Goodbye F-One - Liam Whaley

[Leon van Bergen]

What's the longest any team rider or whatever has been with a brand...?

Youri Zoon is with Slingshot for a long time..

[Lom]

He spent several years with Bestkiteboarding.

[Baptiste_FR]

Regarding Liam's choice to join Duotone, of course the Porsche partnership must have played a huge role.
On the kite side, the Vegas will suits him really well for the freestyle competiton.
However, for big air, it is not that easy. The Rebel is a very good big air kite, but not specifically designed for the competition (on the contrary of the North Orbit). Therefore, most of the riders use the Dice or the EVO. Great kite, but not specifically Big Air oriented.
KOTA (and other Big Air event) will probably be one of the priority of Duotone as the impact of a win (or even a podium) has on the brand notoriety and probably on sale number.

[Kitemenn]

What's the longest any team rider or whatever has been with a brand...?

Youri Zoon is with Slingshot for a long time..

Steven Akkersdijk is with Core since 2012 almost 10 years now.

Aaron Hadlow/Lewis Crathern/ Youri Zoon all started with their current partners in 2016

[nothing2seehere]

What's the longest any team rider or whatever has been with a brand...?

Robbie Naish has been with Naish for a long time

[fguinda]

Liam has been doing some shooting this morning at my homespot. Duotone gear.

[Kamikuza]

What's the longest any team rider or whatever has been with a brand...?

Youri Zoon is with Slingshot for a long time..

Steven Akkersdijk is with Core since 2012 almost 10 years now.

Aaron Hadlow/Lewis Crathern/ Youri Zoon all started with their current partners in 2016

Harlow was with Flexifoil for a very long time too eh.

Seems like they change all the time, but clearly that's wrong

[Mgatti]

am I the only one asking what's the crazy riders budget duotone has? I think they have 10x more riders than any other brand
I think Duotone got Liam to try to win KOTA next year (Andrea and Lorenzo need at least two years more, in my opinion, whereas Liam could have won it already this year).

[nothing2seehere]

am I the only one asking what's the crazy riders budget duotone has? I think they have 10x more riders than any other brand
I think Duotone got Liam to try to win KOTA next year (Andrea and Lorenzo need at least two years more, in my opinion, whereas Liam could have won it already this year).

Which is sound business logic as far as I'm concerned. Look at the big competitions right now. Big air/Freestyle/Racing/Surf(????? Not sure about this as I'm european and we don't really see the competitions beyond the big air strapless). I've yet to hear anyone pay full price for freestyle kites - its either rider discount or buy last years model for peanuts from a team rider. The racing scene is difficult to break into and low volume. They already have a strong surf range from what I can tell. Therefore, Big Air is the growth sales market. It did well for North with the Orbit and devices like the Woo and Surfr offer the Pokemon Go experience to keep people invested.

Looked at another way - Aaron joined the development team, mentions a big air kite project in vlogs and then turns up with a custom big air kite to KOTA so maybe they are looking for another rider (a lightweight unlike Lasse) to help refine the Dice? Note I'm aware this is full conspiracy theory but its fun to look at the extreme ideas.

[rnelias]

at least F-One still has Charles Brodel on hydrofoil freestyle and Mitu on kitewave...