Sunday 15th November – Windsurf **** - River Orwell - Levington – lovely sunny winters day:).

Starboard Formula and Slingshot Hover Glide F/Wind with Tushingham Lightning 6.5.

Foil – 20.41 knot max., 16.71 knot ave., 6.93 knot hour, 10.92 knot mile, 21.20 km., 8.03 knot Alpha.

After missing out yesterday due to it being cloudy and wet today was much better, wall to wall winter sunshine with a nice wsw forecast:) With a good tide at Levington I headed over to the Marina with Jamie arriving soon after and David Coles making it a trio of foilers. I was first to set up so had to guess at what sail to use and being a foiling novice it’s never an easy choice! With some good gusts coming in I went for 6.5, while lightweight Jamie rigged 5.6 and racer David 8m. It made a change to have someone near and handy to zip me in my winter wetsuit and to be honest I thought I had made a mistake as I was the first to sail away into a fresh onshore breeze gusting to 25 knots thinking perhaps, I should be on a fin board! I soon changed my mind as I was soon up and flying, really broad, my favourite foiling direction, front foot in the strap, out of the harness and no need to sheet in! This is a good direction here on the river as you can sail from Levington Bay up towards Pin Mill and I found I could fly really well downwind but find it harder to sail upwind towards Ipswich at the moment! I was happy to sail upwind in the bigger gusts hooked in with the board very close to the water. I was pleased with the session on the whole as I haven’t done much foiling latterly and only went in a couple of times in a session lasting well over two hours. The temperature being a balmy 9 degrees the only thing to get cold was my hands. As expected, the other two foilers were flying longer than me especially the very experienced David Coles who disappeared past Pin Mill going well on his race kit. The wind went a bit patchy and was then under a lot of the time with 6.5 and need to get used to using a bigger sail to help with the varying wind strengths experienced on the river but a cold winters day was not the day to push the limits especially as not in the harness much! So I was pleased with my 100th session of the year and the foiling is coming along nicely, perhaps its time to treat myself to a dedicated foil board if only I could find one, not many in the second-hand market at the moment!

 https://www.facebook.com/stephen.squirrell.1/media_set?set=a.10217240857626147&type=3

Sunday 15th November – Windsurf **** - River Orwell - Levington – lovely sunny winters day:).

Starboard Formula and Slingshot Hover Glide F/Wind with Tushingham Lightning 6.5.

Foil – 20.41 knot max., 16.71 knot ave., 6.93 knot hour, 10.92 knot mile, 21.20 km., 8.03 knot Alpha.

After missing out yesterday due to it being cloudy and wet today was much better, wall to wall winter sunshine with a nice wsw forecast:) With a good tide at Levington I headed over to the Marina with Jamie arriving soon after and David Coles making it a trio of foilers. I was first to set up so had to guess at what sail to use and being a foiling novice it’s never an easy choice! With some good gusts coming in I went for 6.5, while lightweight Jamie rigged 5.6 and racer David 8m. It made a change to have someone near and handy to zip me in my winter wetsuit and to be honest I thought I had made a mistake as I was the first to sail away into a fresh onshore breeze gusting to 25 knots thinking perhaps, I should be on a fin board! I soon changed my mind as I was soon up and flying, really broad, my favourite foiling direction, front foot in the strap, out of the harness and no need to sheet in! This is a good direction here on the river as you can sail from Levington Bay up towards Pin Mill and I found I could fly really well downwind but find it harder to sail upwind towards Ipswich at the moment! I was happy to sail upwind in the bigger gusts hooked in with the board very close to the water. I was pleased with the session on the whole as I haven’t done much foiling latterly and only went in a couple of times in a session lasting well over two hours. The temperature being a balmy 9 degrees the only thing to get cold was my hands. As expected, the other two foilers were flying longer than me especially the very experienced David Coles who disappeared past Pin Mill going well on his race kit. The wind went a bit patchy and was then under a lot of the time with 6.5 and need to get used to using a bigger sail to help with the varying wind strengths experienced on the river but a cold winters day was not the day to push the limits especially as not in the harness much! So I was pleased with my 100th session of the year and the foiling is coming along nicely, perhaps its time to treat myself to a dedicated foil board if only I could find one, not many in the second-hand market at the moment!

 https://www.facebook.com/stephen.squirrell.1/media_set?set=a.10217240857626147&type=3