a perfect double

Yesterday I took photos till 1.30 and Browsinho had just hit the water. Nonetheless, the only shot I took of him gets the photo of the day award, since he landed this perfect double forward.

Unfortunately, doubles are jumps that require a sequence, but you get what you get. This is after the first rotation. You can see from the little leftover water coming off the nose of his board how fast he's rotating.


Chronological order for the other shots.
Some Goya riders were having a photoshoot.
Jake backloop.


Laurent push loop.


As soon as I saw this girl at Middles I thought:"guaranteed she's gonna need help to come back!"
I taught enough surf lessons to identify a classic beginner position: ass off the center and open legs.


Jake keeps on looping.


Keith hits the water in green photoshoot attire.
In case you never sailed Hookipa, this photo shows how to time the shore break. Keith just dropped the board on the water of an incoming wave that is about to hit his legs. By the time he'll be able to put both hands on the boom and jump on the board (with both feet!), the water will just about to start flowing out and he will get enough speed to pass over the next incoming wave.
The summer shore break is more challenging that the winter one, because of the shorter period between incoming waves (especially the windswell, around 8 seconds).


And Jake keeps on looping.


Oh, looks who's there! The beach is to the left of this photo and in that place the current is strong and going right, away from the beach. That's why she couldn't make it and chose to come in through the rocks.
BTW, at the downwind end of the beach, the current goes left, still away from the beach. If you're surfing or swimming, your only chance to come back to the beach is in the middle of it.


Left foot up.


Right foot up. Seems like she's loving it!


Her friend was directed by the lifeguards and managed to come back through the middle of the beach.


Keith. The wave riding was marginal... it was all about the jumps. Good, I'm not missing much.


There we go. A little lesson on how the current works at Hookipa. Geez, those girls have some serious tatoos!


Doesn't do it for me!


Today I'll be at the beach at 2.30 and tomorrow I'll post the photos together with part 2 of the custom sail discussion with Jeff. Stay tuned.

windswell days

Last year's May was an unprecedented streak of no wind days and glassy surf: very unusual.
This year is the exact opposite. A super strong high pressure is creating blustery trade winds and the related windswell is pretty much the only form of waves you can see on the north shore.

The photos of the day from yesterday afternoon at Hookipa go to a couple that recently lost a young daughter after a long fight with cancer.
This is the firefighter dad.


And judging from the gear, I'm pretty sure (but not 100%) that this is the mum.
My big respect goes to them for the incredible pain they must be going through.
Windsurfing is a great way of getting thoughts and feelings out of your mind for a few minutes.


Here's the other photos in chronological order.
Skyler Haywood tried to go to college on the mainland. Understandably, it didn't work out. He came back to Maui and signed up at the Maui Community College. Might not be the best college on Earth, but his sailing is now improving by the day.



On most of his waves, you can expect Browsinho to throw either a taka, a goiter or a 360. Just a regular aerial or top turn must feel like average moves to him...
Notice the very close hands on the boom.


Skyler.


This was a sweet very hesitated forward by Juanma.


Two nice windsurfing asses in one shot... that's a rarity!
The one on the left is well known, and I had the pleasure to meet the one on the right at the party for the inauguration of Sara's new boutique in Paia later in the afternoon. Lovely girl.


Well, judging from this photo stolen from FB, it looks like I left too early and missed the usual Ulli's show.


Browsinho 360.


Nico. I missed two of his backloops way higher than this one... da hell, I should be more focused on the only mauisurfreport team rider...


I heard a few people say that the Mark Angulo's Mutant is just a wave 360 off the lip.
Right.


Hey Jeff, can you design me a sail as light and efficient as that?


Bernd managed to find a wave that was head high for him!


I missed the good ones, but I got a bail...


Elena shows off her self designed rash guard. What a figure!


Next three is Skyler, showing that he was aptly named.




Browsinho goiter.


This is Mark riding clew first. He has all three fins out and just a bit of rail in the water... too bad I don't remember if he fell or not.


Aurelian.


The end of another day at the office for Francky. Here's the photos he took.


Browsinho.


Skyler.


