Tuesday, April 3, 2012

MWA Round 1 Hollowell Reservoir, Northamptonshire, UK March 24th 2012


On March 24th i made the short trek over to Hollowell Reservoir in Northamptonshire from Birmingham for the 1st round of the Midlands Windsurfing Association Race Series. As i am now based in the Midlands in the UK this race series was one i wanted to take part in as quite a few of the guys i race against in the UKWA national events take part so it is great practice for the national events.

On arrival at 9am there was little to no wind but the forecast was showing it to pick up as the day went on to around 5 knots the race officer laid a box course as we all rigged up. As there was little chance of there being any strong winds the decision of what to rig was easy so i got my Starboard Phantom 380 Race with 50cm Vector Maui Fins Canefire fin ready and rigged my 10.5m Raceboard sail and registered and got changed as the first start was going to be 11am so i wanted to be ready. The first 3 races were held virtually back to back with a short rest between them in very testing conditions as the wind was only around 4-5 knots and very gusty but i had decent speed upwind keeping up with everyone but once off the wind i was finding it hard to keep up with the others as they weighed so much lighter (20kgs in some cases) than myself which i have known for awhile has been an issue for me but one i am working on trying to get my weight down to 80kg.

After a quick lunch we had another 2 races before the race officer called it a day and although i don't like these light shifty conditions i had great fun on the water with some very close racing between myself and a couple of the sailors. I finished the day 7th Overall and 1st in the Raceboard Unlimited fleet which is a good start for the year and hopefully i can build on this and get a decent final ranking once the race series has finished. The next event for me now is the Round Hayling on April 6th so i will hopefully see some of you on the water if your down there

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