state of the art wave kite foiling

[juandesooka]

Ridiculous radness! Endless fun potential!

So why do we inevitably end up bickering and arguing about these silly nuances and semantics? I think The Matrix pegged it, humans need to have some conflict and pain anxiety to be satisfied. If we all got along and agreed on everything and lived in an infinite wave garden paradise, then we'd figure out a way to fight about that too. Ah well. When the wind blows and the surf's up, I'm on it, and then ... really .. who care what anyone else thinks. Just giv'r and have a laugh with pals after.

[Kitetwin-1]

Like he said !!!

[plummet]

Yeah get out there and ride however the hell you like. For me wave foiling is about flow, speed and carving on and off the wave/swell face. I dice with the pocket every now and then just to feel manly, then go back to the business of fun which is charging full sweeping carves on, over, through around the waves. A good wholesome high-speed fang down a jacking up wave face is thrilling too, carving out before it closes out and eats you up. I don't like riding through the whitewash on the foil. For me, that kills the fun, just lumpy horrible riding. So I dice with the wave while its peeling and then carve off and back upwind before I get to any closeout and subsequent whitewash ride. I'll leave that to the sb guys. I also like to evoke drexler style kite looping tomfoolery while i'm fangen down the line on the wave. That adds a level of complexity and amusement that I enjoy.

Its like smashing endless burms on my mountain bike. My own personal 5000000000 m² pump track. A worthy sensation indeed.

[flying grandpa]

Even that seems sometimes hard with bigger swells, to shut of the harsh acceleration of the foil when slightly overpowered and entering a steep part of the wave...

Decreasing max speed of most foils is easy.
The other way around - increasing - that’s a chore time!

To decrease max foil speed, put a washer (one or more credit cards) under one of front wing screw to lift up its leading edge.
This increases drag and reduces speed radically ( fuse angle of attack becomes negative in addition to increased downward force on stabi).
You’ll often get good stability with the same strap and mast position, as well as expect better low end in some cases.

You may even try to adjust your max speed to wave hight with proper washer thickness.

This way you can familiarize speeding down steep wawe a bit, at least it works fine for me at my age.

Well drifting kite helps a lot to stay in control. 4m Peak4 works very well for me. Its line tension helps me a lot to speed up my turns, at least until I learn to turn like a foilsurfer.

[pikovsg]

I love kite foiling waves and can't get enough of it. So much more to discover! Per earlier mentions - go to school on Oyvind, Adam Withington, Fred Hope, Kai Lenny, Ketos, BRM, Horue and Core rider vids and give it some time – foil surfing will evolve into much more complex ride sequences as more people push the envelope. Wings and boards will evolve in parallel as manufacturers get inspired by watching these guys.

IMO a strong kite/foil community also drives progress. Here in Boston we have a lot of people getting into wave foiling and as a community everyone inspires each other to advance. At this point, thanks to other riders, I'm able to to spray the lip (at times) and do kiteroll backloops, reverse slides, and occasional megaloops on decent size waves. We just need a videographer to share a few decent vids and put them online. I'm sure there are others pushing it at any given time somewhere else.

Experiment with various boards, wings and kites. Slow down on the wave when down the line. Get to know the nitty gritty of your kite control. Try different positions on the mast track, beef up your leg muscles, work on your body's flexibility, while foiling more waves instead of writing posts about what's not possible.


P.S. (super secret tip)
Electric skateboards like Lacroix Lonestar, Bamboo Evolve GT, Onewheel and oldschool Carver skateboards allow you to work on the same wave techniques on land, essentially doubling your time learning while keeping that kite and foil stoke. It's not a coincidence that you see Oyvind on the Onewheel before nearly every session.

[stevez]

P.S. (super secret tip)
Electric skateboards like Lacroix Lonestar, Bamboo Evolve GT, Onewheel and oldschool Carver skateboards allow you to work on the same wave techniques on land, essentially doubling your time learning while keeping that kite and foil stoke. It's not an coincidence that you see Oyvind on the Onewheel before nearly every session.

Just pulled the trigger on the onewheel pint. Had my eye on the onewheel for a while, they've just been a bit out of range pricewise until now.

[pikovsg]

P.S. (super secret tip)
Electric skateboards like Lacroix Lonestar, Bamboo Evolve GT, Onewheel and oldschool Carver skateboards allow you to work on the same wave techniques on land, essentially doubling your time learning while keeping that kite and foil stoke. It's not an coincidence that you see Oyvind on the Onewheel before nearly every session.

