Top pros and local vets enjoy Micro Cup

After a four-day festival of wind and waves, the participants of the 2006 Micronesian Cup finally got a chance to relax on Sunday night during the awards ceremony at the Pacific Islands Club.

Among those who earned top nods was 2005 UKWA wind surfer of the year Dan Ellis of Great Britain. Ellis travels the globe in search of new races and challenges and said that he jumped on the chance to return to Saipan for a second straight year.

“It’s great to be back here in Saipan. I had a really good race, the conditions were perfect, and we had a really steady wind. I’m looking forward to coming back next year and doing the race again,” he said.

Ellis is en route to his home in England where he’ll enjoy a couple of weeks off before traveling to Egypt to compete in the Camel Cup. While he’s out there, Ellis said that he will try to get more of his fellow professionals to come to Saipan next year.

“It’s something I’m going to work on—trying to encourage some more of the guys to come out here, and when they see the video footage and the film footage and the pitch from here, it’s going to help us. It’s really a good place for windsurfing. I think that the organizers are really going to make the push to get some more guys out here. It’s a shame to not have a lot of the top surfers in the world because it is one of the best places to windsurf on the planet,” he said.

Ellis said that Saipan has unique conditions that make it the ideal place to race, and that you can’t beat the combination of wind and water that the CNMI has to offer.

“One advantage that you have out here is that you’ve got really constant trade winds. You’ve got really, really flat water and that makes it for really good racing,” he said.

Ellis wasn’t the only pro on the scene, as Japan’s Ayako Suzuki took the top nod for the pro women. Suzuki said that she has been to Saipan 10 times since she started wind surfing 12 years ago, and that she really enjoyed her most recent trip to the Marianas.

Suzuki has competed internationally, but she will have to make the transition to Japan’s chili waters for a little while before heading to Korea in June.

She wasn’t the only traveler among the winners, as former Saipan resident Tim Farrell made the trip from Guam to win the Masters division in only his only third competition on island.

“It was fantastic. It was ideal conditions on Friday. That’s typical for an event is that you get one good day, and as long as if you get in enough races in during one day that’s all you need. We had the luxury if having to days off for relaxing because you’re just so tired after the first day,” he said.

Farrell said that he will definitely be back next year, but returning to Saipan for the race won’t be a problem for women’s division winner and Saipan resident Ann Jordan. Two years after arriving in the CNMI in 1981, Jordan took up wind surfing and has tamed the tides ever since. Now she encourages anyone to give the sport a try.

“The race is a lot of fun. I always enjoy being on the water. It’s a great place to learn. It’s really wonderful out there off Micro Beach. It’s fairly shallow, the winds are good, and if you fall off your board you can stand up and get back on again so it’s good for anyone to get back out there and learn,” she said.

Jordan said that the Micronesian Open has previously reeled in as many as 100 competitors with well over 20 professionals amongst the crowd. Now she said that it allows the local community a glimpse into the world of wind surfing.

“It’s a lot of fun having the competition because people come from a lot of different countries and you get to learn a lot about the latest gear and what’s going on in the windsurfing world,” she said.