PWA Sylt report:
I had the feeling that this was the best competition of the year for Freestyle at least. From the 12 days days that I spend in Sylt we’ve had 10 days with wind, last year it was the opposite as there was no wind at all! I’m glad that we got to compete a lot, instead of only doing one single elimination we now did one double elimination. During the single elimination the conditions where tough, but fortunately during the double elimination things got better as we had side shore wind from the South. I’m happy that I could sail a lot of heats, definitely not happy with my last heat. But final 9th place is not bad at all, happy to be in the top 10 again. What also helped me, that I really know now where I have to work on for my next season. Hopefully we have more competitions in 2013 and combined with both good wind and water conditions too. I might consider attending in a couple of wave events.
Below you can read my daily report
DAY 1 report: Just arrived in Sylt together with my team mates Brian Metcalf Perez from the US and Steven van Broeckhoven from Belgium. Sylt is an Island on the border between Germany and Denmark. We drove really fast but at the same time we where all tired so we slept a lot yesterday. The forecast for the week looks really promising for every discipline as there will be a week of good wind here in Sylt. Tomorrow the skippersmeeting will be at 9AM. We might start with Freestyle.
DAY 2 report: Today was a big waiting game at the beginning. Around 2PM we started finally competing, I was facing a though draw although there are no easy heats. Actually everybody is sailing really good and with tough conditions out on the North-Sea anything could happen. First heat today was against fellow teamrider Ricardo Campello. 3x Worldchampion Freestyle and 2x Vice Worldchampion Wave. Ricardo is special, this one of the most gifted sailors and is good in pretty much every sport he does. Even when not competing in actual freestyle competition anymore I would still put my money on him making it into the top three. If there only were more wavy conditions at the tourstops. I knew I had to sail a very super good heat to beat him. When going out the conditions where really not in the favor of anybody. Light winds combined with current and not to much power in at least my sail to get going for bigger jumps. I decided to sail more like a safe heat. Just to fill up the scoring sheet, and after this to take much more risk. Ricardo made a super high AirShaka, as well a Backloop, boosting up his scores for sure. But eventually he missed out on a couple of moves. So I won the heat, didn’t expect this to happened. For sure Ricardo will be on warpath chasing trough the double elimination. Next heat I had to face Bjorn Saragoza from Bonaire who’s currently ranked 5th overall. Again a though heat, so I had to give everything. Luckily the wind picked up for my 4.8 sail. During the heat it was so hard to sail for me and for Bjorn too. We where both crashing all over the place. Just over time I nailed a Airchachoo, which could might give me the edge….? When heading to the beach Bjorn won with a 2-1 decision winning with 0,5 point. Which let me with thought, what if..For tomorrow we might first start with wave discipline and later on Freestyle, I hope the conditions will turn out good for me and I can setup a great performance!!
DAY 3 report: Great wave sailing action today. Outstanding sailors where: Ricardo Campello, Alex Mussolini, Victor Fernandez and World champion Philip Koster. Waverider of the day; Alex Mussolini, who was riding the waves like he was surfing at Ho’okipa beach in Maui.
DAY 4 report: Today we started of with the double elimination of freestyle. I did pretty good advancing 4 rounds, eventually Phillip Soltysiak was sailing against me which prevent me from advancing any further rounds. Philip was sailing well and I had a really bad heat so he deserved it! Right now I’m 9th. in the double elimination. So far my scoring was really good on port tack had some really clean Airchachoo’s but also really would like to a double in a heat (wind was to light), but I really need to step up the game with tricks on starboardtack. Tomorrow we might finish the Freestyle double elimination but if there’s enough they will finally start the Slalom. This what the PWA had to say: Double Elimination The first round of the double elimination went according to the form book and all of the sailors that expected to progress did, as did much of the second. The main talking point occurred in heat thirty-seven as Max Matissek (Fanatic / North) sailed against Tony Mottus (JP / NeilPryde). The two sailors endured an extremely close heat and the result came down to a 2:1 decision in the favor of Matissek. The closest heat in the freestyle though occurred in the next round as Andy Chambers took on Maarten Van Ochten (JP / NeilPryde / MFC). The pair landed some massive moves, including an outstanding air chachoo from Van Ochten, and by the end of the heat the scoring was tied. This meant that by way of a tiebreak Van Ochten progressed into heat forty-five, where he would face Phil Soltysiak (Starboard / Sailworks). The Canadian proved too much for Van Ochten on this occasion as Soltysiak marched into the top eight.As already mentioned in heat forty-five Phil Soltysiak was able to dispatch of Maarten Van Ochten, meanwhile, the B-side of the heat saw Dieter Van der Eyken (Starboard / Severne) continue his hugely impressive form as the Belgium brought an end to Davy Scheffers’ (Tabou / Gaastra) double elimination.
PWA Freestyle Sylt overall result:
Photos: John Carter/ Matthias Mueller