40mph on open water!

How would it feel to travel at speeds of over 40mph on a windsurfer? What would it feel like to crash at that speed? A friend of mine would know. I received an email with the results of the Maui V Max speed race. Here is the report and links to the official results.
Over 40mph on open water…WOW!

After a few days of light winds the speed gods blessed us with some nice moderate 25 knot tradewinds. As usual the wind was inconsistent coming and going as it pleased promply dropping as soon as the course opened. The Iwindsurf site kept showing gusts of over 30 mph, but these were not to be found on the speed course. Most sailors rigged something close to 6.5. Unfortunately at the most advantageous tide the wind was not co-opperating and when it did finnally fill in the tide had come up and the course started to get bumpy. The trick at that point was to find a stretch of flat water in amongst the lumps.
35 knots seemed to be the number of the day but then Erik Beale came in with a good run (wanting to get it logged in just in case of mishaps later). Eric's 37 knotter motivated the boys to get back out there and try a little harder. By 3:30pm the chop was getting quite bad and it seemed clear the best runs of the day were behind us. When Alex discovered Peter John had just beaten him by 1/10th of a knot he headed back to the water in a last ditch attempt to find a puff and velvet before the course closed at 4pm. Alex was unable to overcome the rough water and had to settle for his earlier 38.2 knot 100m run behind Peter John's 38.3 knot run despite having the highest peak speed of the day of 39.1. Erik held on to 3rd followed by John Smalley with another 0.1 knot margin over Tom Hammerton.
This was a very impressive day with the highest speeds of the year in all divisions. Carl Grundy put in an impressive 30.7 knots in the wave division and Tracey Harrap - the only womens competitor so far - just snuck over 30 with a 30.1 on some gear borrowed from Terry Alkemade. Chris Freeman competing in his first GPS contest in the wave division rewarded himself with a forward loop at the end of every run when he went faster. A good time was definately had by all.
It was a very international fleet with visiting sailors from the Southern Hemisphere Chris Adamson (AUS) and Terry Alkemade (NZ) as well as fellow Kiwi transplants Tracey Harrap and Peter John. The UK was well represented with 5 sailors, Erik Beale, Carl Grundy, Chris Freeman, Tom Hammerton and John Smalley. Olaf Sutor was the lone European competitor waving the flag for Germany. The fleet was completed with the two American sailors Matt Daniels and Alex "wear-a-hole-in-the-ocean" Aguera.
For full results go to: http://www.mauivmax.com/sunday,july26clickforresults
Peter and Alex move to the top of the speed ladder bumping Pieter Bijl down to third in Open with Carl Grundy moving to the top of Wave: http://www.mauivmax.com/mauivmax2009speedladderresults
Thanks to Dain, Marc, Ayesha, Chris, Liz and Anne for keeping an eye on things.