Out due to ACL injury
 

Dudes and Dudettes, I have been out with a pulled ACL and RUPTURED ACHILLES since last tuesday! I am so bummed with the wind blowing like crazy this whole week. Went up for a sweet jump, came down, hit a wave front tip first, board came off one foot and SWUNG around the other. OUCH!!!

Makes me think about getting binders for when I wanna get really crazy in high winds... any thoughts on that are welcome.

Hopefully I will see you all soon, maybe another week.

~Christopher

Did a doctor actually tell you that you had a ruptured achilles?
A ruptured achilles would mean you would be out for a pretty long time.
I hope that's not what you have. Did they say strain, I hope?

my brother got a ruptured achilles and was down and out for a long time..months.. finally had it fixed surgically .. serious stuff if not cared for.. heal quick man.. never want to hear about anyone getting hurt..

gotta be quick to kick the board out if you are heading for a slam..

i dont like the idea of having my feet in bindings.. i get in a few situations per session where its safer to kick the board off than anything else..

others like them tho... tough call.

Sorry to hear of your injury. Word to the wise, don't mess with your Achilles tendons. The result can be permanent and even life altering. If the doc says, rest it do just that. I saw a guy once with some Achilles damage from when he was a teenager, there was some atrophy to where his leg was about half the size of the normal leg in that area. Despite that he his real active, still if you have a choice to avoid this, why not.

I've been a step behind messed up Achilles with torn Gastrocs. If you need to rehab your calves, I have had pretty good luck using http://www.amazon.com/ProStretch-Pro.../dp/B0006OG44G . Far more luck than with physical theraphy even, if your doc thinks it could help and if it won't annoy your ACL.

Coming from a wakeboarding background I was very uncertain about not having my feet in bindings when I started kiteboarding.

I have taken some pretty hard falls from pretty high up and at much faster speeds than on a kiteboard and never had a problem.

I'm not opposed to riding with bindings as well. I think that its just a little harder to get back in them if you fall off. Not a bad thought though.

You might want to take a look at the LF Union binding.

but the difference is you can let go when wakeboarding....
try being stuck in binding when your kite goes into a death spiral....

im sure tom wouldnt have walked away from his EB accident if he had his feet stuck in binding, more then likely would have dislocated something.....

but everything has its risks.....

Correct, everything has its risks and I don't know what happened with Tom and East Beach, but if you are riding in accordance to the agreed upon safety rules like riding 200 feet from the beach one might have more time to 1) get their feet out of bindings (I can do this rather quickly) 2) pull the releases on ones kite (This should not have much to do with ones feet)

Like I said, I don't know what happened and like you said everything does have its risks!

Sounds like this month is officially "Injury Awareness Month." I've been wearing a knee brace since Tuesday due to a kiting injury at Lassing. Brian just hurt his knee the other day as well....and now Chris. Man, I'm glad this month is almost over! lol

tom got worked .. dragged in from over 200 meters out i believe.. QR wouldnt release .. issues with the BEST 04 bar QR system..
basically he was at the mercy of a pummeling, looping kite when a squall hit the beach.. the nightmare-kitemare that we all fear.

Yep... dragged about 100 yards into shore, lofted, and dragged (on stomach while kite looping) another 40 yards between the signs, trees, and moving cars (!) until hitting the mangroves at the back of EB.

Board was still 100 yards out in the water. I was standing (walking for my board) on a sandbar in waist deep water when it went crazy.

I don't think kicking my feet out of the bindings would have even had time to sink in though because it all happened so fast... but maybe if I were used to kicking them off. I've seen quite a few people dragged/lofted onto shore with bindings still on their feet. Then again I may have been able to hold the kite down if I'd had my board on my feet (maybe but maybe not) ... instead I was dragged like a rag doll.

BTW, this was 2+ years ago on an 18M C kite when it suddenly went from 13 to 35+, onshore winds... as Bleighty mentioned... stupid QR failure.

Lesson: Crash kite in water immediately (and repeatedly) when it goes ballistic and THEN release or unhook it.