With all due respect Bill…while I agree with you that sailing in a ditch has brought the numbers up to where they now are…it is still easily with in reach of an accomplished windsurfer to hit 35-40 mph with high quality stock “off the shelf windsurfing gear”. As far as real world water goes, cooking along at 35-40 mph in 3 foot chop on a 7’-10” X 20” (bump and jump type board/sail, not race board/sail) basically in the air more than in the water is pretty common sight. Ask Keith Notary…he was building some of the best boards for those conditions.

I use to do it all the time (still can). Sustained winds of 30 mph +. Come up to Herman’s bay just South of the St. Lucie Nuclear power plant on those strong west winds from the cold fronts, and you will see sailors all over the place going 35+ in wicked chop. On rare occasion conditions get to the point where a 2.5 sq/mt. sail was too big to hold on to. That is a small sail…you need 20 mph wind just to keep the board from sinking under your feet…forget about planning till nearly 30 mph wind speed. . Even on modern wave gear (which is designed around maneuverability rather than all out speed) we are probably getting in the low to mid thirties on the ocean…how else do you think we get 20’+ plus in the air launching off a five foot wave face?

In the early 90’s windsurfing was making some quantum leaps in performance…the board plan shapes and rocker lines were obsessed over with countless prototypes, hand ground fins with exhaustive foil research, new stiffer carbon booms that helped retain the sail shape from changing (kept out haul constant), new carbon fiber masts which zeroed out quicker to keep the sail designers shape over a wider wind range…steps toward using mono film and scrim/Mylar sail material that held its shape better. Ever ounce of board weight, mast weight, boom weight, sail weight, even the mast extensions, mast foot and foot straps were paired down to minimum. The interaction between components was finally beginning to make sense. Rigs became more and more controllable; the back winded face plants became rarer and rarer.

The speeds achieved by modern sailboards is due to a host of factors well beyond the sailing of a few in a ditch in France…

Bob