🤯 How I Won The Biggest Windsurf Race In The World!

DefiWind 2026, this year is going to be an epic one. As you can see behind me, it's freaking windy already. And the forecast gives more than 40 knots. Epic races ahead, almost 1,500 people competing. And I have some big goals, because I want to win my first DefiWind race. And you guys can win my Lycra shirt, the number 7. So I would say, let's get it started. What a beast, this rain. You cannot train for it. This happens when you keep on fighting, guys. 5.6, already rigged. I have another 5.3 right here. Might be using that one. We have that guy over there, who's going to compete on the foil. What are you rigging? I'm going to prepare the 4.5 and the 5.4. But it's looking pretty gnarly already out there. It's gnarly. So foil always about a square meter smaller, 4.5. I don't even have a camber sail that small, only my wave sail. So good luck to Armado. Hopefully, he wins the foil. And my goal is, of course, to do a good result on the fin. And a lot of the pro guys are actually competing on fin. Because, yeah, over the last years, it came up a little bit again. It became more popular again. And of course, I want to compete in whatever the strongest guys are competing in. And I love going on the fin, especially in the strong wind. It's just the best. So I'm going to be competing on the fin. I'm going to get my small board ready. I have a couple of fins here. Just deciding what to take. Probably a 32-centimeter fin. Another fin that doesn't fit. But I figured now that it's the box of the boat. This doesn't fit any of the f***ing... So the DefiWind experience is done. What did we tell all the people? Prepare your gear at home. What's one of the head coaches doing? Preparing his gear two hours before the race. Because he didn't listen to himself. I was busy preparing the others. Over the last years, you've probably seen that we always come here with a group of excited windsurfers who have the goal of finishing a DefiWind race. We meet online before the event to go through all the eventualities. We help you on the spot. And of course, during the two days before the event, we give you all the tips and tricks to master the race. Sign-ups for next year are already open and linked below. And this event is such a milestone for many windsurfers because it's like an approval of your skill set. Finishing just one race shows that you can cover big distances, handle big wind changes, and that you have a mindset to achieve big things. And if that sounds like you, if you want to improve your skills and have the best windsurfing holiday ever with a group of like-minded windsurfers, you don't actually have to wait for next year. Let me be your guide during your next windsurfing trip. We run the NP7 experiences currently in Bonaire, the absolute windsurfers paradise, Turkey, Lake Garda and Tenerife. And just because I enjoy it so much, we might actually do different ones or more next year. So check out the link below and sign up for the experience infos or for the upcoming experiences. This is one windsurfer. These are 300 and this is what 1500 windsurfers look like. And here you can see what they look like windsurfing together at the same time. The DefiWind is the biggest windsurfing competition in the world. A long distance race with almost 1500 starters at the same time. This is only possible in very few places. And this place couldn't be better. Grousson in France, where the Tramontana wind comes in straight offshore, which makes for flat water for almost eight kilometers in one reach. And this Tramontana wind has let this event down for the past two years, which is quite an unlikely scenario. Even more unlikely to be without wind three years in a row. So I would say this time the odds were in our favor. This start is super famous. I mean, when do you ever see so many windsurfers in one place? The boat opens the line, meaning the downwind starters have a slower course to the mark, but can start first. This boat is known to not avoid people and they do warn you about that several times during the briefing. After three jibes and four reaches, you reach the finish line, which is just behind the starting. All right, guys, first time DefiWind. Are you nervous? Yeah, super excited. Yeah, we are kind of nervous first time, but excited and nervous and happy. It's looking super strong out there, the winds. What do you have rigged? Today, 5.0 and 5.8, but not sure what to use yet, so... I have my 5.6 ready, so you are more or less in the same sail range, huh? Yeah, seems so. So maybe I should take this smaller one. Does that scare you? Yes, a little bit. You will do it, you will do it. Good luck, guys. Thank you very much. Thank you, man. What's your name? Julian. Julian, how old are you? 14. 14, and you're competing with 14 years. Yes. Wow, and what's your goal? To finish all the races. You want to finish all the races? And beat my speed record. What is your speed record? 