I think anyplace is better than BS for beginners, except maybe the Gandy! The launch at BS is tricky and there is not much room for error. Plus, the wind closer to shore is usually a little weird, making the launch ever worse for beginners. I did not ride at BS at all until this year, and I started kiting 5 years ago. There are still times I don't feel good about riding there, especially when the wind is really heavy or gusty. Hell, the last time I got hurt, I was at BS and got tossed onto the beach by a gnarly gust and suffered a contusion to my left heel that is still a little tender.

Z paid some dues yesterday but he will come back stronger. I think Z lives up in St. Pete, so hook him up with a few of the easier spots. Z, you might want to get some booties to wear, as well, to protect your feet until you progress with the kite to the point that you are not fighting against it by jamming your feet into the seafloor. That's always a prescription for an infected laceration.

One last thing, Z.

Z said:Remember that you are always responsible for your kite, so if a wind gust, wind lull, rogue wave, girl in a topless bikini, broken line or some other unexpected event causes things to get of of control, it is still up to you to get that kite back under control without the kite hurting someone else. Otherwise, the blame will fall on you.

Expecting the unexpected will help you to minimize the risk of problems, and putting the blame on yourself for any kitemares you have will help you to learn from errors and avoid repeating them.

Frankly, a lot of events are not unexpected. Gusts and lulls are part of every session, and you will need to learn to handle them if you don't want to spend your whole session with your kite in the water while you are not being teabagged.

I remember watching a kiter flying a kite once on a beach just upwind of a father and his little girl. The wind was going side-off and was gusty, so the kite was falling back in the window and eventually hit the beach, 5 feet upwind of this little girl. Then, the kite powers up and roars right past the father and his little girl. Bad stuff. When I confronted the kiter, who is a friend of mine, he told me, "it's not my fault, the wind is really gusty all of a sudden." That's a bullshit answer and I told him as much. There were a lot of things he could have done to avoid such a problem: getting further away from people, riding at a different spot, even putting the kite down because of the difficult conditions.

I'll get off the soapbox now, but a characteristic of every strong rider is that rider's knowledge that he is 100% responsible for taking care of himself and his kite. Given my full-on kitemare earlier this year, I need to remember this just as much as anyone else.