Thursday Thoughts Hawai'i Race Wrap Up | What was good, what could be improved, who performed?

I loved doing all four races, Voyager, Paddle Imua, Maui 2 Molokai and Molokai 2 Oahu. Each of the races presented a different set of conditions and challenges. 

There seemed to be a fairly well defined top group followed by a relatively big chase group. 

There were dark horses like Jarrod Snow getting inside the top 5 or Paddle Imua and top 10 for Maui 2 Molokai, the Tahitian twins stepping up from last year and leading at times for Molokai 2 Oahu plus Axel and Raiarii with 5th and 6th placed results for Maui 2 Molokai showing the Tahitians are coming.

Kai Thompson and Guido announcing themselves as serious contenders with podiums at Maui 2 Molokai and Molokai 2 Oahu. 

Overall times between competitors were closer than ever and those who made mistakes fell a long way down the pecking order. Finn Spencer in Voyager, Edo in Paddle Imua, Mala’e in Molokai 2 Oahu.

At the end of the day this year’s Hawaiian Race Season was a resounding success and improvement on last year. 

Time keeping/results still weren’t perfect but they were a step in the right direction, there were efforts to fix the M2O escort boat issue although it still needs looking at and the live stream for M2O and Dot Vision for M2M showed the intent to improve the issues that occurred last year and to grow the sport to a wider audience. 

Whilst I am still concerned that foil racing is becoming something completely different from what I got into originally I think it is here to stay and I cannot deny I love the physical and technical challenge that it has become. 

I’m not sure why organisers make the M2O course ‘easier’ for foilers, wind line to wind line when we cross the channel the fastest, but it seems this is the new direction and I cannot deny it is a fun course. So much so that the Kaiwi channel had the best conditions for the second year in a row, a lot better than Pailolo.

I do still believe some races/events should attempt to capture that reason we got into Downwind Foiling, the Voyager’s Flow Show or King of the Cutback style celebration of turning at speed with friends. That is the true beauty of Downwind Foiling and that is what we need to prioritise. 

Races to me are a coming together of the downwind foil community, my concern is that it becomes too elitist and scares off those new to the sport. I guess it is inevitable but perhaps fun runs become apart of the schedule of a race. 

The Koa Kai will crown Kane as the men's Champion and Annie as the women's champion and rightly so, they were consistently the best over the two channel crossings this year but there were so many battles within this years racing and that to me is a sign of a seriously exciting future for downwind foil racing.