Michigan Windsurfing

Windsurfing & Stand-Up Paddleboarding in Michigan

Epic night on St. Clair last night. The wind began to pump in from the North around 4pm, as predicted, continued to build to around 20 knots +, (as predicted), and blew through the night. Yeah!!!! I was out for the first half hour on my 7.5 as the wind started to fill in. Ann showed up shortly after five, and went out on a 6.5 and 90 litre board. Soon after Paul showed up and then Brooke. Some new faces also appeared.

By this time Ann was thinking of downsizing as  was I as well. She rigged a 6.0 and I took her 6.5. Sailworks Hucker 6.6 to be more accurate. I can't say how impressed I am with this sail. This was the second time this year I  have managed to hang on to that sail when others have re rigged to 5.5's, and still was stil in the comfort zone. It seems to have great low end grunt, but when the wind starts to really pump it seems to bleed off well and the draft stays very locked in, amazing! We were all in the water again until around 8. In the last half hour Ann had tired out so I took her 6.0 and 90ltr board and continued sailing for a while longer..

Brooke was last person in about 15 minutes after the rest of us, and we came back to our house for some hot tub soaking, bloody Ceaser's, and pizza. Great night all in all.

Sorry no pictures as no one wanted to stop long enough to snap any.

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I thought about going after work last night, but didn't think it would last!  Although I don't know if the wind showed up on this side??

Brian

Usually here Northerlies blow stronger in the morning, die off a bit in the afternoon (almost to nothing yesterday), and then, more often than not, come back as evening falls and the land cools off. I usually don't get to excited until I see the marker buoy on St. Clair hit around 18 mph as it will sometimes buffer out as it comes into shore. Usually once it begins to pick up it blows at least until dusk and sometimes even longer, as it was still 18 on St; Clair this mornin g when I got up. I was pretty much wasted by 8 last night I could have probaly gone back out again on 5.5 for the last hour if I had the energy.

Don,

I have the same experience with Lac St Clair, We call it the evening anomaly.

I got out with a few others at Blue Lagoon on Wednesday sailed 5.5, 100 liter from 4:00 to 8:00pm.

Not bad for an after work session. Second session this week on Monday got out at Metro Beach with a WSW wind on a 6.0 100 liter.

I now keep an on line blog of my windsurf activities I am at 17 sessions for the season.

http://slicesports.blogspot.com/

 

Belle River wind graph, 7/14/11

Hey Tom great to see you are at it! Great idea the blog, I will likely do one for Ann and I as well. I like the way you are keeping track of the details as our memory tends to blunt things sometimes and I can only write down so much on a small calender square. You have given me some incentive with the 360's, I am still a bit sketchy on duck jibes on port tack alhough I am pretty much planning through them on the starboard side if I can get well powered, probably the reason I break so many booms as I usally sail really, really powered up so the turns are effortless. We would still love to come over to BL to sail with your group sometime soon, but the forecasts have been late bloomers. That is except for Wednesdays' nice to see that they can still get it right once in a while!
Don, As we know windsurfing is a practice and if you try to learn new skills it keeps it interesting. That's the main reason I don't kite, there is still so much to learn in windsurfing be it lite wind tricks or big wind tricks.
I like to work on learning new stuff as much as possible and by mentioning it in a log it's easy to watch the progross.
As bad as this wind season has been I'm only 3 sessions behind last year.

I totaly agree. To quote someone that is quite big in the windsurfing industry,  "Kiting was like a virus which cleansed all the weak windsurfers away leaving only the dedicated ones."

I love that!  So often I hear guys saying how great they used to windsurf before they got bored and started kiting, however my recollection of their windsurfing skills were not at par with their stories about how great they were,

Ego's are funny sometimes, and yes, leaving windsurfing now would leave  too many things undone for me, I think I will always have new things to try or learn in it and that is what keeps me coming back.

I do a bit of kiting but it just hasn't cought me the way windsurfing has. I started sailing in 1985 and I am more enthusiastic about it today than ever. We will see if kiting holds their attention as long! Also I enjoy snowboard kiting as it puts in the winters for me.

 

 

 

Tom, added your log to the 'Windsurfing Links"

brian

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