1st downwinder ever!

Avg. wind was 22 kph from southeast (154•).  Waves were 0.3m from southeast/east (124•). I naively thought that the two were coming from the same general direction so it should be ok.  I was travelling from Scarborough bluffs to Frenchman’s Bay, Pickering (15-16 km northeast).  What happened was the faster wind chops were colliding with the slower ground swells at an angle, resulting in a bloody washing machine of chop.  I flew the ama a couple of times, but don’t ask me to repeat it because I don’t know how I did it without ending up in the drink lol.  I’ve never flew the ama before so darn it, where’s a camera when you need it lol.  A second factor was I was getting exhausted trying to link up fast moving wind chop.  I’ve never done a 12k run before so I was conserving a little energy.  In retrospect I could have chased a few more waves.  Confident that with practice I’ll get better at linking up ground swells.  The few times I did, I stayed on the ‘series’ for a good 12-15 seconds and my 1k split while I was on top of the waves was way faster than I could ever imagine (below 5:00!).  Anyways happy I got a run in safely even if it was slow.  Flew the ama, rode a couple exhilarating ground swell series, all in all a good day.

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Lamond Lee

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