Your editor is too tired, bruised and bulldozed by the competition to come up with a real mid-event report, so please take what little I’ve got:
1. The pro freestyle competition is dazzling! Caesar Finies, hero of a thousand youtube videos has come to Long Island to hurl is magic live. Defending King of the East Mike Burns in turn is pulling out all the stops (and doing it mid-railride) to try and retain his crown.
2. The racing is hilariously intense. Young bucks on enormous formula gear compete against not-so-young bucks on longboards manufactured well before the young bucks were born. Pete “The Eliminator” Roesch is somehow not in first place, whilst Jimi Sobeck and Tom Lepak have been whipping the water into foam.
“Yeah, but look at the size sails those guys have,” says Pete.
3. The amateur freestyle is a joy to watch (as long as you don’t watch me) the crowd is large and warm, and overall the 2009 East Coast Windsurfing Festival is bigger and better than last year’s.
Time to drag my ass back to Heckscher…
(Caesar goes aerial no matter what the wind, Jimi Sobeck puts the hammer down. Photos by Bill Doutney.)
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