With a total of 69 competitors, the Brazilian Nationals had a large fleet that had competitors coming from all over Brazil and some South

American countries like Argentina and Chile. It was aimed for 10 races during the 3 days of racing, which was concluded easily.

The event was held in Ilha Bela, 2 hours away from Sao Paulo, in what is considered to be the sailing capital of Brazil. The race comity did

a fantastic job along with the organizers and the event ran smoothly with great racing.

DAY 1

With 12 knots winds we all went to the water with big sails and where couth by surprise after the first race, as the wind increased to a

steady 18-20 knots. 4 races were run back to back of around 20-25 minutes each and there was no time to change sails since the course

was set quite far out because of the wind direction. The local Paulo Dos Reis (BRA 3333) had good board speed especially downwind and won the 4 races of the day, I (Wilhelm Schurmann BRA 999), came in second in all of them. In third place a battle started to emerge between Victor Melo (BRA 2497) Luca Pascolato (BRA 200) and Leonardo Rebello (BRA 121). After the Racing most people were pretty tiered and went to get some food and straight to bed since for the next day winds where predicted to reach up to 30 knots.

DAY 2

When we arrived at the beach we could see it was going to be really windyyy, outside at the race course, big rolling waves where coming

in, and the down wind mark was set just in the edge of some braking waves, making it spectacular racing with winds ranging from 18-30

knots. Most sailors went with the smallest sails they could get their hand in and by 11 am we were starting the firs race. I was on my 9.8 and just before the start of the race had a equipment brake down and had to go back to shore missing the first race and having to go out on my 10.7, Mathias Pinheiro (BRA 5) also had some bad luck, just before he went to the water a gust funnel down the mountain to hit the beach at around +50 knots. His equipment was lifted and dragged for 30 meters before stopping at a brick wall, smashing his sail, board and fin. Another competitive sailor with some bad luck was Marc Conrad (BRA 171) that in the first day broke his gear twice and ended missing all 4 races.

Paulo dos Reis won the first race followed by Dulter Manhaes (BRA 39) and Leonardo Rebello. On the second race I was quite a bit overpowered on 10.7 and had some great racing that was more like match racing with Paulo dos Reis, he came first making his 6th win, I followed in second and Fabio Melo (BRA74) in third.

We went to the beach for lunch and by the time we went for the 2 afternoon races, the wind had dropped a bit to around 16-20 knots. I

won both races in the afternoon followed by Victor Melo and Dulter in one, and Paulo dos Reis and Fabio Melo on the other.

DAY 3 (final day)

A beautiful sunny day presented the sailors with perfect formula conditions and a steady 15 knots showed why the Island of Ilha Bela is

Brazil’s Capital of Sailing. As only 2 races where planned to complete the 10 programmed races, the race comity waited for the wind to fill in nicely and by 1pm we started the first race. I won the first race and was looking at Paulo dos Reis who had to finish in the top 3 to win the event, on the first up wind he was around 6th but recovered to second and as he sailed across the finish lined I congratulated him on his second Brazilian National title. The last race of the event was a real match racing with Paulo and me fighting until the finish line. I crossed in first, Paulo in second and behind us the battle for 3rd place was right to the end with Leonardo Rebello taking the slot deservedly.

In the Youth, Dulter (BRA 39) won the Youth (8th overall) and was one of the happiest person around since on the second day of the event, he received a phone call at 1am with news that his wife had given birth to his new son, congratulations to the new dad. Second place went to Elias Aguiar Seadi (BRA 344) (17th overall).

In the junior fleet, the 14 years old Gabriel Oliveira, also known as Biel (BRA 8696) finished first with an impressive 10th overall. In

second came Lucas Trindade (BRA 333) (25th overall)

Nelson Oliveira (BRA 7171) took the Masters title (7th overall) followed by Carlos Issac Anjinho (BRA 768) (12th overall

The Super Masters went to Marcelo Mig (BRA 719) (22nd overall) and in second was Thomas Schmidt (BRA 237) (23rd overall)

In the women’s fleet, Valeria Matuck (BRA 704) dominated all the races and won the event not needing to race on the last day. Second went to Patricia Castro (BRA 9).

In the Sport fleet, local sailor, Klayton Silva (BRA 4444), also won the event by anticipation and did not have to race the last day,

second went to Vinicius Lucena (BRA 88).

This is the link to the results:

OPEN: http://www.bl3.com.br/fw2005/open.htm

SPORT: http://www.bl3.com.br/fw2005/sport.htm

I will be sending some pictures as soon as I get them, here are some other sites with event reports and pic: www.bl3.com.br/fw2005 or

www.upwind.com.br, or loopwindsurf.com or www.katanka.com.br

BEST REGARDS TO ALL

WILHELM SCHURMANN

BRA999