FW board by JP Australia

A longstanding rumour is getting more real by the day. A Formula Windsurfing board will appear in JP's product line, with obviously some serious input by multi-world champ Antoine Albeau.

The round pointed nose is a quite unlike the trend towards "square" noses displayed by the other major brands. 228 cm long, 100cm wide, 168 liters, full carbon deck, not much data yet, but the pictures are superb!

Tramontana sessions

This past Easter and beginning of May, we enjoyed a nice breeze in Pals and emptyied our stressed minds with welcome exercise.

On the photos: Jordi Riera, Alex Serra, Ruben Serra and myself.

I'll take my SUP ice-cold please

Check this one out

Is this the short term future?

Weird leech design is making a come back on wave sails, quad fin wave boards are all the buzz (in addition to Kauli, it is rumored that Thomas Traversa is testing quad fins). We shall find out when the 2010 collections show up in surf shops if these are just R&D prototypes or the real thing.

200 km/h sailing record... on land

On the morning of March 26th, on the ‘dry’ Lake Ivanpah, The Ecotricity Greenbird driven by British engineer, Richard Jenkins smashed the world land speed record for wind powered vehicles. The Greenbird clocked 109 knots or 202.9 km/h, eclipsing the old, record set by Bob Schumacher in the Iron Duck in March 1999 at the same location.

GoPro Wide

There is a new toy at home: a tiny on-board camera for those watersports, skiing or mountain-biking sessions.
I have a lot of progress to make photo-wise (managing the wide angle or light direction, to start with), not to mention my stance on the board. A great tool to visualize my errors and, hopefully, correct them and improve.

Follow the red boards

Gong SUP boards have reached an agreement to partner with DROPS Windsurfing and share their shapes with them, maintaining their legendary red color.

More news here:
www.gongsup.com/spip.php?page=news〈=fr#News_1400

or there:
http://www.drops.net/portal/content.php?action=show&type=news&id=292

And more in a few days when additional developments become available

quad fins for Kauli Seadi ? No more twinsers ?

Several news are giving me the impression that Kauli Seadi may be about to start a new trend.

Two years ago, at the Punta Preta Cabo Verde PWA event, Kauli's stellar surfing style on his new twinser boards made everyone realize this was a way to go. Fast forward to January 2009: every pro sailor has a twinser in his quiver and most brands have twin fin wave boards in their product line.

February 2009: if those photos are correct, it seems Kauli is now in Cabo Verde with quad fins board. Then again, if he impresses everyone with his waveriding style at the upcoming PWA event, will everyone scramble to move to 4 fins, swallow tails and wingers?

Time will tell.

For now, I let you meditate these photos found on:
Windmag.com (http://www.windmag.com/News/2154-exclu-des-nouveaux-jouets-pour-kauli.html)
and Windsurfjournal.com (http://www.windsurfjournal.com/frontblocks/news/pop_up_news.asp?id_news=16789&ID_BB_LANGUAGES=1)

Perfect snow

Vars, French Alps, last week. No comment...

Deboichet quality fins!

January 3rd: I met Oriana and Jean-Jacques Deboichet. Nice lunch together at Almanarre and a most pleasant 3 hour conversation around fins and windsurfing.

They are truly passionate about their job and their mission to provide the best quality windsurfing fins. I look forward to their new wave fins and other projects they mentionned to me off the record.