ROSS WILLIAMS
I think there has always been a chance of these types of accidents happening during racing without any rules. I do believe these were both unlucky accidents. None of the riders were directly looking for a collision, so that is the way it goes. Personally, I wouldn’t like to see us go back to racing with rules, but maybe also the PWA need to have some sort of deterrent to stop sailors sailing too aggressively. I don’t think it would affect the way I race in Fuerteventura, because I am more aware of who are the potential sailors that these issues usually occur with and I always try not to position myself near them. Any slalom race can be as dangerous as you allow it to be. I don’t think Fuerteventura is a place we have to be extra careful because collisions can happen anytime and anywhere. I hope that now we have had these accidents, more of the fleet will actually start to realise that potential we each have with our gear to hurt and injure a friend and fellow competitor and we will all act accordingly. If there are guys that are generally sailing dangerous, they should have harsher penalties imposed on them when caught. But I think this time both of these accidents were just accidents in the heat of the battle. I don’t think wearing protection is going to solve this issue, I think it is within each competitor to choose and learn from this and hopefully we can continue to have very little accidents in the future, along with exciting racing.