Biggest kite boarding blunders?
 

Ok kite boarding community fess up, what’s the craziest ,foolish,
Dumb-ish, ass hol-ish , almost or comin close to die – ish, thing that ever happen to you or saw happen during your kite boarding experience. Please,do feel free to testify to more than one blunder. Let the pain being :twisted: :twisted:

Ok since I made up this topic I’ll be the first to fess up.
it’s during my infant almost still in the womb stages of kite baording and
at the time ,TO MY KNOWLEDGE! I was the only one on the island do this. Coming from a Sailing, beginner windsurfing, water and beginner snow
skiing and wake boarding back ground I thought anything dealing with
water and boards it’s nothing to learn. The very first time i saw a kite boarder
I think it’s was in 01 but whatever year seeing it turned my
world in side out,but,that’s another story. I bought my first kite and trainer Dvd, Paul Mentas wha cha ma call it,but I was like,” I don’t need no stinking instructional dvd “ so I put it under my bed a little 2 line trainer kite no more than 3m came with the dvd. I flew that thing for months even bought a mongoose mountain board. I had mastered flying that thing so I bought my kite package, a 12m Cab 02 Acces complete, seat harness, a razor sharp 152 Cab pranksta board. Now, mind you, I’ve never seen a four line kite so setting it up took over an hr with 2 other sailors brains involved. This is the end result of the set up, no safety release line, we thought the raw red back line was the safety, so I had one of my friends near me to pull the red back line if anything goes wrong, putting the end tip of the circle line to form a pig tail wasn’t knowledge for
me so I just took the line that had the circle and put in around the line that had the knot
at the end. I remember that day it was 15-20 knots I had to cancel
my sailing lesson and it was a very cloudy and rainy day so, none of the guest at the Radisson was on the beach(thank god) except a little old woman under a beach hunt. 12m kite 15-20knots launching straight down wind. Can you imagine what happen next, well,
when I pulled back to bring the kite of the ground I was pull about 15-20ft in the air and brought back down(hard) dragged about 100 - 150ft through and under the sand,I missed the part wooden and part concrete wedding gazebo by inches but I didn’t
let go the bar .Finally that half ass set up and friend pulling so hard on the red line until blood ended up saving my life
the kite came down and exploded on top of the beach hunt the old woman was under, I swear the amount of speed and force that kite came down with if she wasn’t under that thing she was going to be seriously injured or killed . The end result from the whole thing, I had sand everywhere on my body,my friend right hand need serious first aid ,my right foot was messed up for days and I couldn’t stop trembling for days. I went under my bed and started watching that, stinking instructional dvd 2 years
later ya!da!ya!da!ya!da! i finally learned the sport.


i'll post the other blunder later

I will post soon. Good story of what not to do when self launching. :shock:

Buying a big hi aspect kite back in like 2002 and trying to learn in lite gusty conditions. Kite lept sailing over my head, stalling and crashing.Put me off the sport for a few years which was a shame.

The other big blunder was to fall in with a bunch of nerds who kite in Nassau and hang out here.

Biggest blunder is to learn kitesurfing in 1997 with a 5 line foil and then think that when you switch over to 4 line inflatable leading edge kites that the attachment points are the same! DUHhhhhhhhhhhh!

Good thing I let go of that kite when Kent yelled " Let it go!"



:o



Second worst blunder is to incorrectly rig the bridle knot on your two line LEI wipika in 1998 in the middle of Miami Bch. and then launch it to find out that it takes 5 Cuban immigrants and one illegal mexican holding you down to stop the kite from pulling you into the hotels on the beach! :shock:

Big R! I Have 2 words for your second blunder," DAMN!,DAAMMN! " :shock: :D
Balloon boy!!! your second blunder give me a good giggle :D :D

My second blunder would have to be trying to make the kite have way more depower, (this is pre 100% depower Bow). I think back in 03 , anywho! I was experimenting with extending the center line, because I love riding over powered but wanted
to be able to have some kind of control of the kite without flying down wind in a ball of speed holding onto dear life,well,one day at work(Radisson’s water sports) I made the center line waaay to long and when I self launched about 50 yards away from a wall and in front of 2 sail boats the kite came up and went straight into the power zone, as I was sand skiing ,but not panicking towards this wall and missed the sail boats
I was able to crash the kite on top of the roof of the Time share condos next door. When I stopped sand skiing I was arms length in front of the wall. I did perfect the depowering and then came Bows.When I extending the center line the other riders called crazy Cabrinha does it, calls it 100% depower and it’s innovation, what kind of crap is
that… :D :D .

