Napeague Freestyle with ABK

Andy Brandt and the ABK Boardsports crew blew into town for their fall visit to the East End (see also the colorful report by The Peconic Puffin). Because of the unreliable wind this summer, and even less trustworthy forecasts, I swung by for extra water time on the beautiful Napeague Harbor. On Thursday afternoon, I ran into fellow ABK freestyle campers George Marr and Pete Roesch, and we snuck in some extra water time as easterlies hit mid to upper teens. I was impressed with Pete's progress with the Vulcan - he was getting good rhythm on the pop and getting the board around. My Vulcan pops are an explosion of body, board and sail that result in spectacular crashes, but I made some progress getting the nose planted thanks to tips from Andy, ie. less board, more sail, slower pops.



When I first came to an ABK clinic last year, I was mostly self-taught, studying Peter Hart videos and Dasher's 12-point jibe (I'm also a bigbig fan of Guy Cribb's Intuition). But nothing can replace on the water instruction and video analysis that comes with each ABK clinic. Besides the group of freestylers going for aerials and gecko tricks, a number of beginners ranging from young to finely aged, big to small, and male to (thankfully) female made excellent progress as well. ABK is not only an instructional clinic, but also a welcoming, supportive social club of sorts, with members from all walks of life (architects, students, engineers, retirees, cabinetmakers, media types and so on).


On Sunday we were rewarded with light warm winds and abundant sunshine, which was perfect for light wind freestyle tricks (anklebiters galore) and a workout for my waterproof camera. Check out the results in this Flickr photoset: ABK freestyle clinic at Napeague - Sept 2008

ABK Windsurfing Clinic at Napeague - Sept 2007

The ABK clinic this past weekend was a success, despite the mostly light winds. We all pulled off one new move (the sloppy but useful Gecko Loop), and got tons of instruction on many other freestyle moves. I'm on a hunt for a small fin to shave down, so I can start skipping into Vulcans and Flakas. I greatly enjoyed meeting and learning alongside such a cool and enthusiastic group.

I'm starting to upload pictures to Flickr: ABK freestyle clinic at Napeague - Sept 2007



On a side tangent, some fellow campers saw me trying out the orange waterproof Olympus 790SW. The camera is very sturdy and easy to use. Some of the pictures came out great (see the Flickr set), and some came out unfocused. But I was mostly disappointed with the video mode as it had terrible sound, and a 10-second limitation for the high quality mode (640x480 30fps). Read my more detailed rant if you are considering this camera.