Windsurfing Nirvana

Windsurfing nirvana. That's what Bart said after sailing in Duxbury Bay for the first time. His words, not mine. He continued to write "I wish I had known/sailed this place before". Alex, who also sailed in Duxbury Bay for the first time yesterday, wrote "Gene and I both had an absolute blast". 

Ok, I liked it too. No big surprise for me, since I have had many great sessions in Duxbury. But before you all get excited, let me put things into perspective. Check my GPS tracks from yesterday:

Did you notice that runs are 3 miles (almost 5 kilometers) long? Most windsurfers I know would die of boredom halfway through the run. So sue me, but my idea of fun is a bit different. Maybe I had a good reason to like the long runs. I was aiming to get a good 1-hour average speed for the GPS Team Challenge. My jibes are currently a bit broken - not wet, but rarely planed through. So I needed long runs with few jibes to get a good average. If came out reasonably well - 20.78 knots, a new personal best. For me, that's fast. 

But Dean also showed up. He has the annoying habit of sailing 3-5 knots faster than I do, even if we are on very similar gear. He set a new personal best for the hour, to, at 23.1 knots. But that's great - at least for a little while, the Fogland Speedsurfers have the #1 ranking in the 1 hour category for the month. Only 23 teams have posted sessions so far, and we will probably slide down a few spots before the end of the month, but for now it's great.

Another thing that can be great in Duxbury Bay is that the outer sandbar minimizes the chop. In the area where we were sailing, the chop ranged from a few inches to a foot or so, and it was quite orderly. Here's a short movie just to show the conditions:

I was on a 6.0 m sail and a 96 l board. I later switched to my 90 l slalom board to go a bit faster.

A lot of windsurfers I know probably fell asleep trying to watch the video - no waves, not even decent chop. What can I say - Duxbury Bay is for flat water lovers! Well, at least the part closer to the outer sandbar is, when the wind is NE-ENE. The one time that I ventured closer to the main land, about a mile away from the sandbar, I found some sizable chop that could compare to Kalmus on a typical SW day. There's even a launch there, close to the harbor, for those who love chop. But I like my water flat.

If you also like flat water and consider checking out Duxbury, let me give you a few warnings. The "nirvana" conditions that we had yesterday happen only if the wind direction is just right, between NE and ENE (it was 50-55º yesterday). In NNE wind, the bay on the south side of Powder Point Bridge can be much less pleasant. Then, the bridge throws a surprisingly long wind shadow, so you'd have to sail away from it. And while the chop lines up nicely parallel to a beam reaches in NE-ENE, you will head straight into it in N-NE wind directions. We're talking about short, steep chop here - no fun at all!

So in more northerly wind directions, the smaller part of the bay on the north side of the bridge is better for sailing. But for the north side, you really need to watch the tide levels. At water levels below 4 feet, many parts of the northern bay are too shallow for windsurfing. I proved that repeatedly by running aground at full speed a few years ago; fortunately, the only thing that broke was a boom. Even at intermediate tides, the marsh islands stick out of the water and disturb the wind, making it quite gusty. Later, near high tide, the same islands are fully covered by water, which can make normal fins dangerous. But freestylers with mini-fins and kiters love it.  Finally, when the high tide goes down, the current can get strong - I and others have been swept under the bridge when falling close to it, and the wind near the bridge was not strong enough to waterstart. Not a big problem with a windsurfer, but kites can get stuck. Also, as we get later into the fall, the outgoing tide will flush out a lot of dead reads, which can stop you dead in your tracks even with a weed fin. That gets better towards low tide, but keep in mind that most of Duxbury Bay can become unsailable if the tide drops to very low levels. The nominal water depth even on the south side is often just 1-2 feet, and spring tides (near full or new moon) can drop the water level to -2 feet.

But when the conditions are just right, the northern part of the bay can be a lot of fun in N-NNE wind. Here are some GPS tracks from last Thursday:

The little grass island in the middle create some perfectly flat water just behind it that is good for some short speed runs when the water level is just right. It let me finally reach 31 knots again, for the first time in almost 2 years! Fun! A short trip to the southern part of the bay, however, was misguided - very gusty winds and nasty chop drove me back to the northern part right away. Nina was smarter and stayed on the north side, playing with freestyle and having a blast.

