ABK at Napeague, Week One

Day one was barely planeable, and day three strictly nonplaning, though day two saw gusts over thirty ("typical camp conditions" according to ABK-meister Andy Brandt. "We get nothing or it blows stink!") The sun kept shining, the instruction kept coming, and week one of ABK's Long Island tour seemed to be a winner.

Highlights included everything from the minting of a brand new windsurfer to Dana's first duck jibe ("I dreamed about that duck jibe" Dana told The Puffin.) Sally got her high-wind waterstarts down and was ripping into jibe entries ("I was hammer down!") and Lily expanded her definition of "scary fast." Dana, Sally, and Lily were just a part of the exceptional showing of shredders of the female species at this clinic, which also featured Long Island regular Jill (her husband George joins your humble editor in next week's clinic).

While Friday and Sunday were far less radical, there was still a lot of light wind work to do on the water, and lectures aplenty (with groups ranging from rigging 101 and waterstarting to duck jibes and nose-spin hoss tacks.) Andy, Ben, Ed, and Tom kept students' plates full.

Everyone had a victory or three...Robert can just TASTE getting into the footstraps and tearing off across the bay! You can get in on the action too next Friday and join ABK for their second September session on Long Island. Join your editor, Peconic Jeff, The Mighty Larry Hoff, Jill's husband George and a whole crew of windsurfing lunatics at next week's clinic. Hope to see you there!

(note: if you lost or found any equipment at the clinic, post a message in the Yahoo Long Island Windsurfers Group, and/or you can leave a message here and I'll post it if you don't want to join...though you should join!)

(iWindsurf chart: The winds arrived on Saturday with a bang.
Photo 1: Lily discusses the planing jibe with ABK instructor Ben
Photo 2: Rip fest in 25+ knots
Photo 3-5: ABK says "Get better here." You can. The Peconic Puffin wouldn't lie.)

Comments

[Manfred Schreiber]

Great site. Been long time ago when I did windsurf alot. Gone back into sailing. But this weekend it was time for windsurfing, not sailing. Really strong wind. Above 25kn/h. I took my 2,55m Slalom and 4.5qm for a ride in front of the door. The old phrase from Robby Naish "Mast close to the nose" helped me with my (mostly planing through) jibes.
Looks like I have to start surfing your site more.
Hang loose.
Manfred

[Michael]

Welcome back to windsurfing, Manfred! Glad to have you on the Peconic Puffin, but more importantly looking forward to seeing you on the water.

A little Robbie is always inspiration for a sesh...

[Christine Nuzum]

Hi Michael et. al,

I enjoyed a great ABK camp last weekend (Sept 14-16) but might have left a black XS O'Neill neoprene fleece there. If it's in the lost and found or wherever, could someone pass it to my neighbor Larry Hoff? I waited 4 mos last year for that fleece to come in and my fall windsurfing days will be over soon without it. Then again, maybe it's buried somewhere in my car.

Posting this here as my application to the Yahoo LI Windsurfers' group remains under review.

Thanks, folks!
Christine

[Michael]

I'll follow up, Christine.