Tenerife has become the winter go-to spot for slalom sailors, but let’s not forget Tenerife in winter can also offer huge Atlantic surf on more exposed parts of the island. Visiting Polish PWA racer Maciek Rutkowski took a break from training round the buoys to sample the big stuff.
This winter I headed out to Tenerife quite a bit later than normal. It had to do with a lot of reasons, but the main one was that in previous years I would peak in May and run out of gas by September. So after a slightly longer than usual winter break, which included an amazing month in Maui, I shoved my eight bags of race gear and myself on a Ryanair flight mid-February and headed to Tenerife. Since I had less time scheduled in the Canaries, I was 100% committed to racing and if I got a few days of wave sailing in Cabezo it would be a nice bonus. Signing with FMX Racing meant I was a “free agent” for wave boards, so I phoned up Puls Boards, a local shaper from Warsaw, to ask if he had any onshore boards around 59 cm and packed that along with only 2 wave sails – a 4.7 and 4.0, no point bringing anything bigger, I thought.
NO TRADES - NO SECRET
I arrived and the trades weren’t playing ball, which left us looking around the island for wind. Actually that’s not exactly true – I knew exactly where to go, but promised I wouldn’t tell even which coast it was on. Two days of foil testing into the trip we ran into a day which had not enough wind for slalom and too risky of a shorebreak to launch and come back in one piece with our super high-tech expensive foils. So we decided to drive up the coast to a place I had surfed multiple times and was pretty sure was the wave I saw German local ripper Jochen Stolz post pics of all winter on Facebook. And, as my friends hate to admit, as usual I was right (trying to keep a straight face while saying that). It was a bit funny seeing Jochen’s face when we arrived there, he was clearly not happy! But at the same time he kept posting pics on Facebook all winter, I guess that’s something to note - can’t have both the empty spot and the Facebook glory!
GETTING IN
Denne historien er fra Issue 389 - September 2019-utgaven av Windsurf.
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Denne historien er fra Issue 389 - September 2019-utgaven av Windsurf.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
New School
Slingshot’s windsurfing brand manager, Wyatt Miller, has noticed that kids are drawn to playing with wings and puts forward an interesting case as to why he thinks this could help entice them and others into windsurfing.
Changes
Wave sailor Flo Jung reflects on our changed world during his lockdown in Germany.
THE LAST WAVE
Lockdown stirred the creative juices of reader Björn Alfthan, who peers into the future to present a fictional story set in the wild waves of Norway, five years from now.
STILL IN THE GAME
After a horrific fracture in his leg from a crashed aerial in 2018, Alessio Stillrich is back! John Carter talks to the highflyer from Gran Canaria about his move to the Simmer team, recovering from injury and how he learned to windsurf in Gran Canaria!
MOVE ON UP - GET ON THE FRONT FOOT
This month we look at how our front foot weighting can affect and improve different aspects of our main windsurfing moves.
SOUTH' KIPA
Nik tweaking it over home waters.
A NEW NORMAL
On a trip to La Tranche-sur-Mer in France last year, Tris Best estimated over 80% of the windsurfers were foiling. This summer in Portland Harbour, foiling activity has increased dramatically too he reports. With the market offering plenty of choice to recreational windfoilers, our test team check out some of the latest foil offerings.
TACKING – THE SEQUEL
Having given you time to practice, Harty concludes his tacking series by critiquing various tacking options, including the carve tack, as well as offering solutions to common slip-ups.
‘NO VAPOUR TRAILS TO SCAR THE SKY' *
Realising we may be about to enter an extraordinary period in our lives, Harty decided to keep a windsurf-centric lockdown diary. Here are some of his choice excerpts.
REDEMPTION DAY!
Renowned for its windsurfing and variety of spots to sail at, Kimmerdige Bay is a wave sailing jewel on the south coast of England. Timo Mullen gives a guide to its shores while reflecting on why a recent session there was a reminder that there is no place like home!
