Low wind body dragging

[Peter_Frank]

Herman is spot on - the by far major mistake, even by experienced kitesurfers to retrieve the board, is to point too high with your arm/body.

Think about that, just drag mentally across the wind and you will go upwind so to speak, a lot faster, and avoid the classic mistake trying to point up to your board

If you are using your board to drag upwind, it is somewhat different because you have to hold one arm over your board, no matter if a surfboard or TT or hydrofoil, same thing.
You still have to avoid pointing too high, but a lot easier and more intuitive when you dont try to GET to your board, but are dragging with your board.

Even in 5-7 knots on a hydrofoil, you can drag upwind (with a light kite), holding your foilboard with one arm, and in marginal winds you have to dive your kite down forward, not too low, depower it while flying up again avoiding losing kitespeed - up to or even past 12, and then down again.
An important skill for being able to get out to sufficiently deep water when dead onshore - which it unfortunately most often is in marginal/light wind seabreezes - which is the best weather to foil in, warm and smooth wind and sunny

No matter how, dont fly the kite too low, and in light wind, be ready to downloop it to save it from dropping.
Difficult with bigger kites indeed, but more important as no wind at the surface thus maybe impossible to relaunch if they go down.

If your kite can hang at almost 9 or 15 o'clock, it is easy, and you just have to park it 30 to 45 degree above water a bit depowered and remember not to point too high upwind - AND, depower the kite fully flying it slowly over 12 when you change tack to avoid losing ground.
Not a good idea to take long tacks for your board, short ones so it does not get out of sight.

Peter

[dice]

Also don't forget that every time you turn, you go downwind.
Unless there is barely any power in the kite at all, but then you won't go upwind anyway.
If that's the case, I just do the backstroke straight to my board. Always works.

[ham-er]

Also don't forget that every time you turn, you go downwind.
Unless there is barely any power in the kite at all, but then you won't go upwind anyway.
If that's the case, I just do the backstroke straight to my board. Always works.

Yes, I've heard that backstroke especially in light wind gives better results than body dragging

[ham-er]

Herman is spot on - the by far major mistake, even by experienced kitesurfers to retrieve the board, is to point too high with your arm/body.

Think about that, just drag mentally across the wind and you will go upwind so to speak, a lot faster, and avoid the classic mistake trying to point up to your board

If you are using your board to drag upwind, it is somewhat different because you have to hold one arm over your board, no matter if a surfboard or TT or hydrofoil, same thing.
You still have to avoid pointing too high, but a lot easier and more intuitive when you dont try to GET to your board, but are dragging with your board.

Even in 5-7 knots on a hydrofoil, you can drag upwind (with a light kite), holding your foilboard with one arm, and in marginal winds you have to dive your kite down forward, not too low, depower it while flying up again avoiding losing kitespeed - up to or even past 12, and then down again.
An important skill for being able to get out to sufficiently deep water when dead onshore - which it unfortunately most often is in marginal/light wind seabreezes - which is the best weather to foil in, warm and smooth wind and sunny

No matter how, dont fly the kite too low, and in light wind, be ready to downloop it to save it from dropping.
Difficult with bigger kites indeed, but more important as no wind at the surface thus maybe impossible to relaunch if they go down.

If your kite can hang at almost 9 or 15 o'clock, it is easy, and you just have to park it 30 to 45 degree above water a bit depowered and remember not to point too high upwind - AND, depower the kite fully flying it slowly over 12 when you change tack to avoid losing ground.
Not a good idea to take long tacks for your board, short ones so it does not get out of sight.

Peter

I think that might be my problem, desperately trying to get back to the board and as a result I either go too much upwind or my body is in weird position which points me more into the wind than I think.
The thing is, I knew how to do it, but then something's happened during winter and I'm struggling to get back to board ever since.
Maybe it was the cold water shock or rough sea conditions, but instead of nicely and quickly getting back to the board it feels more like drowning and then loosing track of the board. Shortly exhaustion kicks in and back to almost drowning. At that point the only thing to do is drift donwind back to shore, land the kite, relax a bit, locate the board and go for a swim to retrieve it.

It's all good fun, but it takes about 20-30 min that way, lol

One thing for sure I will sort this out, next session I'll spend half of it in the water

Thanks a lot for the tips

[Herman]

A change in mindset might help. You don’t have to go upwind. All you have to do is hold ground and let the board come to you. You have to get used to being patient and not fixating on the board (if you stare at the board you end up pointing too high). In the early days it’s not daft to tape a kids armband to the handle. This makes the board easier to see and drift downwind more quickly. With respect to swimming, you might find sidestroke useful as well as backstroke.

PS If you cannot see the board, use the man overboard technique of counting to measure distance to centre your tacks on your search area. Probably even more important not to stall when trying to maintain an even search pattern! Use the gibes to lift you up at the top of the swell to help sight the board if possible.

[dice]

A change in mindset might help. You don’t have to go upwind. All you have to do is hold ground and let the board come to you.

That only works if the board is floating downwind. Which is not always the case.

[Herman]

Exceptions maybe - hydrofoils floating on their side (they can sail), or a hypothetical weird current that your boards in and you are not! The mind set works for me in open ocean. Any other caveats you think should be applied??


PS Weirdly satisfying when you have been dragging back and forth unable to locate your board only to bump into it when you decide to bodydrag downwind back to the beach. Done that a couple of times .

[Steve271]

Just a couple of thoughts If you feel like you are drowning,

do you have any flotation? I usually wear an impact vest and really noticed the difference when I forgot it recently

Are you a strong enough swimmer? I wasn’t when I started windsurfing in college, so me and my buddies signed up for a lifeguard course- we quickly had to improve our swimming skills and felt confident about being able to look after each other. Now I love swimming (I’m not good but have remained very comfortable the water for decades afterward)

[Turbaani]

Like others mentioned above, and especially if you feel like drowning, check these:
-Harness stays down, not on ribs
-Little floatation like impact vest
-Don't use too much energy, just go side wind

Bodydragging doesn't need much energy, but if you do it wrong and panicky, ye then it can. At some point you will feel what is the max direction upwind you can go. Its not much. After that point if you point too high, you will lose momentum and start going straight downwind. Imagine you are a fin in water and keep a bit of momentum. Standing still, or almost still means you go downwind.

[ham-er]

Just a couple of thoughts If you feel like you are drowning,

do you have any flotation? I usually wear an impact vest and really noticed the difference when I forgot it recently

Are you a strong enough swimmer? I wasn’t when I started windsurfing in college, so me and my buddies signed up for a lifeguard course- we quickly had to improve our swimming skills and felt confident about being able to look after each other. Now I love swimming (I’m not good but have remained very comfortable the water for decades afterward)

I did wear a life vest in the winter. Not now, unless it's high tide and very choppy water.

To me body dragging without vest feels smoother.

The mentioned drowning feeling was from splashes of water on the face every second or 2 or from submerging my head in waves, not actually drowning. Maybe my kite was too low...

I can swim reasonably well, I just need to work on my technique

Thanks