The windiest day of the 4-day nor'easter was last Friday, but we decided to stay inside - too much rain! Our bodies also wanted a little break before two more days of sailing. On Saturday, we went to Orleans for a speed session with Dean, Alex, and Gene. The wind was a bit lighter and gustier than expected, but still fun on 4.2-6.2 m sails. The 6.2 was Dean's sail, who set a new personal best for the spot with 35.94 knots. In most months, we count our rankings by how far away from the bottom we are - 5th from the bottom counts as a good result. But together with yesterday's numbers, the Saturday session put us into the top half of the monthly ranking (9th of 23 teams). Four different team members contributed - Dean, Al, Bart, and Peter. Great to see three of the fast guys on the team sailing at the same time! For the rest of the month, I plan ignore the GPS TC rankings, since we'll only get pushed down as the other teams get good conditions. Unless, of course, we get another nor'easter - I bet that Dean and Bart can improve their nautical mile numbers for the month by a few knots!

Going for distance

Yesterday was a great day for windsurfing in Duxbury Bay. I have rarely seen more windsurfers in Duxbury before - we had speed surfers (Dani, Sabah, Fred, and I), ABK alumni and trick surfers (Nina, Martin, Graham, Jeff, Jonathen, and Jeynaba), and quite a few folks that I did not know, including beginners, folks working on getting into the straps, and several advanced windsurfers. Nice showing!

The one thing that did not show quite as I had hoped for was the wind:

Averages remained between 16 and 18 mph for most of the day, and gusts remained below 22 mph. A bit low for the trick surfers, who often had to schlog or pump - but enough for the speed surfers on big boards and big sails.

Here are Sabah's GPS tracks from yesterday:

Sabah started out a 7.5 m sail and a 122 l board, and was a bit underpowered. He also had problems with  seaweed and seagrass, which slowed him down a bit from time to time. Even so, he got a top speed that was about 30% higher than the wind speed, and sailed a total of 74.2 km (46 miles). Sabah set 3 personal bests for 1 hour (11.35 kn), nautical mile (19.38 kn), and total distance. On almost any other day, that would have scored on the GPS Team Challenge - but not yesterday.

Fred also went out on a 7.5, and was underpowered a bit- but that did not keep him from setting personal bests for the nautical mile (20.28 kn) and total distance (44 km). He "only" sailed 2 1/2 hours, while the other speed surfers sailed for 5 to 6 1/2 hours.

Dani was on fire yesterday, planing all the time. His low weight was a huge advantage in the light winds, and his fast board and (relative to his weight) big sails certainly did not hurt. Here are Dani's tracks:

Despite some problems with seaweeds, Dani set personal bests for 1 hour (12.37 kn), nautical mile (20.48 kn), and distance (96.73 km). Every single time I saw Dani on the water, there was a huge smile on his face. Gotta love the attitude!

Nina refuses to even think about speed while the water is still warm, and worked a bit on vulcans and other tricks. The wind was a bit low for her 5.3, but at least she had other trick surfers to keep her company, including Martin and Graham. Last fall, Nina and I often were the only windsurfers in Duxbury.

I was on a mission yesterday, so when I saw that the wind was a bit lower than I had promised, I rigged my 8.5 m V8 sail onto my new Aeron V-grip boom and hit the water at noon. The wind direction was perfect for crossing the entire bay length-wise - that's about 5 km (3 miles) each way. On my first run, I snagged up some seagrass, so I went back in to switch to the my Select Weed Eliminator L fin. That turned out to be a mistake - the fin was just to small for the marginal conditions, and I had a really hard time going upwind without falling off the plane. It took me an hour and many tacks just to get back were I had started.

While switching back to the 44 cm slalom fin, I chatted a bit with some of the new arrivals, but soon was back on the water. I had a good idea now where the seagrass was in the water - it was mostly limited to one stretch in the middle of the bay. Finally being able to kick the fin again felt so good! After another hour on the water, I finally needed to eat something. When I checked the trip meter on shore, I saw that I had sailed 93 km already - and it was only 3:35 pm, with the wind just picking up a bit! So I went back out for another 90 minute sessions, which was enough time for 4 complete and 2 partial bay crossings. By now, it was 5:30 pm, and I was starting to get just a bit tired. My hands also started to hurt a bit, mostly because this was my first time sailing the V-grip boom, and different parts of my fingers made contact than on my other boom. But back at shore, I saw that I was only about 10 or 15 miles away from sailing 100 miles - so back onto the water it was!

