Table of contents for #82 August - September 2016 in Kiteworld Magazine

We feel different to average society, don’t we? I mean, we’re kitesurfers. We strap ourselves to a huge kite and surf the wind. We’re already part of a greater common bond than any currency, or border. Apart from getting on the water, our community spirit and shared experiences are the best parts of this sport. One man who knows more than most about the positive spirit in kiteboarding is Dan Charlish. Maybe you haven’t heard of him, but he has helped organise four Guinness World Records for kitesuring through his management of the Virgin Kitesurfing Armada and through that event has raised £160,000 for the Armada Trust Charities. Dan’s background is in charity work, initially with Christian Aid when he finished his studies, before moving on to community work in…

2016 is shaping up to be a stellar year for kite park events. The Triple-S in Cape Hatteras in North Carolina, USA is the sport’s premier slider event and each year welcomes an elite core of wakestyle riders to compete for a share of the $50,000 in prize money. The finals for both the Men’s and Women’s divisions were run in one large ‘Super Final’ heat for each division. All riders would hit one obstacle at a time, with three attempts per rider, before everyone progressed on to the next feature. Moving from the North rail to the KOA kicker, then on to the Liquid Force Rail, the 82 foot John Wayne A-Frame slider and finally the Core Kicker. The level was high, as you’d expect from the crop of…

It takes a brave man to schedule an event dependent on wind and the successful marshaling of more than 400 kitesurfers along a one mile course but, on the weekend of 17th - 19th June at CBK Beach on Hayling Island, Dan Charlish and his team at the Virgin Kitesurfing Armada did just that – again! Not content with having already set a record earlier this year in Cape Town, the guys were determined to be successful on home soil once more. Thursday evening saw exhibitors fill two huge exhibition / show tents erected alongside a smaller one to cater for the overspill of businesses that wanted to be part of the event. As Friday morning dawned a growing number of cars and vans full of kiters began to pack…

WHATEVER YOU DO, IT’S JUST THE SENSATION OF SLIDING THAT’S SO ADDICTIVE. After seven years of competing on the world tour I decided that it was a time for a break in 2009. The competition circuit had very few events that season and certain circumstances really made me think twice about committing so much to doing it again. Personally I needed a break, but it also seemed that the growing stagnation of the tour might take a few years to sort out. As it turned out, it bounced back fairly quickly. In 2015 cracks started to appear once again though and this year is undoubtedly the worst it has ever been. Despite the efforts of the riders trying to create something more solid for themselves, it is still hard to…

“I DEFINITELY SEE OPPORTUNITY IN THE MARKET RIGHT NOW BECAUSE THERE IS A LOT OF CONFORMITY.” I’ve been this way ever since I was a little kid. I grew up near the beach and we always had a lot of different toys to play in the ocean with. Even when I was at home and swimming around in my pool I would be constantly finding ways to entertain myself. Little things like how long can I hold my breath underwater. Can I swim from this side of the pool to the other and back? I’ll try anything out that comes across my radar that is moderately interesting. Tomorrow it will be something else. Next year it will be something else. These things are going to keep happening, that’s for sure.…

THE ANALYST Vaclav Hornik says that the absolute beginnings of his Windguru wesbite happened around 1993 when he started studying economics at university. Windsurfing and computers were his passions and during his time at uni the Internet was developing quickly. He discovered a lot of weather sources that could provide an array of very interesting information for a wind addict, however the information wasn’t very easy to assimilate. After a lot of exploration his page that provided forecasts in an easy to read format became very popular within the Czech windsurfing community. After adding many more forecast pages for different spots around the world, Vaclav translated the site to English and registered the domain ‘Windguru’. The rest is history and we’re all very familiar with the positive effect the site…

“WITHIN 30 MINUTES OF ARRIVAL I WAS PLONKED ON A VOLCANIC MOONSCAPE OF A BEACH STARING OUT INTO THE NORTH ATLANTIC, A SOLID OVER-HEAD SWELL AND HAD 45 KNOTS OF CROSS-OFF WIND BLOWING OVER MY SHOULDER. NOSING OUT THROUGH THE SWELL, KITE FULLY DEPOWERED, THE FEELING OF EXPOSURE WAS UNDENIABLE.” The plane banked in towards Reykjavik and I peered out of the window towards the snowy peaks jutting through the clouds and then down at the white caps on the slate grey sea, visible even now from cloud level. The pilot told us that the northerly headwinds were blowing ‘pretty hard’ at around 45mph and I made a mental check of how many layers I’d packed. Not enough I decided. I was travelling to Iceland with Patagonia to test out…

