YANNICK ANTON
I live in Fuerteventura and winter is the time of year to enjoy windsurfing with the best swells on the island. The locals and I could sail many days every week, but as we all have jobs (for me it is with the windsurfing school Sailsense), we normally only sail on the best days and work the others. Like other windsurfers I check windguru once a day, which gives us a good idea of what’s coming. The forecast was very nice for a week of waveriding on the north shore. One day especially stood out with big swell like we can have a few times during winter. The nice thing of being in Fuerteventura is that every day of windsurfing is special, because it changes a lot. We all know where to go depending on the conditions, and on the type of wave we want to sail. There are many possibilities, so we go to the coast, check one or two spots and go where we like the most.
The Witchcraft Haka 74 is my go-to board for most conditions together with a set of Witchcraft Slayer sails, which are powerful with a lot of drive and not twitchy, so they don’t do weird things. When the swell gets heavier on the island, all I change is put a bigger centre fin in to hold more pressure on the top turn, but other than that the stock fins work really well on the Haka. During this week I took time off for 3 sessions, 3 good sessions, exceptional sessions I would say if I were not living here! The first day I went to Caleta, it was mast high, side-offshore wind grooming the waves and turquoise water – perfect. Guys in the water were going fast down the line, carving on some sweet sections. I had to coach two guys there before going for it myself. When I was free, I went to the big wave spot because the orientation of the swell meant it was getting in there a bit better with some sections a bit punchier then Caleta. I got some very nice waves there, trying to surf clean lines and attack just when a good opportunity set up.