SHOULDER SOLDIER
The rush was there on every wave, but I was careful not to make any mistakes. The pictures tell it all, I sat a lot wider than the others, but then again my gear survived, I survived and frankly my wife is very happy about that, not to mention how glad I am! I got to sail Cloudbreak in 15-foot waves for 3 hours. We all got heaps of rides and it was just the four of us. That was the craziest session I’ve ever had.
Watching Scotty and JP rip this wave to pieces was unbelievable. Those guys are quite correctly some of the most awesome sailors ever. I found out later that Philip had broken his mast and torn his sail on the first wipeout and, because his other gear hadn’t turned at the airport, was forced to sit on the boat. He was out of gear and couldn’t even borrow my equipment due to sponsorship deals. Seriously, I did offer! He wasn’t alone though. Both JP and Scotty had broken 2-3 sails each and a couple of masts as well. It turned out I was the only one who didn’t break anything. I think this is because of my earlier mental note, luck had nothing to do with it!
That night we had a few beers and regaled each other with stories about the awesome couple of days we’d just had. What an amazing experience. I must say those guys are some of the nicest blokes you can meet. When you consider that they let a complete amateur tag along with them, you get a real sense of the love they have for this, the greatest of all sports, and the fraternity that we belong to as windsurfers. TC