TEST TEAM NOTES: We’ve enjoyed testing Nobile’s closest offering to a full on C kite for several seasons, having been an easy kite to perform to a high all-round level, mixing performance freeride and freestyle capabilities. Extremely jumpy yet manageable, it also moved quickly and cleanly through a loop. This 2016 model has everything we’ve enjoyed seeing on the latest kite designs. Pumped up via the popular mid-size Boston valve single-point inflation system, requiring the middle size nozzle, it’s easy to inflate and deflate. There’s no doubt that the kite is pretty well constructed, cleanly stitched and certainly feels built to last. The five strut layout features the same very flat middle strut as previous 50/Fifty models – so flat that it has almost no profile, like a floating strut.…

SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE IT’S TOO LATE TO CHANGE ANYTHING BUT THEN I THINK ABOUT THE DALAI LAMA WHO SAID, “IF YOU THINK YOU’RE TOO SMALL TO CHANGE THE WORLD THEN JUST THINK ABOUT THE EFFECT ONE TINY MOSQUITO HAS ON A ROOM WHEN YOU’RE SLEEPING IN IT.” Carine Camboulives and her family lead quite an unconventional life. Based for much of the year on Maui where they own and operate a lily farm, Carine, her husband Manu and their two children have regularly been travelling the world since their eldest daughter Lou was barely three months old. They’ve taken her on extensive trips to some wild and remote destinations where she always seems to effortlessly integrate herself into the various communities - now also alongside her younger sister. Gaining…

TAKE YOUR KITE FLYING SKILLS FROM 2D TO 3D The majority of recreational kitesurfers usually only turn their kite one way, by doing the traditional top turn where the kite turns ‘up’. Most riders instinctively avoid flying a kite in any sort of downward facing turn and few have ever experimented with a down turn in their riding. Many have a difficult time discerning the differences between a down turn, down loop and kite loop. One of the best ways to progress your riding is to push your kite flying skills forward by exploring all of the kite’s possible turning options, flight paths and flight speeds. In this article we will explain the benefits of using different down turns and how to incorporate them into your riding by practicing them…

Before you start learning transitions you should have a good basic understanding of how to jump using your kite. An air transition is basically then just like a normal jump, but rather than maintaining forward flight, the goal is to jump straight up and then end up moving in the opposite direction when you come in to land, so it has some differences in approach when it comes to board and kite movements. TRANSITION TECHNIQUE: • Work out which way you will be more comfortable practicing your transitions to begin with – it will usually be when you approach the trick on your preferred tack. • Head into this manoeuvre at a comfortable speed and with your kite around 10 or 2 o’clock in the window. • Begin by leaning…

Matchu Lopes is set for a helluva season. Having finished second at the first event on the GKA Wave & Strapless Freestyle Tour in Tarifa in July, the Cape Verdean star is one of the hot favourites for the new title that combines flat water freestyle events with full-on pure wave riding. Five stops are scheduled this year, still to come are Sotavento in August, Mauritius in September, Dakhla in October and the finale in Brazil in November. Find more at: www.global-kitesports.org Matchu will also feature next issue with a surf tale of experiences riding off the Cape Verdean island of Boa Vista, where he ran wild like this. Happy shredding, and thanks for stopping by everyone... KW…

The GKA Wave & Strapless Tour will see a mix of freestyle and wave events over the next several months, eventually resulting in the crowning of a GKA Wave & Strapless Freestyle Rider of the Year. The much anticipated first event, the Tarifa Strapless Kitesurfing Pro 2016, organised in large part by Jaime Herraiz and his Wet Tarifa team, began on Wednesday 29th June with a trials event that would decide the 12 riders going forward to meet the eight event competitors pre-qualified from last year’s Tarifa event. Four local wildcards joined those 20 riders. Seeing this many focused strapless freestyle riders coming together on the same beach to compete, the action ran hot throughout the five days. The forecast was good for the week, mixing steady Poniente conditions early…

