Earlier in the week, Miyachi told me there was a typhoon rolling in this weekend so apart from having to work on Saturday, the weekend looked good... Forecast came up to par too so I headed out, aiming for a 12:30 on-the-water start. Highway wasn't co-operating though, with a traffic jam on the important junction to Tsu... a 70-minute traffic jam. So I jumped off at Tsuchiyama and took the bottom roads...
Arrived at around 12:30pm to a good blow - people putting up 6's and 9's. I measured on the shore - dipping to 6m/s, gusting to 13, averaging around 10. Hmm... it's supposed to pick up too. XB 13 is my smallest LEI but wait, I've got the Speed3 12 in car... hope I can get out with that on the small board!
Nuts, forgot I tried to swap the Black Line and hadn't finished tuning the lines... quicker to swap the bar for the S3 15's. So I do that.
Ooh neato - the tide is out, leaving a good size of clean beach to set up on and some flat water just... down... there. Lay the kite out, re-rig the bar... help some people launch :-/ easy launch for me - except for fatty standing right next to the kite and looking like he wanted to help but didn't know what to grab so he just fucking stood right next to it and refused to move. So I launched over his toes...
Into the water... tough to get started - trim the kite, that's better! Ok we're moving and we got some board speed - booOOOST! Gonna be a good day!
And it was! Some epic big boosts, carving nicely up the face of clean waves. Also had fun trying to ride the waves, carving some gybes... even got a few nice back rolls in, I was feeling so brave.
I stuck to what is apparently the appropriate area for kiteboarders (!) cos the water was better anyway. Got a bit crowded as the day progressed - The Fattest Kiteboarder in Japan was there, that gringo from Nagoya and a bunch of people I recognize but don't know the names of. A few occasions of having to do a quick gybe to get out of their ways but otherwise, no problems.
Had some fighting with the kite in the lulls... had to keep it trimmed to stop backstalling it but that didn't seem to affect the jumps :o Had a tip-wrap that I could only solve by flying it to the edge, putting it on the water, letting it drift back onto the LE then relaunching it that way. Dude on the shore looked like he was going to help LOL no thanks! Towards the end of my session, it got punchy as hell - kite was jumping like a summabitch, making like it was going to invert and generally giving me the shits. Add to that the abrasion from the harness and so, I packed it in.
Sat down to reverse land but it behaved itself once it was down... 2 and a half hours on the water! Great session!
As I was wrapping up, I noticed that the guy on the F-one had just ripped a hole LE to TE on his kite... poor bugger!
Moment of the day was, for once, not the massive jumps but actually dropping into a wave and feeling the drive... I can see why those kooks get into it!
Mood of the session was mellow thrilled surprised.
It sucks when the guys taking photos with the telephoto lens doesn't offer to email you the pics...
Weather was reported as ESE 21-19-20-20 knots at 1-4pm; max gust of 32 knots at 5pm. 28.5°C at 78%.
Wind felt like it was closer to the peak gusts than it was to what was recorded... 30% just underpowered, 60% perfectly powered and 10% slightly worried.
What I learned today...
• That turbulent bit just behind a breaker is not so good to ride it - not enough water?
• Kept landing little hops too much on my front foot = face-plant.
• Sharks stay on even when you get hit in the face by a giant breaker!
• The spreader bar pad is catching on the power belt - that's why it's flipping up.
• The 12 is so quick across the window when you turn that you HAVE to sheet in to slow it down... but be prepared for the power!
• Fancy footwork with the board gets you around waves nicely...
• Maybe I don't need a Nugget after all!
• Almost filling my thermos with ice makes for sweet, sweet cold water!
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