Jack chats to Bowien Van Der Linden, 2021 Wingfoil World Champion and all round ripper.

Hey Bowien! It’s awesome to have you join us here at Tonic Mag. Let’s start with the big one, what was it like becoming the 2021 Wingfoil World Champion?

Sometimes I still don’t believe it. My whole life has been full of watersports - windsurfing, surfing, and supping - from a young age. But when I started wingfoiling I never expected I would do any world tour events, let alone win an event or win a world title! 

It’s been such a fun experience and I especially love how it has given me the opportunity to dedicate more of my life to watersports, travelling, and competing.   

Can you tell us about that year of competition, how many tour stops did you go to? What were you focusing on during the heats?

I had very little competition experience thus I had no idea what I was doing at the beginning of the year, luckily I learned fast. I think the experience mostly helps you prepare better for heats - getting you better results in the heats. What gear do you choose, how do you trim your gear, how and what to train, keeping calm and collected before your heat, knowing the ins and outs of the spot (especially important in surf events) etc. In my heat, I just focus first on landing the tricks I have in mind and when I’ve gotten them all locked down I try to better the scores! 

That year I did the whole tour which was Leucate, Dakhla, Brazil, and Tarifa. 

Last year you unfortunately dislocated your shoulder which I believe resulted in surgery and missing a good deal of competition. How did it happen and are you back to full strength now? It certainly looks that way!

I had a dislocation once, eight years ago, during SUP surfing my shoulder was pulled out by a big wave. After recovering from that injury all seemed well and I didn’t have any troubles with my shoulder. Then I traveled to Cape Town after I won the world title to train. After a couple of weeks, I had a session where I was super sore and tired from many days of winging before and then the worst possible thing happened. My shoulder dislocated in the middle of a 360 - a sign that my shoulder wasn’t nearly as reliable as I thought. And I immediately knew my chances of defending my title were gone. Even if I could do most of the events, how was I going to push myself with an unreliable shoulder? I immediately took action and was operated on the same week. After a couple of months off the water and getting my range of motion and strength back I’ve slowly started getting back onto the foil and getting into freestyle. 

I would say my shoulder is definitely not 100% - some days yes, but some days not. But with training it gets better and better - I’m really grateful for the progress I’ve made and proud to say I’ve been on every single freestyle podium since I’ve been back on the tour! 

I'm glad to hear it's recovering. Let’s rewind a bit, your childhood involved a mix of living in Noordwijk, The Netherlands & Cape Town. It must’ve been an amazing opportunity to ride in Cape Town as a youngster. How often did you travel/move between the two?

So I literally grew up 50/50 between the two countries spending 6 months in the Netherlands and 6 months in Cape Town each year. Pretty much an endless summer!

The opportunity to get so much time riding in Cape Town as a youngster was an amazing experience - it’s given me the skills I’ve needed to progress fast in wingfoiling and even though I don’t get to spend so much time there recently Cape Town is amazing for winging. I stopped spending half my year there when I started at university, now that I've nearly finished my master's degree I hope to spend more time there again. 

Well, I'm impressed that you've managed to fit studying in around all that water time! Am I right in saying you're studying Design Engineering? How's it going and do you make the course relevant to the watersports industry?

Yes, I’m studying design engineering. It’s going well, at the moment I am doing my thesis for my Masters degree. So I’m nearly done, I am looking forward to being able to fully focus on winging once I’m done! 

I got the opportunity to do my thesis at Mystic. The North Action Sports group and Mystic headquarters are located in Katwijk, right next to my hometown Noordwijk. So it was the perfect opportunity to combine my knowledge from my studies with my watersports experience! 

Sounds like the perfect place to do a thesis. When did you first start wingfoiling? How did you find the learning process?

I started wingfoiling in June 2019 - nearly 4 years ago - my dad was already into SUP-foiling and bought one of the first production wings he could get his hands on in the Netherlands. We had no idea what we were doing, but we had so much fun learning this new exotic sport. Then I went to Cape Town that winter and there we weren’t the only wingers on the water, I started to progress really fast and was soon doing carve 360’s and some little jumps - the rest is history 😉

Awesome. At what point did you realise that wingfoiling could become a professional career for you? Must’ve been a super cool feeling!

I think this moment was in Brazil in 2021, at a certain point I knew that if I won I would become World Champion - that was a crazy feeling! 

2023 has been great so far for you competition-wise. Podiums in all disciplines on the GWA tour, freestyle, surf & race! Do you find it difficult to balance the different disciplines or is it a natural part of winging for you?

I think in such an early stage in the sport it’s pretty easy to balance the different disciplines, but it’s getting a bit more difficult, especially with the full calendar. For me, Surf and Freestyle definitely have the focus when the time comes but now that they are still combined with racing, I'm doing everything! 

You signed with North last year, what’s your go-to equipment in the different disciplines? You made the HA650 look insane in Cape Verde!

For freestyle and wave, my favourite setup is the Seek or Swell 4’4’’ with my HA’s and a NOVA. For racing I stay with the HA’s and switch to the MODE’s and the slightly larger Seek 4’6’’. I’m using my HA’s for basically everything, I just range between the different sizes but if the winds are good the HA650 is definitely my favourite size. 

How do you balance training with things like staying on top of your social media? Or do you just go with the flow?

For me it’s something that I just go with the flow, when I’m traveling I naturally post more as I have more things to post about and I love to keep everybody updated while I’m competing. When I’m busy with other things than winging - like my studies - it’s a bit more difficult. 

Competition in freestyle is getting more & more intense. What tricks are you working on at the moment to stay ahead of the game?

It’s definitely getting much more intense, in the last few months my focus has been more on my shoulder and getting down all the tricks I had locked down before the injury. So not too many crazy new things, now I need to shift my focus to some new things otherwise I’ll fall behind. At the moment I want to start training some combos! 

With the racing discipline, do you have any background in sailing or are you fairly new to the race course? Do you think winging has a big future in racing, similar to that of windsurfing or kitesurfing?

I have absolutely no experience in racing. I think it has a huge future, where I personally see the potential is that with winging you can have really short upwind and downwind legs making the course really exciting. Instead of just having longer-distance races. 

What’s your schedule like for the rest of the year? Will you compete as often as possible or choose specific events?

If all goes according to plan I will be competing in all the world tour events this year. I’m still finishing my master's degree so between the comps I won’t be traveling that much! 

Lastly, what advice would you have for women & girls getting into wingfoiling? I’m well aware that it is a male-dominated sport at the moment but we’d like to start seeing that change a bit!

I think winging is such an accessible sport for anybody - it already has such a high level of fun in mediocre conditions and with a large wind window it can increase the time on the water like crazy! And especially very accessible for ladies - it takes less power than windsurfing and doesn’t have all the lines and the power that might be frightening to some ladies during kitesurfing. 

Thanks for taking the time Bowien. Good luck for the rest of the year!

By Jack Galloway

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