not landing on your head like i did yesterday, thank god for my goofy looking helmet.

Big balls and a no fear attitude

Dont try learning to loop on big kites 13m + as the rotation is somewhat slower & find yourself doing the Superman If not High enough..

Landing the Belly Busta from Hell

good training though if you ever change to WWF wrestling

so is it easyer to to just pop into a back roll pulling hard on back hand then to loop it at top off jump???
i am really wanting to throw my first loop and have been running it thru my head for months and always thought that looping it at top of jump would be better with height

graceful said...

so is it easyer to to just pop into a back roll pulling hard on back hand then to loop it at top off jump???
i am really wanting to throw my first loop and have been running it thru my head for months and always thought that looping it at top of jump would be better with height

The advantage of a backroll kiteloop is that you are not looking at the kite as it goes through the window. And again I find that fish poling (both hands on one end) your bar also helps with commitment. The Kite loop is not a technically difficult trick it needs timing and most of all commitment.

Just go easy in the beginning and build from it. I think everyone has the first timers fear of kite looping and getting mashed up. You WILL get spanked but learn from it and try again...

so really just pop into the back roll while pulling hard on back hand,hold on and land hard downwind?

i have to agree that it is easy to loop later and start with the kite higher. But i personally like to loop the kite either unhooked or hooked in just after i have popped off the water. you get the most amount of pull that way, and if you start with you kite just under 45 degrees you still get some good pull up, landing are too soft though, if you have bad knee. But unhooked raileys are the go

I agree with everything that has been said, kiteloops are incredibly additive, especially when you do proper megaloops 30ft up but still land as soft as ever. I don't get loops like that often, maybe 1 in 5, but the feeling stays with you for a long time and all you want to do is more!!! However, as was said before, looping can be very hard on your body and gear if you don't do them right.

I stuffed a loop up yesterday by luffing the kite when it was at the bottom of the loop. I didn't land super hard but wasn't lined up right and ended up really hurting my knee and tearing my front foot strap off my new board. My knee will be fine as long as i stay off it for a week or two but my foot strap is ruined....4 pairs in 8 months. Oh ya, i've snapped 2 boards in the last 8 months doing loops too. BUT MY GOD THEY ARE FUN!!!!

Maybe I'm not with the scene, kiting on my own most of the time, but.....

I learnt loops hooked in on my SB3 12m first, in light winds where I had just enough power to stay upwind and pop maybe 2-3m off the water in the jumps. Cranked hard on the backhand just before the kite reached the zenith of the jump, often the kite doesn't get all the way around before you land, but the landings are pretty mellow and you can't really do too much damage.

The progressed to trying them on the SB3 8m in 22-24 knots, so a bit more power, a bit higher in the jumps, but the kite turns quicker and you can actually get it right around before you land.

I found that there are certain jumps that suit a loop better than others......a bit hard to describe, but once you've done a few and been spanked on a few, you sort of know which ones will suit a loop.

If I had to say it, I guess they are the jumps where you don't have as much forward speed, and the kite starts higher in the window as you jump, and the loft is more up and down with the kite held a little behind your position as you get the initial boost.

It seems like having the kite come into the loop with some momentum helps too....in other words don't try and send it for the loop with the kite static above your head at the top of the jump and at the front of the window...it will turn very slow initially and then you'll get a big yank as it heads for the water. Better to initiate the loop as the kite (and you) are still heading up on the ascending part of the jump.

Also, tuck your legs up as the yank comes on, so you don't get pulled out of alignment and miss the landing.

One other thing that helped....mucking around on the beach on my son's SB1 5m and SB2 6m in 12 knots of wind, just throwing heaps of loops and getting the feel for how the kite handles while looping. I think part of the problem with the bigger kites is that we can't just muck around throwing loops with them on the beach, so we don't get the feel for the looping behaviour until we actually start kitelooping for real out on the water, and then the consequences for stuffing it up are a lot more severe.

One thing that blew me away watching Jessie Richmond ride at Lizard in June, as well as the mega double loops he was throwing at the top of huge jumps, was just his loop control while riding generally....the kid just loops the kite non-stop, with his eyes closed, no matter what manoeuvre he is doing.

Its all about kite control, as usual............

I find it better with a good amount of wind in the kite, so nicely powered, and just commit, let go with front hand,stops you chickening out half way. And wear an impact vest at first, cos when you land if you get it wrong its gona hurt. I wore an impact vest and lid and I was invinceable, never felt a thing even after doing 1 1/2 back rolls and slamming into water at warp speed. But you Have to commit 100%. Just do it and dont think to much about it.
Good luck.