I find myself pushing my bar away from me and depowering the kite as much as possible while riding waves, therefor i donn't see the point of unhooking and riding the wave on full power.
I know all the pros unhook but do they do this to look cool or are there big advantages

Riding waves unhooked, makes you a real kitesurfer....but only if your strapless.

if ya dont like the full power bit, Try the wipika wave system which depowers the kite when you unhook by pulling on the 5th line, i gave mine ago today and really liked it!

sam

Hey Dustin,

No need to unhook to go vert if you ride a kite with full depower. I ride either Flow SLE or DNA's in the surf and you can stay hooked in and just push away the bar for no pull, go vert, smack, aerial, sheet in and land back on the wave with however much power you need.

I agree that to go vert on a "C" kite it would be much better to unhook.

Good winds,

It is obvious that competition results will show what the "real" kitesurfers are doing.



I believe that Aaron Jarman won the Australian wave riding titles hooked and strapped.



However, at the recent Mauritius invitational, Felix Pivec won riding unhooked and strapped.



However, a significant percentage of competitors at the Australian wave nationals rode either hooked or unhooked, and unstrapped. The runner up I think was unhooked and unstrapped.



At our local beach, most people are hooked and strapped, but some ride strapped and unhooked, some ride unstrapped and hooked and some ride unhooked and unstrapped.




All of those riding unstrapped are riding surf boards, except for those riding skims. Some of those are hooked and some unhooked. Some of the strapped riders are riding TTs whilst other are riding surf boards with straps. Most of the TT riders seem to ride hooked whilst some ride unhooked. Many riders ride bow kites. Some ride SLEs whist others ride C kites. Most bow and SLE riders seem to prefer hooked and either strapped or unstrapped on either TTs or Surfboards or sometimes either strapped our unstrapped on skims. Some kiters also use Arcs or foils. These riders may also be either strapped or unstrapped on TTs, surfboards or skim boards. They my ride unhooked or hooked on a strapped or unstrapped surfboard, or hooked or unhooked on a TT or hooked or unhooked on a strapped or strappless skimboard.

I hope that clears it all up.

Maybe all unhooked and unstrapped kiters should leave their kites on the beach, thats what they're trying to get at isn't it? True wave riding with no kite assistance??

Why are they not entering surfing competitions, but trying to create kite-surfing comp rules and regs to get as close as possible to surfing but without using the kite..??!..

All those purist kite surfers don't make any sense to me, if you're trying to surf like a surfer, then leave the kite at home! If you want to ride on waves with power, boosting, huge floaters and unimaginable possibilities, then use the gear thats available to make it happen.

if ya dont like the full power bit, Try the wipika wave system which depowers the kite when you unhook by pulling on the 5th line, i gave mine ago today and really liked it!

sam

Yeh I agree Sam Its pretty sweet playing aound with the kite while surfing , It sits way down wind and just drifts like a feather. Shweet.

I would never want the judges to mark a hooked in person better then the unhooked and same with the strapped vs unstrapped.
I guess i should probably put some solid effort into wave riding unhooked.
At the end of the day its all about pulling chicks right. thats why i don't cover my organ with boardies. Go the banana hamock!

Who could bother to give a "flying phuck at a rolling donut" about what the judges want. Hooked, unhooked, strapped or strapless budgie smugglers, wettie or boardies, if your ripping, your ripping.....!

On second thoughts nobody rips in a pair of budgie smugglers

Good winds,

what's all this stuff about budgie smugglers ,if that is what the trafficers are doing to those poore budgies that is soooooooooo wrong ,i think you no more than you are letting on[ quote]Originally posted by Kitehard

Who could bother to give a "flying phuck at a rolling donut" about what the judges want. Hooked, unhooked, strapped or strapless budgie smugglers, wettie or boardies, if your ripping, your ripping.....!

On second thoughts nobody rips in a pair of budgie smugglers

Good winds,