Hi pole boy,
I personnaly think this is the biggest step forward for Olympic sailing in years. What the Olympics needs is a board that can sail in 3 knots and 30 knots . A big call. With the Neil Pryde I think they have this covered. It may not look as sexy as a formula board, but is not far behind. With a fleet that can race in anything, the yacht clubs will start getting interested , and then we can start getting some youth involved.
Windsurfing is still the cheapest fleet in the Olympics, and yet is one of the most competitive. The standard is so high ,yet most Olympic sailors are ignored by the windsurfing press world wide, who focus instead on over paid ,under worked "pros" who idea of training is going for a freestyle session.
Look at Allison Shreeve, after 4 years plus on the Olympic circuit (she did not get to go to Athens) she then has a go at Formula and wips the other girls to win the World Championships.
I run windsurfing lessons out of South of Perth Yacht club here on the Swan River, whose acadamey get over 30 kids a weekend racing Pelican(small unsexy, boring looking dinghy). Why do they do it. Because no matter what the weather is the can race, and enjoy it.Now if we can get only a small number of them over onto the new Olympic board we will be sorted.



Simon
[email protected]
www.gowindsurfing.com

though have you seen the formula boards in 30kn they don't go to well they are to wide and just tend to get flattened (or fly off). also they can only have one sail so you need a sail where you can adjust the downhaul on the water. i don't know about you but formula rigs will be really hard to adjust on the water. on an imco you have a 24:1 ratio on the downhaul. i cant see this being enough on the rigs which have been specified, considering people are uing whinch systems just to tension the downhauls on land!!!

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