We arrived yesterday late afternoon on Gran Canaria and drove straight to the event site of the Gran Canaria Wind and Waves Festival. Everything was prepared for the start of the event. Again a nice tent, containers for the people working at the event, flags, music, food booths. The wind was light, no waves at all.

 

The conditions did not allow to run the local trials, so all the local riders decided through a voting, who should get the two wildcards given by the organizer. Jose Romero and Aleix Sanllehy were the two lucky ones, who got a place in the main event. All the other sailors have to go through the 15 men strong trials.

 

  

THE TRIALS

Heat 1 – Moritz Mauch vs Jaeger Stone vs Josep Pons

Heat 2 – Alessio Stillrich vs Eric Sanllehy vs Markus Rydberg vs Nicolas Akgazciyan

Heat 3 – Albert Pijoan vs Jonas Ceballos vs Pablo Ramires vs Robert Baldyga 

Heat 4 – Graham Ezzy vs Justin Denel vs Camille Juban vs Arthur Arutkin

 

Each heat in the trials is a tough one. In the first three heats are some of the best locals. Moritz and Josep will give Jaeger a hard time for sure. Alessio and Eric are probably the favourites in heat 2. Markus is the underdog and Nicolas just arrived from the EFPT event on Lanzarote. He is very experienced in waves, too. Heat 3 sees three guys, who know Pozo very well. Albert, Jonas and Pablo. In heat 4 Hawaiian style meets young radical French style. Arthur already warmed up in the kids competition. Graham travelled a few weeks before the event to Pozo to train a and get used to the port tack conditions. Justin likes to windsurf in Pozo and has spent much time at this spot, too and Camille, who is, after being off the PWA Tour for 2 years, back on the PWA tour. The trials were not started today, but the first round of the junior competition got finished

 

 

JUNIOR COMPETITION

Valentino Pasquale, Mariano Gil, Jules Cachat, Loick Lesauvage, Alexandre Grand-Guillot, Nicklas Herrera Mathisen, Noah Vocker, Arthur Arutkin, Tim Van Dam Sanchidrian and Marc Pare participated in the junior competition. It was nice to see a lot of young blood ripping in the bay of Pozo. The conditions were good and we even saw some sets coming in. The kids were competing in the best conditions of the day. Arthur Arutkin, who already competed in regular PWA wave events at Pozo and Cabezo in 2012, dominated the first round of the junior wave competition. Noah Vocker, who broke his leg in the last year’s juniors competition at El Cabezo, showed excellent skills and finished in 2nd place. And completing the podium was the French windsurfer Alexandre Grand-Guillot.

 

WHAT ELSE?

Patrik Diethelm, who is Ricardo Campello’s new shaper and sponsor, ist not only supporting his radical team rider during the competition, he went out on his Slalom gear today, showed great speed, good jibes and a nice, very hard tailwalk crash.

 

Sarah-Quita is motivated to do good in waves and stalled a few Forwards. Good job Sarah-Quita.

 

Boujmaa Guilloul is back in the game despite it’s Ramadan at the moment and the wind still blows port tack at Pozo. He landed nice Forwards (Forward Loop Video), Pushloops and Backloops and went for the same tricks on the way in.

 

 

The skippers meeting for tomorrow is scheduled for 9.30. Let’s hope the trials will be started in the morning.

 

 

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