Beach Telegraph

Full House Friday

Some quality viewing is on-the-cards for British and Irish TV license payers.

An exciting new online store and resource website for European windsurfers and watersports freaks has just been launched by Irish wave addict Pearse Geaney.

Check out BigSurf.ie for more details.

Here's some effects of big surf...

Siiiiick...

Windsurfing's father-figure and co-inventor Jim Drake's gonna celebrate his 80th Birthday at the Defi Wind.

The PWA feature a new Brazilian Freestyle talent - João Henrique Barros Ferreira

Finian Maynard talks about his latest Slalom racing beasts. (Here's some more pre-season tune-up talk from Starboard.)

Remember, Epic Session's weekend-long webcast from Ho'okipa starts today. (Maui-time.)

GP tells me the Starboard team is in town so the level of action might well get stepped-up as rival teams go all-out to get the most insane action in-the-can for their marketing materials.

There's a link on WSJ to video footage of Allison Shreeve's Bass Straight Challenge attempt.

WSJ also have a French language interview with Julien Taboulet on his 'Full House' switch to Naish. (Tip - use Google translate to read in preferred language.)

I'm looking for good topics for a new Poll or two so if you've got any good ideas or can think of issues you'd like to see peoples' opinion on please leave a comment below, (No sign-in required) or mail me. Thanks.

I'm going a wave huntin' this weekend and early next week so probably gonna be offline for a while.

Remember the webcasts are on and to trawl through all the good sites on the Links Page for content. Have a great weekend!

Over the Falls

(Timo Mullen - Ho'okipa April 1st)

Congratulations to Taty Frans for his record-breaking crossing.

A new iPhone surf check app from Oakley.

News of a new inland comp called 'Bavarian StyleKing' in Germany, which is set to attract big names as well as talented locals on the landlocked scene.

EFPT and PWA rider Ruben Petrisie is already booked-in

Couple of good (French language) April Fool's gags from WIND magazine we missed yesterday...including Dunkerbeck's switch to Kiteboarding and the new PWA Masters Tour.

Guru coach Jem Hall sent in some good news from the Bring Back the Swansea-Cork Ferry campaign which many of you readers have supported.

Jem says it's looking good for trips to County Kerry for travelling to one if his wavesailing clinics in October!

A Whale of a time on Maui.

Speaking of Maui there's a treat for you guys in store this weekend from David of the Epic Sessions Blog.

David says "Keith Teboul, Jake Miller, Pascal Bronnimann, Levi Siver and I are joining forces for a team webcast - though I think Levi is still in Europe judging a snowboarding comp. Still, its gonna be sick!

We should be webcasting all days - Friday/Sat/Sunday."

A bit more April foolery from Timo Mullen (pictured top) who sent in these pics from Hawaii.

"First day on Maui, just getting into sailing starboard tack again, Ho’okipa was good size, logo/mast high but loads of east in the swell so not exactly epic, anyway I get worked on this one wave, swam for my gear and sail back out, then I see my arm has a gaping open cut!

The new fins I had been trying were pretty sharp and I guess I must have hit them when I went over the falls.

(Nice Gash)

The Lifeguards patched me up before heading to Maui Memorial hospital for some stitches. 

(Matt's Cutty)

I'm staying at UK PWA slalom sailor Matt Wemms' house while in Maui so you can imagine how surprised I was to see Matt turn up at the hospital one hour after me with a pretty deep cut on his chin, somehow he had got washed on the rocks and slipped and hit his face on a lump of coral! 

(Matt's Cut)

Fortunately the Dr who stitched us both up was Dr Ben Massenburg winner of his age group at the Da Kine Maui  Slalom series so we were in good hands and hopefully with his help we can both get back in the water ASAP!! 

(Dr Ben)

Other casualties that day were Micah Buzianis, who I heard hurt his [previously injured] leg wavesailing at Ho’okipa."

Many thanks to Timo, Matt and their photographic assistants.

Here's some more windy windy Maui GoPro footage from Kanaha Kai.

Shark Eat Seal World

What a marathon. Well done to this guy in Western Oz. I wonder if he saw any Sharks?

Miami Windsurfing interview Formula and PWA Slalom Racer Wilhelm Schurmann who just sharked his way to victory at the North American Championships. "Shark takes out Miami Dolphins"

David sailed over a Tiger Shark. It's at the end of the clip. David said "On the day that GP had the "seal" incident on the rocks, I sailed right over a 8-10 foot Tiger shark - and caught my "oh shit" on the GoPro on my boom.

