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Name: Philip Soltysiak CAN9
Age: 24
Hometown: Markham, Canada
Birthday: May 31, 1987
It all began...
Phil’s first time windsurfing was in 1995 on a family trip to Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. His mother sowed a sail for him and his two brothers out of tarp, rigged it on a kid’s mast and boom, and hooked it up to an original windsurfer.
Two years later Phil spent 3 weeks camping at Killbear Provincial Park, on Georgian Bay. He sailed almost every day constantly asking his mother and father to help him with his tacks or jibes. He was hooked.
Every year since then Phil’s summers were spent windsurfing on Georgian Bay. During school he would convince his father the forecast said it would be windy so that he could drive them to the lake to go windsurfing.
Competitive
His windsurfing slowly improved, and in 2002 he competed at the Canadian Championships and was the best junior at the event. Later that summer he competed in France at the Formula Experience European Championships and placed 14th.
In 2003 Phil continued racing. Again he won top honours at the Canadian Championships as a youth and went on to compete at the FE European Championships in Portugal taking 6th place.
Over the next year his interests shifted from racing to freestyle. He learnt to Vulcan and decided to completely drop racing and concentrate on freestyle from then on. The following summer after finishing high school, Phil and his brothers along with two friends went on a road trip across the country to the West coast to sail at one of Canada’s best spots, Nitinat Lake and later on in Hood River and on the Oregon Coast. Phil learnt to loop and spock that summer and after competing at the Canadian Championships and placing 6th in the mens division went to study Management at the University of Toronto.
As soon as his last exam was over in May 2006, Phil left for a year long trip to practice his freestyle with his goal being to compete at his first PWA competition by the end of the year training and gain sufficient sponsorship and experience to compete at all the freestyle stops in 2008.
To know more about Philip, visit: Official Website Facebook
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