Friday July 18, 2003

Unbelievable freestyle performances started today at Sotavento in fifteen knots
of wind with the women’s fleet competing first. The famous Moreno twins
(Mistral / North) soon found themselves battling against each other in the quarter
finals with a sister act that Iballa won, revenging her beating at the last
event by Daida. With Daida back in fifth place, Iballa and the amazing local
sailor Suzanne Kather, who’d just beaten Spain’s Angela Peral Martinez
(JP / Neil Pryde), fought for a place in the finals and rocked the world rankings.

On the other side of the draw, Freestyle World Champion Karin Jaggi (F2 / Arrows)
and Austria’s Tanja Emig knocked out Gran Canaria’s Nayra Alonso,
Austrian Claudia Vogt (Fanatic / Arrows) and Spain’s Angie Holzschuh in
their quarter finals, to find each other fighting for a place in the final.

fue03 Karin willy skipper
Courtesy of PWA/Williams

With a slight drop in the wind, Karin and Iballa comfortably advanced to meet
in the showdown after nearly two hours of exhausting freestyle competition.

As the finals started, the winds stepped up a gear and the girls speed through
their moves, every bit as good as the men. After an opening blunder, Karin soon
landed a perfect one-handed spock right in front of the judges and crowds. Hearing
the cheers, she went on to pull off a forward loop, a monkey gybe, body drag,
Vulcan and came very close to a flaka and a grubby, convincingly beating Iballa
who crashed and burned too many of her normally well polished stunts.

The battle for third saw Susanne and Tanja totally over powered and absolutely
exhausted, struggling to keep control of any move after such a long and successful
day. Tanja took third place and Susanne fourth, giving them the strength and
confidence for tomorrow’s double elimination action.

fue03 Iballa day 1
Courtesy of PWA/Williams

The Fuerteventura PWA Freestyle World Cup men’s competition kicked off
with so much style and extremism in the increasing winds with most sailors maxed
out on 5- 5.5m sails. With their ‘dingle elimination’ format they
basically get a second chance if at first they don’t succeed. But all the
judges and hundreds of spectators on the beach could see was everyone succeeding
big time.

The standard of windsurfing in the PWA World Tour has never been so exiting.
All the sailors can basically pull off virtually every stunt, so the competition
is clearly based on who’s got the style, the speed and the tactics.

Top sixteen men by heat 32:

K-89 Robby Swift (JP / Neil Pryde)
F-3 Thomas Traversa
V-69 Diony Guadagnino (Neil Pryde)
BRA-3 Konan Lang (Naish)
NB-7 Tonky Frans (AHD / Gaastra)
E-42 Victor Lopez (Fanatic)
K-57 John Skye (F2 / Arrows)
NB-9 Taty Frans (AHD / Gaastra)
NC-4 Colin Sifferlen (Starboard)
E-40 Jonas Ceballos (Fanatic / Gaastra)
F-85 Antony Ruenes (AHD / Naish)
H-23 Remko De Weerd (Fanatic / Gaastra)
H-79 Kevin Mevissen (JP / Neil Pryde)
E-19 Orjan Jensen (North sails)
BRA-253 Kauli Seadi (AHD / Naish)
V-34 Douglas Diaz (Fanatic / North)

After their incredible performances in the trials, five of the seven ‘wild
cards’ did some serious freestyling and advanced into the top thirty two
men, the top half of the fleet! Normen Günzlein (Neil Pryde), Christiaan
Dammers (Starboard), Matteo Guazzoni and Frank Lewisch (Gaastra) were then knocked
out as the top sixteen men advanced, but the super styling Antony Ruenes (AHD
/ Naish), the youngest PWA competitor to ever win a heat was today’s sensation,
joining the top sixteen men. At only fourteen years old, this French dude is
the one to look out for tomorrow as he takes on the experienced Remko De Weerd
(Fanatic / Gaastra) for a place in the quarter finals.

fue03 Anthony Ruenes day 1
Courtesy of PWA/Williams

Current PWA Freestyle World Tour leader Ricardo Campello (JP / Neil Pryde),
the number one seed here, cruised through his first heats but then had a shocker
wiping out on many of his stunts. New Caledonia’s Colin Sifferlen (Starboard),
last years King of the Lake champion renowned for his erratic results found
his form and eliminated Ricardo.

By 7 pm in Fuerteventura the wind was getting too light for any further heats
but the top sixteen has been established, and with the exception of Orjan Jensen
(North) who’s 29 years old and John Skye (F2 / Arrows) at 26, none of the
other leading windsurfers here have even reached their 22nd birthday.

The battle of youth continues tomorrow in winds forecast to reach force 8!
Check out the action online when we can expect to see a second elimination completed
in the women’s fleet, the men’s finals and heaps more radical freestyling
from the world’s best windsurfers.