Lohesurfi õpetus - veest välja põrkamine (popping)
Andres Larin
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The ability to get some pop is unquestionably one of the most useful, polyvalent skills known to a kitesurfer. We discussed it to a degree in the air gybe, but it leads to many other glorious moves and is the secret to any tomfoolery when the kite is not sent to get us off the water as for a jump. The raley in its most basic form is a pop! (See video 1) Pop is however often referred to, but rarely explained. Moreover manufacturers often credit their boards with awesome pop, which can often be true, but unluckily for us they are not programmed with said pop, but rather rely on the expertise of the person at the helm.
The Legend of Edge and Release
Some of you may doubt this technique as an urban myth. Edging theoretically at least is quite clear, but the grand finale of releasing is nothing more than a word. If you’ve already tried unsuccessfully to pop, you probably edged, achieved the necessary tension on the lines and then released, maybe by flattening the board off, at which stage you just carried on slowly. Don’t be down heartened though, the same problem crops up time after time even for advanced kiters. Last summers down-looping craze, witnessed many a good rider casually sailing along whilst his/her kite looped without even a shard of light appearing between board and water. Yes the vital release was missing. We will refer to the entire process as popping.
The Bare Necessities
Speed is your friend! Finding a comfortable balance between speed and power is your ideal here. Popping works from board speed. You can have all the power you can handle but if you’re edging along like a weekend driver you’ll not be treated much pop in return for your efforts.
Points of sail! You’re not about to race around a triangle but you will need to be able to steer your board from riding upwind, to riding more downwind and then upwind again. If you carry too much power this could be tricky as you may encounter Mach 10 shortly after pointing your board off the wind.
Kite Position! To start off with you should have the kite around 11 or 1 o’clock. As you turn your board off the wind and pick up speed your kite will also drop back slightly in the window. This is a good thing. Your kite does not need to move during a pop so it’s worth trying to get both hands in towards the centre of the bar.
An excitable back leg! At the given moment you’ll need to carve hard upwind and stomp down through your back foot. Essentially you’re trying to cork the board (Pic A) by pushing it down and away from you into the water and against the kite’s power – a mean feat.
All Together Now
Why do we do the above? If you gather speed, by turning off the wind, momentarily the kite de-powers and feels light as you point towards it. This will make carving hard against it easier, and with your extra speed you’ll get more pop.
As you travel towards the kite, it drops back in the window, which means that when you carve against it, it tries to pull you downwind, increasing the tension in the lines which yet again equals more pop. Add to this the fact that as it’s pulling from downwind it will make you land pointing more downwind, which is a whole lot easier than landing on an edge across the wind. If you don’t go downwind, then when you edge the kite goes straight to the edge of the window and you stop! If you do get pop then you are more likely to spin uncontrollably into wind.
As you carve hard against the kite, dropping your weight and twisting to look upwind, the most common sin is to bend both legs in an effort to jump up off the board, as you would on terra firma. This scuppers everything as you’ll loose your edge and tension in the lines and end up under the kite with zero pop. You need to jump off the edge whilst resisting the kite’s power. This means dropping over your back leg, which straightens the front leg, maintaining your edge. From here you can explode against the back foot, corking the board and stretching the lines even more. In Pic B and Video 2 you can see how Karine has launched of her back leg.
Tips From the Top
For the first few attempts try and find some flattish water, as bearing off the wind over chop is likely to pull you all out of shape.
If you have small waves to use they can help with the timing.
As you get more confident try bringing the kite lower to 10:30 or 1:30 before you pop.
The more speed, power and resistance you have will result in your body getting a more horizontal pull, leading into that sweet stretched-out raley look.
The ability to get some pop is unquestionably one of the most useful, polyvalent skills known to a kitesurfer. We discussed it to a degree in the air gybe, but it leads to many other glorious moves and is the secret to any tomfoolery when the kite is not sent to get us off the water as for a jump. The raley in its most basic form is a pop! (See video 1) Pop is however often referred to, but rarely explained. Moreover manufacturers often credit their boards with awesome pop, which can often be true, but unluckily for us they are not programmed with said pop, but rather rely on the expertise of the person at the helm.
The Legend of Edge and Release
Some of you may doubt this technique as an urban myth. Edging theoretically at least is quite clear, but the grand finale of releasing is nothing more than a word. If you’ve already tried unsuccessfully to pop, you probably edged, achieved the necessary tension on the lines and then released, maybe by flattening the board off, at which stage you just carried on slowly. Don’t be down heartened though, the same problem crops up time after time even for advanced kiters. Last summers down-looping craze, witnessed many a good rider casually sailing along whilst his/her kite looped without even a shard of light appearing between board and water. Yes the vital release was missing. We will refer to the entire process as popping.
The Bare Necessities
Speed is your friend! Finding a comfortable balance between speed and power is your ideal here. Popping works from board speed. You can have all the power you can handle but if you’re edging along like a weekend driver you’ll not be treated much pop in return for your efforts.
Points of sail! You’re not about to race around a triangle but you will need to be able to steer your board from riding upwind, to riding more downwind and then upwind again. If you carry too much power this could be tricky as you may encounter Mach 10 shortly after pointing your board off the wind.
Kite Position! To start off with you should have the kite around 11 or 1 o’clock. As you turn your board off the wind and pick up speed your kite will also drop back slightly in the window. This is a good thing. Your kite does not need to move during a pop so it’s worth trying to get both hands in towards the centre of the bar.
An excitable back leg! At the given moment you’ll need to carve hard upwind and stomp down through your back foot. Essentially you’re trying to cork the board (Pic A) by pushing it down and away from you into the water and against the kite’s power – a mean feat.
All Together Now
Why do we do the above? If you gather speed, by turning off the wind, momentarily the kite de-powers and feels light as you point towards it. This will make carving hard against it easier, and with your extra speed you’ll get more pop.
As you travel towards the kite, it drops back in the window, which means that when you carve against it, it tries to pull you downwind, increasing the tension in the lines which yet again equals more pop. Add to this the fact that as it’s pulling from downwind it will make you land pointing more downwind, which is a whole lot easier than landing on an edge across the wind. If you don’t go downwind, then when you edge the kite goes straight to the edge of the window and you stop! If you do get pop then you are more likely to spin uncontrollably into wind.
As you carve hard against the kite, dropping your weight and twisting to look upwind, the most common sin is to bend both legs in an effort to jump up off the board, as you would on terra firma. This scuppers everything as you’ll loose your edge and tension in the lines and end up under the kite with zero pop. You need to jump off the edge whilst resisting the kite’s power. This means dropping over your back leg, which straightens the front leg, maintaining your edge. From here you can explode against the back foot, corking the board and stretching the lines even more. In Pic B and Video 2 you can see how Karine has launched of her back leg.
Tips From the Top
For the first few attempts try and find some flattish water, as bearing off the wind over chop is likely to pull you all out of shape.
If you have small waves to use they can help with the timing.
As you get more confident try bringing the kite lower to 10:30 or 1:30 before you pop.
The more speed, power and resistance you have will result in your body getting a more horizontal pull, leading into that sweet stretched-out raley look.