You definitely can´t beat water photography for a different perspective of any watersport, and these pics taken by Victor of SailboardsFuerte prove this point to the max. Taken at our favourite SUP (and windsurf) spot on the northshore two days ago, great quality, great colours, great pics- thanks Victor...
I´ve put together this short video of one of the days at Majanicho earlier this month. I apologise in advance for the fact that it´s another "gopro" movie- the plan was to mix it up with some "proper" footage shot from the beach, but it has proven impossible to get any footage as nobody wants to stand on the beach and film when it´s working there! Anyway, I was left with these gopro clips and it seemed such a shame to waste them or let them get old, so I stuck them together in a short vid. With all the current debate about quads, twins and singles etc. you may be interested to know that this day I was on my Fanatic Skate 100, a dedicated freestyle board with a 17cm freestyle fin in it. Totally not designed for shredding waves, but it just goes to show that you can´t blame everything on the "wrong" board. In fact, speed is such a crucial element in waveriding (as in so many other areas of our sport), that on a lightish wind day such as this one was, it´s often better to have a real fast board which maybe doesn´t turn as well, and I have always wholeheartedly extolled the versatility of "freestyle" boards. Everyone should have one in the van. Anyway, enough of that. The video also proved useful as an analytical tool on a recent clinic where we watched it to teach hand movements on the boom while waveriding with a great degree of success! Regular readers of the blog may also note that, due to the semi-arctic conditions at the minute (23 degrees and sunshine, ahem) I have been forced to don my full winter suit... on that note, here´s the video.
On one of the lightwind days over xmas, I took Hobbsy to the lagoons in Cotillo to teach him to tack as he was struggling on his small board. I can´t over emphasize how valuable sessions like this can be in learning shortboard manoeuvres! He quickly got to grips wuth the habd and foot movements and was soon tacking away to his heart´s content. I then decided to show him some lightwind freestyle on the big board to improve his rig handling and he learnt very quickly indeed- he can now back-wind gybe helicopter tack and sail on the lee side of the sail, excellent stuff. All of these skills are very useful when sailing our shortboards but can take ages to learn on an unforgiving 80l waveboard, so I´d like to think that we improved Hobbsy´s sailing by a fair bit in the two hours we spent there. He actually admitted that he felt he learned more there than in any other day´s windsurfing!! Oh, and it´s great fun of course- check out the video clip and feast yer eyes on Hobbsy´s new-found skills. Well done, amigo...
The forecast was for strong east wind but it never materialised. The swell was still pumping, though, and it looked do-able from the shore so I ventured out on my 100l Fanatic Skate and 5.3 North Hero in what turned out to be the lightest wind I have ever wavesailed in- about 6-8kts. Getting out there was tricky to say the least and took a while. No way to waterstart so I tried my utmost to stay upright and avoid uphauling in the mast-and-a-half sets. I manged to catch a few half-decent waves but called it a day after about 40 minutes when the wind dropped even more and manged to wobble back in with my hair still dry. Phew. Got some alright video footage though, and I took these stills to give you an idea what it was like out there....
No wind today, which gives me the perfect opportunity to share some more pics of the action from Majanicho this week. And what a week! Two days of calm now and then it starts again, even stronger next week! Time to chill...
Yeah, the wind materialised yesterday for what will be the start of a perfect week of down-the-line conditions!!! Hobbsy took up where he left off at El Martillo- his waveriding is getting better with every session (pity he won´t get any more til he comes back here, haha). Check out this short clip of me teaching him from upwind on a couple of waves from the morning session, great stuff...
Another year gone, wow! Looks like this year is going to start with a bang if windguru is correct- the forecast is amazing for this coming week. It´s going to be going off every day at Punta then Majanicho, so I´m having a quiet day today, enjoying my hangover and recuperating ready for tomorrow. Should have loads of footage to post up as we have a big bag of camera and video equipment in the van so fingers crossed.... in the meantime, check out these pics from Punta a couple of days ago. I had an awesome little session in the late afternoon, thanks to Simon for taking the photos (he missed the wind by standing on the rocks taking them).
