Careful observation of the weather witchcraft website gpv-weather.info lead me down to the lake at 11am. Started out nicely powered on the Crossbow, but soon was wa-aaay overpowered - 8m/s was forecast but it felt like 10+. Packed it up, went back to the car and got my 15m Synergy.
Man, I'm glad I did! Had an epic session of hard riding, hard landings and a few big jumps though not as many as I'd have liked. Was much more in tune with the little arc and had a great ol' time throwing it around and going easy on the bar :)
I was the only person on the lake for about 90 minutes! The wind dropped of as others were starting to show up - I guessed they'd turned up for the afternoon blow that I guessed wasn't coming - so I slogged into shore and self-landed.
Waited around for the wind and it didn't seem to be coming. Picked up a bit, so I unpacked and re-pumped the 'bow ... faaaark!
Got about 30 minutes of noodling around before I muffed a jump and the kite inverted WTF!!! How about that, the LEI inverted and the arc didn't. Horseshit. Recovered the inverted LEI with arc technique but the right steering line was wrapped around the power lines. Unhooked and sorted that out then spent about 10 minutes body dragging around trying to find my board ... found it then noticed the wind had died so I slogged into shore again ...
The rest of the afternoon was spent telling people "No seriously I'm not cold at all in my shorts and t-shirt/rash guard. Yes I know you're wearing a full-length semi-dry suit but I'm still not cold!" and waiting for the wind. There was a gust around 4pm that got us all excited but it didn't pan out so I called it a day ... apparently the wind picked up as I left the beach but by then I was actually starting to feel cold. And very hungry!
What I learned today ...
• An LEI can invert. It sucks.
• Stopper ball on the Navigator bar is the best idea ever!
• Landings seemed much harsher today, maybe it was the smaller kite. Certainly need to send the kite more to launch.
• The wind in winter is a fickle bitch, but when it's on - it's ALL on! Should have taken the smaller board with me too!
• I need more constant wind so I can start trying aerial transitions etc again ...
• Lazy turns (big radius) up the top, tight turns down the bottom keeps the kite speed and pull constant.
• I'm becoming an expert at packing the very large Crossbow in to the very small Cabrinha bag ... deflate, lay out, roll wingtips into center in flat folds, fold the kite LE to TE in thirds and here's the important bit : put the end with the wing tips into the bottom of the bag and pull the bag edges up over the kite, then zip the flap up and stuff the folded end into the bag ... it should almost fit perfectly.
