Xmas Present
Christmas day on Maui started off with beautiful sunny blue skies. The forecast was only calling for winds around 10 - 15, so it was a pleasant surprise to find Kanaha blowing in the upper teens. Normally I would't get too excited about that, but this time of year, you take what you can get here.
Arriving at Kanaha, it looked like marginal 5.8/90L. I pumped onto a plane and headed for Lowers where some nice clean head-high sets were coming in. Caught some pretty nice waves despite the wind being pretty light and offshore. Good fun. Just what every windsurfer wants for Christmas.
At dinner later in the evening, I heard second-hand that one well-known local windsurfer had spotted a shark while out sailing at Lowers with his wife. Little did I know I was chumming along a couple of times while waiting for enough wind to waterstart in that exact same area!
Finally getting some time to catch up on windsurfing video footage taken by our Maui Windsuring video correspondents. I got a bunch from Steve Robinson a few weeks ago from the Aloha Classic. The Aloha was all about bringing out windsurfers of any level for competition. Lots of kids participation despite the sizeable waves and shorebreak at Hookipa. This video shows future windsurfing star Kai Lenny battling with the Hookipa shorebreak just to launch. You think you got it tough. Try launch in light winds when the shore break is almost bigger than you are!
Another promising talent in the Maui windsurfing world is Skyler Haywood, son of former speed sailor Fred Haywood. Skyler lives just a few houses up from Kanaha so he gets lots of TOW and he's a regular site at Kanaha. Norm Roediger got some footage of Skyler recently.
Looks like we could be in for a long period of the doldrums here on Maui. High pressure is sitting right on top of the islands, effectively shutting of the trades. Waves are HUGE though. Lots of big swells being generated by the big storms in the north Pacific. The tow surfers should be getting their fill as Jaws will probably be going off several times over the next week or two.
Arriving at Kanaha, it looked like marginal 5.8/90L. I pumped onto a plane and headed for Lowers where some nice clean head-high sets were coming in. Caught some pretty nice waves despite the wind being pretty light and offshore. Good fun. Just what every windsurfer wants for Christmas.
At dinner later in the evening, I heard second-hand that one well-known local windsurfer had spotted a shark while out sailing at Lowers with his wife. Little did I know I was chumming along a couple of times while waiting for enough wind to waterstart in that exact same area!
Finally getting some time to catch up on windsurfing video footage taken by our Maui Windsuring video correspondents. I got a bunch from Steve Robinson a few weeks ago from the Aloha Classic. The Aloha was all about bringing out windsurfers of any level for competition. Lots of kids participation despite the sizeable waves and shorebreak at Hookipa. This video shows future windsurfing star Kai Lenny battling with the Hookipa shorebreak just to launch. You think you got it tough. Try launch in light winds when the shore break is almost bigger than you are!
Another promising talent in the Maui windsurfing world is Skyler Haywood, son of former speed sailor Fred Haywood. Skyler lives just a few houses up from Kanaha so he gets lots of TOW and he's a regular site at Kanaha. Norm Roediger got some footage of Skyler recently.
Looks like we could be in for a long period of the doldrums here on Maui. High pressure is sitting right on top of the islands, effectively shutting of the trades. Waves are HUGE though. Lots of big swells being generated by the big storms in the north Pacific. The tow surfers should be getting their fill as Jaws will probably be going off several times over the next week or two.
posted by Jeff at
4:09 PM
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