Windsurf | Glenn Ward

Sometimes you dont know what you’d like to do but you know what you like doing

I write this post as a thought pops into my head. I often get asked for life advice, despite not feeling qualified in myself to give this kin of advise I always try and encourage a line of questioning of oneself, ones actions or things that could be considered, rather than handing out direct, do this do that advice.

I have embedded a video at the bottom of this post that is well worth a watch. It explains what is fundamentally broken and what holds back a good many of us from being great. Really! take the time to watch it.

Ok, my thought process begins with some early life choices. Deciding on my A-Levels, like many I had no idea what I wanted to do. I did know what I liked, what I was good at and the things that make me happy so I chose PE, Art and Business Studies… oh how they laughed! this is when I realized I had a bit of a what the f*/k do you know attitude, I wasn’t however massively qualified to argue with the gibes but stuck to my decision. In hindsight the ridicule came from those with a lack of knowledge in certain areas, they didn’t know the things I knew and they were those I considered well educated (the video below explains) A weaker man might have changed there mind and studied 3 coinciding subjects to meet societies pre conceptions of what would be the right thing to do.

Having finished my A-Levels I still didn’t know what I wanted to do however I knew what I liked doing. I first became a windsurf instructor, I knew I liked windsurfing, I knew I wanted to see a bit of the world, it made sense. In my off season I wrote an idea for a TV show, it got made by a href=http://www.rapido.co.uk/shows/shw.5.phpchannel 4/a and I shot off around the world filming. I then worked in TV, back to water sports, well yachting during which time I was teaching myself about websites and ecommerce as my brother and sister set up a www.innerwolf.co.uk. One more cheeky season in Egypt (windsurfing) then university to study a Media and Design for Digital Media during which time I helped take the watersports shop 2xs to being an online retailer. A quick stint as an website and marketing manager for a clothing company then up to the smoke to set up an in house video production service for a market research company. Now I am heading up the role out of our Website and Social media strategy.

My point here is that all of these things benefited very well from my choice of A-levels and more importantly what I do for a living now didn’t exist as a job when I started down this road. So, how can I take advice on my education when the people giving the advice have no concept of what the future might hold for me or the economy, you cant! and those who did take that advise, probably ended up in a job where they look at watch every day.

Sure, there are times you’ll take a knock. I got fired from the UKSA and it hugely dented my confidence. I thought questioning safety was a good thing but apparently not when you are questioning the decision of the MD. They attempted to throw me off the Isle of Wight as I influenced the other instuctors. So, draw the positives from any given situation, I’m an influencer! there’s a little take away, Ill put that in my toolbox and use that later.

Do what you like doing along the way, it might not fall into place straight away but you’re more likely to end up in the right place because if you are interested in something your learning is accelerated and people will notice, sure there will be politics along the way but stay focused on the bigger picture and let it wash over you.

Love this video!

Andy Bubble Chambers (K540) winter windsurf training Cape Town 09/10

Andy Bubble Chambers, currently ranked 18 on the world tour for freestyle sent me his footage from his winter training session out in Cape Town. Work commitments meant I couldn’t spend as much time on it as I would have liked and it doesn’t have the sick remix that my buddy was going edit but take a look and spread it round your social media spaces, cheers!

Or visit my YouTube Channel

The Kitewing – On land, on sand and on the water

Last year my brothers and I bought a couple of quivers of kitewings, Mountain Boards, Dirtsurfers and the surf board they brought out to use with the 7.5m Kitewing. Our first tests were up on a disused airfield in Tangmere, a large expanse of disused concrete with very little obstacles. If the wind were blowing in the right direction you could do runs of over a few hundred metres at a time, it wasn’t however which meant we had the quickly learn to tack and gybe the things across the width of the airfield. It didn’t take much, we were soon tacking, gybing, sailing upwind and downwind with no hastle. Luke even began to pop in a few cheeky jumps.

