Slalom School

Over the last 8 years the TWS slalom training in Tenerife has become one of the places to be for aspiring racers, whether you want to finish higher at a national event, are pushing to make the PWA top 10 or even win it outright. John Skye has been a frequent student of the Tenerife school of training, read on as he let’s us know more about its benefits and illustrious pupils.

- John Skye

The TWS training has been around in one form or another for 8 years now and the results it has produced at the top level speak for themselves. In 2018, 2 of the top 3 PWA men’s slalom trained in Tenerife. Further down the rankings, 5 of the top 10 trained there, and 10 of the top 20. That is 50% of the worlds 20 best slalom sailors! What is perhaps more impressive is the rise of some of the riders, from back of the fleet nobodies, to World Cup superstars almost overnight. To find out more about its history I sat down with Maciek Rutowski (FMX Racing/ Challenger) and Matteo Iachino (Starboard/Severne).

Matteo Iachino - “I first came to Tenerife back in 2011 just to train a bit for a month with Andrea Cucci. The place was so consistent for wind and straight away we realized the potential. The following winter (2012/2013) Andrea put together the first training camp, mainly for the Point 7 team. We had Mark Hosegood as the race director and we had a good group of riders, including Andrea Cucci, Alberto Menengatti, Pascal Toselli, Maciek Rutowski, Vincent Langer, a few others and myself. It was really good because we never had anything like that before, and Sparky was an amazing race director and did a fantastic job, so it was a very beneficial experience. We then went to the first race of the year in Korea and I made my first ever winners final and Alberto won his first ever PWA event, the first Italian to ever win a PWA event. In 2013/2014 it was even better with a greater level of off the water training and a higher level of rider joining.”