More discoveries in France

On Friday I made a number of cool windsurfing related discoveries.

1. There are a lot of windsurfing shops in France. Between the two shops that I've been going to (Carro Surfshop in Carro and La Voile Libre in Fos) there is another shop in between. A nice guy named Martin from Holland who I met Tuesday at Le Jai had recommended Hot Mer as a good place to rent gear for the upcoming Defi wind race. I headed there and was amazed to find yet another massively well stocked shop.

Windsurfing beaches and shops near Aix-en-Provence

2. I know a lot of French windsurfing terms. During the two hours that I spent selecting my Defi wind rental quiver (two boards, two sails, fins, booms, extensions etc.) Shop manager Thierry and I chatted a lot. All in French.

3. France is an epicentre for windsurfers. While I was in the shop admiring a Peter Thommen board and mentioned that I'd met him in Maui, Thierry noted that Peter has a house close by here in France. Cool.

4. There are neat beaches everywhere nearby. Thierry recommended another sailing spot on Etang de Berre for sailing in a Mistral wind. Apparently it is near Le Jai, which I thought was the only good spot. Sure enough, I headed to the nice sandy beach, complete with palm trees. I rigged up with one other guy there, and sailed 25km in an hour and a half in the gusty wind. I enjoyed the scenic drive back to Aix through the vineyards, olive groves and small villages. And I still made it back to school in time to pick up my daughter and drive her downtown to the dentist where my loving wife had already taken our sons.

5. I do like slalom sailing. I had never before sailed on an 85cm wide board. I used to joke about guys sailing on "doors". My current "race" board is a 75cm wide Techno 148 which is fun, but... The big board I rented for the Defi is a 135 liter Tabou Mantra quasi race board. It is 85 cm wide. I loved how it goes up and down wind with a 7.5m cambered sail. It is also easier to sail than I expected. In the picture below, you can see my various up and down wind sections - max speed was 45.6 km/h. 

My up and down wind slalom windsurfing tracks
at my new favourite beach

Sweet sunset freestyle session

48 hours after my long slalom windsurfing session, there was another Mistral wind forecast. After dropping the kids home from school, I headed to the nearest beach and rigged up in the 35c late afternoon sun.

There were around 30 people out at Le Jai, generally on 6m sails and slalom gear. I rigged the 6.2 with my Skate 108 freestyle board and small fin. I had the right sail, and despite too much downhaul initially, I got going fine.

But I was feeling very rusty, unable to really get upwind, and definitely not feeling like I was able to do any tricks. I was starting to wonder if my windsurfing ability has plateaued. Maybe I'm just in maintenance mode now?

I kept sailing, and at around the 1 hour mark, I started to feel comfortable. There were fish jumping and it was feeling a bit like being in the Gorge with the warm wind blowing on my forearms.

So I decided to really make an effort on my Vulcans - no more just trying one or two a session. So indeed, around my 10th one (#125), I landed sliding backwards, and had my hands on the other side of the boom a few times. While I still fell over backwards, I almost waterstarted switch foot and might even have been able to claim one. I tried another 10 (total 135 attempts now) and got somewhat close again one other time, but maybe, just maybe this will be in my future. I'll keep trying - I've heard it can take 1,000 tries.

Windsurfing until the sun set!

I sailed a full 2 hours, and was one of the last people packing up as the sun set. There are new palm trees on the beach, and I'm looking forward to a few more freestyle visits here before we leave Provence in a few weeks.


4 Windsurfing Vulcan attempts from Canadian Guy on Vimeo.

51km Defi race training session

It is less than two weeks until the Defi wind race. I'm now officially a bit nervous about having signed up for this 1,000 windsurfer race where each heat is 40 km long.

GPS trail of the 51km session

I had been watching the wind reports and Sunday was supposed to be windy in Gruisson where the race is held. So I hopped in the car and drove to do some reconnaisance.

Luckily there was still wind when I got there at 3:30pm, in fact it had been building. I rented some gear from the rental shop on the beach and headed out. I was fully powered on a 5.0 and 100 litre board. In fact, the boom clamp line snapped, but luckily I was able to swim back to the beach against the 30 knot wind to effect repairs. After that I stayed even closer to the beach in the offshore winds that were now gusting to 40. I downhauled the sail a bit more to make it less powerful.

Solid wind while I was sailing!

I sailed 51k in 1hour and 50 minutes (around 15 minutes of which were spent adjusting gear.) Towards the end I was feeling more comfortable with the speed.

Some mental notes: I'll need to wear sunglasses for the race. The sand blowing off the beach and spray from passing windsurfers is blinding. Last year the winds built from 20 knots on day one to 50+ knots on day 4. I also really think I need to rent some true slalom gear. The 50 or so other guys out were all practising on serious slalom equipment (I like the look of the Mauisails TR5). I did still hit 50km/h toward the end of some runs. I nailed virtually all my jibes which was nice, but didn't try any tricks. There were only two freestylers out.

50 km/h at the end of each broad reach!

