no. 34. February 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Photo : Darrell Wong Photography
Big aloha from Josh Angulo Aloha All, Probably for most part of the year, my Maui Monthly column will be about places other then Maui although this month I did get to go to Maui for a momentous occasion, which we’ll get to soon. My Feb. started different than any year I can remember, it entailed finalizing a business relationship with Maui Sails which injected a big bolt of fresh energy into my career. At the exact same time, I spent a lot of time on the computer finalizing details for the Cabo Verde World Cup Which starts next week here in Sal. Combine that with a couple quick jaunts to Praia, our countries capital to discuss last minute details about a windsurf event in my backyard and I was about as jacked up as any windsurfer could be. I also spent first couple weeks planning an in and out attack mission to Maui to pick up 8 new custom wave boards that my brother had waiting for me and a whole treasure chest of sails, masts and accessories that Maui Sails and Streamlined had ready to go.
I flew into Maui mid-month just in time to strap up a new board and go out for only my second session on a Maui Sail in over double-Mast surf with only myself and Alex Aguera.... It definitely brought back some reminiscing for both Alex and I as it was exactly on a day like that many moons ago that Alex, his brother Greg and I went up and sailed Jaws for it’s virgin descent. Hookipa was immensely intimidating that day and after a couple good ones I tucked tail and went for some small school shredding at Sprecks, where I ran into Micah Buzianis (old high-school pal) who showed me some new funky fin that we need to keep under wraps until we figure out.... “ what’s really going on ??”. It should be noted in the Hookipa session that I saw Alex Aguera ride what was Arguably the biggest wave ever ridden at Hookipa. Unfortunately, although there was a semi-well known photo sitting on the beach he didn’t get the shot of Alex, because as he so delicately put it me .... he only works for money and “it was too cloudy”....... Bring back the Darrel Wong’s and the Erik Aeder’s of our sport.... guys that through the years have captured millions of timeless masterpieces and even to this day are some of the most humble and easy-going guys to work with!!
Photo : Mart Kuperij
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 34. February 2008
My Maui trip squeezed in one more good day of sailing where I got to get groovy at Hookipa on both the Legend and the Global... I think working with Barry Spanier has an immediate grooviness that rubs off on you. After showering off in the Hookipa parking lot it was a mad scramble to get all the new slalom sails and a new Tabou slalom board packed up with my 8 new waveboards plus some quatro teamriders gear and all my maui sails quiver to fly back to Cabo verde.. Of course no Maui trip would be complete without a Holy Spirit gas-up with my good friends Pastor Mark and Pastor BJ from “My Brother´s Keeper “ church in Haiku which by the way has it’s Sunday service at 10 am in the Haiku elementary school cafeteria. Pastor Mark helped keep me focus and grounded in my usual mad-rush to the airport and my smooth check-in allowed enough time to scoff down a big American bacon cheeseburger at IHOP before heading back to Cabo Verde...
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Flying with 11 pieces ( 8 of them oversize windsurf bags) is not so bad unless you have to recheck and change terminals, which I got to do in Boston. Fortunately the boys at Enterprise rental car picked me up curbside, helped me load the gear, I got a couple ZZZZ´s at the Logan Hilton and then went back curbside to Terminal E to check in To Cabo Verde.. The Enterprise guy, who had met me at the hotel dropped me curbside and I was off to team TACV who checked me through to Sal. Getting back to CV , has been a hactic run, with a one day trip to Boa Vista , a one day trip to Sao Vicente , a bit of sailing and lots of work organizing the event here. Today (we had the first day of the trials and as March 7 rolls ever closer we are getting very excited to see the swell forecast looking promising for the first event of the PWA 2008 wave world tour... Tune in and Stay tuned! Aloha, Josh Angulo
Photo : Darrell Wong Photography
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 34. February 2008
Bad luck for Martin in February Last month I had my share of bad luck. I broke my leg in a stupid snowboard accident. Basically I never went as slow as I did this time, my board stuck in a hole, and I fell forward breaking my board and my leg. Luckily the Austrian Doctors are incredible and put a titanium rod in my leg. I am walking again and in a couple of weeks from now I will be hitting the water. Last weekend a massive low pressure ridge hit Northern Europe. Trees were torn out of the ground in England, but at Southend the direction was a bit too Northerly so no call was made for the Driven by Wind attempt. I lent out my Cuben Fibre TR4 4.7 special to Dirk Doppenberg. Barry made this sail for me in anticipation of a truly big day during the DBW attempt . Dirk planned to go to Northern Germany with some friends and I hoped he could give the sail a good test and perhaps break some GPS records while he was at it. Near Büsum, a sandbank gets exposed at low tide creating a near perfect speed strip. Wind gusts up till 55 knots were predicted but it turned out the water level would rise dramatically. Just before the guys would leave for the record attempt the trip was cancelled.
