Day three: Alaçati continues to produce as four more winners are crowned.

The third day of the Pegasus Airlines PWA World Cup saw a further two eliminations completed, once the wind had settled in, after a somewhat frustrating morning. However, the wind soon swung more cross-shore which resulted in an afternoon of spectacular slalom, with high, lows and non-stop drama. By the end of the day we saw four different winners crowned as the unpredictability of the week here in Alacati continued. Winning the men’s races today were Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde) and Peter Volwater (Fanatic / Avanti), whilst the winners of the women’s division were Karin Jaggi (Patrik / Severne) and Sarah-Quita Offringa (Starboard / Gaastra / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins / Chris Benz).

Men’s elimination Three

Winners’ Final
Antoine Albeau laid down the gauntlet at the beginning of the day by winning his second successive elimination, after winning race two yesterday. The big Frenchmen wasted little time in picking up where he left off and despite Ben Van Der Steen (Starboard / Loft / Mystic / Different) making the best start of the fleet, Albeau had risen to the front of the pack as they approached the first mark. Over the remainder of the course Albeau cranked his way through effortless gybes as he opened up a substantial lead by the finish line. Behind him there was a battle between Van Der Steen, Alberto Menegatti (Starboard / Gaastra), Ludovic Jossin (Patrik / Loft) and Micah Buzianis (JP / MauiSails). The big hitters continued to battle it out but in the end it was Van Der Steen who claimed second followed by Menegatti and Buzianis.

Ben taking 2nd

The other major news of race three was the fact that Bjorn Dunkerbeck (Starboard / Severne / Mystic / Dunkerbeck Eyewear / Chris Benz) missed out on a place in the winners’ final after finishing sixth in heat fourteen. The terminator was then only beaten by a flying Julien Quentel (RRD / NeilPryde) in the losers’ final as he had to settle for tenth overall. Whilst Taty Frans (Starboard / MauiSails / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins) managed to edge his way past Patrick Diethelm (Patrik / Loft) on the final straight to finish third and fourth respectively in heat fifteen.

Bjorn ended up tenth overall

Elimination Four

Winners’ Final
The second winners’ final of the day witnessed two flying Dutchmen at the front of the fleet, but it was Peter Volwater who timed his start to perfection to lead from the outset, just ahead of Britain’s Ross Williams (Tabou / Gaastra). Volwater handled the pressure with consummate ease as he held off his rivals to claim his first bullet of the year, after an outstanding display of sailing. His fellow countryman Ben Van Der Steen was a man on a mission and he surpassed Williams to claim second place overall. The Brit meanwhile had to settle for third, whilst Cyril Moussilmani (Starboard / Severne / Mystic) and Dunkerbeck had their own private battle for fourth and fifth. Eventually Moussilmani managed to overtake his teammate after an exciting finale.

Cyril taking a stab at the terminator

The fourth elimination proved to be an intriguing affair throughout as the intensity and furiousness of the heats continued to increase, which resulted in some major upsets such as, Steve Allen (Starboard / Severne), Micah Buzianis and Sylvain Moussilmani (Tabou / Simmer) all being knocked out in the opening round. However, the biggest shock of them all arrived in the final heat of the first round, involving Antoine Albeau, who had won two out of the three eliminations completed thus far. However on this occasion the big Frenchman failed to progress into the quarter finals after battling it out against Pierre Mortefon (Fanatic / North) for the final qualifying spot, however as Albeau cranked around the final mark he fell ending all hopes of him advancing. Going through to the quarterfinals from heat eight were Cyril Moussilmani, Benoit Moussilmani (Tabou / Simmer), Pascal Toselli (RRD / Point-7) and Mortefon.

The fifth elimination is underway and the first round was completed by the end of the day, which means the quarter finals will be the first heats to be sailed when the action resumes tomorrow.

Women's third Elimination

The first women’s winners’ final of the day required a restart after the current reigning world champion, Sarah-Quita Offringa, jumped the gun. When the seven remaining sailors were underway again it was Karin Jaggi and Marion Mortefon (Starboard / Severne) who leapt out of the blocks. As the women approached the opening gybe it was Jaggi that had taken command of the heat as she rounded the buoy in pole position with Valerie Arrighetti (Tabou / Gaastra / Mystic) and Mortefon trying to keep her company. The Swiss Gem looked back to her brilliant best today and despite Arrighetti fighting back, she didn’t quite have enough in the tank to overcome her fierce rival and stop Jaggi claiming the victory. With the top two confirmed it was now all about the intense battle for third and fourth, which involved Mortefon and Lena Erdil (Patrik / Loft / AL360). By the final mark Erdil had managed to maneuver her way past her French counterpart and the Turk made no mistakes on the final leg to claim third overall.

