After so many records were broken many riders were hopeful that the last Thursday would deliver more wind that would enable the speeds to be pushed a little further, but unfortunately it was not to be. Yet this will surely go down as one of the best speed sailing competitions in history, with many record broken, many times, and of course the overall speed record not only being taken over 50knots, but over 52 by Antoine Albeau!

Here on Boards we have covered the event every step of the way, so to check out all the coverage just head here; posts include videos, interviews with Antoine Albeau and Zara Davis, images and of course details of even record broken and top speed reached!

We would also like to congratulate all the riders that took part this year, it has been incredible to see everyone pushing the top speeds and it’s certainly inspired us to get the GPS out!

Luderitz closing ceremony

Are you into speed sailing? Has the Luderitz competition inspired you to head our to your nearest speed course too?

On day nine of the competition in Luderitz the competitors were treated to winds between 40 and 45knots, another great day on the canal and many sailors more than took advantage.

Antoine Albeau

None more so than Antoine Albeau, who increased the record time and again, finally resting at 52.05knots at the end of the day.

Anders Bringdal

Anders Bringdal followed with a new Swedish Record which is also Production board World Record : 51.45 knots!

Jurjen van der Noord

Jurjen Van Der Noord the Dutch Record Holder also went over 51 knots today, joining Anders Bringdal and Cédric Bordes, with 51.26 knots!

Bjorn Dunkerbeck the famous 41 times world title holder just joined the event today in the afternoon reaching 49.53 knots, he did this after only a couple of runs !

Martyn Ogier

Well done to Martyn Ogier from UK who recorded a speed of 48.21 knots (current British Record held by Farrell O’Shea with 48.82 knots) and to Martin Van Meurs from Netherlands: 47.95 knots who improved their best speeds.

Zara Davis

Zara Davis was back on the water today after a little injury:

“1st day back on the water today, after stitches in my leg five days ago. It was quite painful and I took it easy and only did 5 runs. Initially I was disappointed with my best run of 44.25 knots, then Pete reminded me my initial hope before I came was 43 knots and if I had been told before i got here that I was going to do 44 plus knots I would have been turning cartwheels. We are all getting a bit complacent for sure. The wind today was very strong but gusty which favoured the strong heavy guys. Big respect to Antoine, for his 52.05 knot run and pushing the record higher again. Lena did very well today with a 45.5 run she is getting quicker for sure. A huge well done to Nick V for getting in to the exclusive 50 knot club.” Follow more news from Zara on her Facebook page here.

Catch all the latest speed sailing news from Luderitz and beyond here on Boards.

You may also like to:

Read more from Antoine on Boards.

Antoine Albeau. Image credit PWA/JC.

But the question is how fast do you think he can go? Over 53knots? Over 55? Share your thoughts at the bottom of this post!

After a successful King and Queen of the wind events the EFPT went behind the scenes to find out more from competitor and event organiser Adam Sims. Another event we have heard a lot about this week in the SWA Wet Dream Four….Play; with this event passed and the Northern Monkey event this weekend there is a lot going on in SWA land. Check out all the latest student windsurfing news and features here.

The other big news this week of course cam from Ludertiz, where all sailors have been increasing their top speeds day on day. Zara Davis and Farrell O’Shea have both broken records, but the top news is that Antoine Albeau and Anders Bringdal both broke the 50knot barrier. Find out more about Antoine, including some words on the record from the man himself here.  With more promising forecasts around the corner, we will continue to follow all the action in Luderitz, fingers crossed more records will be broken in the near future.

We finish up the news this week with a video from Juice Boardsports and their recent demo at Fraisthorpe beach.

Video from Antoine’s run released!!!

And an awesome video from the day from Jurjen van der Noord!

Anders Bringdal smashing 50knots on a production board!

There was some confusion in our previous report over the official times from Anders and Antoine, but here is the official report from the Luderitz Speed Challenge team:

After the promising previous days, everyone felt that the 50 knots barrier break cannot be far.
Today was the 4th race day, and marks the day that mythical 50 knot barrier was smashed !
Records kept tumbling almost with every run this afternoon, and some of the speeds still need to be confirmed by the Time Keeper.

First, the Swedish Record Holder Anders Bringdal broke the 50 knots barrier twice, with 50.41 and then 50.46 knots improving the world Record on Production Board as well !

After that Antoine Albeau surpassed Anders’ performance with 50.62 knots recovering his position of World Record holder in Windsurfing, which was also shortly held by Cédric Bordes in the afternoon with 49.66 knots.

Anders Bringdal. Image courtesy Luderitz Speed Challenge.

Zara Davis has also improved her World Record in Windsurfing with 44.92 knots and also Lena improved her Turkish Record with 43.81.

The record on Tandem has been also broken by Antoine and Cedric Bordes (1 board / 2 sails / 2 riders) with 38.12 knots!

And lots of other National Records were smashed!
Mark Grinnell from South Africa and Matthias Röttcher from Namibia were successively improving their national records which they had already broken earlier during the day.
Mark: 46.49 kts and Matthias: 46.69 kts.

