ISWC SPEED WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS: PRINCE OF SPEED

La Palme in the South of France recently hosted the latest speed sailing world championships, which saw the world’s fastest sailors going head-to-head in the battle for glory, while trying to tame the ferocious Tramontana winds. We hear from event champions, Vincent Valkenaers and Heidi Ulrich, as well as the UK’s Scotty Stallman.

Words: Peter Davis, Vincent Valkenaers, Heidi Ulrich & Scotty Stallman // Photos: Aurelien Toulan

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The International Speed Windsurfing Class (ISWC) World Championships recently finished on the beautiful La Palme beach in Cöte du Midi, South of France. The area is renowned for strong winds, known as the Tramontana, and this beach is perfectly set up for this direction with the wind blowing offshore at a long straight sandy beach. It’s a speed sailing Nirvana.

This famous beach of La Palme is the location of multiple official national and world records for the nautical mile, which it is best known for. It is the best natural high wind straight beach in the world and even rivals Lüderitz in Namibia, which has a purpose built canal, for some 500m records. It regularly has winds in excess of 50 knots, so it really is the perfect place to stage the ISWC World Championships for the second consecutive year. And it didn’t disappoint… it was on fire from day one with speeds of over 45 knots being recorded over the 500m course. The conditions were brutal with a lot of chop on the course and it suited the very experienced racer and current world speed record holder – Antoine Albeau – who won last year’s event, so it’s safe to say he knows the spot well and he was the early leader after posting a 45.47 knot run.

Day two still saw strong winds, but with smoother water it favoured the dedicated speed sailors who regularly train here. Vincent Valkenaers, who is a Belgian speed specialist took the overall lead from Albeau with two bullets. Meanwhile, in the women’s fleet, Heidi Ulrich was having things all her own way and showed why she is the current women’s world record holder – as well as being the defending champion – with wins on both days, but was there a chink in her armour? Jenna Gibson from the UK was attending her first international speed event and she finished in a close second place in every round. After each round your two fastest runs are averaged and Gibson had the fastest top speed out of all the girls with an impressive 39.59 knots, which it is worth noting that that is the fastest speed ever recorded by a woman during a ISWC World Championship. This was made all the more impressive given the strength in depth of the women’s fleet. The final place on the podium was secured by another national record holder – Melek Toraman – who hails from Germany.

Event organiser, Principe Baldini, who also organises all of the other Prince of Speed events, is a hard taskmaster and squeezed in as many rounds as physically possible. The Italian even managed a wind-foil round when the breeze dropped slightly. However, even so, the conditions were on the limit for the foils and it was a treacherous journey with only the brave and the talented managing to navigate their way down the 500m course. In the men’s fleet reigning PWA Slalom world champion – Matteo Iachino – showed off his foil-slalom skills to clinch the victory, while Jenna Gibson was the only female to successfully complete the course to deservedly claim the victory in the women’s foil fleet.

According to the forecast, day three looked as though it would be the last day of strong Tramontana winds, so everyone was determined to make the most of it. Vincent Valkenaers was flying again, as was his training buddy, Hans Kreisel, as they claimed first and second respectively in both rounds while relegating overnight leader Albeau into third place. Heidi Ulrich was also not having it all her own way on day three with Jenna Gibson firmly getting her speed eye in, which saw the Brit claim two bullets on with some blistering runs to keep her in contention.

After the conclusion of day three, the sailors were left praying to the wind gods for different scenarios depending where they sat in the rankings. Current event leaders, Valkenaers and Ulrich, were probably quite happy to sit on the beach to secure their respective victories, while the likes of Albeau and Gibson would’ve chomping at the bit for a late flurry of wind to give them one last shot at snatching the titles. A nervous few days of waiting ensued, but ultimately the winds remained light and onshore, so results remained as they were.

VINCENT VALKENAURS – MEN’S CHAMPION

I feel super happy to win the event. I never expected this to happen this year. The first day Antoine [Albeau] was sailing much faster than us, so it was hard to keep belief that anyone could catch him. However, after the second day I started to believe it was possible.

CONDITIONS AND EQUIPMENT

The conditions were a bit tricky and it was hard to select the best moments for the runs, so I’m happy that Principe Baldini was able to read the conditions so well, which gave us the best chance of laying down our best possible runs. I’m 196cm tall and weigh 103kg, but I also used 4kg extra of lead. I was on my JP 45 Speed and my custom speed NeilPryde Evo 15 5.7m most of the time. The sail was working super good for me paired with my new Chopper Fins 21.

PUTTING BELGIUM ON THE SPEED SAILING MAP

This is something I’m really proud of, we have a few super good freestylers, and for a few years now I’ve already made my mark in the world of speed sailing. I came extremely close to setting the world speed record over 500m and achieved the fastest top speed ever at 56 knots, which is amazing. This keeps me motivated to keep going to become the fastest in the world and who knows… maybe to be the first person ever to reach 54 knots over 500m.

ON THE SPOT

La Palme is a spot that I am familiar with and that I like a lot. I come here to train frequently as you know know when you come here that you are almost guaranteed some good conditions, which makes it ones of the best places in the world to train.