I just did 2 1/2 more crossings, and then stopped so that I could use the remaining daylight to derig and load the trailer. Here are my tracks for the day:

Overall, I spend 5 hours and 20 minutes on the water, with an additional hour of breaks in between. My average speed was mostly around 20 mph, with just a few minutes of schlogging, and a few faster downwind runs for fun. I set new personal bests for 1 hour (17.92 kn) and total distance (163.51 km). That's more than 100 miles, and 52 km more than my previous best. Together with Dani's 1 hour and distance, we pushed the Fogland Speed Surfers up a few ranks in the GPS Team Challenge rankings, and got into the top 10 for the distance ranking (albeit only for a day - we're down to #11 today).

It was great to see so many friends in Duxbury yesterday. Everyone I talked to who sailed there for the first or second time loved it, despite the somewhat light wind. I really appreciate the efforts of the team mates on the water yesterday - seeing Dani, Jeff, and Graham sailing late really helped to push through the last few crossings. This was great fun, and we should do this again soon - maybe with a bit more wind! Maybe we get lucky and get real northeast wind next time, like mid-20s gusting to low 30s. The water would still be wicked flat, and we could work on short distance, nautical mile, and alpha.

One day later, I'm very happy with yesterday's effort. I pushed myself further than I had before, and had a blast doing so. Ok, walking up the stairs yesterday evening was a bit slow, but with all the Maui training, my body has learned to recover quickly, and I could definitely go for a repeat tomorrow if the wind played along (and there was not this thing called work which keeps me from windsurfing every now and then). It's been a big ego booster when the friendly folks at the GPS Team Challenge site pointed out that I now hold the US record for distance traveled on the site. So ok, there are only 13 windsurfers from the US registered, but that includes a few wicked fast guys: Roo, who's hit 40 knots in the Gorge and helped develop the GT-31; Dean, who's hit 36 knots in Hatteras, after sailing out to the reef for a couple of miles; and Boro, who holds the top spots for 1 hour, alpha, and the nautical mile (with 30.72 knots - I have yet to hit that speed for 2 seconds!).  The international rankings illustrate that the US is not exactly a hot-spot for speed surfing (yet): there, my 163.51 km put me on the 95th spot. Not that I am unhappy with that ranking - but I got 5 more disciplines where I need to climb up the ladder :)

Duxbury in northeast winds

The fall winds are finally arriving - here is the wind forecast for Duxbury for Sunday September 18, 2011:

Perhaps the numbers do not look very exciting - unless you consider this:

• The predicted wind direction is northeast.
• In northeast winds, the last obstruction that the wind saw was in Nova Scotia, Canada - that's a clean fetch of 250 miles!
• Computer models usually underestimate NE winds in Duxbury - winds are often at least 5 mph stronger than forecast.
• With the long clear fetch, NE winds in Duxbury tend to be very steady.
• Duxbury bay is separated from the ocean by a small strip of sand that barely obstructs the wind, which creates very flat water.
• Duxbury bay is 3 miles long, and the entire length is protected by the sand strip - making it the perfect place for long distance speedsurfing.

Here are GPS tracks from a similar setup last year (9/26/2010):

I set my personal best for 1 hour that day (17.4 knots), even though the wind averages were only 20-22 mph:

My top speed for the day was not great, but I was on a freeride board (Mistral Screamer 116) and a non-cambered sail (Matrix 7.0) that was a bit small for top speed. Gonzalo, who was on a Ray 115 and a 7.5 m race sail, passed me all the time at will, and was probably going 20% faster than I was.

So, flatwater lovers and Fogland Speed Surfers: come to Duxbury tomorrow, Sunday 9/18! Lets set some personal records for long distance and alphas! The other US speedsurfing team, the Speedsters, have just passed us in the monthly ranking. We need only small improvements in the 1 hour averages and alphas to pull even! In the international ranking, we are ranked 46 of 50 teams for the month - it should be pretty easy to move up a few spots! For once, the tides in Duxbury are good, with a low tide of 1.6 ft at 10 am - meaning we can sail all day! I am hoping to get some serious distance tomorrow! Ok, maybe I am fighting a cold right now, but I am sure it will be mostly gone tomorrow, and I should be able to get at least 3 or 4 hours of sailing in. Last year, I sailed 86 km in 3 hours. With better gear (and better jibes) this year, I'll be shooting to break my personal best for distance (111.8 km). I sure hope another Fogland Speed Surfer will back me up so that it counts!