The scintillating drama that unfolded in fickle, shifty winds on the flat Mediterranean waters off Cagliari’s Poetto Beach on Sardinia, Italy, during the first European KiteFoil Championships, showed the pathway to kiteboarding’s exciting future. The Monegasque racer — current International Kiteboarding Association (IKA) KiteFoil Gold Cup Champion and Course-Board World Champion — Maxime Nocher, once again stamped his authority on proceedings with an impressive string of wins that left him untouchable on the leader board after six nerve-jangling days of high-octane action. If that was same-old, same-old, other things were not. After a slow start Britain’s Olly Bridge, still just 18, surged up the field as the week reached a fitting climax to earn the second podium spot. Reigning European Formula Kite Champion — formerly the course board discipline until…

Under normal circumstances I would have written this piece last Friday 24th June, but during what I suspect will become a rather important day in the UK history books I declined to put pen to paper for a variety of reasons, not least because I went kiteboarding. The temptation to write my own thoughts on the so called ‘Brexit’ is strong, but thankfully not overwhelming, so I shall resist it. Will the developing situation effect kiteboarders through the UK? Yes. Can anyone adequately predict by how much? No. Will you still go kiteboarding? Yes - which leads me to think that it’s all water under the bridge for us and we’ll let the hordes of so-called experts pontificate on it while we have fun. Of course, if you don’t live…

Surfin Sem Fim run some of the most evocative downwind experiences along this coast, ranging from simple guided trips through to the ultimate 600 kilometre Iron Man adventure. We spoke to some of their founders and guides to get a taste of the experience. MARCO DALPAZZO SSF FOUNDER AND EXPEDITION CAPTAIN “I’ve skied since I was young and had the idea to set up a connected tour in kiteboarding. The northeast of Brazil is the only place that I knew of with enough space and reliable wind. “For any expedition you need a leader – someone who is accountable, who can make decisions and co-ordinate with others. The captain plans a great many details, connecting the offshore and onshore teams. Kitesurfing adventures are wonderful, but in a second a great…

GETTING STARTED Thanks to modern equipment’s improved ease-of-use and a wide spread of schools around the world, kiteboarding is now a relatively safe sport in comparison to its early days in the early 2000s. However, attaching yourself to a huge kite carries risk and makes getting lessons essential to ensure safe progress in the sport. Your instructor will teach you how to safely control a kite, explaining in detail how the equipment works, how to self-rescue should you ever need to and the various safe practices that you’ll carry forward once you start kiting on your own. The good news is that your initial learning curve will be a lot faster with an instructor on hand, making everything much more enjoyable, meaning you’ll be on the water and riding independently…

TEST TEAM NOTES: The GTS 3 provided a really interesting test in Cape Town earlier this year. Wildly different in its settings (and in our opinion you needed to make use of these different settings to really get what you specifically wanted from the kite), it took our test team several sessions to really dial into the kite. Although it could be all things to all riders, in the end, once we’d fully tested it in a range of conditions we became big fans, but did think that it could have been a bit more seamless in its’ transition between different styles of riding. Reading the specs on the GTS 4 kite before this test, it seemed that there had only been subtle changes in terms of geometry shape, among…

#01 CRUISING CAT IN THE BALTIC SEA What a trip! Emerald, clear waters, endless, snow-white beaches and a littering of sandbars. Steady easterly 18 - 22 knot winds and sun all day. Cruising together on a spacious catamaran with pro riders Colleen Carrol, Craig Cunningham and Anne Valvatne, we also took a lot of toys, including a Lampuga Electric-Jet surfboard. The itinerary and images sound more like a Caribbean or Micronesia type trip that you may have seen lavishly spread in magazines. Well, not this time. We started out in Rostock harbour, Denmark where there are certainly no palm trees, but we were bid a striking farewell with a blood red sunset and a steady easterly breeze. A trip around these waters usually lasts for a week, but we were…

There are many types of advanced grabs but this issue I will explain the fundamentals of four types: Cross body, through the legs, glides and double handed. Each of these techniques require more control to pull off as the positions your body gets into are much more extreme. NUCLEAR AND SEATBELT The two basic cross body grabs are Nuclear and Seatbelt. For a Nuclear, you grab the nose with your back hand. A Seatbelt is the opposite with your front hand reaching to the tail. In snowboarding a back hand grab on the nose is actually called Crail and you have to reach all the way to the heelside front of the board for it to be a Nuclear. In wakeboarding, however, they are both just called Nuclear. These grabs…

