Duotone presents: The Sum Of 5

[Toby]

“We are not here to sell you on a dream. A video filled with smoke and mirrors. The perfect day doesn’t exist. The perfect session, the perfect trip… Moments of perfection are relative, intangible, unpredictable. They happen when every little detail comes together, with just the right timing.”

Passion and persistence are unrelenting forces that drive Hannah Whiteley, Mikaili Sol, Francesca Bagnoli, Paula Novotna and Colleen Carroll and bring them together as the cast of this most recent Duotone Episode. Despite their differences in background, discipline, personality or style, these five women met up in Soma Bay, Egypt this past fall to work on a group video and showcase their best riding as part of the first all female Duotone team photo shoot.

Boasting a formidable roster of female athletes, we felt it was time to put them in the spotlight and share with the rest of the kiteboarding community just what they could do. What they came up with was better than we could have imagined. Coming closer together as a team, working towards a common goal with talented filmmaker – Vincent Bergeron, these women have delivered a kiteboard video to the likes that we have rarely seen. We are proud to present to you, The Sum of 5.

[Laughingman]

Wow, great video, good riding, fun to watch... the promotional speak was a bit corny but other then that very well done imho...

[grigorib]

Somehow wherever I go I see absolutely minimal wakestyle. It must have been hot 10 years ago but I don’t think it caught up. Even pretty girls’ cheeks can’t revolve a declining niche discipline.

These are just my thoughts, I’d love to see sales numbers for high-rocker boards, boots, C-ish kites and unhooked-style bars with huge chickenloop - to suppprt/reverse my gut feeling and observations.

[rynhardt]

Somehow wherever I go I see absolutely minimal wakestyle. It must have been hot 10 years ago but I don’t think it caught up. Even pretty girls’ cheeks can’t revolve a declining niche discipline.

These are just my thoughts, I’d love to see sales numbers for high-rocker boards, boots, C-ish kites and unhooked-style bars with huge chickenloop - to suppprt/reverse my gut feeling and observations.

Yeah it's probably location driven. You should come to the flat water spots around Cape Town.
On a pumping day there's literally a queue for the shallows!

This was Hermanus..

[Slappysan]

Good vid. Dunno if I would be showing one of my kite leashes failing ( 4:58 ) in a product video though.

[Leon van Bergen]

Good vid. Dunno if I would be showing one of my kite leashes failing ( 4:58 ) in a product video though.

Now that you mentioned, not smart indeed! But yes a nice video!

[grigorib]

Somehow wherever I go I see absolutely minimal wakestyle. It must have been hot 10 years ago but I don’t think it caught up. Even pretty girls’ cheeks can’t revolve a declining niche discipline.

These are just my thoughts, I’d love to see sales numbers for high-rocker boards, boots, C-ish kites and unhooked-style bars with huge chickenloop - to suppprt/reverse my gut feeling and observations.

Yeah it's probably location driven. You should come to the flat water spots around Cape Town.
On a pumping day there's literally a queue for the shallows!

This was Hermanus..

slicks are superfun and I see lots of freestyle but it very rarely goes into unhooked. Unhooked is not easy, and is very technical. Takes lot of practice too and crowds appreciate smooth and powered loaded jumps and pretty transitions rather than grabs and handlepasses.

But I saw guys who get excited by unhooked freestyle, buy high rocker boards, boots and RPM/GTS/Torch/... and it holds back their progression quite some. Probably there are others who do same and rock but mostly when I see someone in boots and C-ish kite - their riding doesn't look anything close to what Pavla and Co deliver above

[jumptheshark]

Ha, I think it's hilarious how the girls know exactly what's what and choose a style in contrast to what the older male intermediate masses are doing. Good on them. This sport needs more girl power! Keeping it real and all about the skills!

I think its sad as f*** the top men have cow towed to the tastes of lesser riders instead of speaking truth to lameness.

[grigorib]

Ha, I think it's hilarious how the girls know exactly what's what and choose a style in contrast to what the older male intermediate masses are doing. Good on them. This sport needs more girl power! Keeping it real and all about the skills!

I think its sad as f*** the top men have cow towed to the tastes of lesser riders instead of speaking truth to lameness.

I believe it's rather Duotone who's selling image of girls' youth and female body curves to pimp the gear. Same for exotic locations those videos are filmed in.
Men ride just fine but not many men are attracted to males in means of "eye candy". If duotone could have add dogs and kids to attract more ladies into sport - they would.
Practically top men kick @ss in KOTA into which not a single girl qualified for. And Daniela and Elena are flying the fock out of their foils on foils without need to loan their image for commercials. And foiling gear _sells_ compared to unhooked freestyle (the last I heard from dealers).

That's to "keeping it real"

Also young men and girls just don't have enough time and money to play our game. They're ether busy students or broke (or combination of both). They can't hang out and ride 4 out of 12 months and ride brand new wings.

Don't get me wrong - I appreciate their great skills, I also appreciate boobies and asses, close shots of pretty faces and cute accents. Let's not forget what the most massive thread of kiteforum is

What puzzled me is why duotone is focusing on extremely complicated and technical unhooked wakestyle unless that gear sells really well.

[jumptheshark]

That's simply what the pro girls are doing. There are not that many out there. This is the dawn of their input into the sport. I hope to hell they take over. You'll see.

Like socks in sandals or tucked in T shirts, Y'all need the girls to show you whats what.

Down the line there will be plenty of variety to what the top girls do, but its worth understanding, the two styles they chose to kick ass in first were waves and wake.