Friday 21 August 2009

A short taster............

As I may have already mentioned, Oisin is busy at home now editing the hours of footage we got using the GoPro HeroCam. In the meantime, here is a short clip to give you an idea................................

Saturday 15 August 2009

As promised, a few pics of the action from last week at Punta..............

Friday 14 August 2009

The Last Two Weeks!!!!!!!

Well, that´s it, Oisin is on his way back to Ireland and I´m knackered! We managed to sail every day except the last one and once again Oisin motivated and inspired me as he always does!
We have hours of video taken from all angles on the GoPro helmet cam and it is now up to Oisin to edit it all into a movie, good luck mate.
I will post up a load of photos over the next couple of days but for now here is a short clip of vid that was taken on one of the last days at Punta. Oisin convinced me that I could do one-handed shakas so I went out and punished myself for the camera (Will was most amused by the variety of splendid crashes that ensued!), and after a few disastrous first attempts I started to get closer and closer to landing one, which I eventually did, landing a clean, dry one when Oisin was doing a panoramic sweep of the bay with the video camera. Typical! Anyway, I got a couple of shady ones on video and the next day landed quite a few dry when we weren´t filming. Check out the bit of vid below and watch this space for when I eventually get a decent one on camera..................

First day of one handed attempts....... from Stephen Gibson on Vimeo.

Wednesday 5 August 2009

Another week with Alex.

Just had another fantastic week with young Alex Mitchell, he's been three times now and I have to say he is learning and improving at a phenomenal rate! Once again we were blessed with perfect winds- 6 days from 6 with 3 days at Punta concentrating on freestyle and jumping and then 3 days in the south for high wind freestyle.
At Punta we had great allround conditions sailing on 4.5s and 5s with 2-3m waves and Alex is getting closer and closer to that elusive first backloop! His forwards are now supersmooth (he learnt those in his first clinic!) and he's even landing planing and looking like he may even be ready to launch himself into doubles soon!
At Sotavento we wanted to clean up his spocks, make them more fluid and consistent. By the end of the third day he was getting about 4 from 5, compared to the 1 from 10 he was getting when he arrived. I then made him concentrate on one-handers and 540s which he very quickly learnt and became consistent at. Moving quickly on we switched to ponch training on the last day (he had never tried one but can flaka fairly consistently now (clinic no.2!), and he managed to pull one on his second try! He got some great ponches after that and, although he is yet to sail away cleanly, can now consider it another trick in his bag! Well done once again that lad- definitely a name to watch out for in the (very near) future............
I apologise for the lack of pics and vid but we were far too busy sailing, haha. Got my good friend and fellow JP/Neil Pryde teamrider Oisin Van Gelderen here at the moment, though and we are getting some amazing stuff on the GoPro helmetcam so watch this space..............



Welcome to the site!
Aswell as regular features and news updates from Fuerte, I am going to be using this site to promote my windsurfing clinics.
After 15 years on the island,having competed in the PWA freestyle world cup and now representing Fanatic Boards and North Sails, I have decided to give something back to the sport which has given me so much over the years.
My aim is to provide clinics "tailor-made"for each individual, with a strong emphasis on practical in-the-water instruction, backed up by on-the-beach tuition and video analysis. The consistent conditions here in Fuerte make learning so much easier and, perhaps equally important, more fun than the typically inconsistent, cold UK - why not come over for a week and improve your windsurfing by a year!!!

I can help with any manoeuvres from carve-gybe through to advanced jumping and freestyle, just email me with your wish list and we'll take it from there! Over the next few months, I am going to be video-chronicling manoeuvres which you can check out on the right in my tricktionary sections. This will give you some idea of the things we can work on, or, if you can't make it over here, you may find them useful to help understand and break down a manoeuvre you would like to learn (hopefully, the slow-mo will help in this respect!).Just click on the trick and scroll down..........
Anyway, keep checking it out as I have loads more in my bag of tricks and will be updating as and when I get the footage.
If you're interested, e-mail me on gibboinfuerte@yahoo.co.uk
See ya in Fuerte?
Stephen.............