Kit to progress to bigger jumps

[Taraskin]

Hello! I'm looking for suggestions for kite and board for me to progress to bigger jumps. I've been kiting on and off since 2010. Recently i've started learning to jump and can now do about 2-3 meters in a decently controlled manner and land nicely. Can do higher but control is lost then..(edit control is lost due to my own lack of skill not the kit obviously). A friend of mine suggested that my kit is not really appropriate for the task at hand. I've got an old 130 nobile 555 and an rrd religion 8m. I am generally of the opinion that a skilled person will be able to jump high with any kite, so learning the intricacies IS the most important thing, but at the same time maybe its good to do that on kit that will not cap my progression and help the learning process. So basically there are two questions:

1) Which kites should I look at that will help me shift gears in my jumping?
2) Which boards should I look at?

Seeing as kit is bought for some time, I'd like to get something that is a bit more advanced than I need at the moment in order to grow into it. I am 75kg if that makes any difference.

Thanks

Taraskin

[leeuwen]

You are correct that skill is most important but a “sheet and go” kite will help compared to your current wave kite for sure. Also hangtime Will improve.

1) Any high aspect kite will help. If you just want to jump as high as possible and don’t care about any other performance.
Think ozone edge/ core xr/Duotone Rebel/ North Orbit/ RRD addiction. Depending on your local winds 8m seems pretty small unless you are lucky to get 30+ knots all the time.

2) Boards are a lot up to personal taste.
Stiff carbon boards will pop better and get you higher theoretically but on landings they are less forgiving for your knees.
Probably will impact your jump performance the least compared to kite or skill.

[Robsw6]

Technique should be your priority over new kit, kit will help, but watch as many how to videos as possible & break down/practice each phase of the jump - ideally be very strict & jump on both tacks.

I would avoid a boosting kite, as get on an Edge or Orbit & it is likely you won’t improve as fast (if at all) compared to a more intermediate kite- North Reach / Reedin Supermodel or even a Naish Pivot (as although this can really boost it is a very accessible kite).

[rnelias]

Technique should be your priority over new kit, kit will help, but watch as many how to videos as possible & break down/practice each phase of the jump - ideally be very strict & jump on both tacks.

I would avoid a boosting kite, as get on an Edge or Orbit & it is likely you won’t improve as fast (if at all) compared to a more intermediate kite- North Reach / Reedin Supermodel or even a Naish Pivot (as although this can really boost it is a very accessible kite).

+1

I've been kiting since 2018. My first kites were Dices, not an usuall choice as first kite but they served me very well to get practice and confidence to freeride. On my last season I've changed to Rebels in order to practice some jumps and, to be honest, this type of kite does not require much technique to boost you high. They're like airplane wings and If you're kiting in the correct wind speed, just pull the bar and it will yank from the water instantly. You don't even need to know how to pop. They classify these kites as "big air" for some reason , however, you'll also notice that some pro riders are capable to fly high with other 3-struct kites. They can do it just because they know the correct technique on how to pop and extract the required force from the kite. Now I'm swaping my Rebels to 3-struct kites to learn the correct technique and because I've started to hydrofoil and 5-struct kites are horrible to hydrofoil

[deniska]

Technique should be your priority over new kit, kit will help, but watch as many how to videos as possible & break down/practice each phase of the jump - ideally be very strict & jump on both tacks.

I would avoid a boosting kite, as get on an Edge or Orbit & it is likely you won’t improve as fast (if at all) compared to a more intermediate kite- North Reach / Reedin Supermodel or even a Naish Pivot (as although this can really boost it is a very accessible kite).

Sort of agree and disagree
yes you can practice with any kite.. but if you want immediate results get a high aspect 5 strut kite and dance from there..(core XR, edge, appolo, etc)

then more radical advice - get in to foiling.. once you learn basic strapped riding you can attempt jumps.. you will learn that it's much easier to boost with a foil.. it's all about speed and sending.. literally you can get 3-7meters in no wind, if you get your kite to stay up in the air.. you will learn a lot about apparent wind and edging angles from foiling..

