It’s funny to me that whenever you read an article in the magazines about who’s style you like the most, it is very rare that my name pops up, yet the amount of heat percentage wins that I have had over the years deem me to be a pretty good windsurfer. I am very critical of how I sail and can admit that while I am a great windsurfer, I am usually not better than the other guys. For instance the Aloha Classic this year, I went against “Brawzinho”, who is probably like 3 times better a windsurfer than me on any given day, but that day for those 20 minutes, I beat him. I am not saying even that I was better than him, I just happened to put it together while he messed up his one jump, the wind died and he didn’t get another shot at it. The jump he messed up on was probably a 50-foot high back loop, which I would never in a million years be able to make. I just stuck to my plan, made my simple moves and came out the winner. The high of winning was amazing, but not nearly the low that “Brawzinho” felt, thinking back to that one jump that got away. He thought about it for the next month or two and it will probably haunt him until he wins the event, which is probably the next time the PWA runs at Ho’okipa!
But oh how times have changed, I’ve gone from the stressful days of the PWA to now competing on the IWT. There is no stress, no mind games, just fun and good times. We did our first event in Morocco this spring and it was pretty fun. The conditions were great in the single elimination, and terrible in the double elimination, yet I still remained completely calm. The result is not what I wanted but hey, you can’t win them all, I’ve learnt that lesson. Maybe it’s not the winning or losing that makes you high or low, it’s the effort you put in versus the reward you get. The more you put into something the more you want to get out. Winning or losing is just a matter of competing and attaining that utter goal. One of the best things that you can do is go out and try it, see what it is like, try and push your levels to new heights. Not really to beat the other person, but to gain some confidence to push harder in the heat of battle and improve your windsurfing!
