Final before Hookipa: Preview Aloha Classic 2025 - "The Legacy Continues"

First comes the Citroën Windsurf World Cup on Syltbefore the 2025 wave world champions are crowned at the legendary Aloha Classic. But Maui is already warming up, there is a fresh event website - and a great video to whet your appetite!

Under the title "The Legacy Continues", spectacular scenes from over 40 years of the Aloha Classic can be seen. From Pete Cabrinha and Fred Haywood - whose historic picture of his lonely sail top between Hookipa foam rollers also adorns the poster - to Polakow and Dunkerbeck to Kai Lenny, Bernd Roediger and Sarah-Quita Offringa. There is no shortage of pathos: "Once you're an Aloha Classic Champion, you're always an Aloha Classic Champion," it says, and then later: "This is the arena of windsurfing. The legends, the rookies, the women, the youth, the masters, all thrown down in the same lineup. From the first generation that built this sport to the new crew carrying it forward, this event is where the story keeps getting written."

Things get dramatic in between: "Nobody ever said it was easy getting there. Sometimes the ocean reminds you who's boss. Boards break, rigs snap, and yeah, you might leave a little skin on the reef, but then there's the magic. When everything lines up, and for a few seconds, you're not fighting the ocean. You're dancing with it." Fittingly, there are a few brutal crash scenes.

Boards break, rigs snap, and yeah, you might leave a little skin on the reef, but then there's the magic."

Hookipa - Beauty, chaos and the ride of your life

In addition to favourites and Aloha Classic legends, the website also presents some of the probable starters this year, as well as the judges. Among others, Matt and Kevin Pritchard will be there in 2025! This year's event is being organised by Francisco Goya.

Levi Siver and other locals try to put into words what makes Hookipa so legendary and what the challenges of the spot are: "It’s actually the perfect place when you’re doing it right — the opposite when you’re not. That’s probably why it never gets too crowded, the rocks are the self-regulating element" says Levi Siver.

"The challenges start before you even reach the waves," say the locals. "The launch alone has claimed countless injuries and destroyed more gear than anyone can count. Make it past the shorebreak, and you’re immediately confronted with opposing currents, sometimes only five feet apart. To an untrained rider, it’s a chaotic whirlpool; to the seasoned, these are elevators back to the peak."

To an untrained rider, it’s a chaotic whirlpool; to the seasoned, these are elevators back to the peak."

"The wind is no less complex — funnelling through narrow 30- to 50-foot corridors. You have to accelerate in these gusts to cross the next 20 to 40 feet of dead wind before the impact zone, where mast-high whitewater surges into the bay. Making it out on the bigger day is one of the sport’s greatest feats."

Click here to go to the Aloha Classic website: alohaclassic.com