Seneca Blowout 10/26

[Windydoug]

The wind graph reads like a Gorge wind graph (without average wind speeds in the 30's though). Nice and tight between the lull and the gust.
Solid 5.2-5.8 for the entire afternoon, wall to wall sun and whitecaps, and a bunch of guys enjoying what could be the last truly warm day of windsurfing this year (without a water temp of 30-40 something).

Doug, Joe, Mark R., Greg, Teddy, Rick, Dick (on kite), Dan, Keith, Pete W., David, Kel, the guy from Ithaca with the Hot Superfreak's. A couple of sails I didn't recognize, some girls and new guys launching from the park. Awesome windsports day.

Ken got out at The Club for some Gybe (remember when it was spelled that way?), and from the sounds of it Bill did not have much fun with the Kinger at Hamburg. But lets hear about it anyway.

Also, did everybody notice the photo of Lynn Davis in the D and C? He was photographed on Seneca from a really cool angle, a somewhat ariel view....I'm thinking inside the break wall at the park or by the Hotel.
Awesome to see everybody!
Doug

[pat]

I had my first ride at Seneca on Sunday.
Unfortunately I had to be at a wedding by 1:00, but I will definitely go back. Great ingredients for a laid back session!
Hasta Manana!! It won't be the same; I think it's gonna be wild.
Hopefully the warm surface water will show up at Durand.
The last I checked it was getting pushed out the St. Lawrence on the SW wind.

[ibex]

All,

Great to see some of you out there on Sunday, I was one of the FNG's that launched from the park with a few other folks from Ithaca. It was a banner day for me, biggest wind/waves to date in my sub-10 week "career" and my first day in the footstraps.

Thanks to Joe for his help with sail trimming and harness lines! Great to talk with Pat and Greg too. Hope to see you guys on the water again soon.

Cheers!

Shawn

PS anybody have any guesses as the the wave height out in the middle of the lake when it was hauling in the mid-late afternoon?

[Windydoug]

I'm gonna say the wave height got to the five foot mark....best guess anyway.
Great to read that you are so stoked about windsurfing!
WD

[mikeyz]

Everyone is using some excellent language! Shawn used the 'FNG'. I didn't know what this meant, so I of course googled it ... aaaannnndd found this:

www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=F.N.G.

Rad! Shawn is in the military and he sometimes slips and starts talking about stuff like F.N.G.s, F.U.B.A.R's, 9'ers, charlies, and beeps ...

Oh and Shawn is very passionate about windsurfing and if you think my posts are good you should read the ones he sends to the Cayuga crew. You will get all sorts of information about 'alternative lifestyles' and harnesses .... ... I am actually serious about that one; but in addition to being very humorous his posts are well composed and give a wonderful view of what the early stages of our sport are like from the view point of a F.N.G.

[ibex]

All,

Mike is correct, occasionally I do wax poetic after I get off the water. For the interested reader, below is my trip report from that day on Seneca.

Cheers!

Shawn
-------------------------------------------------------------

"the absence of fear"

All,

It was a fantastic day out on the water at Seneca Lake park (in the Lake
Trout Capital of the World), the scene of good wind, good folks and lots
of fun.

The day started with an "alpine start" (this is what we call them in the
climbing world) and a drive to Geneva in the dawn light to try and catch
the (forecasted) 10-ish MPH winds before it started to blow high-teens
with gusts in the high 20's. The early start ended up not being strictly
necessary, but was a good exercise in self-discipline. Rigging our sails
in the 47 degree air Amanda and I discussed even just hanging out on the
beach to wait for it to warm up some more.

In a preemptive move, I filled a couple of big water bottles with hot
water before leaving home and took a moment to "pre-pee" my wetsuit with a
liter of warm water before hitting the water. It is a pretty strange
sensory experience to be trapped inside a big rubber
straight-jacket/wetsuit, a neoprene hood covering your head (so you can't
hear anything) and pouring the hot water down your check, feeling it
trickle all over your torso, forming rivulets across your arms and back,
and finally finding its way to your booties. It was however shear bliss
as I entered the 50-ish degree lake; my only regret being that I didn't
pour in another liter.

Now a point of humble admission is in order...

In my sub-10 week windsurfing career, one thing that always baffled me is
how the h*ll some people always seemed to effortlessly carry their rigged
board/sail down to the water, deftly pick it up with the sail flying
effortlessly, hop on and sail away. My version of this had heretofore
resembled the collision of wills one might see in the front row of an
McCain-Palin rally held at Ithaca College, not pretty, and not very
productive. So after asking Amanda (the embarrassing question of) why
this looks so easy for some people, she enlightened me on the finer points
of carrying and flying the sail while standing still in the water. So let
me extend the offer to any and all newbs to provide a hands-on demo if
they are interested, the difference it makes to have someone show you this
is simply startling...

