This is why you bring a SpeedPuck

by Velocitek 1 May 12:00 BST

26.6 knots. A capsize. A broken leg. The SpeedPuck was there.

An image of Project 3894: Rebuild of the Fastest RS Aero Alive landed in the Velocitek inbox via the RS World Community WhatsApp group. We put out a message on social media to learn more and connected with the sailor behind the post.

That person is Julius van Schagen, and this is his story.

The day the lampposts were on the ground

Julius lives in South Holland, not far from Gouda (yes, that Gouda). He's been sailing since he was four — first cruising the Dutch lakes with his dad and brother, then joining a club around age eight and graduating to the RS Aero. He's 17 now, a sailing instructor, and, as this story will demonstrate, someone with a very particular definition of "manageable conditions."

In the week leading up to what would become his record run, Julius had been tracking the weather forecasts closely on Windy. A Monday or Tuesday was looking wild: sustained winds of 28 knots with spikes up to 40. He marked the date.

When that morning arrived, he still had school. In the Netherlands, you bike. On the way, he noticed lampposts and trees knocked flat across the road.

He went to school. And then he went sailing.

Getting on the water

Julius wasn't reckless about it — or at least, not entirely. He had recruited a friend to drive a crash boat, ran through some pre-sail safety checks, and picked his moment to slip off the dock between gusts. The RS Aero is a light, responsive boat. In 40-knots, getting the boat in the water, let alone getting off the dock without immediately capsizing requires patience, timing, and a bit of nerve.

He found his window and went.

He launched from a protected windward shore and the moment he sailed into open water, the wind hit him properly for the first time. It was more than 40 knots. Possibly 50 in the gusts. The lake — normally flat — had built up half-meter to one-meter waves.

He was on a broad reach, fully powered, the boat lifting and flying. He wasn't watching the SpeedPuck. He was hanging on.

26.6 knots

When Julius reached the far end of the lake, he needed to turn upwind to sail home. He didn't make it. The boat capsized, and in those conditions, there was no righting it. Every time he got it back up, it went straight over again. He grabbed the SpeedPuck, it's his dad's Puck, climbed into the motorboat, and left the Aero.

Back on dry land, he pulled up the SpeedPuck's Max Speed Recall: 26.6 knots. He took a photo.

The boat itself — RS Aero sail number 3894 — had drifted onto the leeward shore and was banging against the rocks, mast and sail shredded. It needed to be retrieved before dark, both to keep it from drawing emergency services and because, well, it was someone's boat.

That retrieval operation, conducted in the dark, in the wind, by Julius and a few friends, is how he broke his leg. In two places. He climbed up the shore to a walking path where he luckily encountered a good Samaritan with medical experience who attended to Julius with a visibly broken leg.

His dad drove him to the hospital. They got home around 1 a.m. The boat was recovered that same night by his friends. Six weeks in a full leg cast, followed by another four to five in a partial. He's almost fully back now — just in time for the RS Aero European Championships and the Aero Youth Worlds this summer.

Project 3894: The Fastest Aero Alive

His speed record may be safe but the boat needed some help. Hull 3894 might have been destined for the scrap heap. Disposing of a broken fiberglass boat is no small task, and the damage was significant. But a friend in the Dutch and Belgian Aero community — a guy named Vincent who likes to fix things — offered to take it. He's been rebuilding it piece by piece, sourcing parts from the community, with a plan to turn it into a boat that new sailors can borrow to try the class.

The unofficial title on the project: The Fastest Aero Alive.

We're working with Julius to pull the GPS track data off that old SpeedPuck — stay tuned for a follow-up post with the full run visualized. In the meantime, you can hear the whole story in his own words in the audio below.

And Julius: heal up fast. We'll be watching for your results this summer.

www.velocitek.com/pages/speedpuck