The 2008 PWA Surf World Cup Podersdorf - Day Four

Windsurfing

The 2008 PWA Surf World Cup Podersdorf - Day Four

02.05.08 -

Light wind and blue skies mean competition stays on hold for another day.

The judges check conditions

Thomas Traversa warms up

The crowd enjoying the sun

Brawzinho and his boards

Another windy morning, and a promising forecast had everyone excited about the prospect of competition. Following the 8.00am skippers meeting, heat nine was scheduled to start at 8.30am.

There was a sense of d?j? vu when, just as the previous day, the wind backed off within minutes of the heat getting started. The riders of heat nine once again had to leave the water without a result.

The familiar wait for wind ensued under blue skies and in warm temperatures. The morning passed without any suggestion of the wind building, and with a windless afternoon on the cards, 2007 freestyle world champion Marcilio ?Brawzinho? Brown (Mistral, Gaastra) took some time out to chat to us about freestyle, and the event.

Q: What are your tactics for this event?

Brawzinho: ?I think in this event I will try to save energy and time to make all the higher level tricks, and not waste time with the older tricks now we have this new format. And I bet many of the other guys will try to do the same.?

Q: What moves do you think you?ll be pulling to get through the heats?

Brawzinho: ?It depends on the conditions, if we have light winds like the first day it might be really hard. I might try shakas, switch stance moves, burners, air flakas and cana bravas. If the wind picks up, then maybe we can try something else.?

Q: Have you learnt any new moves over the winter?

Brawzinho: ?I tried Kiri?s new move, the kono, but I?m still learning it. I was improving my burners and one handed burners, that?s what I tried the most.?

Q: Who do you think is in the running for the 2008 freestyle title?

Brawzinho: ?All of the competitors, everybody?s so good. I would say definitely a few guys are pretty good, Gollito, Ricardo, Kiri, Paskowski, Normen, Taty, Tonky, many guys.?

Q: Do you think you?ll be able to stay as focused on freestyle now you?re pushing for the wave title?

Brawzinho: ?I don?t know if I?ll keep training as hard, but I will keep doing freestyle, for sure. My main goal now is to do well in waves. I?m spending much more of my time in places like Cape Verde and Maui, so I end up training much more for waves.?

Sadly, the afternoon remained sunny and windless. The Brazilian contingent used the downtime to stage a beachside football game, and Danilo ?Chico? Da Silva (Fanatic, North Sails) performed another of his, now notorious, capoeira routines on the main event stage.

Tomorrow?s forecast looks really good, with 18-25 knots predicted for the whole day.

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