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Again the use of GPS proved to be helpful In a last minute change, a new venue was chosen. The fastest Dutch speedies all went to the North of Holland to a lake called Lauwersmeer. Dirk nailed the day and I got him on the phone totally flabbergasted about the ride the sail offered. He got up to a peak speed of 46,7 knots in wind speeds up till 50 knots. He told me the sail rocked on the speed course and upwind the ride was awesome and super relaxing, even in the biggest gusts. The next day he tried the sail at Strand Horst and William Breukelman made some very nice shots. See for yourself why Dirk liked the sail so much. The twist looks impeccable. Thanks for testing it out Dirk. I hope you can use it during the DBW attempt if my leg isn’t healed just yet, but if you don’t mind I hope to be back on my fet before it happens haha. Martin van Meurs
Photo : William Breukelman
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 34. February 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Gabriel reports from Calema Hello, Finally, I am back to Maui after a long trip from Florida for Calema Midwinters 2008 regatta. The first day of event we had light wind, from 6 to 9 knots. The first race was cancelled because of the light winds. I had a good start this race and was second at the upwind mark, but they cancelled the race. We did one more race. At the starting line I was pumping so hard and I had an over early before the start. Again I was 2nd at the upwind mark, but I was disqualified. The second day, there was almost no wind. We waited all day long and finally it came very light in the afternoon. We went to the water but we didn’t race. Last day of the event the forecast was looking good, and the wind came. Winds were from 9 to 12 knots. I knew if we did three more races, there would be only one discard, so I had to be careful because my discard was already there. I was very concentrated on what I should do on the last day to have a good final result. The first race I started at the buoy together with Wilhelm Shurmann and Jesper Vesterstrom. I had good speed and took Wilhelm out, and stayed together with Jesper until the upwind mark. So we stayed like this all the race and I finished fifth. Second race I didn’t start as I wanted. I was going to start perfectly, but I started pumping and I did two spinouts. So I was doing what I can to make up during the race. I finished seventh in this race.
The last race was the best one. I started with good speed and went to the first upwind in seventh. At the last upwind I did a very good tactical race and passed three guys. In front of me was Miguel Martinho, Jimmy Diaz, and Jesper Vesterstrom, so I started this upwind going very high with good speed. Soon I passed Miguel and was fighting with Jimmy and Jesper. They tacked too early, and I decided to go a bit more and tack. I did the best option. I went straight to the last mark with good speed and took Jimmy and Jesper, because they tacked too early, so I finished the last race in fourth place. I finished the event in fifth place tied with Willelm Schurmann. I’m very happy with the sails performance. I went all the time with my TR-4xt 12.0.This sail is so fast and easy. Thanks, Gabriel Browne (BRA-50)
Photo : Lucas Padilha
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 34. February 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
A long February this year
Month of crazy weather on Maui It’s been a month of crazy weather on Maui. Started off very stormy and rainy. I ended up chasing one of the big storms to Utah and got some good powder days, skiing. Back on Maui, we’ve been continuing the wave sail development as well as commencing work on the rest of the 2009 line up. We’re all very excited about Josh Angulo joining the MauiSails team. It’s great to have the added perspective of such a talented and innovative wave sailor in developing the sails. We received some very positive and constructive input from him on the performance of the wave and race sails. We also had a chance to discuss tuning as well as the design direction that we are following. It is reassuring to see that we are all on the same page when it comes to our desired, wave sail performance characteristics. The Legends are feeling great. They have super light handling, good power and impressive speed. I spent a good part of this month working on the sail graphics for next years line up. I have always enjoyed this aspect of the design process. A sail panel layout is dictated first by structural functionality but it’s also important to execute this in a way that is aesthetically pleasing and captures the spirit of intended use. It’s an interesting intersection of art and science. After all, the world would not be very exciting if we all drove around in egg-shaped cars. Some other important considerations are efficient material usage and ease of assembly. These factors restrain you from getting too crazy and encourage clean, functional lines.
