For anyone looking to get into the sport of windsurfing, check out an earlier post ‘Windsurfing Lessons – 5 Steps To Learn How To Windsurf’

Our Full Beginners Windsurfing Course covers everything you need to know to then be safe enough out there on the water hiring some equipment from us, practicing what you have been taught.

On the 1st 3 hour lesson you learn about the windsurfing equipment, getting into a windsurfing start position, a basic static 180 degree turn, the sailing position & a little bit of steering. This is enough to get you up & windsurfing along with a turn to get you back home again!

The 2nd 3 hour lesson we teach you how to prevent sideways drift by looking more at steering, sailing towards the wind & doing a faster turn called a tack then move on the cover sailing away from the wind & doing a turn called a gybe.


You also learn a self rescue technique to get you safely home should the wind disappear!

The aim of our full beginners windsurfing course is to give you the knowledge to, in theory be dropped at any ‘Point A’ in Poole Harbour, told to get to any ‘Point B’ & through a combination of steering, tacks, gybes, upwind & downwind sailing, be able to make your way to your target.

To help boost your learning curve & get you going with windsurfing, our Full Beginners Windsurfing Course is included as one of our Special Windsurfing Offers – Save £11 by booking both halves of the course together.

Come and join in the fun of learning to windsurf at the Poole Windsurfing School!

Then came the iFront boom technology that markets as giving unique trimming & tuning capabilities. Including such features as ‘tool-less RDM adaptor’, ‘Auto-Close’ & ‘Rope Storage’. As the North website says “The brand-new iFRONT head is the first to offer an adjustment and tuning option that changes the overall characteristics of the boom, allowing for ideal adjustment to all conditions. This is made possible by the individually adjustable FLEX.CONTROLLER in three levels.”

This technology seems well suited to racing, using bigger sails (7m2 plus) where you want to crank up the setting to maximum stiffness!

Check the tech:
North Windsurf Boom Technology

Now, the latest to come out of the North Windsurfing technology farm is the Shox XTR. A Power XT that’s been taken to a whole new level of tech! A Power XT with an integrated high-end shock absorber. There is even an adjustable travel control level to set the shock absorber for different conditions.

According to North Windsurfing website…
“In the waves, firstly the SHOX.XTR dampens landings and delivers a new level of board control when going down-the-line.”

“Supports the pop in Freestyling by the rebound. In addition the damping improves reception on landings.

Check the tech:
North Windsurf Boom Technology
More North Windsurf Boom Technology

Another good idea but one that will definitely need to be tested out & like all the good technology it doesn’t come cheap!

A little bit about our teaching background, a quick round up of all the latest windsurf equipment we use followed by some great action from students taking lessons out on the water!

As one of our regular windsurfing students kindly said:

Learning to Windsurf with Poole Windsurfing is a pleasure. The location is hard to beat and the instruction and equipment is first class

- Jon Marshall

Come and join in the windsurfing fun with us at Poole Windsurfing!

If you know where to look then there is a whole world of information available for checking out the weather forecast for Poole Harbour. Wind forecasts specifically for Poole Harbour that include as much or as little data as you require.

Top 3 Wind & Weather Forecasts For Poole Harbour

1. WindGuru – One of the original global wind & weather forecast wesbites and still one of the best for a local wind forecast here at Poole Harbour. The link will take you directly to the Poole Harbour wind & weather forecast page (although you can use WindGuru for practically any well know windsurfing location worldwide).

You get more than the usual 5 day weather forecast for Poole, WindGuru gives you upto an 8 day wind forecast that includes such data as wind strength, wind direction, temperature, cloud cover & rainfall. A nice feature is the special WindGuru ’star rating’ for when you just want a quick indicator of when it’s next going to be windy!

When you look at the wind forecast page you will notice that if you scroll down there are in fact 3 different weather forecasts for Poole Harbour. This is something to do with forecast ‘resolution’, each of the 3 forecasts have a particular level of geographical coverage or ‘resolution’. Technical stuff but basically the 1st forecast at the top of the page will give a more averaged prediction and from experience is the one that gives the most accurate of wind/weather forecasts for Poole Harbour.

2. Windfinder – Maybe a more basic wind & weather forecast website than WindGuru & not dedicated to only Poole Harbour but it still has an 8 day weather forecast. Windfinder includes all the essential data: wind direction, wind speed, cloud cover & temperature.

The wind speed is displayed in an easy to read visual bar chart system & a nice extra is a simple to read wave height & wave period forecast for the Bournemouth / Poole Harbour locations.


3. XC Weather – Provides the basic wind & weather data in a simple to read 6 day weather forecast for Poole.

A really nice feature is actually back on the main XC Weather webpage. You can roll your pointer over the map of the UK to get instant wind & weather forecast information displayed to you. Great for tracking where the weather is coming from & going to when trying to plan your day of windsurfing. This feature also includes some useful additional ‘offshore’ marker locations such as the Solent.

You can also zoom in using the ‘Forecast Maps’ feature to get the same roll over wind forecast but at much more detailed location points – very nice!

XC Weather even has a page where you can play a wind animation which you can use to track what has happened & help predict the future – now there’s a good skill, predicting the future!

Top 2 Live Wind & Weather Feeds For Poole Harbour

1. Poole Harbour Weather – Located at a top secret (well maybe not to us) location right here at Poole Harbour, this website has been spitting out a live feed both of weather statistics & a multi angle, user adjustable webcam showing all the windsurfing action in Poole Harbour for some time now!

The live feed is good for double checking that it really is windy before you make a frantic drive down to the harbour. Nothing worse than getting all psyched up for a good windsurfing session only to arrive to no wind!

What I really love about the Poole Harbour Weather site is the live weather statistics, sad I know but you get sooo much information about what is going on right now at Poole Harbour. The best feature has to be the ‘Graph’ button, which brings up a menu from which you can choose wind speed, wind direction, temperature, etc, etc and then look at a graph of the live feed, last hour, last 24 hours & even the last 31 days of activity!

2. In The Elements -The new kid on the ‘Live Weather – Poole Harbour’ scene and doing a very nice job of it too! A no fuss webcam & the bonus of website that also has lots of other useful watersports info, including a place to buy and sell equipment.

They combine a super smooth auto panning webcam of the Poole Harbour windsurfing location with a summary display of the latest from the WindGuru website.

A great instant check on what the wind is doing down here at Poole Harbour!

With so much wind & weather forecast information to look at you just need to remember to make time to get down to Poole Harbour & us at Poole Windsurfing to actually go windsurfing!