Jurjen Van Der Noord, the Dutch competitor who has just made his first runs today broke the Dutch Record with 47.53 kts.
Patrick Diethelm has improved his Swiss Record and is the 3rd time in the Windsurfing world as well with 49.71 knots!
Nick Vardalachos from Greece and the British Farrell O’Shea improved their record.
Nick: 48.84 kts and Farrell: 48.21 kts.

Christian Benzing who was battling with his German fellow countrymen, broke the German Record in Windsurfing with 45.57 knots.
This incredible day has now gone into the windsurfing history books.The world’s windsurfing community was waiting for a “come back” in Speed Sailing. The goal of the 2012 “Lüderitz Speed Challenge” was to work on that point and offer the best conditions to finally break this mythical barrier. We can expect even better results during the coming days.

Follow the Ludertiz Speed Challenge here on Facebook. 

Plus check out the great album from World of Windsurf here. 

BOARDS June 2011

contents 274 / JUNE 2011. Covershot: Caroline Camboulives windSUPing in mid Pacific paradise, by Maxime Houyvet

features

ATOLLIC BOMBS!

Carine Camboulives, Manu Bouvet, Levi Siver and Keith Teboul discover a cluster of atolls and islets in the middle of the Pacific which may well be the best windsurfing spot on Earth…

MAGNIFICENT SEVENS

To make the most of summer’s fickle winds you’re going to need something in the 7.0m size range, so we gave six of the latest entry-level cammed sails to our tame Clones. Will they live up to the claims of combining the best attributes of a race sail with the user-friendliness of a rotational? Turn to p.44 to find out…

WORKING IN WINDSURFING – ANDERS BRINGDAL

Now into his third decade of windsurfing and responsible for one of the sport’s most iconic brands, Anders Bringdal takes a rare day off to talk with us at his home in the south of France…

BiC – A REVOLUTIONARY BRAND

We pay a visit to BiC – the only manufacturer still producing boards in Europe – where we take a look at the history and technology behind the brand’s success with an exclusive guided tour of their plant in Brittany…

PWA PODERSDORF

European freestyle flakas, culos and shakas its way into the spotlight with 25-knot winds, sun, rain, thunder and parties as Lake Neusiedl puts on an awe-inspiring show for round two of the PWA Freestyle Tour…

SELF SERVICE

This month our resident DIY maestro, Marjan Tkavc, shows us how to wield a knife and disposable lighter to sort out a tiny downhaul pulley that won’t let you loop-loop-go…

2011 BUCS WINDSURFING CHAMPS

Sam Burnett reports from Calshot, where the student windsurfing season came to a dramatic climax…

HAVE YOUR SAY

It been guys, guys, guys up until now, but this month’s Have Your Say contributors are three windsurfing women. Meet Penny Wiles, Sarah Edwards and Naomi Dines…

WC4R

This year’s Windsurfing 4 Cancer Research fundraiser broke all records as over 1,100 windsurfers hit the water on 1 May at over 40 different venues. See if you can spot yourself in our picture special…

NEW TO WINDSURFING

If you’re looking for the best possible introduction to the world’s best sport then look no further – everything you need to know to get you started on the path to windsurfing enlightenment is right here…

PLANET BLOW – BEHIND THE SCENES

Producer Sylvain Demarcastel presents the story behind what could well be the first sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll movie in the windsurfing world…

regulars

DROPPING IN

PICTURE DESK

NEWS

SIMS O’CLOCK

FULLER’S WAY

A SHOT OF JD

SB WINDWISE

WANNABE A WAVESAILOR

BAKER ACADEMY

POND LIFE

NEXT ISSUE

Anders Bringdal and Zara Davis

Mistral team riders Zara Davis and Anders Bringdal are the No1 ranked speed sailors on the ISWC world tour list for 2010. After a tough year for speed events with the world championship in Sotavento cancelled it was left to the national events to decide who would be the top speedsters for the year. With Zara achieving a new production speed record and Anders setting a new open water record this double ranking tops a great year for Mistral boards.

Anders Bringdal, also Mistral’s CEO, is quoted as saying “It has been a fun season with Speed sailing again. My open ocean record in Namibia while playing with the kite guys and now taking the speed tour for the second year running feels good. My boards have helped a lot as they have been great and super performing in all conditions. Big Congratulation to Zara as well as she came up from second to First this year. Looking forward to the new 2011 season”

See the official ISWC rankings here

Anders and Zara

Club Mistral Mistral action

Club Mistral is very happy to announce that from now on the first Mistral test boards are available at some destinations, such as Gran Canaria, Golf de Roses, Alacati and Karpathos.

Club Mistral guests are therefore able to exclusively test brand new boards like Joker Wave, Syncro and Shock Wave and even Screamer, Joker Freestyle and the Twinzer.

From the winter season 2010 / 2011, the complete Mistral board range will be available at all Club Mistral winter destinations.

In addition to the latest Fanatic boards, a wide choice of Mistral equipment perfectly rounds off the Club Mistral program, and enables Club Mistral to offer a huge range of brand new windsurfing gear to every single guest.

For more information check out www.club-mistral.com or call 0049 (0) 881 9254960.

Mistral's main man, Anders Bringdal