no. 40. August 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Josh in Holland - The Mission 2008 Howzit everybody. Just got home from Holland and “ The Mission” at Brouwersdam. I arrived in Holland a bit tired after some extensive travelling through Europe. My energy however was quickly replenished with the vibe at The Mission. The excitment started early when a freak storm that was completely unforecasted blew through. A couple of us ran outside to watch the recently erected tower get blown over. What then followed was an adrenaline filled half hour, where everybody who was around pitched in to tear down all the tents, the scaffolding and all the hard work that had been put in that day. Dirk Doppenberg, Remco Bakker, and a couple crew stayed up late rebuilding the scaffolding in the rain and cold... Cheers Boys! Early Saturday morning the boys were up resetting all the tents etc. and we had a solid 25 -30 kts of wind that was wreaking some havoc on some of the organization tents that were previously without problem. A couple of scary minutes followed, but then everything started mellowing out. As the volunteers, organizers and friends continued last minute preparations, the wind subsided to a perfect 15 kts. for the day’s racing, the sun came out, and that place filled up quick! I’ve never seen so many excited kids, parents and windsurf enthusiasts all in one place. The Mission team was so on it and they ran races all day long. Everybody was stoked and the kids were ripping. The pro freestylers, Tonky, Andre Paskowski, and Gollito put on an excellent show and even though the wind dipped down in the afternoon they got towed towards the beach by a boat and whipped out some incredible freestyle tricks. But Dutch stud Kevin Mevissen was the man of the day pulling some unbelievable jumps of the Red Bull ramp made by Tom Hartmann.
Photo : Fotoart.pl
The day continued with racing, autographs, music, food, and fun all in the easy going yet organized way that only the Dutch can combine so naturally. As the sun started setting Saturday evening the barbecue started up, everybody had their fill, and waited anxiously for the giveaways. The little bar was jam packed and more equipment than a normal retail store stocks was given away that night. Kids walked away with sails, booms, boards, clothes, and bags. Adults also scored many products and every ten minutes t-shirts, dvds, and stickers were rained into the crowd. The prize lottery gave way to one of Europe’s best DJ’s who quickly got the crowd hopping and into a frenzy. I hung out long enough to get a glimpse of where the night was going and stealthily snuck away to my hideaway upstairs. I fell asleep to booming bass and screams from the crowd. Needless to say, the party rocked!
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 40. August 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Sunday morning we were up and at it. I expected to see more people hung over, but everyone was so keen for the finals. Sunday was blessed with the same consistent wind and the finals went off without a hitch. The Masters winner bought a 9.2 TR-4 xt from me that morning, because he took the race so seriously and wanted to beat his mates. He sailed solid and beat his mates, who told me they noticed his increased speed. Needless to say, he was stoked! The boy’s, girl’s, women’s , men’s and pro’s finals all went off perfectly and we were then treated to an even better display of freestyle where Paskowski and Gollito wowed the crowd with strength, speed, and commited moves that were excellently pulled off. Those guys are real real good. Once again Kevin “ the meev” stole the show, getting towed by the boat full speed, coinciding with a good gust he hit the ramp perfectly and went for a double forward. The skill it takes to sit on the boat, hang tough, negotiate the ramp and do a double in minimal wind is absolutely astonishing. After that treat, the day wound down with the last finals and straight into the most massive poster giveaway and autograph session ever, before the grand finale of trophies, more free gear giveaways ( one guy got a brand new board!). The big winner of the day walked away (or I should say rode away) with a brand new scooter. Herman Van Den Berg and his team throw the most impressive, generous and High stoke event I’ve ever been to. I felt very fortunate to be a part of it and I’m already signed up for next year.... Danke! Aloha, Josh
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 40. August 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands Photo : PWA/Carter
A bit of Home and PWA racing I always like this month a lot. Here in Fortaleza the wind is coming back really strong during the last days. Me, my dad, and my brother went on a trip on the northeast coast, around 250 km from where we live. The beach is beautiful, full of palm trees, and very windy. We normally have the slalom nationals there every year and this year we will have the South Americans. I spent three days sailing on the slalom gear with my dad. In the last day of our trip we decided to do a downwind on the coast. Really nice, because the wind is onshore so we can go very close to the beach. Me and my dad were using the slalom sails, and my brother was doing the downwind full of manouvers with the Freestyle equipment. We had a car waiting for us in the end, but my dad and I decided to come back sailing upwind. Just amazing. Sometimes we went so far from the coast, but when we jibe we did a nice upwind with the swell, really nice !!