Below is a map that shows the public parking lot just before the Powder Point Bridge where we will launch. Hope to see you tomorrow!

View Duxbury public parking lot in a larger map. If you need directions, use "400 Powder Point Ave, Duxbury, MA" as the target.

Duxbury in ESE

Some of my best flatwater sessions were in Duxbury during easterly winds. Typically, windspeeds were about 5 mph above the forecast, so when the forecast for today called for ESE in the low 20s, I was hopeful. Dean, the fastest of the Fogland Speed Surfers, just got a new Falcon 111, and the forecast for Avon also looked good, so I was hoping to get some nice speed runs.

When we decided where to go this morning, the wind was better and more steady in Duxbury than on Cape Cod, so it was an easy choice. When we got to Duxbury, we were greeted with white caps and gently rolling chop. With my KA Koncept still waiting for a new batten, I rigged my 7.0 Matrix, which handled 30 mph winds with ease. That also meant I had to take my Skate 110, since my 82 l board does not work well with such a large sail. Not ideal for speed, but I was hoping for some nice flat water at the far side. Windsurfers have to be optimistic ... here's the GPS tracks for the day:

 

The map is shown so that the wind was coming from the top. So the angle between the sand bar on the left and the wind was steeper than I expected, meaning too much chop for good speed. I tacked up about 2.5 km, but did not find the chitter-chatter flat water I had hoped for. Instead, the further I got up towards the top-left, the less friendly the chop became: at the end, there were steep, maybe one foot high wind-waves, separated by less than 10 feet. On the wide freestyle board, that was just a bit too harsh for speed runs. Indeed, I got my best speed in the middle of the bay, where the wind-driven waves were higher, but further apart, and large enough to have some fun with (although the Skate showed that it was clearly not made for wave play).

The tracks also show that the angle to the wind while tacking was very poor, and got worse the higher up I had tacked. The reason is simple: trying to sail upwind in one direction (to the right), I was hitting the chop at almost a right angle. That would have been a blast for jumping, but when trying to keep the board on the water to make speed upwind, it was no fun at all, so I reduced the angle until I could have some fun. Eventually, I gave up on my quest for flat water, and had a couple of fun downwind runs back to the car. By then, the tide was getting low, and Nina had already stopped sailing an hour earlier after she discovered a small rip in her favorite sail, so I called it a day. The only halfway decent speed I got was a 21.46 knots nautical mile on the way back.

So - what had gone wrong? I went back to my sessions database and looked up the previous sessions that I had remembered as east wind sessions in Duxbury, in particular the one where Gonzalo had kicked my butt on his Fanatic Ray and North race sail. In that session, my mile and hour averages had been higher than today, even though the wind was a few miles lower. However, the wind direction was ENE, not E, as I remembered. Even a pure east wind (90º) should have given some nice flat water, but the 110º ESE wind we had today created bump & jump conditions rather than speed slicks. Well, next time I'll know, use a smaller sail, and have a different kind of fun. 

 --

After we got back home, I noticed that the wind in West Dennis had picked up in the afternoon, with 35 mph averages and 42 mph gusts between 4 and 6:30 pm. Low tide was at 5 pm, and it was -0.3 ft, meaning really flat water. Looks like I missed a great opportunity to try the new (to me) GPS 5.0 sail...

Redemption

The day after I wrote about a couple of bad days in Duxbury, the bay redeemed itself with some great wind. Today's winds were in the 30s, a bit more easterly and steadier. I was nicely overpowered on a 5.0, Nina with her 3.7. Just love our North Ice sails - they handle very well when overpowered. Even though I felt a bit out of control most of the time, I set new personal bests for 1 and 2 seconds, with 33.4 mph. Just a tad above my previous best, but every little bit counts :)

Temperatures were a few degrees lower than yesterday, and the stronger wind made it feel a lot colder. Nevertheless, I was pretty comfortable the entire time, largely because of two small modifications:

1. A short-sleeve neoprene shirt under my 5/4 semi-dry suit. Much better blood circulation in the lower arms than with a long-sleeve shirt, and plenty of warmth.
2. I wore cheap, yellow latex kitchen gloves under my open-palm neoprene mittens, so my hands stayed nice and warm the entire time. The kitchen gloves were thin, but kept the water away from my skin, which made a big difference. Here's a picture:

Another thing that helped a lot today was that we parked and started at the ocean side of Powderpoint Bridge. The harbor master drove by a number of times, but we did not get a ticket, so I guess it's probably ok to park there after labor day, at least when the lot is almost empty. We stayed at the north side of the bay, and got a mix of nice flat water and well-formed small swell, nice!

