surf-matic

Ah! We hit another Friday and along with it a new foto friday. For those that read my captions, they are after the photos as before but also a photo’s caption will pop up when you hover your mouse over that photo. (Also, yesterday’s post is revised to have new action photos of me and Russ Faurot from Hookipa).

1) Such perfection is captured here! The moon, the ship, and the sea. And how perfect are the three!

2) I need the sea because it teaches me. Full stop.

3) It’s all a ship under a bridge.

4) I love you but I’ve chosen rock. Tough love at its most petrologic.

5) Many people suffer from invisibly yet are unnoticed by the general population.

6) Life’s just a shade of grey. Or is it gray?

7) This reminds me of one of my favorite Oscar Wilde prose poems “The Disciple”:

THE DISCIPLE

When Narcissus died the pool of his pleasure changed from a cup of
sweet waters into a cup of salt tears, and the Oreads came weeping
through the woodland that they might sing to the pool and give it
comfort.

And when they saw that the pool had changed from a cup of sweet
waters into a cup of salt tears, they loosened the green tresses of
their hair and cried to the pool and said, ‘We do not wonder that
you should mourn in this manner for Narcissus, so beautiful was
he.’

‘But was Narcissus beautiful?’ said the pool.

‘Who should know that better than you?’ answered the Oreads. ‘Us
did he ever pass by, but you he sought for, and would lie on your
banks and look down at you, and in the mirror of your waters he
would mirror his own beauty.’

And the pool answered, ‘But I loved Narcissus because, as he lay on
my banks and looked down at me, in the mirror of his eyes I saw
ever my own beauty mirrored.’

8) This gives new meaning to the idiom “going over the falls”. Mast high doesn’t seem so big anymore.

9) Flappers and speakeasies. Ahhh the 20’s.

10) Let’s just go ride waves because that’s freedom, always.

(Here are some new photos added to the post)

I love this photo of Russ Faurot. The sail looks amazing against the clouds.

Throwing a goiter at the point at Hookipa

Tweaking it a bit differently

And here I tweak one the normal way.

I love back loops lately-- I think they're my new favorite jump.

 
Today was a good day on the water– medium size waves and good wind. I was back on my dumpster diver quatro quad (repaired after being run over by a tourist) and loving it! The shorter board feels so good in the top turns and even though the board is wider, I feel that I can really project it up the wave in my bottom turns.

I was even working hard on a new move. Well, that’s my excuse for spending an entire hour of my session falling on every single wave. But falling is the only way to learn!

Hookipa was (and has been) ridiculously crowded lately. There must have been 100 people on the water! This means that catching a wave is a -expletive- -expletive-. I didn’t have any run ins, but I saw a bunch of people get into arguments and little tiffs on the water and the beach. One was for a guy snaking another guy and the snaker threw a 360 where the mast almost hit the other guy. That one ended with an argument on the beach. And on another wave, one pro tourist snaked a local and wanted to ride the wave for the photographers (some companies are doing photoshoots now); the local didn’t put up with the tourist’s arrogance and rode wave. This ended with an exchange of words and another blocked wave (with the local blocking the tourist). Really, arrogance like in the latter case shouldn’t be tolerated. Respect is the only rule of the water. Respect for priority, respect for seniority, respect for ability, respect for locals, respect for the fellowship of other windsurfers.

I don’t have any pics yet, but I’ll post them once I do. And until then, here is a fun photo (I can’t wait for foto friday tomorrow!):

First off, I love this:
 

Hookipa today was quite typical for a fall day: logo high waves with mast high sets and light gusty wind. I went out first on a 5.0 and it worked well, but since I’m working on getting this current board dialed for the rest of the season, I couldn’t fully immerse in the pleasure of the session. So I’d come in to move my mast track back. But then I moved it too far back so I had to move it forward again (this I did on the water– way out past the breaking waves). Then trying fins. Quad fins offer so many options! With 4 different variables, it’s actually quite overwhelming. Go bigger in the back? In the front? What about placement? And flex? Oh dear.

So my day was consumed with this. Though, it wasn’t bad. Testing and equipment honing are probably the most important parts of being a windsurfer. Without the right tools, nothing works. And further, without tuned gear, you never know whether a mistake is from you or the poorly tuned equipment.

So, it’s not that I dislike the testing, it’s just the part of the sport that I love least. But I guess it’s like an investment: trade sailing today for better sailing in the future.

Throwing the tail out.

Kevin Pritchard was killing it today and some good shots of him have surfaced. I’ll close this post with his pics:

This photo is sick! I love the style on this.

Getting low on an air-- making it look like skating.

To take arms against a sea of troubles… Today at Hookipa, the wind was light and the waves were small. An uneventful combination surely. But I took the opportunity to test out the quatro 95L production board to see if it should be my floater board for the AWT contest at the end of the month. The board, despite its large volume, worked really well. Tomorrow I’ll try it again (if the wind permits) with a few tweaks that should make it better.

I’m going to change the standard footstraps to the Dakine primo straps. This makes a world of difference. The primo straps (not the suprimo!) provide form and are quite sturdy. This allows for a more efficient energy transfer to the board– basically meaning that the board feels more at one with the body.

I’ll also put smaller back fins. I’ll throw on the K4 14’s and see how they get on. Should be good!

Also, my dad tested a new 4.7 today that I’m super excited to try once the wind gets a bit stronger. Once I’ve got some photos of me on it, I’ll throw them up here for all to see.

