AWSI event in Hood River!

I’m excited to be at the AWSI event in Hood River. I’m representing the Launch Pad Windsurf Academy as a windsurfing school that is seeing a great boost in popularity as wing foiling gets more attention.

I flew to Vancouver and buddy Chuck picked me up and we had a great 6 hour drive down the Pacific coast to Hood River. I don’t think I’ve been here since our RV trip in 2006. A lot has changed, but wow, it feels so much like my memories. The event site is still the event site! But the water has a whole different set of wind sports on the water - wing foiling is definitely all the rage. Just a few kiters and windsurfers, a few of each on foils. But wingfoils were everywhere.

The boys in the gorge!

We visited some of the booths that were setting up for the Wed, Thurs & Friday exposition. Toronto native Matt Aiken who runs the AWSI and North Action sports was there and greeted us along with North Windsurfing representative Derek Rijff. They set me up on a 4.8m wing and a 118 litre foilboard with a 1230 foil - the smallest I’ve ever ridden.

I walked and then swam out past the breakwater and knelt on the foilboard. Up and off I went, keeping the nose of the foil board down and settling into nice flight. I foiled for 6km and got almost all of my jibes. My tacks weren’t on the foil, but were ok. 

What was really strange was to have to think about right of way. Where I normally sail there are no other users on the water that I need to worry about. Here there are kiters, windsurfers and now foilers all of whom move at different rates. And all move up and down wind way more than back when there were only windsurfers. I felt remarkably comfortable out on the water and came in after a half hour to return the gear and since the thermal wind started dropping a bit.

A highlight of the day was seeing brother-in-law (by marriage 2x removed) Jaren from Vancouver along with a bunch of other west coast wind sports fans. After settling into our VRBO, Steve, Chuck and I found a Mexican restaurant where I enjoyed a Baja fog.

Tomorrow I’m off to the Hatchery to demo some Duotone gear. The rest of the report from the Gorge is on my Launch Pad windsurf school blog...