Is windsurfing popularity still declining?

Yeah the Easyrider is a similar type of board. It is a lot of fun to goof around on in light winds. Spin the sail around, sail to leeward ard stuff like that when the wind is below ten knots on a warm day. Of course planing on a short board is more fun but getting out on a big board beats waiting for the wind.

If every keen windsurfer who was keen to introduce the sport to others had access to boards like these, numbers would increase.

I've never had the Easyrider on the plane without the centrefin. When it gets windy enough to plane on it I'll probably be on a smaller board.

"That loop on a 12'6" IMCO Raceboard was done in waves, but the top guys could do them off chop as well. A lot of the time it's not about your gear holding you back!"

Not sure that boards a race board. Looks like a small slalom to me.

Chris,i don,t think that you can compare boats v windsurfers and their performance. Most races have a upper wind safety limit of 25kts with many boats breaking in this wind strength and at the other end you would time out before completing the course and of course you need 3 people to carry the thing to the water.

Can i sail with just 1 sail and board? Yes.
Do i want to ? Not really
People.....work out what you want to sail in first 0-10,10-20,20-30,30-40+
and get the gear to do so.
One of the Pit Crew has had for years 1 speedboard and 1 small sail and sails a few times a year.
You,ll never have enough for everything and having less means less of "What should i rigg"
For me ,OD for family fun and beginners,82l for 12kt-40kt,60l for 25-60kt
and 4 sails. Cheep fun for the whole year

Whoops, the loop is on a slalom board or something, you're right. I'll change it. I think that everything else is on an IMCO. Thanks.

I've been told several times by eye witnesses that IMCOs were definitely looped on Port Phillip Bay etc, and we have the vid of Robby looping an Equipe. So it's definitely possible to loop as 12'+ board, and to do more than most people could ever do on something like an IMCO - the board is not an upper limit although a lot of things are easier to do on something smaller.

I never meant to say that people couldn't or shouldn't have a whole quiver. At the moment I'm mainly into simple gear but that's partly 'cause I sail windsurfers, two classes of boats and race two bike disciplines. It's very much a personal thing.

Having the right gear is lots of fun, but it's just whether the sport is giving the message that it is too complicated when it sends a message that everyone has to have lots of gear.

With respect, as a regular boat sailor, I do feel that the typical dinghy has a much, much wider wind range than a typical board. When you're training hard in a Laser, for example, it will sail through conditions ranging from a glassy calm and up to about 25 knots solid - after that we tend to take it a bit easy because of the risk of damage to mast and boom sections. If you want to change down to a smaller sail the upper limit would climb into the 30s, at a guess. That's pretty wide!

Sure, the boat is less convenient to move, and more expensive. Yet lots of people love sailing them in light winds, when they are little quicker than a longboard. That seems to indicate that light wind windsurfing - where you go basically as quickly for less hassle in many ways - isn't as bad as some people say.


EDIT - too late to edit the earlier post, so I'll chuck in the vid of Robby looping an 3.8 or 3.9m Equipe raceboard.

Setting straight? it is a discussion thread- sorry to interrupt the backslapping.. I merely pointed out there is a reason why windsurfing is not as popular as, say, surfing..

Technically, if it was as good as surfing, it would be as popular..

How many new people pick up windsurfing without being indoctrinated by their parents or friends.. Not many.. This is not a sustainable model, let alone a recipe for growth..

And while the testimonials in this thread are great, they don't count for the thousands who ditched windsurfing in pursuit of something else..

Windsurfing is not for everyone, and the average age of windsurfers is increasing, that points to an imminent decline..

And the only thing that would make it more popular is more wind..

----

I'm not worshipping myself, I'm just under no illusion that windsurfing is better than any other sport and that somehow it deserves to be more popular..

heathy sports don't have discussions on how to make said sports more popular.. They have discussions about how much better it was before it got so damn crowded with noobs..

With the usual respect, incredible, this post.

Long or depressing threads can be skipped, as you point out. Yes the title is not overly cheerful, but it doesn't mean it's off the mark either, or that the topic is unworthy of discussion. Most of the posts are about increasing the numbers, and in some cases ways of passing on our passion. I think that's rather uplifting reading (mostly).

Again, as someone who teaches a fair bit, it's comments like yours that hinder the growth of the sport. I've seen it often over the years: a newbie is doing OK *and* having a good time, then some top local sailor (or self-proclaimed top because they don't really go to comps - whatever) tries to turn them off in some way. Which I'm sure you don't, but others do.

I've seen PLENTY of people having a good time on used longboards, cruising around in 10-12 knots, summer after summer. What they do is as worthy as what any one else is doing. I'm equally happy if I can get them there.

If it is the sport, the passion, that is the goal, then those non-pros are winners in my book. Actually they look like the plethora of people we used to see in the 80s. If it's pretending they're doing world-level performance, then of course they're off, but aren't we all then ?

Some of them even teach family members and others, and end up increasing the numbers. How many I-take-the-trailer-out-only-in-30-knot sailors do we see doing that ?