In other Hookipa news from today, it seems that Josh Angulo may have injured his shoulder from a collision with the mast. I hope he’s feeling better and it’s nothing serious.

Here are two shots from today:

Throwing the hand off in a little air.

Another little air... this time with 2 hands.

Today, I saw the photo/caption combo below on one of my favorite tumblr blogs, and I liked it quite a bit, so here it is. No further explanation will be given or is needed.

Hitting the lip on a Sunday swell.

This weekend marked the start of winter: fickle wind and the promise of waves. While the conditions weren’t spectacular, they show that the ocean is transitioning from her peaceful summer form to the the chaotic creature that is winter at sea.

Hookipa during the fall and winter is not the most reliable spot for wind. Sometimes the wind is so light, you have to swim out 100ft to the wind line. I’ve had days where I’ve had to swim out around the rocks and to the channel before having enough wind to waterstart. And of course when the wind is that light, the waves are normally massively over mast high.

This weekend had the bad wind with none of the big surf. The wind seemed to die around 2 most days of the week (with Sunday being the nice exception of the wind going for most of the day).

In these light conditions, having a big board is key. If you can’t catch waves, what’s the point? In tough conditions, equipment is everything. Being tuned right can make the difference between sitting on the beach and sitting on the line-up.

This coming week, I’m going to make sure I’ve got everything ready for the AWT contest here at the end of the month. I’m excited!

I love the feeling of my board turned on its side against a hard-hitting lip.

Coming down through the foam-- I love the look. I made this one and it felt pretty good.

1) Shhhh. Don’t ruin the moment.

2) A ship in a bottle? It’s more free in a glass.

3) Surfing with dolphins– all part of riding waves, which is really just joining the sea.

4) I hate censorship because _____.

5) Milton, Book IV:

On the green bank, to look into the clear
Smooth Lake, that to me seemed another Sky.
As I bent down to look, just opposite,
A Shape within the watry gleam appeard
Bending to look on me, I started back,
It started back, but pleas’d I soon returnd,
Pleas’d it returnd as soon with answering looks
Of sympathie and love; there I had fixt
Mine eyes till now, and pin’d with vain desire,
Had not a voice thus warnd me, What thou seest,
What there thou seest fair Creature is thy self,
With thee it came and goes:

6) I really like this painting, but I’m kicking myself for losing the location I found it. The artist definitely deserves credit. I’m on a mission to find the right info and when I do, I’ll post it here.

7) Why not?

8) Running with the cheetah.

9) I like this because it’s so obvious yet so overly ignored by almost everyone.

10) Peace out, I’m gonna just play in the waves.

Finally back on Maui full time, I now need a full time car. So, I’m waking up at 6:30 on Thursday to spend the morning checking out cars for sale on the island and what options are available to me.

Wednesday’s sailing was fun. Testing a new 5.0 that’s a bit shorter and trying to get some nice tweaked airs. A japanese tourist ran into me though and my favorite board now has a massive ding on the rail. What a birthday present! It reminds me of my 16th birthday when I broke my leg badly while trying to invent a new way to do air takas. I rotated it perfectly but landed backwards in the curl of the wave with so much force that I broke my fibula near the ankle. I was out for 2 months. But in the 2 months I had the opportunity to be a judge for that year’s Aloha Classic. A broken board is much better than a broken bone!

If I get some photos from Jimmie Hepp, I’ll post them here. Until then, you’ll have to suffer with my prose. And now I’m off to bed!

I loved tweaked airs. This one was fun.

Today marks roughly 22 years of my going to Hookipa. Yet amazingly, this is the first year where I can just focus solely on windsurfing. For the last 4 years, I’ve been away at Princeton studying. And before that, I was always busied with high school.

For the first time ever, I’ll be able to plan my days around windsurfing. When I was in high school (a local school located above Makawao in Olinda called Seabury Hall), I got out at 3pm most days and 2:30s on Fridays. Now I can get to the beach at noon every single day. I can actually train like a real athlete.

I’m excited to see where it will go.

2004 seems so long ago when looking at the footage! 7 years past, I was just a little teenager (14 turning 15), and watching the footage now is a bit surreal. Here is a big air crash:

Throwing the tail around in a euphoria-inducing cutback.

I’m back on Maui and damn does it feel good! I feel like a junkie finally bathing in drugs after a drought. Waves! To be riding waves again is simply euphoric.

Back out at Hookipa for the first time in a month, I was giddy to catch and ride anything and everything that I could. I would jibe on small, shitty waves. Big waves. Taken waves. Short waves. Long waves. It didn’t matter– the only impulse running through my body was the need to ride waves.

This back loop felt so good. Landing backloops never gets boring.

I love windsurfing after not windsurfing for a while. Everything is fresh and exciting. I feel like I’m moving so fast, even if its not any faster than normal. And every landed move is extra pleasurable. Plus, I tend to sail really well after a break because I’m so excited. This weekend for example, I landed a ton of goiters, even more takas, and even a mutant. That’s not including the turns, which are my favorite part.

Hitting the lip and throwing a hard carve– that’s the best feeling in my life. Or maybe the best feeling is sliding through a quick off-the-lip taka in the pit. Scratch that, the best feeling is just windsurfing.

Throwing and landing a goiter at the point.

A freeze-frame from that last goiter.

So much invigorated sailing has left my hands quite sore and missing some skin. Oh, and I’ve got a massive blood blister too. It’s strange because my hands are normally fine after long breaks. Oh well, today and tomorrow don’t look that good, so I’ll take these two days to rest from the water and return full force in the middle of the week.

Tweaking a strange air.