Squamish’s breathtaking scenery and consistent wind brought the world’s top professional windsurfers to Nexen Beach last week for the Open Continental Formula Windsurfing Championship.
Fifty top guns from Canada, the U.S., Brazil, Denmark, USVI and Japan took on 30-knot gusts to reach speeds of 80 km/h in the four-day event that wound up Saturday.
Canadian and U.S. competitors fought for the North American Formula Championship title and the entire elite contingency battled for qualifying spots in December’s Formula Windsurfing World Championships in Melbourne, Australia. (The Formula windsurfer is the fastest course-racing craft in the world and features a short, wide board, long fins and high-tech sails up to 12 square metres.)
About 100 spectators clambered over logs and mossy rocks to gain the best vantage points to see the Squamish regatta take place a few hundred meters from shore.
The spectacle of colourful banners whipping in the famous Squamish winds and sailors fiercely competing under the gaze of the granite monolith, the Stawamus Chief, gave the crowd a reason to stick around. With every heat, first place swung back and forth between American Devon Boulon (the eventual winner) and Canadian legend Sam Ireland, sailing on his home turf.
It was Ireland, a Whistler resident, who brought the championship to what he calls the perfect location for international competition.
With the beach just recently opened to the public, Ireland solicited volunteers from among friends and competitors to remove logs and create safer pathways along the shore.
“I couldn’t believe it,” Virgin Islands pro windsurfer Mike Porter laughed. “First time I come to Canada, and they’ve got me hauling logs.”
But the watersport enthusiasts who hope to make the championship an annual Squamish event may have to put even more effort into clearing the debris in the frigid Howe Sound waters that left several sailors with broken boards. Boulon experienced the treacherous conditions on his first day when a fin caught an underwater rope. He catapulted off his board, which then cracked.
Boulon wouldn’t be deterred, however, and went on to win the North American Formula title just ahead of second-place Ireland. Seth Besse from USA came third while Zac Plavsic the young Canadian took forth. Boulon also won the international competition, with Denmark’s Jesper Vesterstrom second and Ireland third.
With the Formula competition over, athletes treated spectators to another show early Saturday afternoon: an informal long course race. Nearly two dozen windsurfers formed a line in waist-deep water for a mass start, and when the starting horn blew, windsurfers raised sails in unison and took off, expertly maneuvering their crafts around the 15-km course. Ireland and Boulon again staged a neck-and-neck race that finished with Boulon winning by a nose.
© The Vancouver Sun 2005
