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Snowkite Masters 2012 PDF Print E-mail
Friday, 20 January 2012 11:49

The winter season this year came late.. VERY late! I currently live in Bodø, Norway; North of the Polar Circle, and outside my window it's still +5 degrees and raining. Needless to say there hasn't been much snowkiting going on this year. On top of that, I managed to sprain my nkle just a few weeks before Christmas so things wasn't looking too bright for the competition


Regardless, my brother Sigurd, my girlfriend Marte and myself jumped on a plane to France to compete. When we got there Saturday night, the stars were shining from a clear sky and everything was looking perfect for the day after. The competition didn't start until Monday, so we used the Sunday to get some much needed practice to get the tricks from last year to stick. My brother and I also took turns taking pictures and kiting, and we got some pretty cool shots!

 

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Training day – Perfect conditions for training the day before the competition. To bad this was the first day of the season :p


The next day started with single elimination and I managed to get to the quarter finals. Even though the wind was a bit low it was possible to do some cool tricks from the kicker building up speed down the hill. My brother Sigurd did an awesome first heat but got unlucky on a huge s-bend from the kicker with the kite glued to the ground and broke his ankle. Even so, he finished his heat and won but wasn't able to do his next heat.

 

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Amazing scenery – All  around us there was beautiful mountains covered in snow perfect for snowkiting


My quarter finals was against Marek Zack; the guy who beat me last year. I was on my new Hadlow ID 12m and Marek was on his 15m Ozone, and that gave me a disadvantage as the wind was very low. Just after the heat started Marek got unlucky and lost his kite on a flat 3 on the kicker. Immediately I was sure I had won since this was reason for disqualification. But the race master chose to restart since the heat had just started, and this time I weren't so lucky. After 7 minutes of struggling for power to do tricks, Marek drew the longest straw and advanced to the next round. I was very disappointed but luckily there was the double elimination the day after which gave me a fighting chance even though I could end up 9th if I lost my first heat. After he single elimination Remi was first, Chasta was second and Marek was third.

 

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Double elimination – In double elimination the competition starts at the bottom and the lowest ranked rider competes against the person above on the ranking list, and the winner advances.


But the day after things didn't go as planned. Already in the second heat I lost my kite, but due to the incident with Marek the day before
the guy I was riding against, Guyot, agreed to rerun the heat. This time I won and we continued the doubles the day after. Now things were finally starting to go my way! I managed to ride my way all the top winning 7 heats in a row beating both Marek and Chasta:D In the finals I had to win two heats against Remi Meum to steal the first position, but now I was starting to get tired from all the heats. The wind picked and things were looking perfect for the heat! We both managed to land a lot of cool tricks (backmobes, frontmobes, KGBs, flat 3s, 5s ++) and were neck and neck in the first heat but just as the heat was about to end I went for a huge kiteloop s-mobe and landed way to hard. Once away I felt something break and couldn't put any weight on my left foot, which meant it was over for this year. Regardless, I was super happy how things went considering how it started out and it felt great to finally be on the podium. Maybe next year ;)

 

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World Snowkite Masters 2012 – riders picture

 

 

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Price giving

 
Kite'n'Cable at Bergsjøstølen PDF Print E-mail
Wednesday, 04 January 2012 16:45

As some of you might know, Kåre and Helge at Bergsjøstølen Hotel invested in a Sesitec System 2.0 cable park. Now it’s set up permanenty in wintertime, so anyone who want can come and ride when the wind isn’t blowing :)

 

Just after Christmas my brother and I came for a visit along with some friends itching to ride. Here’s a video made with my brand new GoPro HD Hero 2

Kite'n'Cable from Andreas Toverud on Vimeo.

Last Updated on Wednesday, 04 January 2012 21:55
 
Fearless Play in Morocco! PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 22 November 2011 09:20

The snow have still to show here up in the far north due to the warmest winter in many decades, so instead of freezing our asses off in the just-above-freezing-temerature water we decided to go south:) Fearless Play had arranged a trip to Morocco, so Helge and I packed all our kitegear and jumped on a plane to Africa!

 

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Fearless Play is an activity group introducing kids and teenagers to extreme sports. On a regular basis they arrange a extreme sport camp calles X-camp on the western coast of Norway involving paragliding, rafting, surfing, downhill bicycle riding, and kitesurfing. This winter they will also arrange Fearless Winter; A winter camp with snowkiting, cable park riding, dog sleding, down hill sledding and ice klimbing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having heard nothing more about the trip than that we were going to Morocco and that I had to buy a plane ticket to Agadir (wherever that was), I arrived at the airport and hooked up with the rest of the guys. Pretty easy to spot them dragging a ton of kite gear around:P We rented a taxi and drove 4 and a half hours (1 and a half hour according to Helge) to the hotell where we were staying in a small town called Essouira. Over the week that followed Helge tought us his new time stand; Surf Time, which is more or less within a couple of hours (if he didn`t get hungry all of a sudden and had to get food, which happened about once an hour)

 

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Local music: When we arrived at the hotel, they had brought a local band to play traditional Morrocan music. I imagine it must be just as strange for them to see traditional Norwegian folk music, but even so.. a very strange yet cool experience.

