So went out for my third session, first time out without instruction - as I left it was just about getting up on the board, needed more practice at this. I was 65kg, 15kts, 10m switchy.

Thought I might document my stuffups - get some feedback from people with more experience, and maybe be useful for other noobs ;)

So after a few lame powerstrokes to get up, I went for a deeper one and slammed the kite into the water and popped one of the single point inflation hoses - leading edge starts going flat.

How do I deal with this? Steer better? Glue the damn things on?

End up with a half powered up kite, that wont fly directly downwind. Pull QR1 (on cabs this detaches the kite, except the landing line). Landing line is still connected to chicken loop.

Hear velcro noise. QR2 pulls itself open. Glad its light winds. Swim after expensive bar and kite, catch it. Yay.

Lesson learned here - check the bloody QR2 on cabs from the factory. Its a pin-folding-over-ring arrangement, with the pin velcroed down. When I put it back together the ring was visible at the top of the pin. From factory seems like the ring is left halfway down the pin, giving it leverage to rip the QR open :S

So short session. :(

Its a sign - NOOB

Does the valve have velcro or elastic to hold the cap down ?

If not - ditch all your gear & give up, kiteings not for you Err I mean take it to a shop to get checked out. It should explode before it does that...

Hang in there! Every balls up you make is part of the learning experience. After five years the initially frequent crap experiences have all but disappeared and the only thing that screws a good session up now is lack of good wind.

I heard they can pop off if crashed hard.

Have smashed mine hard many(too many) times in the last year and has never happend.

I was told you can put a cable tie around the hose where it pushes on to help clamp it on.


Either that or give up kiteing before you get adicted and work,family,relationships and life in general get pushed aside if there is even a slight chance it might blow.

this has happened to me in 35knt onshore winds released the kite to landing line after a pulley failure.
Best bet is to connect your leash directly to the ring on your ids landing line rather than connect to the metal part of the chicken loop. To comply with euro regulations the velcro is suposed to fail under high tension (eg total facking t!ts up disaster) but shouldn't fail in light winds.
Agree with Foosh check your gear and take your time everytime!!
Loads of ops to get it right, only one to get it wrong!!

hardly a fail phx. shame it was a short session though. you're likely to have worse episodes than this esspecially considering you are new and this one wasn't entirely your fault. You'll make more mistakes yet. Just keep thinking and trying and ideally go with someone else. learn quicker and safer that way.

PS a very SPECIAL merry Christmas to surfingboye. You've been missed by all.

Hi mate. I also started with the 10m SB. 15 knots is not enough to learn on that so I would get a 12m for those winds. Youäll find as a beginner you have more power to learn to go upwind, recover from stumbles etc. Thereäs no downside as long as the winds dont gust up to 25 suddenly. The newer SB's have heaps of depower.

Guys here will tell you that they are sick of seeing beginners with too mch kite up but when learning it makes things much easier and more enjoyable. As you progress you can go to the 10 and then maybe a 7 but don't try to start on a small kite ´harder for you.

just my 2 cents.