Alex sailing in Dubai

Full on training

2010-02-26T22:13:00.002+04:00

days in dubai have been unusually windy this might be due to the fact of the weather changing back to being warm rather than the nice 20 degrees we had almost a month ago. sailing the past few days has been very tuff for me and my boat due to the wind strenght but i cant complain, it was fun. today we had the Moth Grand Prix which was kind of not real racing but rather trying to stay upright and not nosedive on the way down. last race that i competed in my foil flap came of and i had to go swim back and get it since i had so much speed that i got far away from it. boats are arriving daily but the sailors are not, so there are around 15 boxes lying the waiting to be opened, and who could have not guessed that nearly 95% if not more of them are Mach2 which is kind of annoying not being able to sail against more people with the same boat to see how you REALLY compare to them instead of trying to keep up with a slower boat. need to fix my flap tomorrow even though there is again good wind forcasted even though that is just in the morning. the swiss team JP and Arnaud are very good sailors and have some very impressive things on their boat which took them 35 hours to make and so again makes them lighter. they are fast upwind but havent sailed against them downwind yet so we will see next time i am leveled with them and not far behind. James from England has also arrived and put on his sponsor stickers today and then went out sailing after my flap broke and the wind then dropped making it even harder in those gusy conditions. Jonny wanted to go sailing but was unfortunate of finding out that his foil was broken not letting him go sailing. it turned out that 25knots and flat water are more fun than scary, except offcourse if the waves kick in. i am still thinking about buying the on the water adjustable ride height, which is very expensive or not???

Puma Boats arrived

2010-02-06T08:47:00.002+04:00

the puma boats had arrived day before yesterday. due to my boat being repaired i decided to rig them noticing how much was missing. so the plan was to take both boats out of the box and fuse then together putting all parts that where missing on one boat onto the other, making atleast on of them sail ready. it took me the whole day to make one of them sail ready that i only got around 30min of sailing in before the sun went down. the boat that i sailed on felt quiet fast or mabye it was just that there was aroung 18knots of wind. the boat looks ferly new and all ropes go through great making it easy to sail. the boom also had a tremendous height, making gybes very easy. i will put some pictures up of it being rigged and if there is enough wind today which is not forcasted, will put some up of it sailing.

germany

2009-11-13T15:02:00.003+04:00

Here are just some pictures during my training in Travemuende, North Germany. Had to watch out for tankers because of the shipping channel going through the bay.

UAE nationals

2009-11-13T14:43:00.002+04:00

sadly to here was that moths were not allowed to take part in the UAE nationals that where held on the 6th-7th november, even though we were not allowed to race we still went out training, conditions where very light and it was hard to get onto the foils marcel and i spent a lot of time on the water trying to find wind to get foiling in and sometimes we did. the next day the wind looked better. morning it was round 12-13knots, then dropped back down to 5, and then picked back up to a good 15 knots which was good but i could have been more. we found out that up wind i had more height but downwind marcel had more depth. at the moment i am looking for a longer wand due to the fact that mine is very short and so i cant fly as high out the water as would want to.

thursday training

2009-10-30T13:46:00.002+04:00

i decided to go sailing again after being sick the last 2 weeks. it was thursday so there where rescue boats out for the thurday training. it is always better to have some people around when sailing the moth cause you never know whats going to break. the club has introduced a new system for dinghies which is a book where you have to sign in before going sailing and sign off when you come back, just to assure everyones safety. arriving at the club after school it was great breeze and perfect foiling condition exept it was a bit choppy. rigging the boat the breeze picked up as forecasted and launching the wind was at round about 16knots. i practised my turns to get back into the boat handling and routines, realizing that after 2 weeks of not going on to the water there is quiet a lot to catch up on again( especially the fitness). the waves where quiet high since the wind was northerly coming throught the opening between the world and rashidiya. i had a few bad nose dives due to the short but high waves. at the end i think the wind got up to 20 knots(dubai wind) so 16 in europe. fantasticly nothing broke and hope it will stay like that.

2009-09-22T15:35:00.001+04:00

around the world record attempt 1= failed

2009-09-22T14:37:00.003+04:00

yesterday, marcel and i wanted to sail round the world to beat Rohans long standing record. wind forcasted was brilliant. just the material wasnt so great. we had to wake up early to get the good southerly breeze. we left DOSC at 8:00am, this was very early for a holiday morning but worth it. it was flat water until we reached the other side of the world. the waves had goten big, they werent just big long waves but big short ones, so a soon as you get up to speed you fly out of the next one and....nose dive. we were half way and smashing the record, until my flap came off. i turned around since sailing up wind in the waves was easier lowriding than going downwind and nosediving the whole time. around 10 minutes later marcels gantry came loose and so they he took down his sail and took his foils out and put his boat on the rib. later on at the beach we saw that not only did his gantry come loose bo his wingbar had cracked. this was not the last time we will try to break the record of rohan.
all broken parts are going to premium now to get repaired and ready to go sailing!!!!!

around the "world" try

2009-09-22T12:14:00.002+04:00

My first try to round the Dubai world with my Moth

boat finally fixed

2009-09-17T20:30:00.003+04:00

just picked up my boat from premium who had fixed the front of my trailer and the kicker block holder which ripped out of the hull. they had to cut a hole into it to reattach it. looks good and hopefully will hold. boat back in dosc, almost ready to go sailing, just one more problem which is the main foil where the flap came off. hopefully i will be able to get it fixed soon to go back sailing.

repairs again!!

2009-09-15T16:57:00.002+04:00

boat broken again! on saturday was racing, unfortunatly i couldnt compete since just before the start of the race the metal piece in the hull which holds the kicker blocks ripped out and so i had to sail back in. surprisingly with no kicker, foiling gybes became so much easier, mabye because of the boom height so it was easier to get across. just before the beach i had to wait since it was full of beginners launching and i didnt want to get in the way. after waiting i was wondering why i wasnt foiling anymore, at the beach i found out that the flap of the main foil had come of, fortunatly i didnt loose it completly. now the boat is back at premium again. hoping to get it fixed ASAP to get back out on the water

Start Up

2009-09-15T12:38:00.000+04:00

I have decided to start keeping track of my preparation for the Moth Worlds online.
This will help me keep track of my training and will inform all of you whats going on before and during the Moth Worlds.