Hawaii 2025

If you haven’t read my blog from last year, last year I had a really good learning experience going over with no expectations. This year I had the goal of being comfortable and seeing if I could place in the middle / top half of the field. I wanted to be comfortable with my gear, the conditions, the runs and just the self imposed pressure of racing. I say self imposed because, let’s not lie, I don’t have a realistic chance of finishing high up the list. But the desire to perform well against my own benchmarks and goals still gives it a nice competition feel and personal challenge.

You may wonder why my goal coming into the race season this year was just to be comfortable. Just with how things were this year, physical training (running, gym work) kind of went out the window for me and I ended up not really being able to fit it in, so I reverted back to the “slow is smooth and smooth is fast” (fast enough) mindset. My focus therefore went to foiling and foiling as fast as possible with as little effort as possible and being as relaxed as I could be on the foils I planned to race in a big range of conditions. Something I figured would help me if I wasn’t going to be as well trained as I’d hoped. So how did I do that? Well getting comfortable actually materialised in the form of a lot more surf sessions with the SUP foil in junky conditions, often sizing up foils, working on turns, flow and efficiency instead of just blindly downwinding as much as possible. Sounds counter intuitive but it helped me dial in my foils a lot more in a different way than downwind does.

Overall I had a decent improvement in all of the races. I’m happy with how it went although in all the races I felt I was extremely conservative. On the flip side, I was extremely comfortable and I can’t complain as that was my main goal for this year. For those who haven’t seen it, Alan Footit put together a cool comparison of the results for M2M and M2O.

Paddle Imua: 

I flew into Maui Friday night (Paddle Imua was on Sunday) and had Saturday to re-familiarise myself with the finish at Kanaha. Despite having done plenty of Maliko runs last year and being very familiar with that run, I only did the Kanaha finish 4 times last year (3 practice runs and Paddle Imua). I remembered that the year before I did some practice runs with different foils and so I already had an idea of which foil I wanted to use so I just tested some options in these practice runs, eventually settling on the 770 / Short fust / 135R (last year I used the 860 / medium / 135).

For me the ‘pre race hours’ of Paddle Imua are some of the best of this trip. It’s the first chance to see and catch up with everyone as we all head up to the Maliko Gulch to get a parking spot early. This gives you plenty of time to hang out with everyone. 

After the briefing and welcome from Dean Wong (CEO of Paddle Imua) who explained what the mission of the event is (support Camp Imua, an amazing program for kids with special needs) we headed out to the start. From a racing perspective I maybe lost myself some places by being lazy and looking for a start spot with some space, that was 20-30m behind the ‘main line’, but I wasn’t too bothered as I just wanted to not have anyone in my way. Off the start I had a great start and had a decent pace with my chosen foil. I had settled on taking the more outside line rather than the inside line which is shorter (but more pumping heavy) due to the travel fatigue, so I pushed at a medium effort until just before the reef where I relaxed a bit to get my heart rate down for the pump in. I also chose where I wanted to cross the reef (two main options at this point) based on the amount of traffic. Coming in I was so happy to have the 770 as it made the pump really quite easy and I pumped past a lot of riders, rounded the buoy and pumped upwind a bit even making it to the beach. Unfortunately with my dismount, my leash wrapped itself round my ankle making the quick removal a lot slower, however I don’t think I really lost any places since I had managed to pump up to the beach. Overall I came 32nd, which I’m pretty happy with as it was well within my goal of being in the middle / top half of the field.

Maui to Molokai (M2M): 

So I spent the next 3-4 days on Maui after Paddle Imua doing some testing of my ‘go to’ foils in more ocean type conditions. Cutting really wide on the Maliko run and seeing how they went. I was pretty comfortable on all these foils, which made me think I maybe needed a 600R too (still on the fence). But I was pretty happy going into M2M with the choice to run the 680R given that we had a good forecast and I was super happy with how my starts were as well as my pace / effort ratio.