I guess we're all agreeing on: to each his/her own. However some of those attitudes don't help the sport.

I think your vid killed your point. That guy on his BMX bike is doing what, 10 ks or less most of the time? That's about 1/6th the speed we get in weekly road races.

And yet, as you say, it inspires kids. So there is a LOT more to attracting people than just getting them to go fast. You can do great stuff, just as in the vid (which seems to be the sort of thing Hans Rey was doing 20 years ago on MTBs) without reaching 1/4 the speed that 65 year old guys go on a road bike. That's not exactly proof that you need ground-breaking performance to attract people. You can do it in very simple, slow gear like a BMX bike.

That guy's bike is sort of the bicycle equivalent of a Techno 293 kid's board, it's no advertisement for high speed and "high performance" as being the way to get kids. You don't exactly see thousands of kids on Time Trial bikes, which are a pretty close analogy to a slalom board, because they prefer slower simpler stuff.

About "Kids looking for a sport don't want to plod around a lake in 5 knots."

Sorry, but many hundreds of kids do enjoy sailing in 5 knots on sailing dinghies, and they love it. It's just factually wrong to say that kids are only into fast sports. If high-wind windsurfing got more kids than all-wind dinghy sailing then you may have a point. But high-wind windsurfing gets a fraction of a percent as many kids as boats get, so your point is wrong.

Where windsurfing IS big with kids, in Europe, they get plenty of them sailing on lakes in 5 knots. That's the facts, no matter how you try to hide them.

"You just can't reach your own potential with windsurfing like you can with other sports (unless you live in a proper windy location).."

So Jessica Crisp, three time PWA world champ (including in waves) and Olympic class worlds runner up AND Aloha Classic Hookipa winner is a crap windsurfer, is she?

Sean is a no-good Formula racer by your standards?

Allison Shreeve's multiple world titles aren't good enough for you?

Olympic medallist Lars Kleppich isn't fit to sand your fins?

Jeezers, you must be **** hot if you can diss them and what they have achieved.

It's not all about kids, who make up a small section of the market.

No one here said that windsurfing would ever be as big as cycling, or that it would be a majority sport. But a lot of us don't think this is a depressing issue. Some of us think that it's a problem caused by the sport's mistakes and therefore something that can be fixed. Of course a sport's popularity can be affected by factors like marketing and management rather than its inherent value. And some of us are doing things like organising the biggest multi-day event in the sport in this country (for kids and adults) instead of poking **** at the sport.

It's actually not hard to get adults and kids in with the right attitude.

Chris, not everyone wants to race, and there is more to windsurfing than course racing - which it seems you are really stuck on. The majority of your posts are focused around course racing or cycle racing.

You ask any kid watching a sport / activity they are interested in, and they are grabbed by the excitement aspect. Take my 6 yo - he races BMX and has done so since he was 4 - all he wants to do is try and jump. He has started to try windsurfing - partly because i sail, so he has been exposed to it. Ask him what he wants to do and its simple jump and flip, like they do on the movies.

I really wish people would stop looking at the past and moaning about it. Get over it and move on. I tried this sport in the late 80's early 90's as a teenager and it lost out to Mountain Biking which was also the new sport on the block. Why? Fun - plain and simple. I lived where the dirt tracks were (and still are) amazing, and windsurfing was not that inviting. sure it was novel going forwards and backwards at slow speeds - but boring as bat ****, and bloody hard work. And as a teenager - no way was i going to invest time and money into something that hard to learn - when i could go smash creek jumps, downhills immediately and got the biggest adrenalin rush going. Especially when i had just a few weekends free (sporting commitments). I took this sport up in 2001 because a mate of mine was windsurfing, and it still took a lot of work.

I agree with Barn that unless you have ideal conditions and you start early - you will struggle to attract the majority of the teenage crowd. You just have to look where the greatest participant numbers around the world are - windy places. There aren't too many windsurfing holidays booked for Botany Bay. I believe you will also see by this forum alone the the majority of newcomers seem to be adults, yet check out the kiting forums and that sport is loaded with teens, or lots of adults with terrible grammar. Why? It's easy to pick up, less time intensive and gives immediate gratification.

Oh yeah by the way the bike is a custom MTB trials bike it is not a BMX, and in no way is comparable to a techno 293 - it is ultra custom, and very high performance as is Danny McCaskill's skills. Check out your local skate park and you will see more kids trying flat land BMX than going for a 80k roadie. You should really stop trying to bring everything back to racing - most people don't race, are not interested in racing, and i would think, actually makes up a very small percentage of the windsurfing market.

As has been said before the learning curve is tough for windsurfing, there is a lot of pain before there is the thrill, and you have to be determined. With those things in mind, windsurfing will never be more than it is now. Which is ok by me.

Barn and DAM, I'm not saying most people will race, or should race. It's just that the fact that hundreds of kids race dinghies, often in light winds, indicates that hundreds of kids ARE interested in sailing that's not just about planing conditions.

