Westerland/Sylt (Germany). Wind force 4 picking up to 5 over the whole day ensured a full program at the Brandenburger Strand for the Windsurfing Euro-Cup. Race director Walter Mielke decided at the Skippers Meeting to run another three races first in order to grant the racers a second discard.

The favourite Steve Allen (AUS-0, Fanatic, Neil Pryde) from Australia was able to score two second positions and a sixth place. He is able to keep up his lead in this discipline with a total of 9,0 points. Still on the second position we find Gonzalo Costa Hoevel (ARG-3, Starboard, Neil Pryde) from Argentina who has 11 points after he was forced to retire once because of equipment damage and scored an 11th and a victory in the last race of the day. We can see an exciting head-to-head-fight for the third place: Devon Boulon (ISV-1, F2, Windwing) from the Virgin Islands is able to slip ahead of Andrea Cucchi (ITA-1, Starboard, Neil Pryde) by the tie break rules. Both racers have 18 points but Devon Boulon was able to beat Andrea Cucci more times then vice versa.

At noon the wind got stronger and accelerated to 20 knots. This allowed the change of the discipline in favour of Slalom to run three complete slalom eliminations in the course of the afternoon. Over 25.000 spectators followed the exciting slalom action as the course was set up directly in front of the promenade. The finish was even directly at the beach which made it possible to see the „white in the eyes of the competitors“.

In the first elimination the reigning Euro-Cup Champion Steve Allen was able to prove that he is not only a racing expert. With a victory in this slalom he underlined his ambitions for the overall title at the EC Westerland/Sylt. On the second place followed the German record champion Bernd Flessner (GER-16, F2, Neil Pryde) from the island Norderney. It was possible to feel his excitement about the re introduction of the Slalom as a discipline of the German Windsurf Cup. The third place went to Arnon Dagan (ISR-1, Fanatic, Neil Pryde) from Israel.

In the second Slalom there was no change in the top-2: Euro-Cup Champion Steve Allen in front of the German Champion Bernd Flessner. But this time Andi Laufer (GER-93, Lorch, Starboard) from Konstanz was able to win the third place.

In the last Slalom Steve Allen was again dominating in front of Bernd Flessner. The Dutch Fanatic rider Pieter Bijl (NED-0, Fanatic, Neil Pryde) was able to achieve a sensation with his third place: He plugged a freeride sail to his new slalom weapon and scored a very good position in the strong fleet which was mostly equipped with bigger racesails.

After three slalom eliminations and tree victories Steve Allen has a save lead in this discipline. With a total of 3 points. With double points of 6 Bernd Flessner follows on the second position. After quiete a big gap Helge Wilkens was able to ensure his third position as he pressented a very consistent performance with sixth places in all the three slaloms giving him a total of 18 points. Several favourites like Andi Laufer and Arnon Dagan desperately need another slalom to have discard.

In the overall ranking of the event in which each competitors can introduce the best two results out of the three disciplines Steve Allen was able to take the lead with the optimum points of 2 by his triple victory in the Slalom today. The German Windsurfing legend Bernd Flessner is on his heals with a second place in the slalom and a fourth place in the wave-freestyle giving him 6 points. Only 4 points behind we find Helge Wilkens who scored a third place in the slalom and a seventh place in the Wave-Freestyle.

For the final day (Sunday) the forecasts are predicting good winds. So we are looking forward to some more great windsurfing action which can significantly change the provisional results of the single disciplines and also the overall ranking.

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You can find more information, results, pictures etc. and follow the competitions online on the official Website of the Windsurfing Euro-Cup www.euro-cup.org and on the FW Class Website www.formulawindsurfing.org .