Thanks to the shop Pole Nautique Gruisson on the beach, they were very kind despite my poor French, and didn't even demand a security deposit. Just pay now and bring it back when you are finished. The other guys on the beach were all friendly too. Merci beaucoup!

What's that smell?

 Could that be the camels on the beach? No, it's the smell of Carl getting skunked.

Circus camels on the beach at Carro, France
One guy out on an SUP with a sail playing in the waves

Check out the wind chart. I got to the beach at 14:00. Folks were sailing, having a good time. 5.4s and 4.7s were all over the beach with 90l wave boards. I rigged my 5.4 and thought "I'll be fine, I've got a 108l board." I got on the water at 14:15 and had an uneasy feeling as the wind got lighter and lighter.

The big lull happens when Carl goes out

Well, I did get planing twice and had two really nice gibes on the outside. But I think there was a current and my upwind - sub planing ability is clearly weak. My last ride track back in shows some weird up and down wind portions, which I'm guessing are currents and eddies as there are large rocks under water. So I wound up doing a 400m walk of shame (along with a kiter who suffered the same fate.)

The Shadowbox ride track - two nice gibes on the outside
then slog back - with currents?

The only upside was that since I was already rigged, and everyone had already left the parking lot, I got to try out the Turfdog land sailer a bit more. I made it back in time to pick up the kids from school. so I kept some nice brownie points from my wife that way.

GoPro + Shadowbox = Fail Video

I finally got around to putting together my GoPro camera clips, and my Shadowbox ride data from April 12 into a video.


GoPro + Shadowbox = Fail Video from Canadian Guy on Vimeo.

The failed loop and vulcan (#115) attempt are funny but the best has to be the slow motion mast cam video where my back foot comes out of the strap and I go over the handlebars. One of the jumps is 5ft in height and the big slow motion one is over 10ft high and 30ft long.

I think the video would benefit from a bit more text, but I'm pretty happy with my first efforts.  In any case it got picked up by windsport magazine:
http://www.windsport.com/videos_display/video:3312/From-a-Windsport-reader

Visit to Wesh windsurft park - Leucate

On our family drive back to France from Barcelona, we passed by Leucate. This windsurfing town, famous for its windsurfing speed strip now boasts the first windsurfing rail park. I managed to convince the family to make a slight detour so we could visit.

It also turned out to be windy so I was super stoked that I might get to sail. On our way to Leucate, we drove by several beaches jammed with windsurfers, kiters and learn to sail operations. We also saw a few well stocked windsurfing shops.

When we finally got to location of the Wesh centre, I was excited to find a fully stocked windsurfing rental operation. I quickly got a wetsuit, harness, 5.8 and 100l Naish concept board, and headed out to the water.

My kids hung out in the car playing video games and my wife chatted with many of the French windsurfers at the beach hut.

I sailed for 2 hours and then started feeling guilty about leaving the family on the beach. It was the first time in months I'd abandoned them, so they readily forgave me when they saw the size of the smile on my face.

My loving family captured a duck jibe from shore

Unfortunately the ramp and rail were not set up. In fact the ramp looked to have taken a beating over the winter. I'm not sure I would have tried it anyway. I did do a bunch of nice upwind 360s in the straps and got some downwind 360s as well.

The Wesh centre ramp

The location is a nice protected bay, where the Tramontine wind comes out to the sea. It felt a lot like the walk down to Doug's in the Gorge, but with a Bonaire waist deep area and very small chop. The warm weather, good vibes, muddy water, dry hills, parking lot full of RVs, windsurfing gear trailers and seeing the French TGV trains going across the other side of the bay probably were some of the many things that reminded me of being at the Columbia River Gorge. 

The path looks like the one to Doug's

I enjoyed sharing my copy of Windsurfing Mag with them. I happened to have the "Ripping up Rails in France" issue, so I left it with the Wesh crew. That turned out to be very handy and good karma, as then next day we realized that my wife left her ID at the cash. Luckily they had our postal address on the magazine cover and could mail it to us!

All the facilities are right on shore

It is very cool that in France there are so many windsurfing rental shops right on the beaches.

A great session!

Mistral today - I'm glad I've got a 4.2

After a week of waiting for a good day, the Mistral (north wind) happened as predicted. Topping it off, it was 21c and sunny.

I started out on my 4.7, but rigged down to 4.2. I'm glad I had that sail, but still didn't really have much success in the trick department. Survival sailing was the best I could do, with a few good jibes.

I am really pleased that the foam nose protector that I glued to the front of my board is sticking in place. I would have had one very ugly nose crack if it wasn't there!

Wind stats during my time on the water, 11:00 to 13:00.
Later in the day, gusts were hitting 49 knots

Is a 2 hour session in that kind of wind wimpy? I kind of thought so, but some of the other sailors that rigged up and headed out at the same time as me, were already de-rigged and gone when I got back to shore.

I think that's me, captured out on the Le Jai webcam

I have lots of Shadowbox and GoPro data and look forward to posting some of that soon once I go through it all. A failed loop attempt and a possible 13ft high jump off chop should be interesting to review.