If kids hate light wind sailing and slow gear then why are there more kids who sail slow dinghies in light wind than there are sailing fast boards in strong winds, even (as I understand it) in WA?

"You ask any kid watching a sport / activity they are interested in, and they are grabbed by the excitement aspect."

I've got four kids, and they and their friends are often interested in slower sports. Every sailing club is proof of that.

Not every kid is the same, thank god. Nor every teenager or adult. The fact that you or I as individuals may have preferred one sport doesn't mean that sport is better. If you guys preferred BMX to windsurfing, then great - but that means no more than the fact that I and my mates preferred windsurfing to BMX.

When did I say speed was a factor?.. Comparing that to road racing is like comparing wet'n'wild to triathlons.. Not even the same ballpark.. When did I say that you said that speed was a factor?

I assumed that was the point you were trying to make by posting the trials vid was that kids prefer thrill sports, because that seems to be your main point. It seemed that you were trying to say that because many (but not all) kids are out there doing tricks on bikes, then kids would only get into windsurfing if it's about shortboard freestyle or strong winds or waves.

But while it's always hard to draw analogies between sports, you can also say that low-speed trials riding is more similar to light-wind freestyle than it is to high wind windsurfing. Therefore if kids like trials riding (which I assume is the point you were trying to make) then they can also like light wind windsurfing - which plenty of them do. It's simply wrong to say that all the Euro kids on Technos etc are finding it's boring and giving up.

I really wish people would stop looking at the past and moaning about it. Get over it and move on.

Are many people moaning? I thought most people were trying to be positive and look for ways to make the sport bigger once again. That's positive, surely?

Windsurfing is a sport tailor made for kids.. There is just never any wind to keep them at it.. Errr, just a tiny contradiction, no?

Thats because there is no high wind windsurfing, there is never any wind.

There is wind, of course - get out in a boat on the typical day and there's plenty. It's the fact that windsurfing is so aimed at strong winds that it says a typical 8-15 knot day is "no wind" is the problem!

So what some of us are saying is, let's stop trying to pretend there IS lots of wind in most places, and let's promote the fact that the sport can be about more than just high-wind sailing. It's an indisputable fact that thousands of people (including many kids) are out there each weekend sailing boats that are no faster than a windsurfer, more expensive and harder to launch. There's no reason why more of them can't be windsurfing (like they used to) apart from the fact that they keep on getting the message that it's a hard sport only to be done in strong winds.

Sure, it's hard to learn to windsurf fast in big winds or waves. So? Lots of sports are hard at the high performance end, so don't expect everyone to do the high performance stuff. It's like sailing, bike riding, kayaking etc - if you welcome people who just do the easy stuff then you get a few who go on to do the hard bits.

Sure, not everyone will windsurf, but no one has been saying it could ever become a huge sport - all we're saying is it could be bigger if we do what guys like Naish, Sven Rasumussen and others are now saying. There's surely no reason why we can't get at least as many people on boards as there are on sailing dinghies, which are (for their size and cost) generally slower (often even in light winds),more expensive and harder to handle ashore.

Anyway this discussion is going nowhere. Barn isn't going to convince me that my friends and I have actually been having a ****ty time when I've been windsurfing in light winds, he's not going to convince me that all kids are adrenalin junkies who hate light winds when there are many kids who are not adrenalin junkies and lots of kids who like light winds, and I'm not going to believe that windsurfing is as narrow and limited as some people say.


PS - yeah, I didn't check to see if it was a trials bike or exactly how high tech it was, because in your preceding post you'd mentioned BMXs. Your point is..??

OK, who's going to start page 10 now ??

Pick me, Pick me!!!

I am enjoying reading different peoples perspective and see that you ALL have points that are right.
But don't lose sight of what this topic was about
I am not game to say anything bad cause I might meet some of you on the beach one day (& I'm only 60Kg).

“nothing is cool” not windsurfing, not skateboarding, not yoyos, not anything though some things have cool in their DNA. There are only two decades in the last ten when cool things were created those being the 1950s and the 1970s.

So many things that began in the seventies have disappeared, things like seamonkeys, floppy discs, Atari, mood rings and lava lamps and then there are the survivors….Recombinant DNA technology, Test Tube babies, Barcodes, Smiley Faces and best of all Windsurfing..

So mad props to the survivors.

Is the popularity of BMX declining?

When I was a kid in the 80's everyone had a BMX, BMX bandits was a top film, and shops were full of them ..... Now everyone seems to have mountain bikes, road bikes are super popular around here and my local bike shop has about 10 BMX compared to 70 -100 mountain bikes.


Finally does anyone really care?

Page 10?

he can't walk the wire but he can sure ride it. pretty cool.

And what is all this babble about. It seems this is only going on because some people either like to practice their typing,
or because they like to read what they write

Can you ever get enough windsurfing?

Sails do seem to be getting bright. Just got my new 9.7 Speed Demon lots of fluro orange and yellow....I am going to need sunglasses when i am sailing with it!