am getting some early interest for 2016 and realised I hadn't posted this in the qld forum. i managed to put it in every forum except this one.

Burrum Windfest 2016 - '10th Birthday Celebration'

prelim dates. Mon 7th March 2016 - Sat 12th March 2016.

Speed HQ is possibly moving to 'The Grand', which is situated on the esplanade further towards the boat ramp.

It is our intention for this coming event to push the hell out of it and encourage everyone to come.

Help make our 10th birthday a big one. forget dwelling on the wind! come and make a holiday of it.

If you have thought over the past few years you'd like to come but haven't pushed the button then 2016 IS the year to do it!

the format is simple. longboard racing in the morning, speed/slalom racing in the afternoon and parties at night. we have boats on the water and a general area to sail depending on daily wind direction.
it's mate against mate on the same stretch of water. turn up, strap on a gps and blast or battle it out on the race course against Australia best or do both!

We plan to be there Justin and Peter - once you have settled on dates I can request hols

excellent.

those dates above are 99% but i'll re confirm with the committee.

Hey Gents.

I am hoping to make it up next year and have in principle permission from the powers that be.

Just after a few details on how things run to help negotiations.

You mention Monday to Saturday. Is it full days on each of these? Do you pick and choose events?

May main dillema is whether my wife and 5 year old will be left deserted on the beach for 6 days while I am enjoying myself.

Is it a family friendly week, or would I be best heading up by myself?

Is my impression that some of the sailing is a bit remote from town correct?

Any opinions or experiences, thanks for any feed back.

Cheers, Brad.

Great questions Brad, thanks.

Depending on what and in what you want to race/sail will determine if you're on the water all day or part of.
The mornings are filled with Windsurfer one design state title and longboard racing at high tide. At the beginning of the event these races start very early. This year the first start was at 7am...brrrr...as the week goes on start times move to an "after breakfast" event.
Speed-sailing starts later in the day as we need low tide for optimal conditions. The same here, traveling in the race week will see later starts.

Longboard and Windsurfer One Design races take around 2 hours, sailing 4 races per day.
Speed-sailing is dependent on the wind and starts around lunchtime. 4 -5 hours sailing is not unusual.

Longboards and W1D sail close to shore, great for spectators having a coffee along the foreshore.
Speed-sailing takes place in the mouth of the Burrum River.

There are always families with children having a good time, it's a wonderful area and Hervey bay is just around the corner. Next Wind fest we'll endeavour to incorporate family events, more details will be released soon... Another way to get the family involved is through volunteering in the various rolls to be filled.

Hope this answers your questions Brad and looking forward meeting you and your family.

Thanks, very helpful.

Looking forward to the event.

Cheers.

what peter said.

I think for families there is a fair bit to do. swimming at high tide, searching for crabs at low tide, small skate park, bike rides, fishing

plus hervey bay has a water park, shops, cafes beaches etc and is only 30 minutes down the road.

also if your family doesn't mind 3 hours on the water we take family and friends out on the barge.

we also have bbq's, dinners out for everyone at the event. competitor families are automatically entitled and encouraged to join in with bbq's etc.

the other thing to remember is on days with poor wind we call rest days for the gps guys so family and friends can go off and explore.

as peter mentioned we've got more details to follow including an updated vent website this week.

The official Windfest site is up and running, looks good Justin!!...now we're just waiting to install a register button on the Wanderers website so you can register asap

www.windfest.info/

it's not ready for public launch though.

Should have the official website up tomorrow. Currently it is not working as one would expect as links are not updated.

So, here is something else to keep everyone occupied.

ok, we are good to go.

www.windfest.info

as peter posted above.

follow the 2015 link to see the write up about last years event.

I would appreciate any feedback on bugs.

something new for everyone.

Those following Windfest will know there has been a push with course racing in the past few years. It has doubled our time on the water, opened the event to a whole new bunch of windsurfers and formalised something we were already doing at the event. We have been able to do this because we had developed a very reliable and fun GPS Speed sailing format, which, with a few tweaks has evolved into a format that everyone enjoys.

