Wow

[Tighe]

What a day yesterday. My body is still buzzing from the adrenaline but I feel light in the head.

After a lesson at Malmo (Tim and Todd did great considering the offshore winds), Chad and I headed to Reddy. The first session left me considering heading to Garrison. The wind was gusty and you were heading right into the wave faces. It was a short, less than satisfying session. Then the wind clocked south and the joy turned on. Wow what a difference. The sky cleared and the air warmed to create some thermals...oh what a joy. Nothing quite like those days at Reddy. Endless floaters down the shore line off clean ramps, shimmering waters to one side, bright white caps on blue waters to the other. Everyone was looking dialed. Brian was the everyready rider, riding without a break. Everyone was pulling some nice jumps. I was exhausted long before I quit but just couldn't stop. You know when you ride to the point where you can barely speak, all you can mutter is "wow". It was one of those sessions. Thanks to everyone who shared the wind. It was fun playing.

[JRN]

HOW WAS THE WATER TEMPERATURE? Can we leave the dry suit at home when riding at Mille Lacs? Glad you had a nice session. While your wind clocked from SW to S, it switched from SE to S at WBL. Would have liked to have joined you, but remembered the old Windsurfer adage, "Never leave wind to find wind." We had a nice turnout at Ramsey, even alot of the West Side Boys showed up. Fun to see Scott, Jeff, & Matt riding our home pond!

[Lee_Uptown]

I thought the water was a still a little cold... but not as cold as last Saturday at Malmo. I stuck with a drysuit. I guess it was about High 50s to 60 degrees... I may be off by an order of magnitude...
However, a few people did not think it was that cold... Some dude was wearing a pair of boardshorts and some other guy had a shorty. Debbie kited in a bikini.

[mdh01]

Jim,
Water temp is tolerable...four of us were riding Pelican in the Brainerd area (Todd, Vicky, Bryce and myself) on Monday. The wind was strong, steady and made for excellent riding!

Bryce and I were in dry suits which made us look pretty wimpy when Todd and Vicky showed up in shorties! Another few weeks and a wet suit should be fine up there (for me). I was at Clear Lake, IA last week and a shorty was no problem.

Mark

[Elkman]

I was in a 7mm wetsuit at Malmo (and then Reddy Creek) and I was OK. Then again, I'm used to cold water from scuba diving. Someday, I'll have to explain how I got nicknamed the "Nutty Buddy" from my certification course at Square Lake, but that's off topic.

Anyway, as Tighe mentioned, I started the day off at Malmo taking the Kitesurfing 101 course. Despite the less-than-perfect winds, I think I did pretty well with kite skills during the lesson, including launching, relaunching, and body dragging. After the lesson, I went out with the Slingshot Diesel that I bought used back in March, and that was a different story altogether. The first time I launched, the kite just took off right into the power zone and dragged me forward, face-first. After pulling myself out of the water and coughing up the water I inhaled, Tim helped me launch again, but I was just having problems with trying to fly the kite steadily, and I couldn't get the kite to relaunch in water without a lot of extra effort.

So, I packed up and went to Reddy Creek to hang out and watch the real riders have fun. I talked with Rick on the beach and told him about my lesson, and he offered to help me out with launching and relaunching and stuff. So, he worked with me for a while and pointed out a few things about water-relaunching a C kite. That helped, but I still think I need to upgrade to a T3 or some other bow kite. After a while, I finally figured enough about relaunching to get the kite up in the air and keep it where I wanted, and I ended up doing some successful body dragging.

Thanks again to Rick (if I've got the name right) for the help. I figure that with a more user-friendly kite and more practice, I'll be a real kiteboarder eventually.

[steveb]

Todd...nice write up.
Please keep us in the loop about your experiences. It's nice to read about learning and the fun of the challenges at the beginning.

I have a nice 15m 08 for sale if you're still looking for a kite. my e mails at the side of the post if you want to know more about it.

[kenais]

I was at Reddy and wore a 3/2 and booties - plenty warm. There was a guy (Tim I think) wearing only board shorts, his hand and feet were blue but he seemed pretty happy to be out for a short time.

[Tighe]

I had my thicker full suit and was toasty. Definitely chiller than Waconia but definitely not requiring a drysuit unless the air temp was really cold.