Delphine Cousin (JP / NeilPryde) came into the third elimination tied as the current event leader, after a brilliant display on Tuesday. However today the young French woman made a catastrophic tactical error in the opening round of the day. Cousin was disqualified from heat two for a false start and with it she was handed an unwanted early exit. Elsewhere Arrianne Aukes (RRD / Simmer / AL360 / Maui Ultra Fins), who is well known for her freestyling abilities, is competing in her first slalom competition ever and the Dutch woman progressed into the semi-finals for the first time today. The freestyler finished fourth in heat three behind Sarah-Quita Offringa, Valerie Arrighetti and Annika Valkna.

Sarah-Quita up front

Fourth Elimination

Winners’ Final
Sarah-Quita Offringa marked her return to the slalom competition scene with a victory in the fourth race after overcoming competition from Lena Erdil, Karin Jaggi and Delphine Cousin. Erdil crossed the line in first place but it didn’t take long for Offringa to step on the gas and take the lead. From this position she was never going to give it away and she deservedly claimed first place. Meanwhile, Jaggi finished just behind her in second with Erdil and Cousin claiming third and fourth respectively.

In the losers’ final the victory went to Greece’s Leta Margoni, who is making her debut on the PWA World Tour, as she finished ahead of the Turkish contingent consisting of Dilara Uralp (JP / NeilPryde) and Fulya Unlu (Starboard / Severne).

Fulya Unlu

After another day of fantastic racing, tomorrow promises to be action packed once more with plenty of wind on offer. Crucially too the forecast is predicting a more favourable wind direction so hopefully the local thermal will kick in too. Either way we are preparing ourselves for more enthralling slalom and you’ll be able to see it all live by tuning into www.pwaworldtour.com. The skippers’ meeting has been called for 10am tomorrow morning with the action commencing from 10:30.

Results After Four Elimination - Men’s Slalom
1st Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde)
2nd Ben Van Der Steen (Starboard / Loft / Mystic / Different)
3rd Micah Buzianis (JP / MauiSails)
4th Bjorn Dunkerbeck (Starboard / Severne / Mystic / Dunkerbeck Eyewear / Chris Benz)
5th Peter Volwater (Fanatic / Avanti)

Results After Four Elimination - Women’s Slalom
1st Karin Jaggi (Patrik / Severne)
2nd Valerie Arrighetti (Tabou / Gaastra / Mystic)
3rd Delphine Cousin (JP / NeilPryde)
4th Sarah-Quita Offringa (Starboard / Gaastra / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins / Chris Benz)
5th Lena Erdil (Patrik / Loft / AL360)

Day two: The heat continues to rise after an intense day of racing.

After a relaxed opening to the event yesterday, today was at the opposite end of the spectrum as the Pegasus Airlines PWA World Cup exploded into life. The wind arrived right from the off, which allowed two men's and women’s eliminations to be completed in incredible slalom conditions over a grueling seven and a half hours on the water. The competitors made the most of the perfect, 15-25 knots of wind, as they treated the crowds to a relentless episode of adrenaline fueled slalom.

Men’s elimination One

Winners’ Final
The opening winners’ final of the event saw Ben Van Der Steen (Starboard / Loft / Mystic / Different) give an absolute master class as he led from start to finish to claim the first bullet of the day. The Dutchman came flying out of the blocks and he never looked like surrendering his lead as he combined his phenomenal top speed with super fluid gybes to keep the rest of the chasing pack at bay, which consisted of Bjorn Dunkerbeck (Starboard / Severne / Mystic / Dunkerbeck Eyewear / Chris Benz), Finian Maynard (RRD / Avanti) and Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde). However by the third mark Maynard had crashed out of contention, allowing Dunkerbeck and Albeau to pass as well as the hotly pursuing Cyril Moussilmani (Starboard / Severne / Mystic). The top four remained unchanged until the finish line with Dunkerbeck being Van Der Steen’s closest challenger followed by the French contingent of Albeau and Moussilmani.