The forecast for tomorrow is NE 25 mph. Since NE winds in Duxbury get a clearer fetch than N winds, they are typically steadier, and often ~5 miles higher than the forecast. Should be a great day for sailing in the south side of the bay, with some bump & jump in the middle and some nice long speed runs on the ocean side of the bay.

Bad Dux!

I've written several times about great sessions in Duxbury, so I guess I should write about two not-so-great sessions, too. One was today, the other one two days ago, on Sunday.

Sunday was cloudy, with air temps around 43F (6 C). By the time we made it out there, the wind and the tide were both going down. As a result, we were underpowered most of the time. The tide was pretty extreme, so tidal currents were unusually strong, and Nina, Fred and I all got swept under the bridge at least once. Scary the first time it happens, but no big deal, the pillars are far enough apart. Worst thing is that we ended up in the wind shadow of the bridge, but we were on large enough boards to uphaul. Very gusty winds, but still being underpowered most of the time with a 5.5, I spend a lot of time in the water, and ended up getting cold in my 5/4 semi dry suit.

Today's session had decent north winds, ranging from 16 to about 35 mph. Pretty gusty, but not really bad. Even though it was warmer than Sunday, with temps near 50, I decided to wear a long sleeve neoprene shirt under my suit. I soon regretted that - blood circulation in my lower arms ended up being so poor that my hands and arms got tired almost immediately.

Wind averages were near 30 when we started, so I tried to sail my F2 Missile with the 5.8 KA Koncept sail. Would have been nice, except that we started from the public parking lot at the land side of bridge. Once again, the wind quality near shore was too bad to get going, so I switched to a larger board. Still not happy, we went from the north side to the south side, were I finally had a few good runs. With barely usable hands, I really did not like having to waterstart a cambered sail, though.

Eventually, after switching to my Skate 110 because the winds went down even more, the water was filled with reeds that the high tide had collected on shore, and the outgoing tide was now pulling towards the bay inlet. Reads in the water were perfectly lined up for efficient collection, so that I had no chance of planing anymore, despite a weed fin that has so far worked very well - with weeds, not reeds that are (a) much longer, and (b) light than water, and hard to push under water. Even Nina, with a shorter weed fin, started having a hard time planing, despite enough wind for her 4.2 sail.

Lessons learned:

1. Don't sail Duxbury bay this time of the year when the tide is very high, and outgoing. Things were fine 30 minutes after high tide, but basically unsailable about one hour later. Things probably got better again later, but I did not stick around to check.
   
2. Get a dry suit. Nina was perfectly comfortable in her O'Neill breathable dry suit, whether on the water, in the water, or on land. I was warm while windsurfing, still got cold on land after a few minutes, and my lower arms were really hurting from the two constricting layers of neoprene.

But tomorrow is another day. Wind forecast looks better than today, we plan to sail before the high tide, and I'll try using a short-sleeved neoprene shirt under the semi dry suit to see if that keeps me warm without killing blood circulation in my arms.

I love Duxbury!

One great thing about the Boston area is that we have many excellent windsurf spots to pick from. Kalmus and West Dennis on the Cape are favorites, but in the spring and summer, I usually prefer Fogland - the winds are often almost as good, sometimes even better, you have a choice between the river and the shallow and flat bay, and the people there are great. Yes, there are very nice people at other places, too, but Fogland somehow lends itself to being more social than the other places.

But when fall approaches and the winds tend to come from the north or northeast, Duxbury becomes my favorite spot. N and NE winds are typically very steady there, often with averages that are higher than at most other spots. Just look at today's wind:

The range today was between 19 and 28, or 17 and 26 - not bad. On the best days, I have seen lulls of 27, with gusts of 33 - that's incredible steady, at least for around here. For comparison, here are the readings for Kalmus:

Gusts were a lot higher, averages sometimes a bit higher, lulls lower - the range was from 15 to 40. The sensor readings from Fogland were even gustier:


Ok, in both Kalmus and Fogland, there are spots where the wind will be a bit steadier than the sensor shows - but not as even as in Duxbury.

