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MATTEO IACHINO: HAT TRICK HERO!

THREE STRAIGHT VICTORIES FOR MATTEO IACHINO AT THE PWA GUADELOUPE WORLD CUP!

Dominating a PWA racing event is rare; even more so in the technical, unpredictable world of foiling. But Matteo Iachino made a powerful statement to open the 2025 PWA racing season, firing off three straight bullets and turning heads across the beach in Guadeloupe. Fresh after his podium celebrations, we caught up with Matteo to find out the secret behind his sensational start to the season and whether this is just the beginning…

Photos: PWA / Carter

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MATTEO IACHINO

“After many years foil racing, I am starting to understand what you need to work on my gear to actually have it performing the best way possible. Foiling is like the Formula 1 of windsurfing on the sea and you need to have everything tuned perfectly. The pilot matters…but the gear matters a lot more than what I was used to in fin racing. Our sails at Severne have improved and the Starboard X15 foil board has improved too.

This has helped a lot for the basic performance but then you have to tune every single piece of your equipment like a freak! I used to tune like that as a slalom sailor on the fin but not as much on the foil. It took me a while to realize by watching other riders that the tuning was the only way to improve your performance. Every little detail matters…even a hair on the front wing for example!

TUNING AND TESTING

Most riders are using the Patrik Aeon foil but then there are so many other set ups that make a difference. In foiling you want to race with the less power possible. Power also means drag. So, you want to have as least power as possible in the foil to have more glide and be fast.

 

You do need power to climb and get out of bad situations. My new boards and sails have helped a lot. The Hyper 8 Severne sail is lighter on the board, that allows me to go on a smaller front wing or on a less powerful set up earlier. The new X15 Starboard is gliding better too. So, with the lighter sail and the board gliding better, the combination of the two improvements helped me a lot. I also worked on masts, battens, booms and the finish of the foil itself; every detail.

FINDING THE FLOW

Obviously when we are racing the foil is the only element actually in the water but the aerodynamics of the board is critical too. We worked a lot this with Remo Villa and I was surprised at the beginning how much of a difference this has made. We have now been foiling for almost ten years! I thought as many people do still think that once you take off, the board doesn’t matter much because you are in the air. But for us racing you feel the difference of the aerodynamics.

It is a bit like when you put your hand out of the window when you are driving on the highway or if you stand up when you are cycling. You feel the difference with the board, it has a huge impact. You gain power as you go higher, or if you glide and you lose power and it goes down again, there is a fine line where the board is still comfortable.

You can have just enough power to stay in the air but not much to glide through the air and carry the momentum. So, the aerodynamics and stability of the board in these cases makes a massive difference. You have to work on the length, with the size of the nose the size of the tail and all the airflow elements. The position of the foot-straps makes a difference too. There is a lot to work on.

Remi is the mastermind behind all of this. I help Remi bring ideas and Remi is the one who does all of the developing. He put the ideas into something concrete. Sometimes we just sit down and brainstorm new ideas. Since I entered the team I have worked with Remi.

2025 KICKS OFF!

You never know what is going to happen when you go into the first race event of the season. I knew I had better performance with my whole set up in all wind ranges. I knew from medium to high wind and right down to light wind I would be going faster than last season. Also, you don’t know how much the other guys have improved. You test with some people, but you never know if they play their best cards! You never know if you have the best the best sail but not the board or the best foil but the sail is not so good.

You need to test every piece by piece. When you show up at an event you have to hope the improvements you have made are better than the other guys! Testing against another racer from another team, I never play my best cards either! Part of it is not to show how fast you are properly but also if you push too hard testing and you crash into another rider, or crash yourself, then you might break you best gear.

THE TESTING PROCESS

You want to use one piece at a time and see if that works the best and then you vary different other elements. I test an average set up that goes decently. Then I will test only the battens with that set up. Then once I have found the best battens, I will test only masts. Before the event, you put all the best elements together. Then you just hope that you have the magic combination. I use GPS a lot for testing which helps a lot. With foiling you can use GPS more because it accurately tells you all the data you need to know.

THE TASTE OF VICTORY

The first race I was pushing. In medium light conditions you need to on the edge. When I saw that I had good speed, I was not relaxing but playing it a little bit safer. You can never totally play it safe because every sailor is fast. If you start half a second behind you are done! You can maybe come back through the gybes, but it is really difficult at this level.

With the second elimination we were on small gear, we were on 7m sails. In these conditions it is possible to make a comeback earlier but with 9m or 8m in those conditions with seaweed as well it is very difficult to pass. I think I won every race during the day. In some positions when you are qualifying you don’t want to fight too hard. That would be stupid. You could crash for now reason.

It was really cool to win all three rounds. I put so much work into my training and testing this season and that felt very satisfying. It was nice to see the result of all that hard work. But to me there is still no comparison with winning or competing in fin racing.

Winning a heat in Fuerteventura on Slalom X last year had so much adrenaline for me. That was a dream come true. To win in Guadeloupe was super nice, it was amazing don’t get me wrong, but foil is another sport compared to fin. I worked for it! The amount of work I put into it was ridiculous. That makes it special. My true passion is still full hardcore fin racing. If I had to choose, it would be 100% fin over foil!”

REMI VILLA (Starboard shaper)

“We worked a lot on a numeric computer which has helped our designs using AI! This AI has helped me for our development. I having been working on some programmes to study the numbers of the aerodynamics of our shapes. This helped me to design the and improve the boards. We can see compared to last year, Matteo is far more stable when he is foiling. He is really stable all the time. The board is not moving and this is because of the aerodynamics that we developed on the boards. In 2026, which is coming soon, the boards will be even better as we have made some new big steps of improvement already.

It is very important to work on the aerodynamics in foiling as it stabilizes everything. When a gust hits you do not lose the balance, you just accelerate that is it! It is the same with cycling, the aerodynamics make a massive difference. The problem of stability in foiling is all down to the aerodynamics. We have also worked with Matteo on some details of his training! This is important also to give him confidence to be stable for the whole week. He has been very calm all week during the races and he is just going very fast! I am extremely happy about these results. We have been working together for almost ten years and now we really understand each other and everything has come together!”