Like most newbies I did a lot of web surfing for information on the sport. There's a lot out there actually. But what happened to me with my waist harness......I didn't come across it anywhere. So I'm putting it on the web so you don't have to go through the pain.

Most people already know that a waist harness slides upwards when the kite is parked overhead, say when walking back up the beach after a body drag or even during a body drag when the kite is kept high. Usually the front section ends up over and pressing on the lower ribs, a little uncomfortable, a little harder to breath and a little bruising. But not too bad, hey any new sport hurts!

Most people would have already figured out that bringing the kite down the side of the window to say 10 O'clock position takes a lot of the vertical pressure off, you can even wriggle the harness back down to your waist.

After doing some uncomfortable, breathless journeys up the beach, I thought I'd solve the problem by tightening the harness around my waist much more the next time I put it on. BAD MOVE.
I cranked the belt up as hard as I could and ended up really hurting myself. On the walks up the beach that day, instead of being able to ride up over my ribs as usual, the harness rode up UNDER my ribs. The tissue damage this caused was much worse than the bruising I'd been getting with the looser harness. I thought I'd broken a rib or two. An X-ray said no, just tissue damage between and under the rib cage. 3 weeks and a stack of nurofen and panadol later, I still cannot wear the waist harness. I've had to buy a seat harness to keep the pressure off the area and the practice going. Now I didn't come across anything in conversation or on the web about the potential for harness tension to create real body damage. So I felt I had to share this with you.

__________________
We're balanced together ocean upon the sky.......NOT!
(It's a goal of mine you know, the ocean, the sky, the balance. Newbies gotta have goals you know!)
Airush Flow 12 '05 / Switch 150 '04.

you are a soft cock.

A good waist harness should sit snugly below the beer gut to avoid that dreaded dilemma called harness creep.

Hey I'm trying to lose the beer gut! (cider gut actually)
It's half the size it was when I started kiting in October.
Now you're saying it's an advantage to keep it!
Damn...what to do.....

Hey Kitehard,

I would reckon that at the exact time you wrote that message it happened to me at Safety Bay. It was a bit loose, so I tighened it up REAL tight so it wouldn't slip up any more, but it still found a way over my rib cage and I was left gasping for breath. I'm still with an instructor who had plenty of gear with him, so at least I had the option of landing and going back for a seat harness.

People dont like the seat harnesses because of the pressure it can unexpectantly put on your crown jewels BUT I find it much easier to kite with a seat harness as I find it easier to control the power input of the kite if it pulls from below the centre of gravity rather from than slightly above. Waist harnesses can be a bitch if you have no padding (fat) around your midline for the harness to grip onto. Broken ribs are a very real possiblity and I came very close to breaking mine the first few times I used a waist harness.

I recently bought a rock climing harness which has leg straps that tighten just below the widest part of your thigh thus taking any vertical force on the upper part of your thighs rather than my testicles. I'm considering modifying my cheap waist harness adding a leg setup similar to my rockclimbing harness. This would stop the harness riding up and I could position it above, below or at my centre of gravity. Then I could possibly get the best of both worlds!

White men can jump! (With the help of my 15.5m Titan.)

Hey Pads,

don't forget to depower your trim strap, when doing the "walk of shame". If your not doing it - it will relieve some of that pressure.

By the way the same thing happened to me...my first time on a 9m, doing a few jumps and somehow the harness nearly ripped my lower left ribs from my body - ouch!

A few deep breaths later, I managed to keep on keep'n on but it's still sore 4 days later...

Another answer is to get a good impact vest. I've got the bump n jump one with the camelback built in. It's awesome, it's made for the waist harness to sit over the top of it - at the bottom of the front there's a flat padded section which locks the harness down low as well as giving really good padding under it. No more red patches or bruises after a good sesh. I've broken ribs (hitting a wave face from a jump gone wrong) and injured my back from a jump gone wrong. BOth of these wouldn't have happened with the vest on. The added flotation is a bonus and having a drink out there with you is just feckin fantastic - no more salty mouth or dry throat retching.

definitely the only thing to do is have the harness as tight as you can get it, it will not creep then.. SUPER ****EN TIGHT. If u do have a gut you'll need to loose it like I did or else u cannot stop it creeping.

err.. bradgray any reason for bringing this thread up again?? it's 1 1/2 years old!

All seems suss to me....and who the hell is puppetonaring......

assmaster has turned up on kiteforum but seems to be keeping a lower profile there.