For speedsurfing, Duxbury also has several spots where the water is really flat. NE winds are better for sailing south of the Powderpoint bridge, where mile-long speed runs are possible. In N winds as today, the North side has some very flat spots behind some small islands. The flat area is barely long enough for 10 second runs, but the chop behind it is still pretty small. Here's a short video that shows the north side at low tide:



Speaking of tides - before heading out to Duxbury, make sure to check the tides. Within 1-2 hours of low tide, both sides can become unsailable, depending on how low exactly the tide is.

Duxbury has one more disadvantage to remember: non-residents can park & launch only on the land side of the Powderpoint bridge without risking an expensive ticket, even after Labor day. However, the is quite a bit of wind shadow on this side which can make launching on small gear challenging. Today, there were three windsurfers who had a lot of fun blasting around, and one poor fellow who came late, close to low tide, when the north side had become unsailable. The south side was still ok, but the wind shadow from the bridge in N winds like today is nasty, and he never made it out into the clear wind before he gave up.

I had a similar problem when I tried to sail my F2 Missile. The boards a bit small for me - 62 liters don't carry my 90 kg, plus rig. The wind near shore was too weak to get me planing, and the wind direction did not allow me to go downwind from the launch site. For fun, I stood on the board once, and sank until the water was past my hips. Nina tried, too, and for her, the board just barely sinks, but she also did not get going on it because the wind direction forced her to go upwind right away. There'll be another day with more wind and a slightly different direction.

So, if you're going to Duxbury and you're not great at sailing your sinker while sinking/schlogging, think about bringing a slightly bigger board and/or sail. In N or NE winds, it's flat enough for bigger boards, anyway. Hope to see you in Duxbury next time!

Three Great Days at Duxbury

I windsurfed each of the last 3 days in Duxbury - great days with wind averages from 20 to 25 knots. I ended with improved jibes and tacks, three new personal bests for speed, and a broken boom tail end.

Wednesday, 11/11/09: Jibes, tacks, gloves
We had the day off because of Veteran's Day. The forecast called for N to NE winds, so we decided to go to Duxbury in the morning. Only problem were the tides - low tide at 12:30, so we had to get up at 7:30. It was rather chilly at the beach - about 7 degrees Celsius, with wind in the upper twenties (mph). It was almost 11 before we actually started surfing. We chose the north side of Powder Point bridge, and water was getting pretty low. We ended up running aground a few times, and having to wade through muck - juck! However, the wind was just perfect: averages around 27, lulls of 23, gusts of 32. Rarely, if ever, did I surf more constant wind.

I started working on flipping my sail earlier in my jibes. I had thought a bit why I slowed down so much during my jibes (even when planing through), and the late sail flip seemed the most likely culprit. I remembered a clinic in Margarita, where the Tom Mastbaum stated that an earlier sail flip made the biggest different. I tried it, and it worked - I was quite amazed how much more speed I was able to carry through the turn. GPS analysis showed that I got the best jibe score ever on the 120l Nova (52%), and in my best jibe, the minimum speed was 23 kmh - a nice improvement. The strong wind certainly helped. Looking at the GPS tracks, you can see that the jibe entry was nice and smooth, but that there is room for improvement after the sail flip. Still, I had a lots of fun. I also improved my alpha racing personal best by10% in the run with the best jibe - without even focusing on speed.

As the water was getting lower, I found that I had to tack on the bridge side to avoid the shallows. My planing tacks on big boards like my Techno 293 are good, but I often had problems on the 120l board. But I remembered by ABK lessons from last year, and switched sides while still fully planing. So much easier - no more problems with nose or tail dives! I ended up with a close to 100% success rate on the tacks.

We had to stop after one hour, because the water levels where getting to low; we could actually see the ground for about half of the bay. As I was sailing back towards the bridge, at a distance from the shore that I thought was safe. Going about 40 kmh and just getting ready to slow down, the board suddenly ran aground and stopped, while I kept going. My wife was watching and said it looked pretty dramatic - I thought it was a lot of fun. The landing was soft, and for once, I was glad abou the muck. Water depth was just 4 inches where I had landed. Time to go home.

My wife had run aground a bunch more times, so she did not have as much fun, and said maybe that would be the last time surfing for her this year. She had tried out her modifications to the Neil Pryde gloves: she had cut out the Neoprene on the inner side of the fingers on one hand, and on the fingers and the palm on the other hand. This was based on a recent visit at Inland Sea, where we had seen palmless gloves, and chatted about them with Phil. I had also seen a post on the iWindsurf forum, describing the same idea. Worked beautifully; while she had barely been able to hold the boom and mast before in these gloves, she had no problem at all now.


