Official RS:X Olympic Windsurfing Class Website

Following a meeting with the coaches here at the 2008 RS:X Youth World Championships, it has been decided that the RS:X Class will include an U17 Division in all RS:X Youth Championships from now on. This decision has been ratified by the RS:X Class Executive Committee.

The reasons are simple.

1. The RS:X Class is seeing an increasing number of boys and girls registered for championships who are under the age of 17
2. A little research has provided the reason. The Techno board is very weight sensitive. In fact, the word is that if you are over 55 kgs, you are too heavy to be competitive in that class.
3. The RS:X Class see the overlap in age groups with the Techno Class as a good thing. Sailors will be able to move up to the RS:X Class whenever their body weight determines they should and not simply when their age complies with some rule.

The U17 Division will be included in the 2009 RS:X Open Youth European Championship in Greece from April 25th - May 4th and in the 2009 RS:X Youth World Championship in Turkey from July 25th - August 1st.

The U17 Division will sail as part of the U19 Youth Fleet initially.This will mean that they will sail up to 4 races of 25 minutes in length in planing conditions. We are aware that other classes,  Formula Experience for example, have a maximum of 3 races per day for their U17 Division and will therefore carefully monitor the situation in the RS:X Youth Fleet.

It should be noted that, If the number of entries is sufficient, the U17 Division will be offered their own start.