Nic Hibdige, K-700, leads the UK charge on the PWA freestyle circuit and his 9th place finish at the Sylt leg of the 2018 tour shows he has the ability to break into the top ten in the world. We learn more about the 23 year old sailor from the south coast of England this month as he talks with Loris Vietoris about scoring, finance and future plans.
LV - You are one of the few guys who are trying to push the freestyle discipline into new dimensions, with obvious influence from other boardsports. In Fuerteventura last year you came up with the air-spock tail grab for example. Do you try to connect style aspects from windsurfing and skateboarding?
NH - I think with the limited amounts of high scoring power moves it’s important to bring other aspects into the mix. Antony Ruenes and Davy Scheffers for me have both been pushing the air spocks in the past years with their own styles. Antony does this big over the top kind of rotation, sort of like an air chacho and Davy does it more like a backside 360 in skating/ snowboarding, which is really hard to land clean, this is the type I kind of go for. Personally I think it’s underscored as it does not get you many more points than a boring culo or kono. Balz Muller and I were actually sessioning boom to boom air spocks and then it clicked that grabbing the tail is pretty doable as you are so over the gear. The one in the contest wasn’t a full on grab, but there is more to come.
LV - So do you see windsurfing sessions more as training or a way to be creative and expressive?
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