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It has been 3,5 months since the finish of the Volvo Ocean Race and it was a wonderful summer. I did a lot of sailing, catching up with family and friends, some work and travelling. And furthermore, I made new business plans, as the current economic times forced me to be more creative. I won’t unveil my project yet, but stay tuned.

Following a short break at the beginning of July, I continued working for Team Boskalis that competed successfully at the F18 Worlds in Belgium (173 boats). Title defender Coen de Koning (NED) and his new crew Thijs Visser (NED) did an amazing job by winning the thrilling competition. Their team mates Hugh Styles (GBR) and Ferdinand van West (NED) won bronze, with Gunnar Larsen (NED) and Stefan Dubbeldam (NED) in fifth position. Dutch Boskalis duo Sascha Larsen and Christa van Helden finished twelfth as best mixed crew. Despite my efforts to spread the news amongst the national media in the Netherlands, it was only picked up by regional press. Even the sailing magazines did not pay much attention to this outstanding performance. Does this reflect the lack of interest in a non-Olympic sailing class?

Next step Delta Lloyd 24 Hours Race

This year’s Delta Lloyd 24 Hours Race on the IJsselmeer, Markermeer, Wadden Sea and North Sea took a next step in terms of live reporting. Several teams updated their twitter account regularly, which we published on the event’s website. We also received pictures taken from competing boats. Zeilen Magazine participated with their own editorial team and reported live from the water. Geosports equipped about twenty yachts with a tracking & tracing device. The positions were displayed on a special designed web page, including updates and pictures. The traditional sailing classes were also carrying a tracking device. On top of all these news feeds, I did my normal semi-live interviews with skippers during the race and posted them on the website as well. The result was a mix of communications, which I believe is the future.

Belgian Nationals Surfing in Spanish waves

At the end of August I made an interesting trip as Dutch journalist, by order of the Belgian sailing magazine Varen. I went to Berria, in the northwest of Spain, to write an article about the Belgian Surfing Nationals in the Spanish waves. The trip was sponsored by O’neill and showed me a whole new world. One of cool dudes, passionated athletes, wonderful riders’ initiatives, surf culture and friendship. I also had my first surfing lessons and guess what… I loved it. The 6-page article was published in the latest edition of Varen.

Cats & Dinghies

In these economical heavy weather conditions, the magazines seem to have less work for freelance journalists. That allows me to spend more time on the online news platform Cats & Dinghies, for which I wrote many articles in the last couple of months.

Expansion of services

For the season of 2010 I will expand my services to sailing events, which means I won’t only focus on the media. I will work on the rest of the communications as well; both in strategy and execution. That gives me also a more co-ordinating role on location, besides taking care of the daily reports. I am looking forward to this new challenge.

New events

At the moment, there are two new events planned for 2010. More information will follow soon.

October 8, 2009