When GP picked me up that night to drop me off at the airport to depart Maui, we were both "Dude! You wouldn't believe my encounter with mother nature today!" Yikes.

Sounds like the Sharks got plenty of Seals to eat anyway. And Sea Lions...

More from the Quick Interview Blog. Todays it's Brawzinho's turn.

RRD have launched an 'insider's' Blog. It's a bit K*^&surfy for me though. Hopefully Sharks prefer those guys dangling in the water.

Here's some crazy board re-cycling project. A lesson to us all perhaps?

GP Cammaro's been slicing and dicing his old boards and enjoying the results so why not? A fair few PWA riders have 'adjusted' their boards fairly crudely too...but never on the strict production-only Racing tour of course...

Anyone else got any good re-shaping success or diaster stories?

Back in Effect

Many wave-crammed days and a training course later and Beach Telegraph is back in action.

With the dust settling from the Cabo Verde event it's time to get back up-to-speed with everything going on.

So much has happened that I gotta draw a line in the sand and just start from here instead of catching-up.

Actually, just sticking in Cabo Verde for a minute, you'll see that Graham Ezzy won the Super Session.

www.Windinfo.eu sent the flyer above for the Boardshort Picnic Windsurfing Camp (German language) in Gargano Italy.

Continent Seven editor and PWA racer Chris Pressler's been enjoying himself and winning in Vietnam.

Epic Sessions has been giving great webcast service in Maui during the past week. And GP thinks it's about time the PWA offered even a low budget version themselves. What do you think? Should they wait until they get a high-quality rig and the extra budget to staff it and host it, or should they just give us action in any way possible?

Just bear in mind though that although it's easy to park at Ho'okipa and do this, but other competition areas are harder to capture as the contest areas are huge and you'd need extra people to film edit and commentate, plus all the additional radios and someone to coordinate - which all costs money even on a low budget scale.

Don't forget to check GP out on the Flowrider at Kihei too.

Hotsails have been enjoying some Tandem action.

Before the 'line in the sand' WIND mag sent these links to videos of  Thomas Traversa and friends in Big Wave action in France and the consequences.

Boujmaa Guillol is now Blogging.

I saw this Reggae outfit on Twitter thanks to Ms. Porter. I wonder if he inhaled?

Let's not forget 'The Hustle Project' where I hassle the industry for free gear for you guys. Although I've been offline for a week I'm still holding the Fanatic T-Shirt comp open for at least today.

Here's a reminder of the question and details:

How many PWA Events were won by Fanatic Riders in 2008?

Please leave your answer in the Comments section below AND mail me at hotgossip@beachtelegraph.com stating why you want the shirt and like the brand for when I choose the winners. Thanks.

Rules: 1. No pros or sponsored riders or dealers are allowed to answer. We will know who you are! 2. I'll think up more rules as I go along.

More soon. Please leave links to anything you think I've missed in the Comments section below.

Outta Here

OK so I've seen a forecast for wind and waves and have decided to hit the road for a few days while the PWA have the spotlight in Cabo Verde with their live ticker updates, daily summaries, up-to-the-minute elimination ladders and photo galleries.

There's a couple of Bloggers covering the event too like  Spirit of Ponta Preta, Pietro Porcella (Italian language) and Andre Paskowski - plus don't forget the official event website.

The forecast says it's gonna be pumping there this weekend and early/midweek again. Hopefully it's gonna go off where I'm headed too...

Elsewhere, www.EpicSessions.tv are streaming live from Ho'okipa, Maui! You can live chat the camera and ask for specific zooming-in et cetera. It's in 'Beta' so please be patient. 

Please be sure to send a big thank you to David Troup for bringing you this service.

Quite a few sites are running the Pre Cabo Verde PR sent out by Fanatic. You can see that release and the pics at Boardseeker and www.Surferworld.it

SailLoft invite you to visit their newly-launched website.

If you're hungry for more news and content then please look at the list on the Links page - and feel free to add more suggested links in the Comments sections.  Thanks.

Enjoy the contest and I'll be back in action as soon as the wind and waves back off. I'll also announce the winners of the Fanatic T-Shirt competiton then too...so please keep sending your answers and I'll pick the winner when I'm back.