Time to sign up for the Cape Cod ABK clinic

The ABK clinic is coming to Hyannis in 5 weeks - time to sign up! Waiting until a few days before the clinic starts to see if it will be windy is not going to work! Many tried this the last two years, only to discover that the clinic filled up one or two weeks before. I am sure this will happen again this year - many regulars I talked to plan on attending, and I have seen many new faces at Kalmus this year. So sign up now! Yes, Marty and Steve, I am talking to you (and many others!)

Andy Brandt teaching Nina the duck jibe at Kalmus

Do you need reasons to sign up? Well... do you want to improve your windsurfing? Plane through your jibes? Learn to water start? Get into the harness? Finally get into the footstraps? Learn to duck jibe, heli tack, loop, or vulcan? Then grab the opportunity and learn from some of the best windsurf instructors in the world! They are coming to Cape Cod to teach you on September 5-7.

What about the wind, you say? I have attended the ABK clinic in Hyannis since 2009. Every year, we had at least one day, and often two days, of planing conditions. There's still plenty to learn on the light wind days. Nina actually learned to get into the back footstrap on a light wind day at the ABK camp Cape Cod a few years back. She had spend the windy day before with really learning the water start - well enough to go to Maui and the Gorge the next year. She also learned the heli tack during the same camp. I don't learn as quickly, but there's always a lot to be learned in these three days.

You still need more reasons to sign up? How about making new friends who are at least as crazy about windsurfing as you are? How about the opportunity to hear a guest lecture from Caesar Finies, a PWA sailor and one of the best light wind freestylers on this planet? He will be on Cape Cod during the clinic days. He'll be also giving a demonstration of his crazy tricks during the clinic. Many windsurfers who have not seen his "Hail Mary" in real life think that the videos on YouTube where he takes the rig off the board, throws it 20 feet into the air, and then catches it again after it flipped a few times, must be photoshopped. Come see for yourself!

Besides making sure that you get a spot in the clinic, another reason to sign up now is that it may allow Andy Brandt to expand the clinic by getting additional instructors to come. There are quite a few highly qualified ABK instructors around who can help out - but chances to get them to help out are better the more advance notice they have. I have been to more than a dozen ABK camps, and the bigger, the better: larger camps mean that skills within any group are closely matched, which makes teaching and learning easier.

So - sign up now! Don't tell me (again) "I should have listened to you"! Don't wait until you see "6 spaces left" - for the Cape Cod camp, the last 6 spaces may fill up in less than a day! I hope to see you all at the beautiful Kalmus beaches in September.

For those who want to learn windsurfing before then, or take lessons to improve their skills, here is a list of other places that offer windsurfing instructions on or near Cape Cod:

• Sailworld Cape Cod in Buzzards Bay
• Inland Sea in West Dennis (call to ask about lessons)
• Cape Cod Windsurfing in North Falmouth

Another option for windsurfing lessons at Kalmus Beach in Hyannis is to support our "Help Us Bring Caesar to Cape Cod" campaign. Anyone who donates at least $100 to the campaign can get a 2 hour windsurf lesson. There are only 4 of these $100 "perks" left, though, so you may need to act fast.