Kiteboarding News: welovetokite.com

Back in Tarifa again for 10 days, 2 days ago the started the J&B kite masters.

Witch is bassicly a event with a format of freestyle of the last 10 years. And 16 riders where invited.

So we had 45% points for freestyle , 45% points for old school and 10 % for inovation.

In the first heat i was against Jose luengo , the wind was gusty and not that strong  but i won my heat and past to the next round. Read more ...

So todaythe wind is strong on the beach you see mostly 9m kites and smaller. It is goingto be windy day. For my previous experience over here in Tarifa the wind willsoon be even too strong for 7m. But it didn’t come to that strong but 7m yes myfirst heat i had my 7m and manage to pull off some tricks that the judges didlike and decided to pass me on to the next heat. Next heat I’m up vs. the bigSpanish star Alvaro Onieva. And sins the format isn’t only powered freestyletricks everyone is going for big airs and also board offs. It’s a cool idea tocombine freestyle and old school tricks. So anyways next heat I was up vs.Alvaro and i felt i had a pretty good heat did some technical tricks and thensome high board offs. And also manage to land a double pass in the end of theheat. It felt good. But ehhh not this time,, I lose the heat and I’m out forthe day. Tomorrow we will run the double elimination and i will be back withmore news then. Now it’s time for a shower and then we have another dinner.Cheers and enjoy: D

For your FREE WALLPAPER for the month of September, I have chosen a photo taken by Jason Pini, during my once-in-a-lifetime-adventure to Papua New Guinea.

Papua New Guinea is a truly hidden paradise. An absolutely unique place, way back in time…  The country and its people are incredibly special and so lovely.

My trip was divided into 3 stages. This very shot’s been taken pretty much right at the start, when I was privileged to spend one week in a tiny little village on the  “Trobriand Islands”, which are also known as “Islands of Love”. Read more ...

It´s been the first year for the European Tour and we had lot´s of fun during the five events. After I came back from the Seat Supercopa and DTM races in the Netherlands I had a very good session in Denmark. Powered on my 9 with 22 meter lines and could land a new grab with a pass afterwards. Then my dad and me hit the road to the last tour stop of the Kitesurf Tour Europe which took place in Swinoujscie / Poland. The first day there was side off shore wind and really gusty conditions. After the first two rounds we had to stop the Singles and wait for more stable winds. Anyway I could pass my first heats against the local Pyand and the Dutch rider Bram Bast. On Thursday we had a day off and could make some plans for the winter. And then on Friday we finally got the conditions we hoped for (except the rain). The wind was blowing with 20 knots from north east and I could pass into the semifinal after riding against the Italian Martinelli. The semifinal against Christophe Tack, who beat Mike Blomvall the heat before, went good. Mobe to wrapped, some switches and Kiteloops took me to the final. The ten minutes final started off good for me until I missed my swtich Low Mobe. In the end I could nail my switch Downloop Slim and L3. Alberto who also had a good heat got podium again and is now European Champion. Congratulations! After I lost the last two finals in the KTE with a 2 / 3 decision I know that I can reach for the titel the next years. Happy about the European Vize Champion I will finish the season in Europe now and hit Mauritius the next days. Thanks to my sponsors and my family for helping me so much with the last stops!

PolandEuropean tour,

So firstoff from Sweden the ferry from Ystad over to Poland Swinoujscie. The ferry toklike 8h, it was over night so I slept all the way in a cabin. Later: finally atthe event site. When I want to sign in they told me that all the spots wheretaken and I might not be able to compete. Uhh so I went all the way here fornothing I was thinking for myself. But after some talk with the crew theysomehow fixed me in. Phew that was nice. So anyways there is wind and lest seehow good the conditions are. Well the conditions are not the best today andtomorrow it doesn’t look promising on the forecast for tomorrow. So my firstheat up I went alone somehow the dude who was in my heat thought we wererunning 2 men heats but it was 4 men heats. Next heat was against a polishrider don’t remember his name sorry for that. I won that one and that puts mein a good position for next day of the freestyle. This day was over so it’stime to find a hotel sins I went straight to the event I had no time to findhotel. So on my way with my clothes and some other gear in my hands. I went tothe closest on of course and obviously it was full. And they told me that thenext hotel was 15 min away. And I didn’t feel like walking that long with fullof stuff fin my hands so I called Victor and he was just leaving form the eventsite with his car so I got lift with him and I found a nice place. Read more ...

