Hey all.
A quick shout out for the new AK National Championships being held down at the Royal Brighton Yacht Club and sponsored by Cabrinha!
Below is the flier, but for more info I’d suggest checking out www.aksa.com.au
It’s also a good time to get your AK membership back up to date and get the all important 3rd party insurance!
OK. So this isn’t the finest bit of video production. It took about 2 mins whilst skyping with the parentals so I wasn’t putting lots of effort in. As you can see we had some small go pro issues with water on the lens and this is about all the footage we were able to use.
Anyway, wind was good, weather was fine, company was outstanding. We also ran into Jen so there is a guest appearance from her.
Don’t complain about the bop bop music! Haha
Got this message from Hugh. If you’ve seen it let him know. Ta.
2012 CrazyFly Pro Tour – 130 cm Kite board lost in Botany Bay, Sydney at 20:00 30/01/2014! REWARD OFFER TO ANYONE WITH INFOMATION!!! Please contact me on 0431304889, +447766223090 or hughjp@icloud.com Please help me find it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This great little pic came in from Hobbsy, he’s highlighting one of the many perils at Fishermans (brownwater) beach.
Over the past month I’ve seen 2 kites get wrecked on this puppy, numerous fins have been lost to it’s bite and I believe there is also some skin stuck between it’s teeth!
Last night I heard of the demise to another kite to this hungry monster! To those of you who don’t know where this rock is please see the image below from our ‘right of way part 1′ post. It’s the yellow highlighted section at on the left of the image at the bottom that goes out from the beach!
Also be aware that it could be ‘lurking’ low in the water at high tide and a lot longer than you expect!
Why am I telling you this? Well as much as I love to see the kite industry kept alive in new gear and kite repairs its pretty dangerous and a PITA.. so you’ve been warned!
Nice one Davey!
You’d have to be living in a cave right now to not notice that Sydney has wind! In fact, it’s spankingly windy!
I’m looking at the charts and seeing 30knots+ down south and a good 20knots on the Northern Beaches! Looking at the cams at 6pm (I’m still in the office!) I can see kites everywhere! If you didn’t know about the surfit.com cams you can click on the cam links to Manly, Narra, Longy etc from the ‘Wind, Sea & Forecasts’ menu up the top.
The rest of the week is looking pretty good too for the Sydney based kite enthusiast with NE’ers every day this week.
Hope you all had a great ‘Stralia Day. Crews were up north at Old bar, Down south at Ulladulla and probably everywhere in between. Personally I’m tired, sore and sunburnt! I’m hoping to have some good footage to put up on the site soon 
Laters, kite safe.
Pete
Day of rest today but looking pretty schmick for Sunday and Monday over here.
In fact, looking pretty darned good for the next week if you don’t have to work. Apologies for the long gaps between posts. Back at work in the office during the week these days so not much chance to kite or write posted for the site. Summer has kicked in with steroids this year. Cracking 35C pretty much every day these days, despite the forecast calling it 10 degrees less. And it you’re sitting in an office facing west like I am right now, probably add another 5C to that –Infact, my little DickSmith digi thermo unit says 37.5 right now.
20-25 knots from the south tomorrow and Monday. A few of us are getting together for a BBQ at a friends in the mid-afternoon down near Separation Point on Sunday after the Foreshore activities then head out in the water somewhere between Seppos and Back Beach for a bit of fun. Not sure what the plan is for Monday — probably a little excursion up to Coronation.
Haven’t been shooting a lot of photos, GoPro or otherwise lately — that sort of photography is all a bit of an also-ran with so much of it around these days. I wonder what the next cool thing in photography is going to be/?
EXPERIMENTAL MUTANT PROJECT.
In case you haven’t seen my seabreeze posts, I’m trying some new setups on my old Underground Firebird mutant these past few weeks. After accidentally losing a back fin I panicked and couldn’t work out how to replace it. Underground no longer made them and there were no after-market ones around to fit. SO, in desperation, I took and old surfboard fin I had in the car, cut the FCS tabs off, drilled out some holes and bolted it onto the bottom. Voilat! Much to my surprise, it worked better than the original. Love it! So much smoother, better transitions, less drag, etc.
So now, I’ve pulled the other original off and also replaced it with another type of surfboard fin. Here’s a shot of the initial config I’ve been using the past few weeks. Original fin on the left, replacement surfboard fin on the right. Just used some stainless self-taping screws, carefully drilled some pilot holes in three increasingly larger diameters the put some stainless washers on the top to spread the load, and it’s solid as can be.
Will file another when there’s some news on the next trial run. Mutants just leave other strapped boards for dead for just about anything. Yet, it’s difficult to find one that incorporates the design elements necessary to make it all work.
Guess it’s time for me to do a mutant article next!
Stumbled across this vid today. Maybe the first kite vid to feature boobies. Featuring Keahi doing what he does best. And some boobs.
Here is some good action of pro kiters Jesse Richman and Patri McLaughlin taking a few good sets at Jaws in December. Some great wipeout and saves using the kites. Those Naish parks are great! Who’s game enough to try that unstrapped tho?
Enjoy
One thing that seems to be pretty common on the beach is lost gear! I just had a look at the lost and founds over at SeaBreeze and see lots of lost bars, helmets and cameras etc. It seems to be more common with learners who are not into a comfortable routine with their setup and de-rig and still over complicate things by having lots of gear out on the grass or are recovering tangled lines and wet kites etc. It’s interesting looking at the lost gear (we have a few unclaimed bars still on our lost gear section) is that lines are always wrapped up so the intention was to probably take that gear home!
Here is the ONE single thing you need to know so you will NEVER loose your bar or helmet again (if all goes to plan)..
Never put your bar or helmet down! This sounds pretty strange but its actually very simple.
When you have wrapped your bar and lines up simply use your chicken loop and donkey dick to hook your bar to the back of your harness (if you have no strap just stick it down the back of your harness) instead of putting them on the floor. Now all you need to do is not take your harness off when getting to the car and put it directly into the boot where you can put the bar in its bag etc. This will work with helmets too!
There are heaps on benefits for doing this. Less sand, not loosing stuff, less to carry and less to drop.
See the attached picture to see what we mean.
We really hope this helps you to keep your gear safe and sound.
Hi All,
I’m cleaning out the garage and found 3 slingshot pumps that I believe are un-used! They are a few years old but they are great for travelling as they are the half size ones. All have metal shafts. I’m shifting these for $15 each. Sorry there are no hoses.
First come first serve on choice of color. email me on pete@kitesurfing.com.au
Got anything you need to sell. email us some pics and a description and we’ll post it up for you..
Cheers
Pete