Spearfishing World Cup 2010

The spearfishing world cup is going to start in less than a day, I know the guys have been doing some scouting, this is some information I got from Craig Heslop, one of the Springboks in the Team.

Hey all

We have finally managed to sort out a wireless connection in the hotel so comms should be more regular. The boys have been scouting hard, generally launching by 9am (civilised start with a healthy breakfast) and at sea till about 7pm – it gets dark at about 8pm. Diving is pretty tough as know in the med – deep and no fish. Water has been unusually cold with thermocline btw 15m and 20m and temp dropping from 19 degrees on surface to 14 degrees, this has resulted in even less fish than usual. We found a nice ledge dropping from 30m to 38m on sand with good cave structure and there were no fish even at that depth. However all teams are reporting the same problem and a southerly is blowing today which is expected to warm the water up and hopefully bring the fish. The team is fit and diving well, Ryan and Brent have been here a week longer than the rest of us and they have acclimatised faster as a result, this has definitely benefited the team as we arrived and were able to launch first thing with boats and permits all sorted. Andrew has been a huge asset to the team, an extra set of eyes has helped enormously in scouting and he has proved a master as spotting Congers.

Most teams have arrived by now and poor weather saw all of the teams take a rest day today and wander the town. The lifestyle is very chilled and typically Mediterranean with outdoor restaurants and tables on the street and lots of long lazy lunches. We will be having dinner with the Croatians team tonight and it will be good to see all of them again, they have been very friendly and helpful on the back of our friendships made earlier in the year. It has been good to rest up and we are all pumped to get out to sea again tomorrow for another spell of scouting. The Spanish are pretty confident as per usual, Joesepa has been scouting on his underwater scooter and they have a team of 9 divers! The Croatians are feeling a fair bit of pressure but they must be favourites in their own back yard. We are in the same hotel as Great Britain with Kevin Daly, Garry Roach and Colin Chester all representing the UK, seems to be a pattern in British sport? Colin arrived yesterday having towed his new C-Ski 444 from London and good to see Steve’s boat spreading around the world!

We had some fun and games on Monday; we dived until 5pm and decided to take a scenic trip back. Area 2 is around the Island of Unje which is about 9km long and 4km wide, it is a huge area and we have only managed to scout the Western side so far so the plan was to run around the Eastern side to get a feel for the coast line. We changed petrol tanks and then the motor died… we were about 1hr from home and the wind was blowing a good 20knots and not another boat in sight. Of course the boat had no tools or safety kit so all we could do was anchor and wait for help. Fortunately the owner was still out at sea (scouting with the Chilean team and not far away). He arrived in a big Bayliner and towed us to the lee of an Island – with the right tools we found that there was some water at in the tank which was blocking the carb. We all had visions of sleeping on the island and enduring a chilly night on empty stomachs but fortunately a hot shower and warm meal was not far away.

Mali Losinj is a pretty BIG Island by Croatian standards but is still a very small village. World Champs is a big deal and spearfishing is very popular over here, there are posters all over town advertising the event and Daniel Gospic who lives on Mali Losinj is the local hero and favourite to win. The town is buzzing with the upcoming comp and the locals are very friendly and accommodating.

That’s about all the news for now, will try to send some pics with the next update

cheers