Sylt & Dutch Wave Championships

Amigooos ! It’s been a while !

Not much windsurfing after the event in Brouwersdam. I’ve been on the water exactly one time since then.The day after the worldcup I went straight back to studies. Which was all going really well until… The worldcup started in Sylt. Livestreaming of the action combined with Ben profit’s commentary is waaay more entertaining than whatever was going on in my books and classes. (Yes.. I was following the slalom and freestyle action on my iphone during class, on my bikerides and had my phone been waterproof I would have followed it in the shower)

Naturally I couldn’t stay away.. so my hand slipped and I “accidentally” booked a ticket to go to Sylt for the last weekend. Sylt is pretty much the biggest event of the year. You just can’t miss out. And in all honesty I just wanted to be there to see everybody and show some support! And it was well worth it.
Kiri Thode had an incredible run freestyling his way to first place in the double after finishing 4th in the single. And with that became the 2013 freestyle worldchampion ( Hip hip hooray !!). When I was younger I very much looked up to Kiri when it came to freestyle. We would often win local events in our age categories so it was great to see him claim his first worldtitle !
Finally after 3 days of windsurfing action, crêpes, celebration, and seeing all of my windsurfing friends it was time to go back to Holland.

The first time I got on the water since Brouwersdam was at the Dutch wave Championship (ONK) at Zandvoort on October 27th. What a day !!
I checked the forecast the day before and thought it would be a nice windy and fun day. I should have known by now though that 30-35knots on windguru for Europe is not the same as for Aruba. In Aruba I would happily sail along on my 4.8. This however was a different story. I am usually the last person to switch to a smaller sail.. but when I realized most of the guys bigger than me were stacked on either 4,0’s or 3.7’s , I got the message and rigged my smallest kit. So for the rest of the day I was hanging on to my 3.6 for dear life. The current was very strong and after each heat all sailors would end up 100-200 meters downwind and… we’d have to do the walk of shame back upwind. Nonetheless it was such a great day! The sun started shining soon after we started and everybody was motivated and in a good mood. Great atmosphere.

There were 8 ladies and I made it to the finals with Eva oude ophuis. I wasn’t very confident in my first heats but by the time I was in the final my wave sailing had already gotten better. I didn’t see the score sheet after the heat but I managed to win and become the 2013 Dutch waveworldchampion! I didn’t expect it but now I’m very motivated to practice waves even more!
Eva finished in second and Jolien Berg in third. The men’s division was also very exciting and saw Kevin mevissen finishing in 1st , Martin ten Hoeve finishing in 2nd and Mike Bossaert in 3rd.

Big Thank you to the organizer Jan Willem and his crew for taking the initiative to organize this event. Hopefully this will boost more events in Holland. And another big thank you to Grant and Danielle for helping me out with a ride and getting me to the water 🙂

Below is the clip of the Dutch championship