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MARK OF A CHAMPION: BOUJMAA GUILLOUL

Boujmaa Guilloul is one of windsurfing’s most radical sailors, but behind the crazy moves and talent also lies a seasoned competitor with many podium finishes. The 2016 IWT champion gives us an insight into his life and success.

Words – Boujmaa Guilloul // Photos – John Carter / pwaworldtour.com

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THE BEST

Obviously everybody wants to improve their life and I too want to be a better version of myself than yesterday. I am trying to use the knowledge that I have accumulated over the years to do that every day. In windsurfing I want to be better than the windsurfer I was yesterday. I always want to be better at any spot, or better than any previous session for myself. I don’t know if it is the same with other sailors, but I always aim to be better. I often think, if I don’t hurt myself when I am windsurfing, then I didn’t push myself, therefore I did not sail good. That is one of the thoughts I had recently. I feel I need to be constantly pushing in everything I do and that is how I prove to myself that I did better.

You can also feel improvement when you feel you are doing things on the water that you have not done in the past. If you go for a session where you are aiming for jumping then I think it is good to try jumps that you did not do in the past or you did not do yesterday; if you do that then you are going to confirm to yourself that you did better. From my own perspective I don’t need to prove to anyone anything I do on the water. I just need to prove to myself that I am on the path of progression and not on a path of regression.

INSPIRATIONS

When I was younger, I did look up to the career of Muhammad Ali and Tyson and all these guys that came out of nothing and invested their energy and time into becoming better versions of themselves or at least in their own sport. I look up to these guys for sure. I don’t compare myself to them because their level is way higher than my sports level, which I consider very low comparatively. I could have done way more, I think.

STRESS

Honestly to deal with stress you just need to be fully prepared and well organized. You need to be ahead of time. It is better to be three hours early than a few minutes late. That will take off some stress when you are competing. But then when it comes to competition I used to stress in the beginning because I wanted not to fall. I felt every move that I tried I was crashing. The more I matured as a sailor, I realized I just had to chill and compete with a really relaxed mind, although that is the hardest thing to do when you are competing. That is because you want to catch the waves in a hurry, jump in a hurry and therefore you are stressed. To control that speed of thinking and speed of action is tough. I still learn every day a little bit better how to manage that.

WINDSURFING

This sport has taken me to places that I never dreamt of. Therefore, I love travelling and I love to go visit different places that I have never discovered. I like to learn the culture and then through travelling I have been able to learn a lot. I have gained a lot of overall knowledge, not only about windsurfing. I like to learn about the culture of where I am competing at. That is quite a highlight in my life in general as a Moroccan

RIVALS

I have never considered any other sailors as the enemy, even though we are competing against each other. I feel like we are a single body and that our sport is in need of collaboration and coworking. I consider other sailors as coworkers and that we are promoting our sport. I am not competing against them, I am competing against myself. I want to win against myself and be a better windsurfer than I was yesterday. I don’t put that pressure on myself and I just hang out with everyone as normal.

In general sailing with all these guys is amazing fun. When I came to the 2021 France PWA event at Marignane, initially the forecast was really solid. I was projecting myself into going crazy because it was going to be starboard tack full on 3.7m conditions. I imagined myself doing crazy moves to beat guys like Brawzinho or Thomas Traversa, trying triples or push loop to double forwards. I wanted to do things that you can’t even imagine, as all the PWA guys push me to push my level. I just want to prove to myself that I can progress no matter what age I am at.

There are a bunch of guys that I admire at the moment. When I follow the social media of Brawzinho it is very impressive what he is doing. Then you have Philip Köster with his crazy insane moves, he doesn’t post too much of his best moves, but I know what he is made of. Traversa is charging in insane conditions. These are just a few besides Marc Paré, Victor Fernandez and Baptiste Cloarec from France. All these kids that are coming up are pretty impressive. They are all special in their own way.

