (she got a bit more practice once we started dating a few years ago). Before camp, she used the harness, and got into the front footstrap - but just "kind of", always holding back quite a bit. In camp, she became comfortable with using the harness and both foot straps, and ended up going really fast - there were several times I could not catch her, which is great. She also learned the low-wind pivot jibe, and started to work on the planing jibe. Great progress for one week. And remember that all these skills translate to more fun on the water.

Last year, when she did not take the class, she also made some progress, but a lot less. She started the camp being skeptical, but ended up looking forward to the next camp. No surprise most surfers in camp are repeaters.

Many others in camp made impressive progress, too. Several surfers in the group I was in went from so-so jibes to nice planing jibes in a week. Most impressive were the two absolute beginners. The wind was to strong to be ideal for beginners - we were in high-wind mode 7 of the 9 half-days of class. So, what did the beginners do? The went from standing on a windsurf board the first time straight to beach starts, waterstarts, and using the harness the first time. Sometimes you see people who are great in other sports progress really fast, like competition skateboarders or world-class kayakers. But neither of our two newbies was that much into sports, so their progress really speaks to the quality of the teaching.

As I said above, one reason why the teaching was so great is consistency. There usually are 4-6 instructors out on the water. If you sail close to anyone of them and they notice something, they'll tell you what you need to do to improve. Typically, it does not matter who it is - if you have a hard time getting something, you may hear the same suggestion from 2 or 3 different instructors. At least when it comes to the planing jibe, they will all teach and demonstrate the move exactly the same way. That's rather amazing; in previous jibe lectures, different instructors would always emphasize rather different points.

Finally, a funny story from camp. One participant (Paul) had brought along a GPS, and threw down a challenge one day. He had given his GPS to another participant (Anthony) in the morning, and Anthony had clocked a high speed of 45 kmh. Paul did not get close to this speed that day (although he had reached 49 kmh a few days before, when it was windier). He gave me the GPS saying " you have to beat 45 kmh". I tried my best, but just got up to 44 kmh. To my excuse, the wind had gone down a bit from the morning, and kept going down, like it typically does in Bonaire. After I came back, the challenge passed to Andy. He has quite a bit of racing background in his 30-year windsurfing career, and had demonstrated that he could pump a 100 liter board onto a plane with a 5.7 m sail when others had problems planing on 138 liters with 8.0 sails. He looked great coming in, but the GPS was merciless: only 42 kmh! That gave a lot of laughs during the video review in the evening, helped by Matt's funny comments ("hit a sandbar, hit a sandbar!"). Of course, Andy managed to reach 42 kmh in conditions where most surfers out there were not planing anymore.. and the jibes he laid down during his attempt were just gorgeous. I swear he can sail out of a jibe faster than he went in!

So, I'm looking forward to warmer days to practice what I've learned, and to my next ABK camp. If you want to improve your windsurfing skills, or learn windsurfing, sign up! Maybe I'll see you in Bonaire next year. Until then, check out a few YouTube videos of Andy Brandt (and others):

• In light wind (check out the sailing on the back of the board near the end!)
• In high wind