Eventually the new homepage of Kitelife has gone online now and presents itself in a new design. A friend of mine, Martin and I designed and progammed the new page. We hope that you will like the new home of Kitelife. If you are looking for a new online presents and have not found something good, just contact us and we’ll find something nice for you. Besides designing homepages the winter has been pretty nice but with no wind at all. Thus I have to go surfing more often. I found a new spot lately which is just around the corner from where I live. It is super nice there and not that aggressive such as Trigg Point. Yesterday there was another super great John Butler concert. It is always something special when an artist plays in his or her hometown. It was just incredibly awesome. So far. I am going to wax my board again and go for another surf. Read more ...

Over the last few days we have been attempting to cross the English Channel. The plan was for Richard Branson along with Family (Holly, Sam and Ivo Branson) and a group of friends including a few of us from Flexifoil would attempt to brake the record for Oldest and youngest kiteboarder, Biggest group and Fastest crossing on a kiteboard across the channel. Unfortunately we did not make it this time, Monday was used for the guys to familiarize themselves with the gear, Tuesday was perfect for us kiteboarders but after 5 miles of batteling through the huge swell in 35 knots we were forced by the boats to come back to the UK as it was unsafe to support the riders in the massive seas. Wednesday we ended up without wind so now we have rescheduled the crossing for sometime in the coming 2 weeks. Read more ...

Just 3weeks ago I got invited bye a dude in china named Lui. There was supposed to bean kite surfing competition and attending would be about 30 differentcountries. I had never been in china before so I did not know what to expectwhen I was going to arrive there. And the place I was going to was not a veryhuge place they say but is any city in china small? Anyways the place is calledQuindao and you pronounce it like it was spelled something like this,(schindao). We were not exactly in this town but where close to something thatwas called Weifang. Read more ...

Dear Friends,

After a couple of days riding at home, and getting back a little bit to the freestyle world :D, here below i post one of the trick i’ve been working hard the last days, was a bit mission to land it, because you have to be very fast turning the hibs to complete the 540 while the kite is very low. It always feels great to land new stuff, specially when you dont hang from the kite at all. Read more ...

I’ve just come across something that ‘The Legend’:  “Good Old Bob” once said and respectively has put into one of his songs and I would like to quote it here 4 u:

“Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you’re riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake Up and Live !” Read more ...

Los mejores kitesurfers del mundo se enfrentarán en la gran final de “J&B Masters of Kite”

Álex Pastor y Álvaro Onieva, dos de los mejores riders españoles, tendrán muchas oportunidades de hacerse con un puesto en el podium Read more ...

Not much was happening today … we woke up so hungover after a great party at the Grizzy Pub in Squamish and honestly we prayed there wouldn’t come any wind! We weren’t lucky. The wind came and it was just weird. There were huge gusts and massive lulls where the kites wold simply fall out of the sky. It sucked! I just gave up after I swam in the cold water for 10 minutes trying to get my kite back up in the air. The guys started one race and actually counted it as well which was kind of weird but whatever, I still had 1 discard after 5 races so it was alright. Overall I am on place 4. I was racing on a NJS board that Adam Vance has brought along. Really good board. It’s pretty easy to jibe and tack and kind of small so you need a little bigger kite. The smaller size makes the board super controllable in the chop. And chop we had a lot during the race with the current of the estuary pushing against the wind. It’s actually for sale the board so if you’re around and wanna get in touch with Adam. I’ll post some contact – details of him later. Read more ...

I have been in Mauritius for the last 10 days, we had some good conditions and we were able to capture some real nice footage for a new short action movie that will be released soon. The guys working with Flexifoil at Kite@North hooked us up during our trip so we got to see all the epic spots. Look out for the video coming soon. Read more ...

Walked out the bus this morning and wasn’t really sure if I was actually awake yet! There was a huge cargo – ship at the terminal, no clouds, a massive glacier in the background and another huge peak on the other side of the valley which I all haven’t spotted before because it was covered in clouds before. I really thought this place couldn’t get any more beautiful but I was wrong … Read more ...

Yesterday the wind has been kind of weird. It didn’t come in really smooth but super gusty with short lulls and gusts. It wasn’t really too much fun riding out there so I stopped after an hour or so. Still we got some cool shots … the background is just mindblowing! There’s this massive wall right on the other side of the bay and you’re surrounded by almost 2000m high mountains. Unfortunately the weather is cloudy at the moment which screws the wind up a little bit. Read more ...

We’re getting close to the end of the season. We only have 3 tourstops left, maybe they’re still gonna add 1 more, but is not confirmed so far. So, the season is past half of it and unfortunately we lost one of the TOP 4 contenders to the title. Now that Kevin hurt his knee and unfortunately is gonna be out this year, it looks like it’s gonna be a fight between Andy Yates, Youri Zoon and me. We’re pretty close on the rankins and I think we have pretty much the same chances. Read more ...