Most of the times, when you break the mast you damage the sail too. The best you can expect is a hole in the mast sleeve. But most times you end up tearing one of more panels of the sail. Unless it's a Hot Sails Maui, of course.
The webbing they put on the mast sleeve is incredibly tough. I remember one session in which Andres broke the mast one foot from the top and he kept sailing for almost an hour looping, ripping and wipeing out. He wanted to see if he could break that thing and he didn't manage to.
Nonetheless, I asked Jeff not to put the webbing in my new custom sail (stay tuned for part two, coming soon) in order to reduce the weight. He said:"Nah, your sail will be built light enough and we better put the webbing on the sleeve, otherwise breaking the mast will mean the death of the sail". You can see he has a point...

Total amount of money this guy will have to spend to fix the sail: zero, nada, nil.


More (and way better) photos of the day from Jimmie.

Custom sail discussion with Jeff Henderson part 1

I'm a peculiar sailor.

So peculiar that I'm going to have Jeff Henderson design a custom sail for my peculiar needs. Here's part 1 of a 15 minutes chat we had yesterday.
Not sure it's going to be interesting for all readers... please let me know with comments.



I feel like adding that in that particular condition of wind I describe (again, BARELY planing on an 80l board and a 5.0), I tried not only the other Hot Sails Maui sails, but also the sails of four other brands.
There just isn't a sail like I want out there. It's only in my mind. And hopefully Jeff will make it for me... how exciting!

There has been a small bump, but I've been working in the afternoon, so I've been relying entirely on Francky and Jimmie for the Hookipa shots.

fish

Every time I see something like this I get pissed off.


It's a typical human behavior to trap animals into cages of all sorts for their own pleasure.
I always hated (well, maybe not when I was 5) zoos and aquariums. I mean, is it that difficult to put yourself in their paws and imagine a life in a cage?
Lately I can't even stand the vision of a dog on a leash!...


I strongly invite you guys to watch these two TED talks and learn more about how we're fucking up the ocean.





I feel pretty guilty because guess what did I eat yesterday? Fresh ahi... oh well, at least not fished industrially, but by a friend with a small boat...

Allright, imagining you're quite depressed by now, let me link you Jimmie Hepp's gallery of photos from yesterday at Hookipa (there was a bump, but I had to work).

While I'm posting this, I'm also watching the Big Waves Invitational in Chile. There's some 15 footers coming through and even though most surfers only try to make the drop and not to fall in front of some really mean looking rocks, I was very impressed by a wave by peruvian Gabriel Villaran ripping with his 9 foot board like he was on a shortboard.
The swell is supposed to pick up more and they're predicting 20 footers by the afternoon for the final (it's six hours ahead of Hawaii).
Damn, I can't watch it!

what a barrell!

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

2010 Olukai SUP race

Olukai is a brand of slippers owned by my friend Matthew. They do a lot of things for the community.



Yesterday there was the SUP downwind race from Maliko to Kanaha. Randy did a fantastic photo report on this thread of his standupzone forum.
Here's the top 6 ladies of the Elite category won by - surprise surprise - brazilian Andrea Moeller (right).


Here's the guys. The winner was another brazilian Maui resident: Livio Menelao (left). Forgot the name of the Oahu paddler that came in second, third was Dave Kalama (now, that's a real surprise!) who is not in the picture, fourth Connor Baxter.


Brazilians also won the GP contest for the best female hair.


But, and that is a huge surprise, they didn't win the GP bikini contest!


At one point the helicopter hovered upon the ceremony to throw flowers. I was probably the only one in the crowd thinking:"what an unnecessary way of polluting"...


The result was undoubtedly picturesque, but again... really necessary?


The thing is that EVERYTHING we do pollutes. This blog pollutes because it's made by me using a computer and is read by you using a computer.

As you can see from the generator behind him, even the lovely melodies sung by John Cruz were polluting.


In order not to pollute, we should go back at doing only things using stuff that is available "as is" in nature. Things like this.


The young hula dancers were extremely cute.


Beautiful interpretation.


Multi hull canoe in action.


John Cruz feeling it.


And playing it.


Future paddler.


Now, let's have a look at this week's content of my po box.
ALL you see is unsolicited, unnecessary and polluting marketing shit.
Even a bloody plastic bag! In my po box!!! That's too much.
I have to find a way of not making that happen. Anyone out there knows how? I'm talking about the bulk mail that is not addressed to my name, but to the generic po box holders. I'll talk to the post office, but in the meantime post suggestions if you have any. Thanks.