The 31st edition of the Lancelin Ocean Classic, Australia's longest running windsurfing event, took place between January 14th and 17th, 2016. However, the conditions only materialized on the last day of the event, forcing the organizers to squeeze four days of competition into one and having both the windsurfers and the kitesurfers on the start line of the 25 km Marathon from Ledge Point to Lancelin, making for intense competition and reviving some old rivalries.

Despite attending the Lancelin Ocean Classic for the first time, Cyril Moussilmani managed to fight off the 2015 winner Steve Allen, Gautier Bourgeois, Patrik Diethelm and Jesper Orth, to name only a few and take first place in the Windsurfing Marathon. Cyril completed the 25 km downwind race in 29 minutes and 42 seconds, 40 seconds ahead of runner-up Steve Allen.

Ecstatic about his win, we quickly caught up with Cyril:

"After 2 days of waiting and rescheduling, the event finally got underway. The Marathon of the 2016 Lancelin Ocean Classic in Western Australia was finally able to kick off on Sunday.

First attempt, first victory! It was a nice race, a little stressful when it came to choosing my sail size as I was struggling between just two sizes that I had available to me; the Severne Reflex 7 9.7m² and the R7 8.6m². For the boards, it was much easier: Starboard iSonic 134 Carbon. In the end, I took the big sail and it was working really well. Powered up the whole way around and fast. After a beach start the race started. Luckily for me, the kiters started ahead of us so I just had to follow them to the finish line.” [...]

"I’m proud to win such a prestigious event and it’s a good start to the year for me and gives me a lot of confidence. I love windsurfing in WA, one of my favorite places in the world… The wind was a bit up and down which made it a bit hard but such a great race..! I love the format and I just wish there were more races like this.”

Also joining Cyril on the podium is Karin Jaggi, first woman to cross the finish line and Olly Bridge who took the top spot in the kitesurf division and was the fastest sailor overall, finishing in just over 26 minutes (26:08).

The decision by organizers to run the windsurfing and kitesurfing events parallel to one another made for the biggest start and finishing lines in the event's history with over 300 sailors racing simultaneously.

On the other hand, the Windsurfing Waves Competition offered a revised format as an exciting and innovative expression session due to small wind and waves conditions. It also offered the opportunity to witness an impressive range of moves and for the riders to experiment with new tricks.

In the end, the top spots on the podiums in both the Men's and Women's were occupied with Starboard/Severne team riders Jaeger Stone, who finished ahead of PWA Freestyle World Champion Dieter van der Eyken and Ben Proffitt while Jane Seman won it in the Women's ahead of Justyna Sniady.

Full results are available here

- Photo Credit: John Carter / Lancelin Ocean Classic -