Get in the mood for this article by pressing play to listen to this song while you read it. (“Turn up the volume, piss off the neighbors”).
For a Kitesurfing Instructor advanced lessons, and jumping lessons above all, are undoubtedly the most fun to give. Unfortunately, they’re just a small part of the instructor’s work, who normally spends 90% of his time giving beginner courses, as easily understandable.
The “Jumping” lesson
Dear old Johnny, head instructor of my school in Sardinia, has a jumping lesson on the plan of the day. Clearly the old bastard kept the best lesson for himself (you know I love you Johnny). His student is an Italian guy in his forties that we met in the previous days. He already knows how to kitesurf but resides on the other side of the world, he’s staying in Italy only for few days and is then pretty stoked. His lesson is scheduled for the afternoon. The forecast for the day has changed of course (Murphy’s Law), and the wind is totally flat. With the rest the team we’re lazing on the beach waiting for the wind to come, but really feels like it’s not going to happen. Johnny sees his jumping lesson fading away:
“The guy for the jumping lesson is about to come… Yeah, sure…”
So we decide to organize a prank for him.
The guy arrives showing the expression of who already knows that is staying dry for the day. Even more, it’s his last day of vacation…
“Hi guys… So is not happening today… “
“No man, we’ll do the lesson for you! Are you ready? “
Johnny plays “Jump Around” from the House of Pain on his phone.
“Are you ready?!?”
At the chorus we start jumping up and down like total jerks, arms to the sky.
“Jump man!! Jump!!! “”
“Jump!”
“Jump!”
“Jump!”
“Everybody Jump!”
“Jump!”
“Jump!”
“Jump!”
“Everybody Jump!”
The rest of the beach watch amused the raving scene of us jumping up and down laughing out loud.
“So…” says Johnny, “Did you have fun?”
“Yes!”
“Have you enjoyed your jumping lesson?!”
“Yes!!!”
Myself: “Cool, you owe us 60 bucks”.
Jumping technique in Kitesurfing
On Youtube you can find hundreds of videos to learn how to jump in Kitesurfing and to improve your technique, but the funniest is hands down this one of Dimitri Maramedines, owner of EPIC kiteboarding, teaching his secretary how to jump. I also recommend the other videos of his channel, which are very entertaining but also give good technical advice.
It goes by itself that before thinking of jumping high you need to learn the basic technique, work your way to the top gradually and according to your ability and experience. For jumping in Kiteboarding you have to get your timing right, you’ll have to work a lot on your technique to achieve high jumps.
The WOO to keep record of your jumps
If you’re taking the “Airstyle” seriously you might think of buying a WOO, a tracking device that records the height and airtime of your jumps, those of your friends, and provides charts of the highest jumps of each spot. Recently a “freestyle mode” has also been introduced, thanks to artificial intelligence the device understands the tricks you are doing and gives them a score.
Watch this video to better understand how the WOO works and get stoked!
Furthermore, the company has just released also the “Woovie editor”, a smart editor you can connect to any video camera or mobile phone, which recognizes and automatically crop your tricks, saving you a lot of time of video editing! ( At the moment Woovie is only available for Apple/Mac).
Photo Credits: Thanks to Simone Masi for the cover pic taken in Sardinia last year.