“I NEVER GAVE UP HOPE, BELIEVING THERE WAS GOING TO BE A MEDICAL MIRACLE AT THE LAST MINUTE. EVEN WHEN THEY TOOK ME TO SURGERY AND DREW A PURPLE LINE AROUND MY LEG WHERE THEY WERE GOING TO AMPUTATE, AND AS I WAS GOING UNDER, I STILL HAD HOPE.” Growing up in Puerto Rico, Frances Osorio was as comfortable in the water as she was out. She transitioned to kiteboarding in 2007 from skateboarding after, as she says, “getting tired of ripping myself up all the time.” After six hours of lessons she was hooked, recalling “It was literally 27 knots and I was on this huge kite getting slammed. My chest was twisting one way and my legs another, but I loved it. I kept learning on my own.…

Congratulations to Steph, Olly and Guy Bridge who recently smashed the record for the fastest time around the Isle of Wight. A prestigious stretch of water in the sailing world, kiting a distance of 50 nautical miles, Guy, still just 16, set two new world records for fastest male kitesurfer around the island and fastest single handed sailor with a time of just two hours, 32 minutes and 25 seconds, beating the previous kitesurfing record set by Jack Galloway earlier this year by almost an hour. Team Bridge set off shortly after 11am, starting from the Royal Yacht Squadron starting line in Cowes, making use of a steady southwesterly wind. Olly quickly built up a lead and looked like he might hold on to his advantage for the entire navigation,…

BKC 2016 KICKS OFF Clacton’s Sea & Beach Festival hosted the first round of the 2016 British Kitesurfing Championship tour, run in collaboration through Kiteworld mag, IKSURFMAG and the BKSA. The weather switched between seasons on the Saturday and even dished out a massive thunderstorm halfway through the afternoon. Spirit remained high and once the wind switched southwest on Sunday we were able to race through heats in the pro fleet in cross-off, gusty, 15 – 20 knot winds. A fast paced two hours of action led us to the semi finals for men and the finals for pro women, leaving joint top placings for MEN: George Dufty, Oli Sweeney, Oli Zabell and Joe Keenan / WOMEN: Holly Keenan and Holly Kennedy. Two more rounds to come. Lancing runs over…

“I FEEL WE NEED WE NEED TO ACT WITH ABSOLUTE URGENCY. HUMANS ARE ABSOLUTELY DELUSIONAL ABOUT HOW MUCH TIME WE HAVE TO CHANGE, SO EVERY LITTLE THING COUNTS IMMEDIATELY.” One of the defining product design fundamentals that we try to adhere to at Airush is, ‘Is the product as environmentally and socially responsible as possible, within the current competitive environment?’ This a very broad sweeping ideology, but it highlights how we approach product development on all products. We focus on what materials are used, the manufacturing processes, the working conditions and also, very importantly, we want to avoid making ‘disposable’ products, while still being realistic about how much customers are willing to pay (although we already make some of the most expensive products on the market). Ultimately we want to…

“I could see the ocean from my window and in the afternoons I’d see kitesurfers passing by on their downwinders. I’d run down to watch them to get as close as possible to watch them jumping and riding really fast. Those moments were really inspiring for me.” I started surfing around 2003 and always wanted to be a professional, but the level was so high and I never managed to reach a podium in local contests. My best memories were from the fun times I had on the water surfing just in front of my house with friends. Sometimes we’d get up at 4.30 to get to the beach. I could see the ocean from my window and in the afternoons I’d see kitesurfers passing by on their downwinders. I’d…

As a reminder, here’s our kite test score breakdown for your reference. KITE BALANCE POINT READINGS X / 10: Build quality: 1 = Sew it yourself / 10 = IndestructibleFull package: 1 = Pigtails sold separately / 10 = Comes with its own windLow end: 1 = More power in a handkerchief / 10 = Like a raging bullTop end: 1 = Force 3 feels like gale force 8 / 10 = Feels manageable in a hurricane.Steering speed: 1 = Barely turns / 10 = Blink and you’ll miss itTurning circle: 1 = Most pivotal / 10 = Likes to scrape the waterPower through turn: 1 = You won’t notice it turning / 10 = Could move a houseBar pressure: 1 = Light as a feather / 10 = Get…

