A few wednesdays ago I was able to go out for another day of Foiling. I went to the same spot up north now known as Foil beach, actually in between Fuwairit and Al Ghariya. The beauty of this spot is the depth of the water. Only a few feet in to the sea it becomes deep enough for the 90 cm foil mast to not hit the bottom. And at low tide it still works! The water is sheltered as it is tucked into a bay. This keeps it quite flat too. The only downside being that the wind comes rolling in over the northeastern corner of Qatar, so it isn’t very stable. It has a tendency of being a little offshore too, but today it actually worked out being perfectly sideshore!
For the homefront too there is a wall built across the beach that gives almost 100% shelter from the winds. An excellent little spot to top up the tan or play in the sand, whereas all over the main beach itself the wind makes it too cold to really enjoy, during these wintery days in Qatar.
The foiling itself was good fun! I started off on my 9m Rebel, sizing up to the 12m by 3pm, as the winds dropped from around 16-17 knots to more like 13 and then less by the end of the afternoon, just like the forecast off of Windguru..
Waterstarts are becoming more consistent! The right amount of power and the right movement of the board coordinated with my feet and all at the right speed keeping also the correct balance are really a handful in the beginning. Like everything, you need to just do it over and over to develop an automation within you that will eventually enable to do it without crunching the brain and muscles as to what should happen next! The feeling of progression, however small, is so exciting!
Actually foiling along is magical. Once the foil is flying all noise and drag seems to just disappear and you are gliding along. At good height above the water! And with such a lightness combined with effortless speed… just amazing. I can now start to assess the right height above the water when having the foil flying. It is very easy to overcontrol the thing, meaning you will be too high so the foil comes out of the water momentarily only to result in a steep nosedive and then a crash.. I need to just spend more and more time to get familiar with the visual picture.. Unfortunately time is precious and even the weather here in Qatar has taken a wintery turn meaning lots of showers, combined with very inconsistent winds.. Whereas normally practically every day in Qatar is a kite day!
Until the next adventure… keep flying and sharing my blog!! =)
Oh! I've included a video with some retrospective talk back on the beach.. didn't want to let this episode go by without any image material!