After a few runs on the water (and the arrival of Sharon and Geoff) the
wind really started to pick up and the runs were getting increasingly
powerful. As a bit of background, my board (built in the Republic of West
Germany, when such a thing still existed) had some uber-crusty and dead
neoprene footstrap covers. Upon their demise while sailing one day (see
trip report approx 4 weeks ago) I had a hankering to replace them with
something... I don't know... "unique." Not wanting to mess with the mojo
of my Van Halen-era board, I decided to go out on a limb and try making my
own footstrap covers out of this wild orange fur. In the interest of full
disclosure, I must admit that I never had the nerve to actually get going
fast enough so that I could even *try* to get my feet under them, but that
is a separate issue. They were the answer to a question of aesthetics
more than anything.

Anyways, as this seemed like it was a day for pushing boundaries, I
thought "why not just try sticking my feet under the straps on the next
run?" Now any beginner who has experienced the challenge of planing,
using the harness, etc will usually have developed enough behavioral
conditioning (i.e. painful endings) to know that this sort of risk taking
is best left off the table. For no particularly clear reason, I manage
get up the nerve to stuff my back foot under the straps, and nothing bad
happens.

Hmmm.

"I wonder what happens when you stick your front foot under the front
strap?" After a few botched attempts, my front foot slides under the
front strap.

Again, nothing bad happens.

The board is standing up on end a little more and is now twitchier
(extremely responsive to heel/toe pressure) but otherwise all is well in
faux-fur-footstrap-land. After a couple more runs at this (omit the
simple things like tacking that I again demonstrated my extremely limited
competence with) I haul into the shore completely spent. With a sick
feeling in my stomach, I just lay down in the grass and ponder the sacred
cow that I had previously feared and had now just slain, and started to
feel pretty good about making this small but important step.

This feeling didn't last though, as the afternoon's runs demonstrated the
painful limits of my hubris and I got completely pushed downwind in the
growing wind and 4 foot swells, while trying to celebrate my new found
"skill" (if you can call it that). The worst part of which is trying to
uphaul the sail while being tossed by cold steel-colored waves that
obliterate your view of the horizon when you are in their trough. It is
hard to describe it, but the feelings of being small and alone are
paramount when all you can see is a few birds flying in the overcast sky
as you hang on to your rig in what seems like a vast empty ocean, with
every cold wave sending a gushing torrent down the neck of your wetsuit.
The sick feeling in your stomach makes your mind not behave rationally and
you almost wish for a Coast Guard helicopter to fly over and pluck you
from the water, so as to save you from facing the walls of water by
yourself. I keep trying to uphaul and numerous failed attempts later, I
finally make it back under way. On the long slow upwind tack back to the
car, I have plenty of time to ponder my feelings of fear in those wave
troughs.

It occurs to me that the real lesson is knowing that even if I got tossed
off my board again, I would find a way to uphaul, I would eventually get
out of that grey trough, I would eventually get sailing again, and
ultimately... I would succeed. In this exhausted moment of introspection
I came to realize that best part of facing down your personal demons,
isn't having the chance at "winning" per se, but tasting the quiet absence
of fear in knowing you have the ability to face the struggle again.

Have a great night everyone!

Shawn

[Kel]

Hey guys, just wanted to give my three cheers for last Sunday too!

It was great to see so many people out and it was fun watching the windsurfers flying fast and furious over the waves.

And thanks again to who ever landed David's kite at the end of the day - then he landed mine! So nice to go home with a dry kite! lol

We had just come back from a week in Hatteras on Fri morning, so Sunday seemed like a gift from God!

Who knows, maybe there is one more warm windy day left.. . . .

[pat]

Hi Kel and David -
I am looking for my kite leash (Sling Shot)-
I left it at Seneca Park on Sunday.
After the wedding I went back to grab it but had no luck.
Did you see it laying by the beach?
I guess those perfect days require a sacrifice to the wind god.
If you have it I'd buy you a beer or something in exchange.
If not, I guess I should buy/make a bulk load of them.
Maybe we could get more days like that.
Thanks

[Pat]

By The Way
Shawn, I think I witnessed your feet go into those plush pumps
You were stylin' for a bit.
Sorry that I couldn't have been more help when you were in need.
Nice to see that the good runs make you forget the rough ones

[ibex]

Thanks Pat! I appreciate you checking in on me when was doing my "swiming" out there in the middle of the lake.

Hope to see you out there again.

Cheers!

Shawn

[kelshipman]

Leash.. sorry Pat.. didnt see a leash.