Also this month I went to the PWA in Turkey. I enjoyed the week there. The place is beautiful and the wind was there everyday. For me, the event was ok. I won my first heat in the PWA ( losers final), but I did some mistakes and there you can’t do this. A lot of people were using MauiSails there during the races. The last week of the month we had a nice swell for wave sailing, around 1.5m, and I had a lot of fun with my Legend 5.0. All my friends were there sailing together, seven guys trying to get the best wave all day. Now I’m back on the slalom gear doing some training for Sylt.This will be the last slalom of the year and I will do my best to finish the year strong. See you on the water, Gabriel.
Photo : PWA/Carter
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 40. August 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Summer is almost over again As quickly as summer arrived it’s almost over again. As a windsurfer on Maui, I’m not lamenting but rather excited about the approach of our fall, prime-time season. We have been receiving samples of the recreational sail lines, Pursuit, Aloha and Titan all month and are in the process of finalizing the designs. Seam-shaping adjustments throughout the ranges, combined with luff-curve refinements, have yielded sails with improved performance, handling and ease of use. Generally, the sails have a slightly softer feel and lighter “sailing weight”. Their efficiency is improved through a more even leech twist pattern and optimized profile shape. The sails have original, new graphics which incorporate more extensive use of coloured X-ply for improved durability and visual appeal. The recreational sail lines also incorporate the new, ultralight weight, moulded sleeve bottom details similar to the wave sails.
We always learn a lot during race sail development and this year is proving no different. Often the ideas from the race sails end up translating to the other sail lines in the future. This year we are compiling a large amount of specific data for each race sail size by size. We are measuring rig tension and profile shape at different downhaul settings in order to determine the optimum combination. A system is developing to better relate the performance of one size
to another in an effort to learn from the best ones and translate the performance through all sizes. On-the-water testing combined with feed-back form our team riders and customers is being related to the theoretical ideas and directing us to new levels of speed and performance. An interesting observation that we have noted is what a dramatic effect 1.0cm of downhaul has on the overall tension of a rigged sail when you are in the realm of the recommended settings. Over-down hauling a sail by only 1.0cm can increase the overall tension by 15% or more. This helps to account for why sails are so tunable for different wind conditions with only tiny adjustments in downhaul and outhaul and also reminds us of how easy it is to overdownhaul a sail.