First blood for Ben

One of the major incidents of the race one involved Frederic Morin (Starboard / NeilPryde), who suffered a nasty gash to his forearm after a crazy pile up at the first mark of heat four. Unfortunately for Morin not only was that the end of his race but it was also the end of his competition, thankfully though the injury wasn’t as bad as first feared or as bad as it potentially could have been. Meanwhile there were a number of big name casualties in the opening round as Cedric Bordes (Tabou / Gaastra / Mystic), Josh Angulo (Angulo / Point-7), Gonzalo Costa Hoevel (Fanatic / North), Pierre Mortefon (Fanatic / North) and Benoit Moussilmani (Tabou / Simmer) all took early exits, which reiterates the point that there truly are no easy heats in the current slalom world.

Frederic being taken down

Elimination Two

Winners’ Final
The second winners’ final of the day started under dramatic circumstances as the current leader of the PWA Slalom World Tour, Bjorn Dunkerbeck, jumped the gun which resulted in terminator having to settle for eighth place and a restart for the remaining sailors. Once the race was underway again we saw an intriguing battle for the front as Albeau, Maynard and Ross Williams (Tabou / Gaastra) made brilliant starts. As the leading three sailors headed for the first mark it was the Frenchman who held his nerve, under some serious pressure, to take command of the race, whilst Finian Maynard ran wide to lose his momentum. Albeau continued to put the pedal to the metal and it wasn’t long before he was claiming his maiden victory of the week. The battle for the top three resulted in a MauiSails second and third as teammates Micah Buzianis (JP / MauiSails) and Taty Frans (Starboard / MauiSails / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins) completed the top three, whilst Finian Maynard held off the challenge of Ross Williams to claim fourth.

Bjorn and Taty in better times

The opening round of the second race saw the majority of the top seeds safely pass into the second round as parity was restored. Meanwhile the two Turkish, Berk Yalgin (Fanatic / North / Maui Ultra Fins) and Poyraz Akay sailed solid heats to qualify for the second round. However it wasn’t long until there was more drama on the horizon in the form of heat twelve. At the center of the controversy were Ludovic Jossin (Patrik / Loft) and fellow teammate Ben van der Steen. As the two sailors bore down on the start line, Jossin ran straight across the nose of Ben van der Steen’s board, which effectively ended the pairs eliminations, and left Ben van der Steen’s board in urgent need of repair.

The third elimination was started but it was only possible to complete it to as far as the end of the second round before the wind began to deteriorate, which eventually brought an end to today’s proceedings. Many of the top seeds were able to successfully book their places in the semi-finals, which will take place tomorrow, but Maciek Rutkowski (Patrik / Loft), Ross Williams and Finian Maynard will all be missing after they were all a little to eager to cross the start line in heat eleven. With only five sailors remaining it was eventually Costa Hoevel, Van Der Steen, Kurosh Kiani (Fanatic / Simmer) and Cedric Bordes who managed to escape from the heat.

Women's elimination One

Winners’ Final
The current top two in the world, Karin Jaggi (Patrik / Severne) and Valerie Arrighetti (Tabou / Gaastra / Mystic) went head to head in the winners’ final. The French woman made a great start to the heat to seize the early advantage, but her closest rival, Jaggi, never let her out of her sights and it didn’t take long for the Swiss gem to move into the number one spot. Despite Arrighetti’s best efforts she wasn’t able to reel in Jaggi as the Swiss lady took the first blood of the day. Arrighetti finished second whilst the top four was completed by Fulya Unlu (Starboard / Severne) and Deniz Sekercioglu as the Turkish women stamped their authority over the event.

Fulya Unlu charged with local knowledge

In her first slalom event of the year the reigning world champion, Sarah-Quita Offringa (Starboard / Gaastra / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins / Chris Benz), missed out on a spot in the winners’ final after the lady from Aruba false started in the semi-finals. Despite the disappointment of not making the final she managed to regain her focus to take the victory in the losers’ final ahead of the local girl Lena Erdil (Patrik / Loft / AL306), Lise Vidal (Fanatic / North) and the other local girl Cagla Kubat (Starboard / Loft).

Elimination Two

Winners’ Final
There was one serious name of note missing from race two’s winners’ final as Karin Jaggi failed to advance from her semi-final. With the door having been swung wide open Sarah-Quita Offringa looked as though she was going to announce her return to the competition scene with a win after she made a perfect start. However, things didn’t go quite to plan as Offringa made an uncharacteristic mistake by flaming her gybe at the first mark. Waiting in the wings was Cagla Kubat, who instantly seized the initiative by claiming a bullet on her home waters in front of Delphine Cousin (JP / NeilPryde), Marion Mortefon (Starboard / Severne) and Sarah-Quita Offringa as Valerie Arrighetti had to settle for fifth place.

