Sports

The reason I started power-kiting was to get into kite-surfing as a light-wind alternative to windsurfing. It took me a while to get a kite-surfboard shaped, and to buy a water-relaunchable kite, but once I had, there was no stopping me. Conditions so far have meant that I've only had a few attempts at kite-surfing, but I managed to get going and on the plane on my first attempt. On my second attempt I was holding my ground upwind on many of my runs. All in all its been a lot easier to learn than any other sport I've done, although progress has been slow this year due to injuries sustained windsurfing. Just maybe the skills learnt elsewhere have helped.. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

Quite a few of the local windsurfers such as Ben, Derek, Simon and Andy are having a go at kitesurfing here in West Wales now, as are some of the surfers such as Shem. Mike is the doing nothing else but kitesurfing and a few other people are regularly seen out kitesurfing on the beach here now. Some days it is more popular than windsurfing and always seems to draw a crowd of interested onlookers.

One of the exciting things about Kite-surfing is that the sport is new and equipment is therefore changing rapidly, with new innovations appearing each month. There are so many variations in the kites, the boards and the bars/handles that deciding which is best is extremely difficult. In actual fact, no-one really knows what's best at the moment, which is why there are so many options. I'm sure things will settle down a bit in a few years and a few designs will prove the most applicable.

At the moment, most people tend to use inflatable kites such as the Wipika and Naish. These have an inflatable leading edge and cross-struts which both hold the kite in shape and allow it to float and therefore be relaunched from water. Other people are using traditional foil kites, especially the Flexifoil Blade series of kites. These are not recommeded for beginners though as they do not float on the water. The third type of kite is a sealed foil such as the Peter Lynn Waterfoil. These have valves along the leading edge which let air in, but not out. This allows the kite to fill with air and adopt a normal foil shape, but should you crash the kite on the water the air stays in the kite, the kite floats and retains its foil shape and launches easily from the water.

All of these kites can be flown in different configurtions, from a bar or handles or in four-line, three-line or two-line mode.

Kite-Surf Boards come in a variety of shapes and sizes too. Larger boards are generally for lighter winds and earlier planing and result in a loss of manouverability, especially in the air, over smaller boards. The three types of board used are directionals, wake-boards and twin tips. Directionals are similar to normal surfboards in appearance, but have sharper thinner rails, have different fin positions and have footstraps on the deck. Wake-boards are the same as those used behind boats and allow for some impressive aerial tricks. They are however more difficult to use to start with, more difficult to maintain ground upwind and have very little bouyancy for early planing or should you need to swim back to shore with it. Twin-tips are a hybrid design between directionals and wake-boards. They tend to be similar in size to a directional board, giving early planing performance, but have a symmetrical nose/tail meaning that they can be sailed in any direction like a wake-board.

Kite-surfing localities are very much dependent on the wind direction, but the best two places around here, especially for beginners/intermediates are the Golf Course Car Park, Borth and the estuary at Ynyslas, which are pretty much next to each other. The west facing beach at Borth is best for kite-surfing at any state of the tide except high tide, and in any winds without any easterly in them (Westerly is onshore). The opposite is true of the estuary at Ynyslas, where its only possible to kite-surf approximately two hours either side of high tide. Wind direction here is less of a factor due to its protected nature and the shape of the beach, onshore winds can be anything from north-westerly through northerly, to south-easterly. Basically from this side of the estuary south-westerly is offshore, and even in a westerly there is a lee-shore which makes for relative safety.