TIME ON WATER

I normally spend at least two hours a day on the water on a surfboard, a SUP, a wing foil, windsurf foil, or a windsurfer if there is waves. I am quite picky for my windsurfing. If it is flat or poor conditions, I won’t windsurf but jump at one of the other sports. I need a certain size of waves and a certain strength of wind for wave sailing. I am still in the water every day. I am not training to compete most of the time, I windsurf to have fun.

WINNING OR MONEY

I think to be able to win you need a certain amount of money to train and go to places. The experience I get from going to these places is just as important to me and obviously the money is something we need. It is a tool to get to the winning. So both money and winning are important in their own way.

BALANCE

Balance in life is hard to shift because we all have weaknesses for some things. There are extremes on both sides so it is hard to find the middle ground. To me the balance is to be able to accept the differences of everybody and their tastes, lifestyle and beliefs. My own balance is a good mixture of eating healthy and occasionally unhealthily. I think it is good to derail a little bit and even eat stuff that takes more time to recover from. I wish I could do more sports. All the other sports like running, stretching and cycling I should be doing more of. So, for me, to find balance, even the bad things I feel are ok for our mental health. To keep on pushing yourself you have to be healthy mentally. Therefore, you should not be too strict.

PUSHING THE LIMITS

We are driven by being better every day. So, every day I go sailing I am going to try something that I have not done before at the limit of not seriously hurting myself, because I can’t afford to be injured anymore. I try to push myself and have imaginary moves I want to do. I still want to invent moves so I am not done here.

NATURAL TALENT

It is a mixture. I was naturally ambitious with my sailing and that paid off. I think I was fearless. That is what gave me the touch that helped me be distinguishable from the rest. I see talent in so many other sailors, people like Thomas Traversa, Brawzinho and Philip Köster have more talent than I have. These guys are super talented. People who work hard and reap the rewards of that work are guys like Brawzinho. Then you have some crazy nuts guys that don’t think at all like Ricardo Campello. He is so impressive by working a little bit and then being fearless. That helps him progress every day.

DREAM EVENT

I would love a starboard tack crazy 3.7m jumping and wave riding event. That would be ideal. Like some of those days in Maui where it was nuking and we were doing jumps but it was wave rideable. Not crazy big waves but around 2-3 metres high. I think everybody would love that. Unfortunately, I was mostly only competing on port tack all my career on the PWA. That did not help with my career. I think every single kid who wants to get into the tour in the future should really be diverse and be able to sail in both tacks. Port tack events just were not for me. I was always dreaming Sylt would be starboard tack. I used to dream that Pozo was starboard tack and that did not help at all. Port tack was the only tack on tour and I did not want to adapt to port tack. I was wishing someday a miracle would happen. Miracles do not happen! It was just my way of thinking.

Everyone would love to win in Cape Verde and obviously Maui at Ho’okipa. Winning in Maui at the IWT, the year I won that, it was unbelievable for me. Every heat I passed I was not sure I had made it. During the heats I was just sailing the best I could. Luckily it paid off. It was a dream to be standing on the podium in first with the guys around me. Polakow and Josh Stone were there, as well as Kevin Pritchard, and these guys were my idols and are still my idols. Winning in Hawaii is the dream for any wave sailor.

GOYA

I am really happy with my move to Goya. The gear works amazing. I would love to be involved in the research and development as well but I guess the guys take care of that in Maui. When I was in Hawaii, I did help with the testing. I gave feedback and all that, but now being far away in Morocco, and not being able to go back to Maui at the moment, I am not involved as much as I would like to be. I am passionate about development.

HIGHS AND LOWS

The lows would be the injuries because I wanted to do better. I took risks and therefore I hurt myself. That is linked to guidance. I think I was not guided by anybody and was just at a young age where I was only thinking for myself. The people that were around me were trying to help with good advice but that was not enough to avoid time wasted off the water after injuries. That did not help with my career all that time off the water. The highs were winning events and being able to pass through heats was the best feeling ever. I think in competition once you start winning you taste that joy and once you start winning you get that drive to do better the next time.