Young Gun Bites the Dust

Windsurf Journal report good news about Eleazar Alonso Sanchez gaining a new sponsor,  but sad news about young racing talent Julien Quentel quitting the tour due to budget cuts. Here's the Google translated page.

It's a negative scenario for the sport in my view when sponsors pay highly for older names and don't support talented youngsters.

Quentel showed high promise in an age-heavy fleet of Slalom racers and takes the hopes of  future stars down with him.

Good Luck to Julien in the future. We hope to see him back on tour again.

What are your views on this? In a dificult market, should brands stick with proven players and get results no matter how much those riders cost or the cuts they have to make elsewhere, or should the stars of the future take priority? (See Comments section below -  no sign-in required. Thanks.)

Comments

[Tautvydas, Lithuania]

Well the purpose of keeping the old sailors ir their reputation. Once a newbie sees photos from PWA races and there's Bjorn passing every1 on his starboard (he was sailing it last year or not?), the newbie thinks - damn that board has to be totally AWESOME, i need to get it to own the local races as well!
However i think companies should focus on bringing new names in the game to make the races fresher. For me its a lot more interesting once a newcomer beads some oldie :)

[Rudie]

I think youngsters can do a lot for slalom aswell as a lot of youngsters changed the freestyle/wave scene completely with all the new moves and stuff! You gotta hear the oldy's about that! ha...

Anyway, power to the millenials (youngsters)!!As long as they're not spoiled little brats...

[Beej]

Ha ha...well now I'm not exactly ripped with a six-pack, but you have to say that the slalom racers are generally, err, a little, well it looks they they overdo the protein shakes and pasta in my opinion. And the freestylers, partly because they are all younger, are far more athletic looking - like real professional sportspeople that other kids would want to be like, physically at least...even if they maybe are not so good at dealing with the public and media :)