Kitesurfer Promotor
Francisco is a 30 year-old Portuguese young man completely passioned by nautical sports. Being taken aboard a boat by his parents only 15 days after he was born, in August, he was never able or wanted to let go of the sea again.
Natural from Lisbon, at age eleven, he started to compete in the dinghy class Optimist where he won several regional and national races and ended representing his country at the ’98 Europeans in Split/Croatia. At age 15 he upgraded to the 420 class (boats of two persons) where he raced until he was eighteen and won the national overall ranking and also got a 11st in the European Championship.
While developing his sailing skills, he was always looking for the most recent and extreme water sports to try and learn. Water ski and wakeboard were his first choices, then windsurf and the latest, in 2002, was Kitesurf.
After seeing kitesurf for the first time in 2001, Francisco immediately loved it. It was love at first sight! During one year he saved money to buy his own kite and board, and in 2002 Francisco started kitesurfing on the same day that he bought the kite, incredibly fast. He found in Kitesurf the most complete sport he has ever tried, because it is a mix of his favorite sports. In 2005 he was national champion and in 2006 vice-champion, as well as 5th in the PKRA world race tour event in Portimão.
In parallel with his sportive life, Francisco graduated from a Master Degree in Engineering and Industrial Management at IST in 2007, which lead to jobs as auditing at Deloitte, strategy marketing analyst at BES bank, co-manager of the portuguese offshore sailor Francisco Lobato’s project, CTO at ConsultaClick.com (co-founder), general manager at Dakhla Attitude resort in Morocco, private yacht skipper, among others. His life is made of different experiences and he lives by challenging himself time after time, into new adventures that make him feel alive.
The Down the Coast kitesurf challenge was an idea that Francisco had in his mind for some years now. After sailing the Portuguese coast several times in his family boat or with his sailing expert friend Francisco Lobato, he always imagined himself on a kiteboard side by side with the boat and even going faster. In 2013 he dedicated his time and effort to make this adventure happen and he understood that it could be possible to do it kitesurfing without stops, with a good wind forecast for the entire course.
Francisco is now focused in training 24/7 for this highly demanding challenge that will put his limits to an extreme test, both physical and mentally.