Thursday, 11/12/09: Long distance speed
Another day that looked great in the forecast. Winds were blowing above 20 when I got up at 6, so when I dropped my daughter off at the commuter rail, I had the trailer hooked up, and was at Duxbury at 7:30 am. The wind came from a more easterly direction, so I sailed on the south side of the bridge, close to the far shore, where the water is nice and calm. I was fully powered on my 7.0 Matrix, but the wind was clearly below 30. Since the south side of Duxbury bay allows for long runs, I decided to go for long-distance personal speed records - nautical mile and 1 hour. My first 10 or so jibes were dry and ok, but then I started getting too many spinouts. I figured I had caught some grass and decided to tack to get rid of it. I got rid of the grass, but lost the rhythm, and fell during the next jibe. Still, I improved both my nautical mile and 1-hour personal bests. The one hour average went up from 27 to 33 kmh, which improved my ranking on GPS speedsurfing from about 800 to about 400 (of ~1700 sailors) - nice. Only drawback was that I was sailing alone - my wife had a belt test the next day, and did not want to be sore.


Friday, 11/13/09: Boom!
Winds were in the upper 20s again, and northeasterly. I started later, staying on the south side again. This time, I rigged a North Natural 6.2. Had not sailed this sail much, and needed a while to adjust the harness lines. Tried to go for short distance speed records, the wind was certainly good enough. My best average is about 46 kmh (average of five 10-second runs). I had a hard time getting faster than 47 kmh, though, and ended up with a 1 sec max of 49.68. The wind certainly would have permitted more, the water was flat - this seems to be close to the max for the 120l Nova (the best 1 sec speed I got on this board was just above 50). I had been thinking about using my wife's Mistral Screamer 116, which can go quite a bit faster. But the first time I used this board, I dinged it, which made here rather unhappy; and since it was Friday the 13th, I decided to stick to my old Nova.
For the first time in these 3 days, I saw other windsurfers on the water, coming from the far end of the bay. I decided to check it out, and sailed all the way over there - a nice 5 km run.

After about an hour, I decided to go to the North side of the bridge. After just a few runs, I ran aground in a region I though was much deeper. The board first slowed down for a few meters, then stopped completely. Getting up from the resulting fall, I discovered that the tail end of the Chinook triple clamp aluminum boom was completely bent. I had used it at close to the maximum length, but the fall had not really been that hard. Oh well - at least I broke the least expensive part of the equipment.

Looking at the GPS record, I discovered that I had improved my best for the nautical mile to 43.48 kmh - not bad for a board that seems to max out at 50. I improved a couple of hundred spots on GPS speedsurfing, but I'm still a lot further back than for 1-hour averages.
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Three great days at Duxbury. Hard to understand why so few other windsurfers were out, especially on Veterans day. Learned to love my Gaastra Matrix 7.0 even more - had more fun with it on Wednesday then on the North Natural 6.2 on Friday, with very similar wind.

I started thinking about new boards. Andy Brandt said it's time for a freestyle board to start new style tricks. I'd also be interested in something faster than my trusty old Nova 120. Looked a bit for dedicated speed boards, but they seem to be hard to come by in the US. After paying for a gold membership on GPS speedsurfing and doing some searches by board brand, I discovered that I should be able to go faster on three of the boards we have. Both the AHD and the Mistral Screamer have been clocked at 60 kmh top speeds, and JP Freestyle Wave boards in the 90l range have been clocked at around 65 kmh. Looks like I picked the wrong board on Friday!

Last year, I stopped windsurfing in October, and still remember being cold the last couple of times I went. This year, after a modest investment in a better wetsuit and a few other things, I was comfortably warm while windsurfing in October and November. I think this really helps getting better. This time of the year, I only go when the wind is likely to be great, which happens often enough. That means smaller sails and smaller boards - I don't even consider using my largest sail or board, which I usually have to sail in the summer to get going. With all the practice, I have become quite comfortable on the smaller board. I may end a day thinking that my jibes stunk - but they usually were dry > 90% of the time, and the jibe scores on a "bad" day are still better than the scores I got on the same board during the summer. Can't wait to play around in Tobago and Bonaire again, where the warm shallow waters encourage risk taking. We just signed up for an ABK camp in Bonaire early next year - hope to see you there!