28 or 29 knots. Okay, so you need to crack the 30 knots. Yes. All right, good luck. Thank you. Excited, nervous, not knowing how much the wind is on the other side. Excited. There is much wind, so... Speed. Good, good. Enjoy. Yes, I'm excited. I've been here 20, 24, no wind. Yeah, that's going to be the first time. It's good, I'm excited, but I'm dull tonight. Yeah. Let's loud here, the moderation, the wind. It's crazy, but the hype, the hype is up. Everyone is super excited and the wind is strong. I just can't wait to start the race. What a beast. You cannot train for it. It's just... When you're in the race with the others, it's just a different ballgame. My leg is dead. It's you... I'm having a hard time finding my words. You keep forgetting how hard this race is. When you're fighting with the others... But I came third. We got a podium place in the first race. How sick. And there was even a moment when I was leading the race and it's such an insane feeling when you have everyone behind you. I'm so dead. Big congratulations to Jordi, man. He was just... He had such a good average speed. I had some really good battles with him. I overtook him, he overtook me. I felt like peak speed. I had a little bit more, but I... On the average, almost 40 kilometers. Just couldn't hold him. Matteo the same. I overtook him a few times. I crashed in the last jibe. He overtook me back. And I was just trying to keep Pierre behind me. But... Insane. It was so funny when I look back to you and you're just like... I couldn't... I couldn't hold it anymore already. And we were not even in the third lap. We're not even halfway yet. You were fast, huh? You had a better average speed. I could be fast, I had to push all the time. Whereas you, just sitting, you were... But to me, it felt the same like what you were explaining about yourself. It felt the same to me, you know? Jordi was fast. And Bruno went. But I also crashed, huh? When I saw him... I know, I saw you. But when I saw him in a speed position, I'm not gonna do that. I saw you fighting a bit and I'm not gonna do that. But it's nice that we had some position changes, no? Yeah, it was good. F*** that first reach. You were coming and then I was pushing and then you were pushing. We kept overtaking each other. It was f***ing sick. It was so good. Good job, Nico. Congrats. This race, you know, feels like a... And then I thought, okay, it's done. Then you came and I was like, no, f***. Feels like a boxing fight. Like when you finish, you just want to hug the others. You're like, no. It's all good again. So tough. But sick average speed, huh? You had sick average speed. You feel comfortable? Yeah, I could just sit. You know, I could sit and it just kept going. Fantastic. First time that I come here for a Diffie win. I like it very much. The Diffie was... I had a herniated disc two months ago and I'm back at it. So that's great. It was so good. But I'm very tired, so I will eat a hamburger. Many, many hamburgers. The afternoon was a bit tougher because I got seaweed in my foil. So I had to stop a couple of times. Always enjoy it. Tired, but it's okay. Difficult, very difficult. I take a 5.8 and a 200 litre and a 46. It's very difficult, but very good. Yeah, it was great. Except that the last one, I needed to go upwind. So I had to do another one. But it was great, yeah. I wanted to give you guys a bit of a glimpse of what goes through your head in such a race. It all starts with the right gear choice, which is a tricky one already. Since the course is big and many windsurfers are on it, the actual wind can vary by more than 10 knots. Obviously, if you want to win the race, you can't afford to stop. So naturally, you accept the fact that in some parts of the race, you will be fully powered up. The start is a bit of a strange one because unless you start all the way downwind, you don't actually see the boat coming. All you know is, it crosses the downwind mark when the countdown hits zero. But from there, I'm just trying to see where the first line of windsurfers is. From there, I try to stay near the front because that's the only place you don't get covered. If the whole line of windsurfers are early, you have a problem because you don't have speed to cross behind the boat. But still better than getting stuck in the back. I started seeing the boat about 5 to 10 seconds before it crosses in front of me. And then it's go time. You just accelerate as fast as possible. You shoot downwind to generate speed and then you slowly start climbing upwind. And from here, I try to aim for the gybe marks, which you don't really see until quite late. But you roughly know where to go. Again, from here, it's just pushing. Naturally, I can't go 100% for the whole race, so typically I have push and relax phases. I don't know exactly how much, but in the relax phases, I typically only reduce the speed by a small percentage. So they don't really relax you that much. When I'm in the fight with someone, I try to look for their small recovery phases and then use that moment to overtake them. And even though it's only a small difference in speed, you can notice it immediately. The first gybe is not too crazy yet, because it's not too busy when you arrive in the front. But you're definitely quite stiff from the reach, so it takes all of my focus to get around nicely. And then the second reach, I decide based on my positioning. If I see an opportunity to overtake someone in front of me, I go a bit downwind. If I want to protect towards the guys behind me, I go upwind. However, I can't go upwind too far too fast, because I would quickly start getting the whole fleet towards me. And then about halfway, when it gets less crowded, I want to start going upwind and near the beach, because the wind here can be a bit light and shifty, so you don't want to have to push upwind right before the gybe. So this is just to create a bit of safety margin in case the wind shifts. At this point, you're happy about every gybe, because it allows you to change the body position. The third reach is quite near the beach, because the gybe mark is quite far inside. So technically nothing special, just keep pushing. And then the last reach is obviously the hardest one, physically and mentally. This is where everyone wants to make a last move and pushes their body to the limit. You tend to ride in higher chop here, because