How these guys manage close to 40 knot 500m in these conditions is beyond me!!!
Results and images here: www.fuerteventura-worldcup.org/
GO SLOWIE!
I'd be lucky to crack 20 in those conditions 
was watching the spectator live (How sad) and AA was getting 42.9 peaks FFS
Interesting to see that all are wearing buoyancy jackets, or life vests
regardless of water depth
Wonder what the brand and supplier is?
regardless of water depth
regardless of water depth
windsurfjournal.perfect-ride.com/fue08-09.mp4
and
windsurfjournal.perfect-ride.com/fue08-11.mp4
For some cool video of Sotovento action. Last one has some nice footage of Antoine skipping over the chop like it is not even there.
How come Finian never smiles? In ALL the video I have ever seen of the guy he is never smiling, EXCEPT for when he broke the record. All other times it's Mr Grumpy. I thought Irish people were meant to be a happy lot? Has losing the record affected him that much! Whereas Antoine is Mr Smiley and so is Bjorn and anyone else for that matter.
The big fella would smile constantly if he got to see Elmo peform one of his famous dismounts in the middle of gybing
I'll have to be careful about not complaining to Slowie about a lumpy track at Man or Pt Walter when he gets back.
Clearly, fins need to work in zero to double shock loads
Suicide Alley?
Actually YoYo, I have been wondering about this and will give this a go in situations when I need to sail off broad into the chop. Due to my accident I am a bit nervous about going for it through the rough stuff whilst hooked in 
I understand that you need to keep as much downward pressure on the mast base to maintain control, and I think you see this in the vid by Valerie hanging a bit more off the boom I think, although only slightly, I dont know what her normal speed sailing style is.
A few weeks ago bender and I found ourselves needing to go downwind in a big squall with very dense invisible floating weed islands in the water. Neither of us was game to hook in, we just pointed downwind and went. I clocked a high 33 and Bender a high 34, fortunately without hitting a weed island, (even unhooked it could have hurt).
There wasn't much strain on the arms, and as you say we just hung off the boom, think we could have gone faster hooked in, but then we haven't had any practice sailing unhooked, and we weren't trying for max speed, just hanging on.
So I think it's possible, may need a bit of experimenting to get the best technique.
I see that slowie has scored another 9th place,taking him to 12th overall and onto the first results page.
Sure looks like fun..or fear..or something starting with F...
Interesting to see Chris was not the highest placing CA rider.
But as Porka stated at the begining, doing 40 knots on that aquatic motocross track defies belief.
Jacques is sponsored by NP/ JP Australia but no doubt in a similar situation to Tabou sponsored Steve Allen riding Starboard formula boards in comps until Tabou/Gaastra came up with the Gaastra Vapor formula board , Jacques has been using CA 50, 44 and recently acquired a 40 as JP had no speed boards.
However, I note on GPS-SS that he now lists 3 2009 JP speed boards in his quiver. A 38x229, 42x230 and a 48x230. These boards are not yet on the JP web site and are news to me. I note he also got a peak 2 sec of 40.38 at Fuerte.
This photo of him on the course shows the CA44 got a work out in some heats....
11th and 12th..not bad for a small manufacturer
Starboard 1st and 19th
F2 ........ 2nd, 6th, 7th, 8th, 15th and 20th
Proof/T1 3rd
RRD...... 4th
Fanatic. 5th, 9th, 17th and 18th
AB+...... 10th
Tabou... 13th
Exocet.. 14th and 16th
Try this one out - www.gps-speedsurfing.com/default.aspx?mnu=user&smnu=sessions&uid=2814
This is a quote off the latest Feurto video - Cyral Moussilmani - "This could be dangerous,the thing is when you go fast...if you crash very hard sometimes the equipment break ,if you go just not enough fast the equipment don't break and you break yourself."
I like it.
yeah it was interesing...
Jaques was riding the 44 the whole time. It was quite windy. He was the dutch champion back in the early '90s so is no slouch. He also imports JP and NP in the netherlands. He got a couple of speed boards from JP but did not bring them to Fuerte. He was going really fast. But suffered a bit. He did one massive crash and broke his mast with his nose 
. AA also broke a couple of masts doing big wipeouts. There was so much broken stuff it was insane. I broke some battens (4) before the start of the event getting dumped in the shorebreak. Lets just say that didnt help. They werent totally broken so I kept sailing. I fixed them all for the 5th round and gee- I started doing a lot better (4th). Got smashed in the 6th round in 35kts+ wind with the 6.6m... was quite unwell at that point (again) so didnt have the energy (+lazy?) to rig the 5.8m. Should have considered it earlier when FM and AA are both on 6.2 and the other guys who did well were on 5.8s. By the last round my board weighed in at 9kg due to the hole in it that I didnt notice. The SP40 was a bit too small for the 6.6m in that chop so I had to use the heavy one. I thought it was the wet sand all over it. Should be dried out by Karpathos (4 plane flights will suck all the water out). Anyway, finishing with a 9th in the last round was OK to get me up a few euro in the final result.
Overall pretty happy given the conditions... Weight seemed to be the king again. The top guys were all wearing plenty of lead. I had to opt for wet sand, which did not cut it. 2kg sand is no match for 12kg of lead
Sounds like carnage all 'round.
Slowie you should travel with your own biosphere. You seem to pick up a bug every trip.
Good luck in Greece.
Just rememember the up an down theory. May the force be with u champ. U have it in u! GOOD LUCK!
Chris cheers for the update and congrats on the effort....have to say your comment re the lead makes me smile...now you know how i feel!...
but i have to wonder how guys with 12 kilos of lead remain positively bouyant or even neutral bouyant for that matter!!! i carry 9 and i have to wear a life jacket to counter that so how do they carry 12!! dont they have rules for bouyancy requirements?
good luck fo the rest of the trip your not missing much back here...
yes there is a rule, but I havent see it being enforced.ever- even at the canal (apparently AA was wearing 2 weight jackets- he canhold it cos his arms are thicker than my legs) Too much on the organisers plates. Some of their equipment got drowned in the high tides on the last days. The waves were crashing righyt next to the containers- 2km from the event tent. a few guys managed to secure all the rigs that were left there when competitors went out to lunch. A big chain of about 20 rigs tied together with bits of downhaul rope, all washing and bobbing round in the soup. We only had 3 containers for everyones rigs (60people). It was total carniage.
