VANESSA LAURIE/Stuff
Jack Parr, 16, is on the New Zealand Sailing Foundation Youth Worlds Team and is going to the Netherlands to compete in the iQFoil class.
Lately, New Plymouth has had either too much wind or not enough, thereby frustrating Jack Parr’s attempts to get out on the water and train.
Jack, 16, will represent New Zealand this week in the iQFoil sailing class – on a windsurfer that is up on a hydrofoil.
‘’I was a windsurfer and I knew how to sail, so I combined both,’’ he said.
The New Zealand Sailing Foundation Youth Worlds Team was leaving on Sunday J to compete at the Allianz Youth World Sailing Championship 2022.
The event is taking place off the coast of Scheveningen in The Hague, Netherlands, between Friday, July 8, and Friday, July 15.
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The iQFoil class is new and will be at the Olympics for the first time Paris in 2024.
The surfboard is 85cms wide and about 1.5m long, Jack said. His fastest speed is 51kmh.
‘’The hardest part is controlling it. You have to control the pitch and the roll, there’s no machine that does it for you. Imagine trying to balance on a piece of wood on top of a ball. It’s very fun.’’
Adam Mustill Photography/Supplied
Jack racing his iQFoil at the trials for the NZ Sailing Foundation Youth Worlds Team.
Jack has been to international competitions before with the New Zealand Development under 14 team in New Caledonia in the optimist class – a small sail boat.
But he has not competed internationally in the iQFoil. And the New Plymouth Boys’ High School Year 11 student said he is both excited and nervous.
‘’I’m nervous because I don’t know how good the people are over there, because I’ve never raced against them before. So, that’s the scariest thing. I don’t know where I sit compared to the rest of them.’’
Because of Covid, a New Zealand team has not competed in the youth world champs since Poland in 2019, and this will be the first time young Kiwis have competed in windfoiling.
Jack has been sailing at the New Plymouth Yacht Club since he was nine years old, and he has had a ‘’generous’’ grant from Taranaki philanthropic organisation the Toi Foundation to help him get to The Hague.
There will be 450 sailors from 69 countries aged up to 19 competing at the world champs and each country can only enter one male and one female, or a team of two, in each class.
Aimee Bright from Manly Yacht Club, in Whangaparaoa, is competing in the girls iQFoil.
There are 13 sailors on the New Zealand team, seven boys and six girls.