The next test was the dirtsurfer, we had seen most the videos online using the dirtsurfers on the hard sand when the tide had gone out so we went down to West Wittering to try this out. Having already mastered the Kitewing skills we could concentrate on the Dirtsurfer skills. Once you got going it was definitely the way to achieve straight line speed but turning around was an issue. We later took the dirtsurfer up to the top of Goodwood hill to throw ourselves in the deep end. Luke went first with a small push from myself and began dodging cow pats at quite a speed, fortunately the dirtsurfer is fitted with a disc brake so you can remain in control even on a stupidly steep hill.

On the water
I was down the beach one day and decided to get the Water wing and board out with Neal Gent, competitive UK kitesurfer. Even for the experts we we struggling, we were underpowered I think and fighting a ripping tide but we found it very difficult to make any progress. I have seen the online videos so know it’s easy in the right conditions so I’m guessing 7.5m weather on a Kitewing will be 5m or even less on a Windsurf.

Obviously this kit is widely used on the snow but we didn’t have a local piste to test it, check out YouTube and judge for yourself. I think they will be in their element here turning speed into height, despite the safety warning that comes with the kit.

Construction
Starting with the adapted surf board, I have to say Otis almost laughable that they have not learnt from the recent evolution off kitesurfing. Whacking some straps on a surfboard doesn’t constitute a custom designed board for the sport and in my opinion after trying it needs a lot more thought.
The 7.5 is designed to be light which it is but with that it has weak spots and at crucial positions on the sail, when learning it is inevitable that your board will connect with the sail and we managed to put a few holes in the weaker areas. The smaller sails 4.5 and Rage 55 are built more durable as the are for land use. On the concrete though we found that you often catch the tips of the wing and the concrete quickly wears the material, possibly a tougher construction over these areas would make the sale last longer.

Overall Kitewing are a very enjoyable and versatile toy to have in the van offering a light wind alternative that can be use on a multitude of terrains. It’s easy to learn especially if you have a windsports background. Have a look at the different packages and learn more at www.pickledshrimp.co.uk

Four Dimensions Movie Trailer – Will it be as good as The Windsurfing Movie?

Since the launch of The Windsurfing Movie in 2007 by Poorboyz Productions, not many production companies caught on to the fact that the best way to make a windsurf film was to actually intend to make it in the first place, develop some camera techniques and put a budget behind it rather than ring around your mates asking them if they’ve got any footage for their video. Andre Paskowski seems like he might have done it properly judging by the trailer with Four Dimensions.
Watch the trailer below.

Also The Windsurfing Movie 2 is currently being made and is set to be better than the first.

Windsurfing Coaching Notes from my Moon Beach season

Moon_Beach_360_sequence

In around 2002, I did a season coaching windsurfing at the high wind resort “Moon Beach” in Egypt for the company Gybemasters. During that time we were encouraged to develop our own teaching style. I ended up writing an extensive pad of notes, half of which will only make sense to me but I thought rather than leave them sitting on my laptop I would make the available to anyone who thinks they might be able use them in their teaching. I have made them available in a PDF Download rather than publish it all to my blog. Download them and use them how you wish!

Windsurfing Coaching Notes (429)

Windsurf videos and stuff from Moon Beach, Egypt, West Wittering, IOW etc

This is going to be a quick blog with two windsurf videos I put up on Youtube, one is of me and the guys windsurfing at Moon Beach in Egypt and the other is the one I made of the 2008 UKWA wave event down at West Wittering.

Here is the short 2XS write up for the event
The final round of the UKWA Wave series was hosted by West Wittering Windsurf Club and Glenn Ward was there to cover the action. This 3 day event attracted windsurfers from all over the UK . Due to the light winds things got off to a slow start, on Sunday the wind picked up and provided a platform for a high level of windsurfing. Conditions were tough for filming but we managed to put together a 5 minute presentation of the event. View the coverage below.

Thanks to 2xs, X-train, Ezzy, RRD and Dakine, Boardseeker, Boards and Windsurf…