WINDSURF MAGAZINE 45“FOILING CAN
OFFER US SOME
NEW ASPECTS TO
WINDSURFING”
FOIL VERSUS SLALOM
The whole situation with racing is quite tricky at the moment because we
don’t really know where foiling is going. I don’t want to miss the train so
I need to be a part of that movement if it continues. It could even take
the place of slalom, who knows? I don’t really like this idea because slalom
has been here for the last 30 years and it is one of the main disciplines of
windsurfing. It would be a shame for it to die because of foiling. Foiling can
offer us some new aspects to windsurfing as well as new events. You can sail
in lighter conditions, but for me it has to stay as a different discipline. They
are two different sports to me. There is a movement amongst the sailors to
combine the two but I am against this. It is like combining freestyle and
wave. It would totally change the hierarchy in windsurf racing. Many of
us have trained for years to reach our level. I am not afraid because I have
been foiling for a few years. I know how it all works, but at the moment it
is not so much skill but more about equipment. It is an equipment war. A
big problem with this is that it will be super tricky for the young generation
to grow up with this system. I know how tough it is to make it to the top
in slalom. It takes a lot of effort and a lot of investment. If you have to do
this in two disciplines then you need a lot of money and a lot of time. It will
not be easy that is for sure. We are all carrying around more gear already as
it stands. But I think it would be good to have a tour in slalom and a tour
in foil. If you want to do both then it’s up to you. You can’t force sailors to
do both. A football player will not want to do rugby. You cannot ask Victor
Fernandez to do a freestyle event as part of the wave title. It is exactly the
same thing combining freestyle and wave as combining foil and slalom.JAPAN
I did not expect to win the first foil race of the season in Japan. It was cool
for me to win a foil event. We worked a lot on the equipment this winter,
especially on every single detail. I was not the best in Japan but I managed
to always be in the mix. I tried to sail easy and not take too much risk at
the start. I was pretty fast on the upwind legs and had a good angle for
pointing. I was coming to Japan just to see how my level was against the
others. I am definitely ready to fight this year. I would still like to keep the
disciplines separate even with that result. At the moment I think this is the
best solution. The Olympic guys were there to shake things up in Japan.
They were racing very well. On the other side, imagine a PWA slalom racer
going to a RS:X event with 30 knots of wind, then we can cause them some
trouble with their rankings too. Costa Brava will be a good opportunity to
level the playing field, especially with 5 more knots of wind. For sure they
will be fighting, but with that extra wind it is going to be different.BACKGROUND
I am from the south of France close to Leucate. I was lucky to be born in a
windy place and my parents were living super close to the sea. They were not
into windsurfing but I was lucky to start sailing in a small club when I was
young. I switched to windsurfing pretty quickly and grew up sailing at one
of the windiest places in France. It was just perfect. In France we are lucky
because we have a very strong youth tour. From 13 years old you can start
competing. This is why the French guys are so strong on the PWA tour. I
am speaking for the young generation, guys like Quentel, Toselli and all the
good French tour sailors that availed of this system. When you start racing
early you are much better prepared when you enter more serious events.
After school I studied business for five years. It was a deal with my parents.
If school was working well then I could sail! It made me work hard at school
and now I have something to fall back on. I knew I had to work hard during
the week to be able to sail at the weekend. Once I passed all my exams I was
able to fully focus on windsurfing and being a professional racer for two or
three years. I said after that time I would then re-evaluate where I was. But
as soon as I started focussing on windsurfing my results quickly improved. It
was ok for me to live from the sport. I was loving what I was doing and also
making a living from it. Now I am just rolling with the flow. I don’t want to
think about the future. I worked hard enough in the past with my studies to
be secure for the future. Now I just want to focus on racing and with guys
like Antoine to look up to, I hope I can go on for ten more years.