One of those tweaks was the Rashie Division. A category aimed at rewarding those attending the entire event and those that are consistently competitive across all 5 GPS categories. Rashie Racing has become a cornerstone of the weeks competition.

This year we have been looking at ways to add additional Rashie Divisions and to incorporate team competition. Informal discussion has been had amongst long term participants of the event and that has enabled a new format to be developed.

We see that team speed sailing can lead to self exclusion of team members gps results when playing for the good of the team. We also see the teams with one or 2 more accomplished sailors tending to have an advantage.

So...... To shake things up we are trialling a new Team Rashie format at Burrum this year. The idea is to create a new "inclusive" team gps format with a fairer playing field between teams. As per previous years, nothing will change on the water.

Now however, we will incorporate a new scoring format for a team category when processing the gps data.

How it works.

Each team will have their team members names put into a team draw at the start of the event. The draw will assign a category to each sailor and be random. The category drawn will be the team members team category for the event.

for eg.

draw 1 - mr A - alpha
draw 2 - Mrs C - 5x10
draw 3 - mr x - NM
etc

After the categories are assigned, everyone goes sailing.

Then, at the end of the days session, the gps data is processed and each team will have their categories added together. The highest team score will be the winning team. the winning team is presented with team rashies to wear on the water.

As the event continues, and at the end of each day of competition, the scores are once again tallied providing a running aggregate score.

At the end of the event the team with the highest score is the winning team.

we will review this new format prior to the event but wanted to get the word out early to let people planning their trip to the event keep up to date.

We also see a future possible state of origin format progressing from this format where each state nominates 5 sailors to compete alongside the team system outlined above.

plenty of opportunities with this.

hope to see you all at Burrum Windfest 2016.
keen to talk through any tweaks/ideas.

Windfest update.

we have an event facebook page up and running.
www.facebook.com/events/1181699448513533/

Also very happy to announce we have added SUP's to the program.

Hervey Bay Stand Up Paddle are working with us to include Paddle Boarding in the Windfest program. Graham will be conducting try paddle board sessions for the general public during the event. The finale for the SUP program is a formal race on the final day of Windfest.

Good to see Graham get on board with SUPs, for the Burrum Windfest, he is really the person to talk to about SUPs here in Hervey Bay, the SUPs will add more fun to the event, bring it on.

yes he is the man!

A question for the locals... are you able to go from the Toogoom boat ramp to the Burrum speed bank at low tide? If so, how long is the trip roughly?

You can use the Toogoom ramp in any state of tide.
Not sure how long it would take, depends on how many
horses you got, probably 5 minutes if you have many horses
and do it when there is enough water over the sand.

It takes about 10 to 15 minutes with 15 hp motor and small tinnie done it many times.

Thanks fellas. Could be an option.

I have just spent 3 days sailing at Burrum I got SE too SSE winds around 15 to 20kts and just letting everyone know the banks are the same as they always have been just unreal. Looking good for windfest although its a long way off the banks should be the same. I love this place

You got that right Glynn, Burrum is a great place to sail when it is on it would be hard to better.

Just put my holiday request in
Cheers Jeff

Thought I would bring this topic back to the top.
Sailed Burrum Monday before New Years and it is one of the best days sailing I have ever had - plenty of wind with nice long runs. Never sailed there before even though I grew up in Hervey Bay many moons ago. Will be coming back for Windfest!!!
Cheers

Awesome!

Family Holiday booked in rely looking forward to sailing there for the first time.
We should get enough for a team

How do people enter cheers

Booked greevys house 7th-12th please be windy

Don't know if I'll enter. Don't really have "speed gear", but I reckon I'll come up to windsurf, drink beer etc.

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trimmer said..
Booked greevys house 7th-12th please be windy

Awesome Shannon

Hopefully nothing will happen to prevent me from coming

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Richiefish said...
Don't know if I'll enter. Don't really have "speed gear", but I reckon I'll come up to windsurf, drink beer etc.

Planing the same thing