8282 ACTION ASIA MAY/JUNE 2009

West Side storySingapore Wake sport

The Vietnam Fun Cup celebrated its 10th anniversary with suitably fierce

competition in good winds at Mui Ne.

The West Side Jam on March 7-8 drew hundreds of spectators to the Raffles

Marina for a weekend-long wake festival. Wakeboard, wakeskate and wakesurf tournaments drew international entries alongside a strong pan-Asian contingent, with a few homegrown champions ensuring plenty of noise from the crowd. The wakeboarding Open final saw AJ Racinelli (shown here) of the US go head-to-head with Padiwat ‘Bomb’ Jaemjan, with the Thai successfully defending the title he won last year. Singapore’s national wakeboarding champion Sasha Christian raised the roof in taking the women’s crown from defending champion Japan’s Ayako Miyazaki and top qualifier Megumi Tomagechi. Wakeskating too had no lack of excite-ment, where Daniel Grant, a British national representing Thailand and all of 11, beat far

Perfect 10Vietnam windsurfing

Austria’s Chris Pressler won the men’s competition from local boys Nguyen Thanh Đong and Nguyen Thanh Tâm, while in the women’s event it went right down to the wire with Sandra Wolf taking first, marginally ahead of Sylvie Feuerle and Kerstin Reiger. See www.windsurf-vietnam.com for more.

The season for hill running and ad-venture races has come to a close

so it is a fitting time to reflect on the health of the scene in these trying times. Race-wise, there was a broader choice of events this year. Rather than copycat events offering similar courses and challenges, it seems organisers are looking to differentiate more to attract entrants who these days often have more than one event on offer each weekend. Action Asia Events took their signature Hong Kong Challenge and stretched it out to appeal to the hard core of racers looking to ramp up the distance and commitment. Feedback was very positive so look for this format to continue. Outward Bound are another familiar name who have stamped their style on the shorter adventure race format. Less technical but littered with trademark mental and team-building challenges, their race is also helped by their supreme organisation before and on raceday. Less of an adventure race, but more than a simple hill run, the Raleigh Mountain Marathon is also an event with a long pedigree. In recent years fewer teams have entered this, in part due to allegations of teams receiving outside help with supplies or route-finding. Hopefully the organisers clamp down effectively on such behaviour as the event is an attractive mix of outright speed and thinking on your feet. A new challenger to the Raleigh event is the AYP Rogaine24 held on February 28-March 1. Nearly 700 peo-ple took part this year, reaching as many checkpoints as possible within 24hrs (there was also an 8-hour category) with heavy fog adding to the challenge. Next year the organisers plan a 6-hour race.

Season summaryAR Hong Kong

pH

oTo

: alf

re

do

ra

ize

more experienced skaters. On accepting his title, he said: “I have no fear because I am young.” Clearly a rider to watch out for.