Cagla claims that bullet

Just like the men’s third elimination, the wind deteriorated long before the completion of race three, as just one heat could be finished. The opening heat saw Marion Mortefon, Lise Vidal, Fulya Unlu (Starboard / North) and Greta Benvenuti (Patrik / Point-7 / AL360) navigate there way into the semi finals, as any early upsets were avoided on this occasion.

Results After Two Eliminations : Men’s Slalom
1st Antoine Albeau (RRD / NeilPryde)
2nd Bjorn Dunkerbeck (Starboard / Severne / Mystic / Dunkerbeck Eyewear / Chris Benz)
3rd Micah Buzianis (JP / MauiSails)
4th Taty Frans (Starboard / MauiSails / Mystic / Maui Ultra Fins)
5th Finian Maynard (RRD / Avanti)

Results After Two Eliminations : Women’s Slalom
1st Valerie Arrighetti (Tabou / Gaastra / Mystic)
2nd Delphine Cousin (JP / NeilPryde)
3rd Marion Mortefon (Starboard / Severne)
4th Karin Jaggi (Patrik / Severne)
5th Deniz Sekercioglu

Day one, The heat is one as all riders prepare for a week of intense action. The inaugural day of the Pegasus Airlines PWA World Cup saw a quiet start to proceedings, as the sailors registered for the upcoming week of competition between 10:30am and 12pm. With just a light breeze gracing the shores of Alacati, the skippers’ meeting was delayed until 2:30pm, however despite the postponement the wind remained absent on day one of the competition. In spite of the light winds there was still plenty going on, both on and off the water, with hundreds of beginners out making the most of the perfect learning conditions.

After the registration period closed we took the opportunity to catch up with the local man Bora Kozanoglu (Starboard / Severne), before the racing begins.

How have the last couple of months been for you?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“I’ve been very busy with my center, here in Alacati, we’re approaching the end of our season now and it’s been super tiring. It’s starting to calm down after a couple of crazy months and we can finally start to relax.”

You are a local here and you probably know the conditions here better than anyone...are you hoping to use that to your advantage over the next five or six days of the competition?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“Of course, I have been windsurfing here for the last twelve or thirteen years, so of course I know the area very well. Sometimes there are some wind shifts in the bay, so although it is flat water and it looks easy but it can be very challenging with the shifts. Having said that, all of the guys on tour are very experienced, and this is the sixth year that the competition has been held here so I don’t think I will have a massive advantage. I do think that being in my home spot is an advantage in terms of being more relaxed and having a team around that can help me.”

Do you have a caddy?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“I do here, but as this is my first year competing on the tour, and without any financial sponsors I didn’t have a caddy for the other events. However I will be taking a caddy with me to all the events next year.”

What sort of conditions can we expect for the coming week?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“Normally in Alacati the wind isn’t particularly strong, but just like last year it looks as though we will be surprised for the event with strong winds expected. Most of the time it is fifteen to twenty knots but when the event is in town the wind seems to go full power. It looks as though we will see a whole range of conditions from very strong in the next couple of days to ‘normal’ Alacati come the end of the week. I have my 6.2 to 9.5 ready to go.”

Can you tell us a little about your fin set up and which fins you are using with different sails?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“I use different fin brands and sizes depending on the conditions. Here in Alacati I use mainly carbon fins because the water is flat and you don’t need the softer feeling G10 fins. I’m using a combination of Z and Carpenter fins for my carbon setup, but in strong winds and choppy water and switch to my Talon Fins. I expect to be using my Talon and T3 fins in the first couple of days, paired with my 6.2 and 7.0 Severne Reflex IIIs. With my 7.8 I’ll be sailing with my 46cm Carpenter and Z fins.”

How have you found your first full year on the PWA Tour?

Bora Kozanoglu:
“It’s been a very exciting experience competing on the PWA Tour surrounded by all of the best sailors in the world. So even though I have many years of windsurfing experience, I have still learned a lot this year from the top guys in terms of preparation, starts and even kit tuning. I truly believe that windsurfing is one of the hardest sports in the world and it’s a shame we don’t have more individual sponsorship. For example a runner only needs a shoe whilst a tennis player just needs a racket, whereas with windsurfing we need a lot of gear to be competitive and we are also a very high class sport. You don’t see fighting between the competitors like you do in football or something.”

The forecast for tomorrow is fantastic with strong winds being predicted for the duration of the day, which means we should see some incredible racing between the elite of the slalom world. The skippers' meeting has been called for 10am tomorrow morning with the action commencing from 10:30.

More to come...

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