the finish line is a little bit further outside. Mostly my back legs and shins were burning at this point, and if the harness lines weren't adjusted 100% correct, I'd also fight with my arms. Towards the end of the event, I actually got my gear more and more dialed in and the race became less exhausting for me. Oh god! Yes! This happens when you keep on fighting, guys. You wait for your moment and then you take it. Yeah! Well, guys, thank you for what you're doing on eternal duty. Another bullet, guys. Another bullet. This one was super important, because now we have a discard and I have already four really good results. So even if the last race is for whatever reason terrible, I think I probably finish on the podium here. So, yeah, that one was really important. How was it, Nico? You've managed to finish, what? I finished it off. Oh, you won. Sick, sick, sick. Good job. I'll be first next time. Here we go. Keep it. Lars, it's finally time for you for the first defiant. I think you chose a good day, right? I don't know yet. It looks insanely windy. And I'm on 6'4", as my smallest sail. So it's gusting 40 knots, guys. And Lars has a 6'4", right over here. And my fingers are crossed for him. So cross your fingers as well. We want to see you finish. I'll try. Sit in the sail and in the harness and pray. Good luck. How was your deafy wind experience? It was really light at the start. I took the... Well, for the start, the wrong port. For the finish, the right one. In the beginning, I was laying around 20 minutes at the start line, which... Yeah. But you finished the race. Yeah, exactly. And it was super nice. Really good experience. And in the end, when the wind picked up, I was flying. So this was nice. I enjoyed it. Nice. I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you for your placement. So far, so good. Don't want to jinx anything, but looking good. It's looking good. It's looking good. I'm still leading the rankings and it's the last day. But there can always be some wind tomorrow. So let's see. Let's wake up tomorrow and then we'll see. Third position on the fin. Local boy, Pierre Mortefour. And on the foil, John Soukos. Second position on the fin, Matteo Iacchino. On the foil, Alexis Matisse. Big of the end. Winning on the fin. The winner on the foil, on the way. It's one big wind surfing party over here. Well, thank you to everyone for making this happening, of course. I think the wind delivered this year. For the last two years, we did not have the wind. And I think we all enjoyed it. Matteo, stop. I think we all enjoyed this very crazy conditions. I think for me, it was one of the windiest days ever. So I hope you guys also enjoyed it as much as I did. And I hope to see you back here next year. Yeah, I also want to thank the organization for making this event happen. I'm almost lost for words. I'm so honored to be up here with all these legends. First major international win for me. So super stoked. It's been a tough week. I know it's been a tough week for all of you guys as well. So congratulations to everyone. We'll finish the race. For those of you who didn't finish any race yet, there's a next year and we will be back here for sure. So thank you. These are your winners. This is the end of the race. Thank you, thank you. We did it. I'm a safe journey back. I won. As you can imagine, guys, it was a bit hectic to capture all the last moments of the last races, especially because Lars finally did his first Defy race and finished it. So I'm super stoked for him. And of course, yeah, what can I say? What an honor to win this epic event. I think this is a once in a lifetime opportunity to stand on top of the podium. It was a tough fight. I was fighting with myself. My body was and is screaming still. And I'm super stoked that we captured it, that Lars was here, that you guys were here with me coming along. I think the most important race was actually the pre-ultimate one. So the last one that I won, because that's the one that put me on top of the ranking. And then, of course, the last one was a discard, the fifth place. So after that race, I was just on the water and I shed some tears, because in that moment I kind of already suspected that this was going to be the important race. But the crazy race, guys, I can tell you this race is something else. Completely different tuning, completely different setup from all the PWA races. Throughout the event, I felt like I was fine-tuning everything better and better and getting more in the rhythm. Actually, on the last day, my body felt less exhausted after the race than on the first day, which is crazy. But yeah, I just felt locked in. And it was such an epic feeling to go along the Reach with 1,100 people in the back of you, fighting with Jordi, fighting with Matteo, fighting with all the top guys. I'm just, yeah, I feel blessed that I can experience this. And I want to thank you. And I want to thank you guys for following along and sharing the way to this one with me, to the Defi Wind win, which is a really big one, because all the top guys were here on the fin. So it really means a lot. And I hope to see you guys in the next video. How are your emotions? How do you feel? You know that I actually cried after the last race that I won, which was not the last, but the one before, because that was the moment I kind of knew that because that was the important race, you know. So now, because it was a bit anti-climatic towards the end, just waiting, waiting, waiting. So it's safe. You know, the year I won, the year after I won the world title. So I have to wait one year for the world title. Exactly. Next year. Why not this year? Come on.