autumn catch up

Finally! A few minutes to post some news.
Hope everyone scores decent wind this weekend around UK. I put off having an awkward wisdom tooth out twice to go away sailing, so am now forced into a weekend just chilling for a change, bagga!

here's what i've been upto:

Training.
Look out for upcoming Windsurf International magazine. Dan Cossins, of Body Development in Bath, and I are running a strength series. I've been training hard when i can and it's been great working with someone at the top of their field to make it as effective as possible.





Marazion stunt fest last weekend! Always nice to get down at the weekend on a big forecast and sail with the boys! (Even if it did mean lesson planning fri and sat night! Fully knackering every day of every week!) Some sun sunday made up for truly horrible weather and light all saturday, scuppering some would-be-excellent action shots from Splashography.




Strong side/side-on with no where to hide from mast+half to 2x mast high N coast was a stunning sight, but frustratingly a no go. Would have been 10seconds adrenaline for an hour of punishment, or worse...



Cornwall Classic. Handily for me slotting into half term week many of us got some good freesailing and stunning clean head high surf in the days leading upto the event. Giwthian and particularly Godrevy provided the goods for a more-than-worthy contest which finished off the 4 nations year. The tour had seen the best conditions ever and the top guys battled it out all the way to the finish...

photo: JC /boardseeker


Boardseekermag.com as ever covering them all with great photo and vid work.

For me I sailed better on day 2 flowing more, forcing less, and got more speed and better turns.

I finish the year 12th Overall, which i'm happy with considering the company above me.


By the way, dont know if i should be keeping it on the down-low! but the latest Gul Windsurf suit in development is seriously good, building on superb current and recent windsurf and surf suits, and should be fully pimp too! Gold bling.

I'll have some big news on kit soon, stay tuned.


October:

Tiree Wave Classic 09. Mangaed to organise the week to do it around full time Uni/school committments. Sam Neil and i missed our heats! Long story... But at least we arrived on the island in time for one day at least of great wind and waves. We sessioned it hard! Following on everyone had a couple of fun days surfing. What can you say its all about the craic.


Coll Challenge triathlon was a great day. With 3rd in run, 7th on bike (didn't go well!) I had to settle for 4th place finish. I was happy with a 3rd in the SUP final with some experienced SUP-ers!


photos: JC/Tiree Waveclassic


















September:

National windsurfing festival. A great success, so many people on one beach! (That wasn't your average day at Hayling was it?!) We lucked in with planing condtions all day on big kit and i qualified for the night race. I managed not to come last. At least if you were so underpowered you could sneak off downwind in pitch black on your return. The Boat crews did a great job we got to fly around the place with glow sticks attached to ourselves. Fun in the dark!

I was on the judging team for national windsurf freestyle champs. No planing wind but great lightwind competing from the youths and a few older youths! Brighton rocked!

Gower, S Wales, day trip one weekend turned out good, 4.4 in chunky waves. Gonna try and get there more often!

A Westerly kick in the balls! : Cornwall chaos

I had a feeling somehow the evening before that the day could turn into a shocker, sat at Marazion watching great stunt ramps roll through-which i expected would disappear overnight-but with no wind on the inside in SW'ly at that time. Sunny and strong wind for most of the day, sounds great no?! But the day conspired against us and I don't think anyone scored much! -aside from a gusty but superb flat water day at Maza. Anyone chasing waves was stuffed! It goes to show things don't always go to plan, and not to always believe what you hear about conditions you missed, or be too miffed when you think you might be missing a good day when actually not much is happening!