We are leaping with an extra day this month, so it’s possible to get even more out of this normally short month. And on that Leap Day I find it interesting that there are so many signs of things going well. Maybe we ought to have Leap Days every year! This has been a very good month for bringing things together. The first shipment of TR-4s is in hand here in Hawaii and those babies are getting on the water with great reviews. It’s very satisfying to be part of something that is making people happy and excited for the season to begin. Young Gabriel Browne (BRA-50) has been here for several weeks getting a lot of time on the water (as much as possible with the uncharacteristic light winds), and has found the performance and handling of the new sails to be perfect for him, a stated improvement over his previous ones. And this month was also exciting because of the hookup with Josh Angulo, and the opportunity to see how he can do using a very different type of sail. I’m especially happy that he is going to race, as there are few who know what a good racer he might have been had he done it more. Josh used to just drop in to the local races and challenge all the big dogs with borrowed equipment. It’s our goal to help him get completely tuned for this season and follow his dream to show the world that he still has plenty of gas in his racing tank.
The wind is back. The surf is up. It’s going to be a killer season.
Lots of new materials have been showing up in the factory so we can make the 2009 wave and freestyle sails look even sexier. And an experiment with a super light Xply has so far been proving to be very viable to improve race performance, so we will see more of this in the future as well. This time of year (including the extra day) is always so much fun because there are so many ideas and suggestions making their way into the products. If I was to sum up in a sentence, “Ain’t life a gas?!”
Aloha, Artur Szpunar
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Maui Monthly | Our Experience Your Reward no. 34. February 2008
Maui, Hawaiian Islands
Expose Yourself : Holger Wagner Name : Holger Wagner Born : March,1976 Favorite discipline : Waveriding Favorite move : Backloop Windsurfing since : 1996 Nationality : German Local beach: Weissenhaus Dream spot : CapeTown SA Favorite MauiSail : Legend Why do you windsurf : I like the feeling...of flying around,riding the wave and feel the power of wind in my hands,the colours in my eyes,crashing into the water... windsurfing is pure life...
Expose Yourself : Paolo De Angelis Name : Paolo De Angelis Nickname : Windspirit Born : South Italy Favorite discipline : Wave Favorite move : Waveriding Windsurfing since : 1999 Nationality : Italy Local beach : All South Italy coast Dream spot : Hookipa (Maui) Favorite MauiSail : Legend Website : www.windspirit.it Why do you windsurf : I do not know, it’s like a drug
Expose Yourself Our important MauiSails customers around the World now can be featured in the next MauiSails Team newsletter which reaches over ten thousand readers each month. So we’d love to hear from you, our happy sailors. So send us (media@mauisails.com) your story and a photo with you using your favorite MauiSail. If you want to add more information such as the details below, feel free. Name : Sail # (if you have one) : Nickname : Born : Favorite discipline : Favorite move : Windsurfing since?
Nationality : Local beach : Dream spot : Favorite MauiSail : Hobbies (besides windsurfing) : Website : Why do you windsurf? www.mauisails.com | 0