I just remembered . . .
 

Not long after learning I put some new groovy lines on my bar- the ones that are tres expensive, stiff, and work no better than the others.

I fed them thru the bottom of the end of the bar as I should, but also thru the top of the end piece. That hole tapers to a V and while big enough for the line, its not for the leader. Stay with me on this.

That week sailed at Club M lit on my 14m Flow and was stoked, only Roger and I. After a couple of hours I'm done but Roger is still on the water so I get to shore drop my kite in the water downwind ( you know, the safest way to land) and wait for it to depower. It doesn't. The leader slides through the bar and than gets jammed at the V. I've let go of the bar but am attached by the safety to my arm. Now the kite starts death spiraling downwind (out to sea fortunately) at about 10 o'clock and I'm getting dragged with it, flying actually; only the tops of my feet are skimming/hitting the water.

I'm kinda wondering what to do- just ditch the kite? Naw- its a perfectly good kite, so I reach up and grab one side of the bar and manage to crash the kite. For about 10 seconds then up it went again. More death spirals.

Managed to get it down again and get it off me this time. The kite flipping merrily out to sea (good riddance). Meanwhile Roger had witnessed the whole event , jumped in my boat and came to fetch me then the kite. When he arrives I'm spent and totally douched. The look on Rogers face said everything; "Fcuk Dave, that was intense!". We will now be forever bound by this event.

After, when I unwound my lines I counted over 30 winds- so thats 30+ loops. Lucky this was at Club M where downwind is just water. If it had been Cable Beach or Coral Harbour . . . it would have been far uglier.

Didn't know about this one didja?

:shock: OOH!!! men! :shock: that was some serious and freaky shit, reading that
I was actually visualizing it in my head, Wow! the thing that's making me laugh,was the fact that you was hurlding down wind into deep shark infested ocean and you was thinking bout how the kite was a perfectly good and didn't want to let it good,that's funny as hell. :lol: :lol: :lol: I’m glad ya still with us.
Balloon B.I thought you was blunder free. :o I can’t believe you was
holding out on us with that story

I can confirm balloonboys kitemare, I remember clearly him getting T-bagged non stop for a long long distance, at first I though it was funny but when he didn't relase after 5 or so loops the show went from fun to scary...lucky we had his boat there...
This topic also remindes me of a couple of experiences on the island:
1.- early 2004 with Matteo, launching my first ever kite a 9m foil, Matteo is holding the bar (2 line) and I am holding the foil straight down wind of him, probably close to 20 knots, I can barelyhold the kite as the lines are hurting my fingers, Matteo gives me the sign and there he goes!!! first 2 meters airtime then a head first dive into the sand and then about 25 meters sand dragged downwinder to where I am standing, I managed to hold him down, I remember his face, eyes nose ears completely full of sand but still smiling!! He the managed to surf for about 5 minutes then the bar broke in half and he had to swim back in dragging the wet heavy foil behindd him...
2. Ridding to club med with ballonboy on heavy big seas, waves crashing close to the boat barely making into the bay , my adrenaline was gone before we even started kiteing. We finally make it in to the bay and we are told to look out for the body of a surfer who drawned the previous day surfing the big break there (body washed in couple of days later) Sad and scary stuff
3. All alone downwinder from paradise island cabbage beach to cable beach or so I thought...wife drops me off and I tell her to go wait for me at cable...had some fun right there and made it past club med all good fun, but wind is turnig more and more off-shore black clouds behind me, already considering dumping the kite and swimming in as I am crossing the harbour entrance, i get nervous and get as close as I can to the rocks on the west side of the harbour, waves are crashing on to the rocks, not the best place to land, local fisherman sitting on the rocks watching me struggle throws a rope attached to a bucket (which he used for keeping his bait) at me, that did not help my situation at all and now i am thinking of sharks as well. I released the safety and hold kite on one line, started swimming towards rocks looking down the deap water for any shades...
finally made it in, cut my foot on the rocks, fisherman thought i was nuts and gave me a ride home....
I am missing the island!!!

Wish you were here for my next kitemare. It won't be the same.
And Laura and Alex miss Toby. How is Toby?? Send me a pic for them. They're in Gstaad hiking right now.