Andy and I scoured beach after beach for 4 hours, including one south coast reef that i'm gagging to sail at some point when i'm around and its working!...the excitement of a potential epic session fading into frustration! The decent swell on its way to the Cornwall north coast was made quickly unsailable and unsurfable by the W winds, with logo high sets of white-water coming through at Hayle turning very onshore and light through the rippy impact zone! We would have been up at Daymer Bay getting whatever wind and waves came through if it wasn't for the A30 grinding to a standstill. Stuffed by the tides, wind and swell directions and now also the monumental bank holiday weekend traffic including a caravan accident! (What would Jeremy Clarkson say if he was a windsurfer...haha)

Dejected and 'over-it' I pulled into the M&S car park to get a coffee. It nearly tipped me over the edge as there was more road rage building in there doing laps and snatching the spaces! The radio reported the M5 was not doing well and as I approached Exeter i heard the A303 was getting stuck, so going south coast near southampton was my move of the day! My last day of 2 weeks holidaying it in cornwall and time to get organised for my move to Bath and imminent PGCE. I felt for those queued up 20 miles on the M5 for upto 6 hours! My journey was smooth and quick other than one near miss where some nutter driving his family home flew past up the inside lane just as the guy in front of me finally decided to pull in...

I cleared my head and thought back to a soulful session a week previous where i had Gwithian on my own for the last hour of light in perfect side-off with some of the cleanest waves i've ridden. On 5.0 and 85, head high and walling up so long and well. And that came from no-where as for the hour previous we were out it was closing and too light, so you just never know when it's gonna go off really do you!

Bring on next weekend's national windsurfing festival; it'll be epic whatever the weather but hopefully with some strong wind day and night too please!

Sotogrande to Sagres

Within 24 hrs of booking the flights, hire car, Gatwick parking…it seemed UK summer was over and there was proper swell forecast…and wind! Of course I was hoping those down in Cornwall where I would have been otherwise were gonna score it –they could thank me!- but I was relieved to have not missed anything classic. So I put surf out of my mind and focussed on 38 deg C and wall to wall sunshine!

Inspired by a university friend Serena, 10 days based down in Sotogrande didn’t seem a bad way of doing probably my only warm trip for this year. Tarifa is only 45 ish mins west...

Taking just 5.7 4.7 3.7 and 85 One I was sure whatever I found I would be ready to ride!

This trip in Photo Gallery:

http://picasaweb.google.com/nickmoffattk903

the trip vid below or:

www.vimeo.com/5846304

Day1

Arrived late avo, getting -and then getting to!- the hire car in Malaga airport was a mission! All the hassle soon evaporated with the sea air once I got on the main road west to Sotogrande.

Tried to Sail at a nearby beach at the harbour and catch the gusts in the super-flat water, avoiding the occasional luxurious boat coming in!

Day2

Over to Tarifa

5.7 was just enough in the gusts, side-on from the right; Poniente

Day3

Scouring the forecasts every am and pm I decided now was the best time for the 3-day Portugal mission. The second part of the 500km journey was stunning, with such a marked change when you cross the border. I couldn’t help get a little excited that I may actually score some waves on what was really a freestyle trip/holiday! We got to Sagres late afternoon and checked a couple of the nearest main beaches. The wind was pumping out of Martinhal bay on S coast while barely a breath on the north coast!

Stacked 4.7.

Camped in Sagres, close to the Fortaleza, nice site, very chilled around the area in general.

Day 4

Checked most of the beaches north from Sagres about 100km up before settling on best place to surf, bearing in mind competing with many hungry and talented locals in a decent summer swell!

Day5

Got 30 mins sailing on north coast but the side-on wind soon died into the late morning. Another fun surf. As attractive as Lisbon and Guincho was, around 200km further north, it was time to head back to Spain and Sotogrande. I can’t wait to go back to Portugal to surf in autumn or spring…

Visited Vejer, a beautiful old town high on a hill overlooking the huge valley.

(No shots-camera battery ran out!)

Day 6

Tarifa in Levante

Powered-up 4.7. Quite gusty at the more side-off spots even a few hundred metres out to sea.

Days7 &8

Tarifa, windier!

Completely overpowered at times on 3.7

Hell-chop but fun! Chatting to a local who works at one of the centres and it seemed it wasn’t the nicest Levante they get, Good to hear I wasn’t the only one finding the conditions tricky! Especially after almost a year of no freestyle, having a few good crashes and mostly just pulling forwards!

