| Waves and action at Cotillo beach for the Fuerteventura Wave Classic |
| Thursday, 05 March 2009 10:07 |
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A bit of action has started today here on Fuerteventura's North Shore after yesterday's warm up in Puertito. On this sunny wednesday, the conditions looked pretty better down there at Cotillo's beach. Around 2pm, riders were invited to select one rider of their team to go on the water for the first heats of the first FWC. After a quick check in the morning in Puertito where we thought today's action would be, we finally came down to Cotillo's beach, right after a briefing by Thomas and JB about the judgements. Cotillo was already sailable with clean logo high sets, a bit closing out but offering some cool sections to play with! Thomas, pretty motivated, was the first on the water to show the other guys that a sursailing session was possible, even if he broke his mast a few minutes later doing a 360 on a hot lip. Around 2pm, FWC project initiators Thomas & JB agreed with FWC organizers Orlando Lavandera & Pierre Bracar to launch the first heats of the contest. Quickly, each team had to choose which rider will go in the water first. As wind was pumping, perfectly side shore oriented, official start for heat #1 was done at 2.30pm. Heat #1 : Klaas, Jonas, Robin, Antony & JB were on the run for a 30 mn heat, each one of them representing their team on the water, while they were judged by their partners. 5 judges attributing notes from 1 to 10 but who can't judge their own team partner. 2 best waves count. Action went on pretty well as logo to head high sets were coming through Cotillo's bay with a good frequency. From this 1st heat, Klaas finished 1st, thanks to a perfect wave selection and some really nice off the lips and aerials. In 2nd came Jonas who certainly chose the best option as he stayed on the right of the spot, scoring some fat opening sets. Frenchy Robin Goffinet finished 3rd, with clean aerials on some good waves too. 4th, JB Caste did not operate the best wave choice and could not express himself on these small waves, while Antony stayed stucked down the spot, certainly due to a bad equipment choice : 5th... Heat #2 : Aleix, Jaume, Stephane, Francisco and Thomas were out just 20 mn after. Because of a too small board, Aleix could not make it and got stucked down the spot, so as Francisco who did not make it to come upwind... During this time, Stephane and Jaume scored the best waves of the day! Jaume charging hard in the critical sections, and Stephane using his experience and choosing some bigger sets he could then run with nice curves, rollers off the lips and some aerials. Thomas, the lightest weight of this heat, unfortunately broke (again!) his mast on the outside and lost too much time before he could come back to the beach, and go back again with Antony's sail. A very good opportunity for the local Jaume who certainly shot the best wave of the day, with an incredible floater on a really fat lip that broke right behind him at the landing! Judges put him 1st, Stephane 2nd, Thomas 3rd, Francisco 4th and Aleix 5th. 10 mn after were ready to go the last riders of each team for heat #3 : locals Ilya and Will, Dario, Boujmaa and Yannick. Unfortunately, the wind dropped down and became really too light to run this heat, even after 20 mn of stand-by. Riders and organization agreed to cancel the heat and everybody finally went for a cool drink with some tapas in Cotillo after this 2nd day of (short) action on the water. Still no stress actually for the riders as the last 2 sessions were pretty "cool", but from tomorrow then will certainly start to grow up a bit of pressure as the conditions should get a little bit more "hardcore" with a massive swell announced for the next 2 days. Regarding the 5 teams of 3 riders, we just actually can't say too much as heat #3 hasn't been runned, but at the moment Stephane Etienne's team has already scored some good points today thanks to Robin Goffinet's performance. Jaume's team also has a good advantage with Jaume's 1st place in heat 2, so as Ilya's team thanks to Klaas Voget's 1st place in heat #1. Let's see how things go tomorrow. Hopefully the action will take place in Puertito : another spot, another wave, another ambiance!
Results of heat #1: 1/Klaas, 2/Jonas, 3/Robin, 4/JB and 5/Antony.
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