Windsurfing and Ultra Trail: Two different sports, the same sensation
What do Windsurfing and Ultra Trail have in common? In principle absolutely nothing, right?
The answer is actually somewhat different. These two sports have more in common than meets the eye…. We'll tell you then.
Keep reading!
BORN TO WINDSURF
Windsurfing dates back to the 1930s, when surfer Tom Blake had the idea of putting a sail on his surfboard so he wouldn't have to wear out his arms so much when paddling. looking for the waves This simple but very effective invention would mean that the force of the wind would be in charge of doing the hard work. We could say that this character was the creator of Windsurfing as a sporting concept.
Years later, in 1949, Newman Derby improved on Blake's idea, developing a more sophisticated sailboard system, but never patented it. Derby is known as the "official" creator of the windsurfing board. Newman and his wife, who is listed today as the first female windsurfer in history, set up a board factory and the invention began to spread.
The growth of this sport reached California, where Jim Drake, a boater and engineer by profession, and Hoyle Schweitzer, a surfer and skier, decided to patent the invention that Derby had developed, but with some modifications and improvements applied. The boards were made of polyethylene instead of fiberglass, thus making the board much lighter and easier to transport.
His new product of his was named the windsurfer and the first runs of the boards were twelve feet long and weighed nearly thirty kilos. Drake bought out his partner Schweitzer's share and expanded the market by going to Holland and popularizing windsurfing on the European continent.
Windsurfing coexisted in parallel for a few years in different ways, in different places. On the one hand, by the hand of Derby and his wife, and on the other in the custody of Drake.
The Derby and Drake couple met in the late 1970s and, unsurprisingly, there was a huge fight between the two sides over who really was the inventor of the windsurfing board. Parallel to their discussion, two surfers residing in Hawaii were investigating the sailboard and developing an improvement so that the pieces remained attached to the board in order to manage the use of the sail well.
Beyond copyright and the exact moment in which this sport began, let us emphasize that, in summary, windsurfing is a sport that is born when a sailor decides to place a sail on a surfboard and use the wind as a motor. Although it is now a very common and established practice in the sports world, windsurfing is the convergence of sailing and surfing; It is influenced by these two water sports and adds elements such as wind or speed that give it its essence and personality.
Anyway, windsurfing is one of those sports that makes you feel free. Far from the area where the waves break, windsurfers spend hours understanding which way the wind is blowing, which way to turn their body, and maintaining their balance while holding onto a large, heavy sail.
BORN TO ULTRATRAIL
The Trail was born in America at the beginning of the 20th century, in San Francisco. The reason for the emergence of this sport was a bet between some runners who wanted to compete to see who could cover the fastest distance from a 19th century settlement to a place known as Mount Tamalpais.
The result of this race between the mountains and changing sandy terrain It was very positive, so much so that it became an annual tradition and the name of the Cross Country Run was given to the course.
In Spain, for its part, the first practices of ultra Trail also date back to the beginning of the 20th century. In the area of the Basque Country, in Bilbao, competitions were organized in which the competitors ran in pairs and went up the mountain with their hands tied.
In 1916 the ultra Trail races left the north of Spain and reached the Sierra de Guadarrama. The Amigos del Campo society organized that year the first “official” competition that had as its itinerary Cercedilla-Siete Picos-Cercedilla.
Mountain races then began to stand out and different clubs, such as the Peñalara Club, created the Iron Cup, a tournament whose winner would be the runner who obtained first place in two consecutive editions. Throughout the first half of the 20th century, new races appeared in Guadarrama. With the outbreak of the Civil War, they came to a standstill, and 50 years after the start of the conflict, ultra Trail competitions returned with the “Cross de las Dehesas” tournament.
BORN TO BE FREE
It may seem at first glance that Windsurfing and Ultra Trail have little or nothing in common with each other, but that is not entirely true. Although each one is performed on a different terrain, in certain conditions and with different qualities and physical demands, both share an element: the sensation of freedom that practicing them gives.
Running an Ultra Trail race means engaging all your senses, feeling each firm footing on the ground, being aware of the speed at which your body is when you see how the wind hits your face, and, above all, everything, knowing that you are alive, noticing the strength with which your heart beats.
Being, on the other hand, somewhat far from the coast, standing on a board and trusting that the wind will carry you at high speed, lift you above the water and make you feel like you are flying is a sensation that can be achieved if you practice windsurfing.
Freedom, positive sensations and happiness are what these sports share, to which we wanted to pay a warm tribute. We have created a collection of caps
We hope that knowing how and where these sports were born has encouraged you to get started in one of them, or discover that you also want to feel free.