Got my little mate Hobbsy here for the festive season and we scored a great little sail at El Martillo yesterday. He wants to learn forwards and also get some decent frontside waveriding in as he doesn´t get the conditions much at home. Well, the conditions were ideal for his first attempt- head high in the sets and straight sideshore! He sailed excellent, nice style and will improve as the week progresses looking at the forecast- well done! Today looks like Punta for forwards, then Jim and the posse from Pura Vida get here and the forecast is amazing so fingers crossed for an unforgettable new year windsurf bonanza!!!!!!!! Check out Hobbsy´s first waveriding experience here....
Christmas has been and gone- absolutely knackered now having been working in Rock Island Bar every night while the owners are away and SUPing every day. The swell has been small but good fun at El Martillo. Loving my new 8´10 Fanatic Allwave, starting to get the hang of turning it a bit more now, it´s so manoueverable compared to the 10ft board I had previously. Got some decent pics from yesterday and a bit of Gopro footage from Boxing Day (I´ll be making a video eventually with all the footage I get over the next couple of weeks). Check it out below. The wind is coming back big-time in the next couple of days and I´ve got a good friend over with all his "digital media devices" so we should have loads of action to post up very soon.... watch this space. Til then, Merry Christmas!!!!
At last some wind at Majanicho! Despite being a "legendary" spot, Majanicho is predominantly a lightwind "float n ride" type of place (better on the SUP normally!) and the last couple of years have been incredibly un-epic there due to super-light winds so I have been searching out alternative, windier places to sail in east/southeast winds. This week, however, we had a real cool session there with pretty strong wind for a change and nice clean, fun-sized waves. Not too busy either, which is quite unusual. I sailed for a good two hours straight and left the water knackered but happy to at last have scored a good blast at what can be one of Fuerte´s best waveriding spots when the wind decides to play ball. Thanks to the injured Victor for these photos...
And it just keeps coming! The eastwind is still here for another couple of days- it´s 8am and I´m just heading out the door to hopefully score El Martillo again. Swell is perfect 3m, and the wind should be picking up as we speak. Swinging NE on Saturday morning so back to Punta. Wow! I´ve had my new SUP for almost 3 weeks now and haven´t been able to use it as it´s been too windy every day- oh, well....
We got the wind which was promised on Saturday and got a pretty decent sail in at Punta with mast high waves and 5m sail. Again, we took to the water with the camera (1 hour shifts, me and Victor), and got some cool photos which I am sifting through as we speak- so far, this is my favourite shot, an air chacho, would have been perfect if the sky hadn´t been so grey. Still a great photo though...
We got our first run of easterlies yesterday and the day before, which meant that everyone and their dog scrambled to Majanicho. The first day was too light for me so I went SUPing instead, but yesterday was windy so I managed a short session. I had stuff to do in the morning so arrived at 12, just in time to get 20 minutes in the dying wind. Majanicho is pretty much a lightwind riding-only spot (it gets nice and windy there maybe twice every winter), and it tends to blow from early morning til mid-day so I wasn´t too surprised to miss it. Oh, well, good fun nevertheless. Sailed at Punta today on 5m, messy but good crack, and it looks as though the wind is turning east again tomorrow for the rest of the week so it´ll be back to Majanicho or, most likely, out with the SUP again- wicked. Here´s a couple of pics taken from the beach yesterday...
If you fancy getting away from it all (with or without the family), I am once again running my hugely successful Easter Clinic in conjunction with Puravida from March 31st 2012. The last two trips have been awesome and places are limited, so if you are interested I suggest you get in touch with Jim at http://www.puravidaboardriders.co.uk/ asap. You can see reports on the previous clinics in older posts in this here blog of mine. In the meantime, check out the promo vid- the windsurfing part was shot a few days ago at Punta. Shorts in November- this could be you at Easter!!!!!
Got some half-decent footage from the last couple of days at Punta, the wind was fairly light but great fun on my Fanatic Skate. Check out this taka...
Don´t confuse my lack of posting for a lack of activity, I´ve been pretty busy this last while. Had a couple of guys over for tuition and been full-on SUP and windsurfing inbetween. This past week has been windy, although I must admit the forecast has failed to deliver every day and I have been on my 99 Skate and 5.3 at Punta in pretty big waves and lightish winds. Nevertheless, we got a couple of photos, and with wind forecast for the next couple of days I´m still hoping to get some better ones....
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.............