Day 9&10

Trip clock since I picked the car up read 2200km. The call was a few drinks out in the evenings and chill by the pool by day! My shoulders were ruined and ankle just about hanging on (again). I didn’t even look at the forecast!

Checked out Gibraltar's rock for a great view and met some monkeys.

Flew home out of Gibraltar the next day in the evening tired and happy!

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Gib was great as it’s so small and some hire cars can be returned there even if rented out from a different location, and the car park is close.

Get a good hire car, mine loved the hill roads and there are lots of them! Watch out for crazy /bad drivers. You’ll notice most cars are dinged up.

Not wanting to promote sausage surfing but if you’re keen to kite check out http://www.giselapulidoprocenter.com and get lessons with a legendary sailor Ben Harrison (of the clubvass oldschool!) who’s made Tarifa his home.

It was pretty much 30-37 degC each day, a couple of cloudy days. Depending where you are the water is still a bit cool to swim for long but nice!

A shorty wetsuit was perfect for the windy days, boardies otherwise. I could have done with my summer steamer for surfing in the Atlantic/Portugal.

UKWA round 2 Rhosneigr goes ballistic!

Action...

http://boards.co.uk/news/article.asp?id=3302

http://www.boardseekermag.com/wnews/show/1/1949

A day of carnage on the water trying to get comfortable on a lit 3.7. It was nuts to basically have the whole bay to yourself during your 10 minute heat, in saturday's nuking wind and waves! I drew Oisin and put together 2 good waverides that beat both his scores but was easily beaten on jumps with his 3 different landed ones vs my one stalled forward. Practice practice... Back and push loops got much better on monday in solid 4.7 wind, later getting blown off the water. Well worth the extra night stay given i could, conking out in nearby B&B after enjoying sunday's little waves that were breaking way out...yep on an SUP...Jem loved it. So did I!
Everything ached driving home... More great craic at another british event with a fantastic turn out for wave, racing and spectating. We really lucked in with the weather and the top boys put on the show to match!

UKWA ‘09, Round 1, Ireland!

What an event… I’m still buzzing from it days later, I really did need a trip away! I’m sure anyone reading this has read about the event via the several boardseeker news clips;
http://www.boardseekermag.com/wnews/show/1/1932

The top boys threw some big moves down in good conditions…Jamie Hancock won, followed by John Skye, Ben Proffitt, Andy King, Phil Horrocks and Rob Jones

How it went for me:

A 13th place (=13th with one other if i've got it correct) out of 26 pros with everyone there wasnt bad for me, and it took a good performance to get that! I went straight out in the single elimination still just finding my feet again in the tricky conditions with mega-overpowering gusts. With another hour on the water getting dialled in, I got comfortable with my new board -the 85One- only the third day riding it.
The single final was action-packed in the logo high side-side off 4.1-4.7 weather. P1-4: Jamie, John, Andy, Ben.
The call came soon after that we’d be starting the double elimination…
I sailed well to win my first round heat, not doing anything that radical but just putting together good turns and hits on two set waves with no mistakes. I made sure I’d re-tuned my sail perfectly to the current wind, feeling ideally powered up. The One allows you to make speed on the wave and float out and upwind easily. I was glad I’d got the mental part of my game sussed this time; no dramatics or kit trashings like last year at Garry William!
I got a debrief from A. King and gleamed some top tips. Just working on the basics and doing those well is paramount and I got more speed, the best waves I could find and made more of them, missing the top12 fight by one place coming 3rd in my 2nd round heat.

The action the following day gave an intense top 6 battle in high winds and mast high+ conditions, creating quite a spectacle.
There was a great team vibe through the event for us at Zerogravity; Goya/Quatro. Everyone pushed each other on sharing good craic on and off the water.

After the contest (and a couple of big nights!) a few of us surfed Garry William point, I say a few, the session turned out to be packed! It was nice to get a couple of good waves from the peak, and to take a couple of beatings over the falls and escape unscathed! Garry William, me 1 all!
The surf sessions with the boys in fuerte had stood me in good stead…would love to surf it when it’s really pumping…