FEAR FACTOR

You get used to sailing so close to the beach, but when you don’t know where the sand banks are it’s really intimidating. However, when you check the area and find the confidence to go for it, it’s amazing and you can take a lot of risk to push to even higher speeds.

SPEED SAILING ADDICTION

I am addicted to speed sailing because you can constantly compete with yourself to go faster every time you are on the water. The ongoing search for places which offer better wind and then the adrenaline you get when you go that fast is just amazing. You can only focus on the task at hand, and that for me is what makes speed sailing so special as you have to forget about everything else and be completely in the moment.

TRAINING

I sometimes train with a personal trainer to improve my core stability and muscle power, and in the winter, I also play volleyball, which keeps me fit and busy. I also have a really physical job, which helps to keep me moving ☺.

TIPS FOR ASPIRING AMATEURS

Buy a GPS and look for some flatwater spots, so that you can push yourself to go faster. Also checking that you have your gear setup correctly with your friends or other sailors as trim can help you a lot. Then sail as much as you possibly can.

GOALS FOR THE FUTURE?

My biggest goal now is to be the fastest ever and to be the first person to go over 54 knots (100km/h) over 500m and to win more events like this.

I would like to thank Baldini for organising an amazing event like this and I hope he can continue doing this and make it even bigger. I would also like to thank my sponsors who make all of this possible – JP Australia, NeilPryde, Alera Food, AGRITYRE, Chopper Fins, Valkenaers Interieurbouw.

WOMEN’S CHAMPION – HEIDI ULRICH

I’m very happy to have successfully defended my world championship title, especially as the competition was super hard this year with British racer Jenna Gibson, who has won multiple races on the PWA World Tour, and the German World Cup competitor, Melek Toraman both competing. It was windy on the first three days of the competition and we had three intense days of racing with winds of 35-45 knots and I was able to win the first three heats.

RACING CONDITIONS

On the third day, things didn’t go quite as planned and I had to settle for two second places as Jenna Gibson set the fastest overall run over 500m at 39.59 knots (73.3km/h), while I “only” registered 38.69 knots (71.6 km/h). My maximum speed for the competition was 43.40 knots, which equals 80.30kmh.

However, these speeds are not decisive for the world championships because only the races that you win are counted.

Overall, I am very happy with the five heats and the whole competition. There were super exciting battles, especially between Jenna and I. I loved racing with her! She’s super talented, passionate and really races with heart on her sleeve, which is just lovely!

We always started together as a full fleet with all the women together with the 40 men, so you had to be very careful not to get lost among all the men. But that was also great fun.

LUCK OF THE DRAW & PROGRESSION

The wind was extremely gusty and it shifted in all directions, so it was therefore a bit of a lottery to catch the right gust and also to be riding the right equipment. So, I’m all the happier that I managed to defend my title. The closeness of the races has now spurred me on to work even harder on my windsurfing technique to get even better.

NEXT GENERATION

The event is also very keen to promote the youth fleet as they are the future of the sport, so we also crowned a youth world champion. It was a very strong fleet from all over Europe and from day one it was dominated by another Belgian, Cyril Everard, who set a fastest run of 43.09 knots – rivalling some of the best in the world. He was chased hard by Luca Pierboni from France, who took one round off Everard to deny him a perfect score, while Brendan Lorho, who is also from France, claimed third. The woman’s youth fleet was won by Luisa Kolmer from Germany with a very respectable 32.3 knots. These guys and girls are going to make a big impact on the main fleet very soon!

The Brits were there in force this year and doing very well. Jenna, as we have already mentioned, was having a blinder with a second place in the female fleet and first in the foil, while Scotty Stallman showed why he is the UK’s top speed sailor with a fifth place overall – setting a fastest run of 43.6 knots and he completed the podium in the wind-foil fleet. Jim Crossley was not far behind in 11th and Simon Pettifer and Michael George finished 16th and 21st overall, respectively.

SCOTTY STALLMAN – CHANGES

I really wanted to improve on my result from last year and I think there were a lot of things I have changed since then – from kit to mindset. We developed our sails over the winter to help with top speed and acceleration, but this is nothing in comparison to mindset and knowledge of the spot. La Palme, even on the best of days, isn’t easy, and when you add 50 competitors into the mix things definitely don’t get any easier. Using my experience from last year and knowing where I went wrong this year, I completely changed the way I sailed and the results were a good showcase of this.

WEYMOUTH HERITAGE AND SPEED IN HIS DNA

Haha, Weymouth sure has its heritage in speed, and with thanks to local riders such as Pete Young, who introduced me to speed and tied my first GPS to me, there is always a big connection there. There is nothing better than lining up for a speed run fully maxed out on a 5.3m sail and 44cm wide board!

I will 100 percent be returning next year! I recommend everyone who is into to speed to come next year too. Principe puts in a lot of effort alongside the local councils for this event to run, so I always think it’s great to have a big turnout and to help promote speed sailing and the spot. it’s also a great time to set some new PB’s!

A special mention must go to Michael George, who was not only competing, but also overseeing the Motion GPS timing system, which was on loan from Weymouth Speed Week, providing super accurate results and rankings, so competitors and the watching public could follow the action day by day. This all added up to a great event, well run and seeing true speed sailors going head-to-head to see who is the best of the best.

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