Dan Ellis has arrived safe and well in Korea, and bar a few hiccups, is set and ready for the first day of racing. In his first report he brings you the low down on who’s pumped and ready for the action, as well as how the pros are setting up. 

“After a relatively easy trip across the Pacific, it turned into a pretty late night by the time we’d taken the bus to Jinha beach and then been allocated our various hotels. Ross, Arnon and myself got shoved in the back of town so the 1st order of business today was getting more suitable accommodation in which to launch are assaults on the world. The hotel situation is a little strange over here with a lot of “love motels”. It’s hard to get a good room that doesn’t have a rock hard, round bed. But after some friendly persuasion we got it sorted, though our new hotel does have a rather strange statue outside.

It was a beautiful day on the beach to get our kit set up, but with barely a breath of wind.

Late in the afternoon I was tempted out but could only plane in the odd gust, this meant I didn’t get a chance to line up with anyone and test my light wind speed, which would have been nice.

Pete Volwater also got tempted out and is obviously keen to capitalise on his current 4th place world ranking. Pete is one of the hardest working guys on tour and looked pretty serious walking around today! He also has his face on the event poster which is plastered all over town, jumping out in front of a slalom heat, so maybe it’s a sign of a great event ahead for him.

With no sailing to speak of most people took the time to fine tune their pit and get every thing ready.

One of the biggest things I noticed is, there is a much bigger variety of fin brands around. Two seasons ago there was only three fin brands around, now there’s a lot more variety at the top, with six or seven brands on the beach.

Alberto Menegatti and Arnon Dagan, who both race for Z fins, must have had 40 fins out that they were going through, adjusting the rake and getting to fit perfectly in the boxes. I’ll keep you posted on what’s what in the fin department as the racing progresses.

The forecast for tomorrow has backed of a little, but there is still the chance of a sea breeze so hopefully we can kick into racing once registration is done in the morning.”

Head to page two for Dan’s profile and pre event run down.