Peoples one and all
Waveslave in his usual unique way has once again raised a valid question in response to a thread which I posted on the Kite forum about and indecent and a location and I for one laud him for it, well done mate
In answer to your question WS
I personally Do Not want to see kiting banned anywhere.
I sail with kiters and windsurfers, a lot of my mates kitesurf and I've been know to have a blast when a bunch of the Perth Riffraff kiting crew come down for a play and I end up being the only Poley out, It doesn't stop the buzz.
I have yet to see a patch of water or a wave with my name on, that being said, I haven't seen anyone else's name on them either.
My thread was designed to point out that the area which we speed sail in Novara is hazardous for Kiting, sh1t in all honesty it's F'ken hazardous for windsurfers as well as Hardies near catastrophic accident of Friday demonstrated.
The other point I wanted to put across was the lack of attention and total ignorance of some people to other sailing around them.
I
Screamed out at the top of my lungs (my throat was sore 2 days later) a fowl mouthed diatribe at a kiter to get his attention to avoid a collision whilst doing what I could to avoid it, thankful he heard me and finally realized there was someone else out there on the water with him and thus managed to avoid a collision.
Now I'll be brutally honest here, I've blown the sh1T out of more windsurfers than I have Kiters (haven't I Hardie
) when they have decided to charge direction rapidly on a run which then require extreme evasive tactics to avoid a collision.
So back to the original post, Polies and teabaggers should be able to share the water, what it takes is a mutual respect and understanding of what the other can and can't do.
Speed sailing What is it?Speed sailing in reality is (semi) controlled lunacy
In relation to speed sailing most people both windsurfers and kiters
think they know what it is involved with speed sailing, the reality is they have no idea what is truly speed sailing.
Most people think that speed sailing is simply blasting back and forth fast, it's not.
You start out by finding the flattest water on the windiest day and then go as fast as you can.
Great good job, now go back to your car pack up your gear and rig a much bigger sail a slalom sail. Put away that wave board , get a fast freeride or slalom board, put a pointer on it.
Go out again and go as fast as you can
Great good job, but you are still going square to the wind, you'll never go fast like that.
Start bearing away, wow you are going faster now cool still not fast enough though.
Start bearing away even more, damn the sails running out of grunt.
Back to the car, Rig an even bigger sail.
Woo hoo we're going quick now but the fins offering to much drag, back to the car put a smaller one on the board.
Now start bearing of the wind even more, oh that's interesting having the wind come over your rear shoulder rather than straight behind you.
Wow we're now going down wind over the back of chop with a small fin skipping from chop to chop.
We want to go quicker still, time for the speed board, time for some absorbent undies.
You fire this puppy up and let it fly it feels like you are sliding on ice, flying down wind, skipping over chop with a f'ken big sail and a skinny little board designed for going fast in a straight line praying that you don't cavitate the tiny fin under your feet whilst trying to hang onto a sail which is trying all the time to launch you as far away from it as possible.
You see the gust of death coming for you just down the run, do you stand up or do you go, you've taken that big can of HTFU before you've gone out, you lean back into the harness even more, you trim the board flat and you point further down wind and with a big grin on your face (Huey hates to see fear) you wait for the acceleration.
The gust is worst than you thought when it hit's, Oh Blessed mother of acceleration "I'm gonna die" you hang on a grit you teeth some more, and on occasion clench your freckle a bit tighter.
You come out the back of the run heart running a million miles an hour, you've survived.
You've done it!!!
a new personal best it's taken you over 6 months to do it, a YYYYYyeeeeeehhhhhhhaaaarrrrrrggggghhhhhhhh escapes your mouth
The next run you will do it all again and try to go even fasterUnfortunately good speed sailing days where all the planets of wind, tides and availability align are rare,
True PB days only happen 2 maybe 3 times a year.What you generally see is the speed sailors training, honing the skills, reactions and equipment for those few special days when they can exceed what they have previously done.
Speed gear is designed for one thing, Going fast in a straight line, not going around corners, not dealing with chop, and mostly for not being easy to slow down, this gear wants to go fast and it doesn't give a F**k if you don't want to.
With speed gear you
can't be half pregnant it's not forgiving you ride it like it's meant to be ridden or you don't ride it all, because if you don't it will bite you. That said it's pretty special when they light up for you.
Speed sailing (both kiting and windsurfing) is only done by dedicated obsessive loonies.
We go out on the windiest day with the biggest sails, the smallest boars and fins we can hang onto, if we can't hang onto the sail quite often weight jackets come out to help hang onto the power which we need to go faster.
We go out with the knowledge that we could have a big of and that of is very likely to injure us, but still we do it and push it harder.
Every other sailor out there be they Kiter or Windsurfer, wave rider freestyler or freerider will generally sail within their limitations and rig for the conditions.
If the wave is to big, they'll chicken gybe or if then conditions look beyond their capabilities.
This is not belittling these disciplines far from it it is showing respect for common sense of these sailors.
Speed sailing however is about exceeding personal limitations and forever pushing your boundaries, it's not easy, it's generally not comfortable (I've shat myself figuratively speaking on quite a few runs) it's very personal as you are constantly racing yourself, but when you do it right it's immensely rewarding.
As speed sailors we do try to keep out of trouble as the speeds we travel when things go wrong it hurts a lot both physically and financially.
Due to the nature of the gear which we sail with we can't react quickly and we cover a lot of distance in a short amount of time.
Nobody owns any particular patch of water.
And Wavey
In regards to your solution, when you want to let go of your gear and bail when you are traveling in excess of 30knots I'll take my hat of to you.
However what you have then is gear still whistling down the course traveling at +30knots which is now without anyone controlling it.
In regards to my issue which you've taken the piss out of (which is fair enough)
I tried pointing my gear up wind as much as I could I managed to wash of 3knots of speed when the guy started pointing further up wind, I started bellowing 50-100m away from him and finished my sentence after I passed him (you can see what I shouted).
It's not like they didn't know where were sailing as we were there long before they turned up and the lines we were taking.
Sailing at 45º to the flow of speed sailing is either lunacy, ignorance either way it's an accident waiting to happen.
Oh well that's my lot on the subject
Good winds to everyone
Have fun out there and play nicely
).
