I'm not bagging it, and I certainly admire them for having a go, but the results of the event highlight once again how the sport of speed windsurfing has moved on from a fixed course and timing gates (and 500m 
) post GPS. Although I am sure the participants had a nice time, the speeds they attained were nothing approaching record speeds. Hell, the average amateur GPS posts each month make them look very ordinary.
They did get some reasonably strong winds in the 30's, but the course was way too square for what they got. The interesting thing is, if they had abandoned their timing gates and just done bearaways across the pond with their GPS's, they could probably had gone 5 to 7 knots faster! And it wouldn't have had to cost them Thousands of Euro's a week!
Even Luderitz, which has incredibly consistent strong winds and wind direction, has a lot of days that are just that little bit off the right angle for perfect runs. And although a lot of records were set there, I think I large factor in that has been the development of sailors interest, skills and gear from the GPS revolution.
It will be interesting to see what develops at La Palm going forward.
