The forecasts were all converging - the winds this afternoon were going to be nuking! I got an earlier than normal afternoon start. When I was setting up, the wind was blowing, but not anything out of the ordinary. I pumped up the 5.2 and bolted on the HS1850/Chopped 300.
Plenty of power on the 5.2 - I made a beeline straight for Firsts. When I got out there, the first of several long gusts came through - water surface turned to smoke with all the spray coming off. I just moved my hands further up on the wing handles to depower the wing. When the gusts would ease, the wind was perfect for the 5.2 - but I think even a 4 would have been too big to keep surfing during the blasts. I got to ride some waves in between gusts - super fun!!! With all the is going on (include me riding goofy foot on a foil on a breaking wave), you just have to trust your gear and surf. With the chopped 300 rear stabilizer, I have not been breaching - good for times like this. I spent 50 minute out at the break - my arms were noodles (4.5 would have been better today) and headed back in. I got in more transition practice with while trekking upwind to get to the launch. I'm having a bunch of fun on my outbound tacks - feels good to carve through the turn, transition the wing, then quickly change foot position - I'm even getting a few without coming down off foil. There were still some strong gusts coming through - you can see the wind line in the photo below - but all the gnarly action started to back down after 4pm.
I was out from 2:30 to 4pm - you can see the gusts were topping 30mph
The 14mph peaks were where I was catching waves. So much fun today (although I should have pumped up the 4.5 - tomorrow the forecast is similar...)!!!!
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