For 2009, to ensure that every customer can rig there sail for optimum performance we have introduced a new, high accuracy downhaul measuring system with reference points that are independent of base extension brand. Aloha, Artur Szpunar
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 40. August 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Fuerte, Alacati and now Maui August started with a very rushed trip out of Fuerteventura. The Speed World Championships finished on the 2nd around 3 o’clock and I had 4 hours to get my gear, Jessie, and myself to the airport on the last UK flight until the following week. This was not an easy task half my gear at the satellite speed compound stuck out on a spit a good mile down the beach, a spit that was by this time a meter or so under water in an unusually high tide! So I tied it all together in a home made raft swam it 500m across the flooded lagoon, put it in a van, swam back to my last set and sailed it back upwind to the event site. There I had a mad rush to pack it all away drag it to the pre booked van and take the hour or so ride to the airport in time for my 8 o’clock flight. I can tell you that by then I was pretty hot and sweaty, but at least we made it! I headed to Turkey refreshed and really fired up. I knew what conditions we were going to get, and was really sure my kit was going to fly. Tuning up the day before it was clear that in the 8.4 TR-4 we had a really special sail, and combined with my Fanatic Falcon 124, I had great speed, which is definitely a nice feeling. For the first time this season I was winning heats and making finals. But it seemed luck was not on my side. After breaking my 8.4 in a gybe mark crash, and snapping my best 44cm fin in another semi, I started to put myself under too much pressure and missed qualifying a few crucial heats by the smallest margin. With a big gap now before the final World Cup in Sylt I came back to Maui where I knew the wind would always blow and I could get a good mix of recharging, training and tuning. We have also been lucky enough to get a couple of early mini swells and after a summer of flat out slalom sailing I’m sure you can imagine how good those first couple of bottom turns felt. Until next month I hope the end of summer also brings you some wind, waves and maybe even a bit of sunshine. Aloha Dan www.mauisails.com | 0
Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 40. August 2008
Summer’s almost over and the surf is coming August has been a fantastic month of growth and success in so many ways. Our situation for shipping and warehousing the USA is getting more streamlined and organized and we can see the trend towards lots of happy new users of MauiSails based on feedback and general response. Field representatives like Casey Hauser, working in the Gorge for Isthmus West and doing beach demos, have given many people a chance to try the sails and the reports of reactions are very positive. There is no substitute... feeling is believing. The ‘loft’ month has been spent finalizing and detailing the early production of the new Titan (replaces MS-2), Pursuit, and Aloha. This year the focus has been able to be on refinement of the last shaping changes, which were a major departure from the previous versions, weight control (no obese sails), and designing a more powerful color graphic for each model. Also in the loft this month we took a step further into aiding Art’s scientific analysis by getting a very high end load cell together. This entailed some figuring and building and designing some systems we can use to test all kinds of things related to loading. This will inevitably lead to lighter attachment details, better seam structures, and will enable us to develop rig tension consistency in ways we have only discussed before. This has been very exciting to contemplate and i expect it to be a big factor in future designs. There are lots of things in the competition pipeline coming next month and we are getting ready for them by training and working with the team that is here. This is also bringing new ideas and feedback into the mix, which is perfect for this time of year. I am most excited for the Formula Worlds as it wil be interesting to see how the great speed that Dennis had at the Europeans can translate in the more dense fleet at the highest level....GO DENNIS! For August now, Aloha. Barry
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
From racing on Maui to a Sylt World Cup Time to slow down a bit after the Summer. All the racing was done early August and we had a little swell come through around mid August, so a little relaxing and some wave sailing was on the order. Results are now official after a successful Summer of racing. After 4 county slalom races series, I became Maui County Champion in the 40-49 age group and Pro division. Then we had the state slalom titles at the beginning of August here on Maui and it was the lightest winds all season. I ended up using the TR4 7.6 and Carbon Art 62cm Board, which was the first time I used this combo the whole season. I was super happy with the way I sailed and the gear felt great. I handily won my age group 40-49, with Kevin Ozee in second and Alex Aguera in third. I put together some very good heats in the pro division, but in the end Pieter Bijl beat me out with some consistent sailing. We are now deep in the testing and finalizing designs of the Pursuit, Aloha and Titan sails. Slowly we massage the shapes and the sails feel better and better, can’t wait for our customers to get a hold of them and see how far we have come in twelve months. The race season isn’t over yet, as I’ve decided to head over to Sylt, Germany to compete in the PWA World Cup’s final slalom event in September. It will be a chance to get a feel for the sails against the big boys, attend a few PWA meetings and catch up with Maui Sails customers. This will be my 22nd year attending this event, so I’m putting in some training on the larger sails and tuning into some production boards which I’ll use during the racing. I’ll also be meeting up with Bogo and our team members over there to do some video and promotions. Aloha Phil.
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