mudgudgeon said..


My ex's partner has given my boy a kitesurfing rig and they've booked him into lessons. That's all good.

Interesting thread.

The torn Dad.

Tell me, is this ex-partner the boy's Mother ?

If it is, don't you have confidence in her ability to assess the risk for her son ?

When you say "That's all good", it sounds unconvincing.

lol.

I reckon experience with a kite may be just as important if not more then stamina. Idk where you are located but you can teach your son in shallow water where u don’t need to have strong swimming. When he gets up and riding tell him to go out as far as he can swim in.

Definitely get him to swim 1k without a break, I do a heck of a lot of swimming when the wind dies and its a good idea to be competent in the surf.
Your best bet is to teach him in waist deep water with a 6m 5 line wave or Free-ride style of kite with heaps of de-power!
Most people would say go 4 line but they pull to hard, I know because I learned when I was 9 yrs old on a 5m 4 line bow kite and it was hard.
I did not spend much time body dragging or flying trainer kites, just get him on a real kite in light winds for a couple of hours and then chuck a board at him.
Remember visual is much better then verbal! and don't push him.

cheers

waveslave said..

waveslave said..

mudgudgeon said..


My ex's partner has given my boy a kitesurfing rig and they've booked him into lessons. That's all good.

Interesting thread.

The torn Dad.

Tell me, is this ex-partner the boy's Mother ?

If it is, don't you have confidence in her ability to assess the risk for her son ?

When you say "That's all good", it sounds unconvincing.

lol.

Oh,

my mistake.

I thought you wrote 'ex-partner'.

So it's the boyfriend of your ex that's taken on the role of kite-guru.

lol.

Good luck with that.

yep, agree with your last line!

no torn dad here. Stoked that he gets opportunities to do this sort of stuff with others, even better when someone else coughs up the cash :D

his mum on the other hand?! frankly, no I don't trust her judgement to be rational or logical any time I oppose something she thinks is OK, nor do I trust her ability to assess the risks in a sport she has no clue about nor experience in any similar sport.
Her new partner has a son who is a very different character to my boy. I dont think what is OK for his boy is necessarily OK for mine.

mudgudgeon said..
thanks guys. Just to clarify, it wont be me teaching him unfortunately.

You're doing the right thing by seeking lessons and although I don't have any kids I totally understand your concern.

As an experienced instructor in deep waters I have to say that the quality of training he ends up getting will mostly determine how competent and confident he ends up getting in deep waters, and obviously determine how confident you feel as a dad letting your kid kite by himself.

I've taught a few 12-15 year olds to be completely independent in deep waters without ever getting wet myself, while the parents are on the beach watching my every move.

Unfortunately the vast majority of schools fall short in teaching students to be completely independent in deep waters. If you can find a top quality school your boy should have absolutely no issues in coping with deep water environments and be completely independent in getting out of trouble by himself (Self-rescue, water relaunch, board recovery).

Self-rescue (the ability to get out of trouble by yourself using your kite as floatation/sail to get back to shore) is the most poorly taught skill in lessons, with half the schools simply skipping this completely and the other half just doing a demonstration of it (not having the student practice it in deep waters). As a result, most beginners are unable to get out of trouble competently and usually end up swimming long distances back to shore or end up getting helped (rescued) by others.

With the right tuition he should be able to easily handle any situation without ever needing to swim, including while getting out of trouble!

I've seen countless kiting dad's who think it's best to teach their own kids...unfortunately although they may think it's a good idea, they always have to look after them and go and help them out when something goes wrong. I recently seen a dad swim 400 meters to recover his little girl's kite and board after she got in trouble. A lot of effort and stress that can be avoided by seeking professional tuition and learning the right skill set.

A competent kite instructor is one that can teach their students to achieve any skill without the student constantly depending on the instructor...and that's hard to find.

Christian