TRENDS SKINNY BARS This year we saw many bars that were proclaimed by brands to be ‘their skinniest ever’. This actually makes a massive difference to your grip after long days on the water and the reduced diameter means that they’re much more comfortable to use when worn with thick neoprene gloves. There are also very few control systems that don’t now have above-bar depower systems (or at least have options to choose it), which in our opinion is great to see – as we think they’re much easier to use. LINE UNTWISTING MECHANISMS We’ve really enjoyed the fact that most brands now include some sort of line untwister mechanisms just above the chicken loop. As most amateur riders find that they do the majority of spins on the same…

As I get older different things become more important to me on each kite trip. When I first got into kiting nothing mattered other than how many days I would be able to kite and how flat the water would be. I made annual migrations to Brazil to fully concentrate on becoming a better kiteboarder. That’s not to say that my riding motivations have lessened, it’s just that I now put a greater importance on having home comforts and also spending more time enjoying the other aspects of travelling and enjoying what a country has to offer. Over the last few years I’ve been drawn back to the Italian island of Sardinia with its first class food, warm summer winds and easy going lifestyle. This year my friend and fellow…

MOVE > UNHOOKED STALE GRAB ROLL TO REVERT RIDER > BRANDON SCHEID PHOTOS > VINCENT BERGERON Before attempting this trick you need to have your unhooked back roll and back roll to revert dialed in. Not only do you want to be able to perform these basic rolls in control, you also want to have a good amount of height, allowing plenty of time to make a grab in the middle of the trick. Enter the trick with a moderate and comfortable amount of speed, bear off slightly downwind and unhook. Lean back into your edge and hook upwind in a sweeping J shaped arc. This will give you the necessary pop and help you start the momentum for the back roll rotation. Release from the water and begin looking…

WORLDWIDE SCHOOLS & SHOPS EVEN MORE LISTINGS AT WWW.KITEWORLDMAG.COM SCHOOLS THE AMERICAS 1 Aerosport Canada Magdalen Islands & Oka Quebec, Canada info@aerosport.ca +1 866 986 6677 www.aerosport.ca 2 Aqua Sports Maui Wailukui, Hawaii kiteboardingmaui@mac.com + 1 808 242 8015 www.mauikiteboardinglessons.com 3 Captain Kirks Kiteboarding Long Beach, LA & La Ventana info@captainkirks.com +1 310 833 3397 www.captainkirks.com 4 Exotikite Kiteboarding School Baja, Sur Mexico info@exotikite.com +521 624 165 2612 www.exotikite.com 5 Good Breeze Kiteboarding Cocoa Beach, Florida info@kiteboardingcloseouts.com +1 321-252-5483 www.goodbreezekiteboarding.com www.kiteboardingcloseouts.com 6 Hatteras Island Surf & Sailing Waves, NC +1 252 987 2292 www.hatterasislandsurfshop.com 7 Kiteboarding School of Maui Kahului, Maui, Hawaii mschale@ksmaui.com +1 808 873 0015 www.ksmaui.com 8 Kitty Hawk Kites Nag's Head, Hatteras mail@kittyhawk.com +1 252 441 0265 www.kittyhawk.com www.khkiteboarding.com 9 KGB Kiteboarding Baja Mexico & California info@kgbswag.com…

“COMMUNITY IS IMPORTANT, WE ARE STRONGER TOGETHER. THE KITESURFING COMMUNITY IS A FANTASTIC EXAMPLE OF THIS IN SO MANY WAYS. I AM PROUD TO BE PART OF IT.” 01 > The best nights out always end in karaoke. 02 > You can take the boy out of Essex, but you can’t take Essex out of the boy. 03 > Life is way too short for bad coffee, cheap red wine and reality TV. 04 > Flying gets scarier with age. Maybe it’s a mortality thing? When I was younger I found myself flying in creaking Russian relief planes across scary African countries and landing on dirt runways without batting an eyelid. These days if I hit turbulence on an EasyJet flight to Geneva I’m looking around and shouting WTF! 05…