I remember sitting at Dos Niños, way back in the day, watching over mast high rollers smashing into the sand wondering if the pro’s would go out, as I didn’t like the look of it. This time I travelled over there with two of the top guys on the tour and it was great to see how much windsurfing in waves has progressed!
When
Back in August, just before Thomas and Alex went off to Reunion for the Wave Classic event, umi joined them on a trip to Spain. A quickie: three days in Galicia with heavy conditions. Alex: ‘We sailed two spots: Cabo Vilano and Dos Niños, a really famous spot for wave riding. It was the second time I was there and like always: I go to Galicia and I score, so it was sick! We were there for three days only, two days sailing and one day relaxing. A really speedy trip, but the conditions were very good, so it was worth it.’
Conditions
Alex: ‘The first day was around logo high, 4,8 to 4,4 weather. In Cabo Vilano there was a lot of seaweed which made it difficult to sail. In the afternoon the wind picked up though and blew all the seaweed away. It was perfect, glassy, just sick. There were two more windsurfers sailing there, they were quite good, respect to the guys as the conditions were really gnarly! It was very gusty and the waves were very big, it’s really hard to get a good timing on that wave. With Thomas we travel a lot and we know what the waves do. I mean, we are pro’s and we’ve sailed in really crazy conditions before, but for a guy that doesn’t get paid for doing this it was sick.’
Alex: ‘Brendan was filming. But I always say to him, when we are sailing you are also sailing with us, I think he gets into it, I really love it. With Thomas we always try to put on a show for him, so he doesn’t get bored and thinks what are these pussies doing?! We push it a little bit extra, we don’t want him to get bored and fall asleep! It’s great to have him with us… I think Brendan’s wife must hate us though, because we always push him to go on these last minute trips with us, sorry!’
Crashes
Alex: ‘Both Thomas and I had really good crashes, normal I think because when you see the other guy you don’t want to hold back; you cannot go less critical, you have to give it all! My biggest crash was when I hit a massive wave very late and shifted my weight too much to the front. I let go of my sail and when I looked I was completely inside the barrel, I could see the lip going over my kit and got completely destroyed. Thomas had a good one as well. As always he was later than late hitting the lip. As he was coming down he landed too much in the flats and the wave went over him and he got completely destroyed, fucking funny. We didn’t destroy our gear though, our masts are fucking strong, we are super happy with them. We both use 370 now all the time and they are like chewing gum, perfect for this!’
© All photos taken by Sophia Regerbis. umi 2009