[Taraskin]

Thanks for the advice all! So I guess a boosting kite is just going to make me a bit lazy and not actually learn properly. On a more theoretical level, what are we looking for in a good jump kite? Leeuewen mentioned that a high aspect kite tends to be good for jumping. Is that then because it has more speed so when you send it quickly to 12 it generates a lot more lifting force than say a low aspect slow kite due to its speed? I was under the impression that hangtime is actually positively affected by the kite being slow and low aspect. As in it doesn't fly as fast and land you as fast as a high aspect kite would?

On another note, what of the boards? I hear you guys that its more of a personal taste but maybe people would like to suggest a few that they think are suited for this? So my current problem is that when I really hang back and power up and edge hard on the board its very easy to overdo it and the board slips off the edge and skips a bit. I was thinking that i'm just pushing a bit too much with the heels, but maybe a newer type construction with all the fancy wake channels and to on would be less susceptible to this problem?

[SWO_kite]

Learning to jump high does not explicitly require a high aspect kite. It mostly amounts to practice, practice, practice!

It's like learning to drive. The first time you drive your car on the highway it feels way too fast and chaotic. By the 100th time you've done it, your muscle memory has been established and you have better control and thought process on how to proceed.

My advice is, get comfortable using any given kite into the upper end of it's wind range. The more power you have, the bigger the jumps. Lots of riders I know get too scared to hold down power and feel they "need" to switch to a smaller kite in bigger wind when they should easily be able to manage at their skill level. Pushing beyond your comfort zone will make yesterdays wind feel weak. That said, when you're actually nice and powered up, try to increase the height of your jumps incrementally in stead of just sending it as hard as you can. Again, it takes time for your mind and body to get comfortable getting 5m, 10m, 15m or more of height.

Switching to a smaller board also helps A LOT when riding over powered. I use a 133 (@85kg) for my 11m in 25kn and my with 8m in 30-35kn.

Also, watch youtube!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2nHMqbTLyY

[Havre]

There is definitely a consideration that moving to a pure "big air" 5-strut kite might make you a bit "lazy". No doubt. And at 75kg I would probably tend to share that view - especially if you are jumping 2-3m high - because then you are far from getting close to the potential of the kit you already got.

On the other hand, my jumping with my Enduros improved after I have borrowed a Rebel for some sessions. Jumping with a Rebel is easy, but you aren't going 20m high regardless of what you do. A "lazy" jump might get you 5m, but a good jump gets you to 8. So riding a more "specialized" "big air" kite doesn't mean you still can't keep on working on your technical ability to jump. For heavy riders as myself (100kg +-) the sweet spot for quite a few kites jumping is so hard to hit perfectly that you do end up with quite a few low jumps that might have been very decent (and then fun) jumps with a different kite.

I have never ridden a RRD Religion so I can't comment on that in any other way than what I read about the kite. It doesn't seem to be the best kite to learn jumping with in my opinion. At 75kg I think TheRussian makes a lot of sense. Maybe not go for a 5-strut "big air", but kites the type he lists. You could add kites like Ozone Enduro, F-One Bandit etc. to that list as well. 3-strut kites that are very good all round and which I guess would get you higher than the Religion.

[Windigo1]

Technique is important but a boosting kite like the XR or Edge will make your life so much easier especially in the small sizes like 8M a kite with great hangtime that brings you down slowly will give you the time to improve your technique and those high aspect kites are not very fast so they are very accessible to learn on. It's like your doing everything in slow motion compared to a fast wave kite. Of course if you still want to do a bit of everything go with something like the Pivot but if the main goal is boosting go with a boosting kite and keep you wave kite for those days you want to do waves.

[sflinux]

I have flown many many different types of kites, including the religion. It is 100% the kite. Religion kites are not designed for jumping. They are designed to spill power to prevent you from being pulled off your edge. Any other kite should be better for jumping.
Wake-style kites will give you pop but not much altitude.
High aspect kites will give you altitude and hang time.
Mid aspect kite will be somewhere in between.
Foil kites typically have more hangtime than inflatables in the larger sizes.
Old school c-kites are fun.