Just pulled the trigger on the onewheel pint. Had my eye on the onewheel for a while, they've just been a bit out of range pricewise until now.

There you go! The Onewheel Pint is very skatey, even more so than XR. You should see an immediate connection to foiling as soon as you ride it.

[elguapo]

I love kite foiling waves and can't get enough of it. So much more to discover! Per earlier mentions - go to school on Oyvind, Adam Withington, Fred Hope, Kai Lenny, Ketos, BRM, Horue and Core rider vids and give it some time – foil surfing will evolve into much more complex ride sequences as more people push the envelope. Wings and boards will evolve in parallel as manufacturers get inspired by watching these guys.

IMO a strong kite/foil community also drives progress. Here in Boston we have a lot of people getting into wave foiling and as a community everyone inspires each other to advance. At this point, thanks to other riders, I'm able to to spray the lip (at times) and do kiteroll backloops, reverse slides, and occasional megaloops on decent size waves. We just need a videographer to share a few decent vids and put them online. I'm sure there are others pushing it at any given time somewhere else.

Experiment with various boards, wings and kites. Slow down on the wave when down the line. Get to know the nitty gritty of your kite control. Try different positions on the mast track, beef up your leg muscles, work on your body's flexibility, while foiling more waves instead of writing posts about what's not possible.


P.S. (super secret tip)
Electric skateboards like Lacroix Lonestar, Bamboo Evolve GT, Onewheel and oldschool Carver skateboards allow you to work on the same wave techniques on land, essentially doubling your time learning while keeping that kite and foil stoke. It's not a coincidence that you see Oyvind on the Onewheel before nearly every session.

doesnt Oyvind use a monofoil?
i'm mindblown thinking of some something so maneuverable with twin power potential of wind and a swollen swell....bacially i see a monofoil in waves as a thruster on steroids.

to me foilig swell is similar on riding on longboard or more precisesly a gun surfboard...excect much faster and you dont need a wave 2x overhead ride it.
ridng is completely different that with a thruster(for example)..
just like on a bigger wave..im trying to catch foil on wave/swell..down and back up..trying to use minimize use of kite. (except dont need to wait for monster swell to do it)

[slowboat]

Even that seems sometimes hard with bigger swells, to shut of the harsh acceleration of the foil when slightly overpowered and entering a steep part of the wave...

Decreasing max speed of most foils is easy.
The other way around - increasing - that’s a chore time!

To decrease max foil speed, put a washer (one or more credit cards) under one of front wing screw to lift up its leading edge.
This increases drag and reduces speed radically ( fuse angle of attack becomes negative in addition to increased downward force on stabi).
You’ll often get good stability with the same strap and mast position, as well as expect better low end in some cases.

You may even try to adjust your max speed to wave hight with proper washer thickness.

This way you can familiarize speeding down steep wawe a bit, at least it works fine for me at my age.

Well drifting kite helps a lot to stay in control. 4m Peak4 works very well for me. Its line tension helps me a lot to speed up my turns, at least until I learn to turn like a foilsurfer.

So do you want a foil with more drag or less drag for waves?

[lebast]

@flying grandpa
My Foil is setup quite nice for waves at least I have the feeling at the moment . The challenge for me lays in riding technique for this given challenge. Like where and how to enter the wave and which line once you are in the wave to choose. Since the wind "waves" that we get here in the baltic sea are based on 30+ktns +-10knts gusty conditions kite size choice can be a gamble. So in this regards smaller (3,5,3,2.8,2.5qm...) foil wave specialized kites will be an improvement (which will enter the market soon) but even with these we will face those situations where a gust hits (big black cloud) and the bigger waves of the days roll in. You feel a little overpowered on your kite but you still want to be able to ride the wave as you desire. And here I have the feeling that the position and the speed where and with wich you enter these waves will be crucial in order to not just go down the wave full speed and out run it but be in the position where you have full control over where and how you want to ride the wave. So I don't want to limit the foil speed by setting it to a certain AOA but I want to be able to control the speed via riding decisions before and while on the wave, like stalling for a tube ride with SB...

In short: for me that is more a riding experience thing than a foil setup up question but I have to admit smaller wave foil oriented kites would probably help. For sure also more defined wave wings that fit your style will help, but that is semantics...

@slowboat
As for wing choice and AOA setup in the waves. This seems very personal a friend of mine likes bigger wings (1000cm²+) to get this intense feeling of being pushed in waves to a certain speed going more straight and wider arched turns and I like rather smaller wings (710cm²) that seem way more manouverable and carvy in the wave, with which speed managing is key.