One thing everyone forgets with M2M is how long the paddle out is (see Dave West’s video). It’s a good long paddle out. I decided to head out early ish with Gio and we leisurely made our way up to the start line. The usual start line confusion took place with boats moving and indicating one position then moving again, but all in all it was pretty well managed. Again, like with Paddle Imua, I had a really good start (somehow my starts this year were much much better, I think the board played a big part there) and I was up and away with the front part of the field. I stuck to my marked course on my watch and found myself foiling with some pretty quick riders and surprised myself that I was keeping up. This was good and I gained confidence. However, then I glanced at my watch…I was off course. The wind felt more northerly than last year (offshore) and I got nervous about following the rest of the group deeper into the channel towards Lanai. So as I decided to cut in early to stay on my course (big mistake), I basically waved goodbye to a decent placed finish. I had forgotten that even with the offshore wind, the wind sort of wraps around Molokai and that the key to this race is to go towards Lanai (lesson learned, update my course and also trust my feel) for longer (though not as far as some, again, see Dave West’s video). As I headed in I got passed by a familiar face (Trent Gordon) who was heading out. I second guessed myself and went back into the channel. Again I found myself making good pace, but once again, started to get nervous about the (what was in my head) more offshore wind and again chickened out and started my cut in. Not until I was back on my line, did I realise how bad of a choice (and line) this was as I ended up in the shorter slower bumps of the Kamalo run. By this point I had resigned myself to the fact I’d cocked it up, and just resorted to cruising, and surfing the fun bumps of the Kamalo run along the coast of Molokai, and really just enjoying the scenery. Sometimes it’s so easy to get wrapped up in it all in your head with racing, that you forget to take in how amazing it is where you are. Nonetheless, I came in 63rd out of 147, still as per target of top half / middle of the pack and when comparing my stats to others who placed roughly where I had hoped to be, I was happy to see my average pace was good despite being in the slow bumps at the end. My poor line really just led me to cover an extra 2-3km or so compared to them.

Molokai to Oahu (M2O):

So unlike last year, where I did the Kamalo run on the Saturday between M2M and M2O, I decided to rest on Saturday so as to not have tired legs going into M2O. The forecast that had seemed light earlier in the week, had filled in and looked really promising for a good run. I had my doubts about taking the 680R (which I wanted to run) and the 770R (safe) after the nightmare I had popping up in 2024. 

On race morning, same as last year it was an early start to get the shuttle from Hotel Molokai where I was staying to the start of the race on the west coast (for people new to M2O, make sure you book both a transfer for you, and one for each of your bags – board bag, foil bag etc with Molokai Outdoors). From the beach, the  wind looked good and so did the bumps. Something confirmed by my boat captain as he came in. So I screwed on my 680R. However, after loading up my boat and the pule, as we went up to the start, I convinced myself that I should go to the 770R not wanting to relive last year… 

The start for M2O was interesting. It was split into two waves. Seeded (based on the previous races and last year) and unseeded riders in two waves respectively. Unseeded riders went in a wave 5min later than the seeded riders, which left an unbelievable amount of boat wake for the riders in wave 2 (something that seriously needs to be addressed) which also put them at a significant disadvantage. Luckily, I was in the first wave and as I paddled out I saw the whole fleet pin it north of the north buoy. This was something that came up in the briefing – we weren’t allowed to be south of the south buoy, but did not have to be constrained by the north buoy… So everyone just went as far north as possible to improve their line in the good bumps. Anyways, I didn’t follow the pack too much and set myself up on the fringe of the pack. Again, like the previous races (and thanks to the big foil) I had a cracking start – to the point that I spent a second wondering if I had false started. But alas, all the top guys on their faster / smaller foils shot past me bringing me crashing back to reality. The first 20km of the run were amazing, I settled into a good rhythm and felt really comfortable. I had a few minor annoyances with 2-3 escort boats weaving around trying to find their foilers (mine was nowhere to be seen) but again, the big foil was comfy and let me hold most of my lines as I wanted, only having to change course twice to head a different direction. Eventually though, a lapse of concentration whilst changing direction led to a breach and a fall – followed by a “oh shit, not this again” as I anticipated the same horror experience as last year. However, within a minute I was back on foil and massively relieved. This gave me a huge confidence boost. Much needed going into the slightly wonkier part of the run with decently sized bumps. Knowing I’d be able to pop up much quicker than last year I had the confidence to commit to bumps and try foil at a decent speed. The only time I foiled really conservatively was the annoying period when the media boat decided to foil near me and fly the drone around my head. At this point the only thing I was thinking was “do not blow up on the live stream” on repeat. Thankfully the coward lines kept me safe and eventually I decided I would head north cutting the media boat off as I changed my line, thankfully getting them to leave me alone. So after the media boat safety foiling I decided to push a bit more and with the confidence of the quick pop up I went to ride a bit faster and higher on my mast. I managed to settle into a rhythm a couple times but the ‘risk’ did lead to two more breaches, both of which I recovered from pretty quickly (within a minute or two). Once I came past China walls a sense of relief came in as the bumps were way better than expected (given the tide) and the familiarity of the run and landmarks (glad I did some practice HK runs last year) put me at ease. I crossed the line, happy with how comfortable it was, but also wondering if the 680R would have been a better call given the faster bumps through the channel. I think my paddle up would have been fine, and that the smaller foil potentially could have avoided the falls I did have. So that will always remain the unknown question I guess. My overall position was 58/103. Slightly higher than my target of top half / middle of the pack. But still a solid 37mins off my time in 2024 and very comfortable. My average heart rate was embarrassingly low given it was a race of this seriousness. But I don’t think I would have been able to push hard the whole way with the 770R.