 

Exhausted by the long trip we went straight to bed after the band had stopped playing. There was still plenty of time to party in the nights to come!

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Amazing sunset: When the sun went down in the ocean and darkness crept up we witnessed one of the most beautifull sunsets in the world. Dust from the Sahara desert blows up in the atmosphere and lights the horizon on fire!

 

The next day, the wind was blowing and we had some pretty decent waves rolling in. After a couple hours of riding I decided to test the new Hadlow ID kite that Helge had just got his hands on before we left Norway. I had met one of the Morrocan PKRA riders and lended him my Hadlow Pro kite while I was using the ID. I will come back with a full review as soon as I have riden it more, but so far it feels like a rock solid mellow version of the Hadlow Pro.

We kept riding untill all the other surfers and kiters had gone home into yet an other beautifull sunset.

Andreas Toverud x

Hadlow ID: An easy to ride, 4 line mellow version of the high octane Hadlow Pro kite. A good choice for intermediate tp pro riders who like the comfort of extra depower and relaunchability without the 5th line.'

 

We had wind the next day as well and used the most of it experimenting with innovative use of GoPro cams in kites, on helmets, control bars, rum bottles, turtles and what not :P Helge is making a movie from the trip which I will post as soon as it`s ready. Unfortunately the wind decided not to show up for the rest of the week so we spent the rest of the trip riding ATVs and camels, surfing, shoping and eating a lot of dodgy food that tasted absolutely awesome!

 

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The next trip is already planned; Snowkite Masters in Serre Chevallier just after Christmas :D

Last Updated on Tuesday, 22 November 2011 15:54
 
Review of Hyperlite System bindings and Marek boots PDF Print E-mail
Friday, 30 September 2011 04:19

Since coming back from Rhodes, things haven't been quite the same. Suddenly water temperatures of 10 degrees Celsius feels a lot colder and riding bindings in water that cold is pure agony. So I decided to look around for a better solution and came up with this:

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Cold weather gear:  Dry suit, gloves, hoodie, socks and the new Hyperlite Marek boots and System bindings

The biggest problem with wearing boots in really cold weather is that you have to get in and out of them. And for us not lucky enough to have a smooth sandy beach to to that on, you have to do it in the water. Which means that even though you have a closed toe boot, you still have to swim around barefooted. You can also wear wetsuit socks, but this makes it difficult to get into the bindings.

My solution was to buy the new Hyperlite System bindings (no strings attached). I used them with my Flexifoil Hadlow wakestyle board, but any other board with 6,5” insert spacing will work.

What I like:

First of all: this system looks awesome on the board, and even though its not the most important part it was a big factor in me choosing these over the Ronix One. Secondly, you can easily put these on with wetsuit socks under even before you go down to the spot. Kind of like snowboard boots:) Really nice for extra cold days. An other thing I love is the comfort of knowing your feet are properly protected when walking over rough terrain and rocks to get into the water.

The snow has already fallen here in the night and the water temperature is about 5 degrees, but I stay warm and comfy in these boots even for longer sessions. Been riding them for three days straight now and love them so far. The weight of the system is pretty good! Lighter than my old LF Unions, but probably a bit heavier the lightest on the market.. Didn’t bother me though. And last; I love the Boa lacing which enables you to tighten the boot around your foot as tight as you like. This combined with the ankle lacing gives you the option to go as flexible or stiff as you want. Hopefully they’ll put in a separate Boa lacing for tightening the ankle on the next model instead of the regular laces.

What I don’t like:

Even though the boots are really nice, the bindings them selves need some work. On my snowboard I ride the SP Fastec bindings which are AWESOME, and I would love to be able to mount them on my wakeboard instead of these. The bindings are not as easy to get into as you would hope, and doing so whilst floating around struggling with a jumpy kite is not an easy feat.  The toe cap on the binding is designed in a way that doesn’t make sense to me at all but it does the job. Once you get into them they give you a nice firm hold with good contact and quick response. The straps keeping the boot in place glitched a couple of time whilst doing quick turns or hard landings so I had to tighten them again and I can see this becoming a problem once they get a bit worn. But time will show. At least those parts should be easy to swap for parts from your local snowboard store if it becomes a problem.

Conclusion:

If you love bindings and ride in cold water, at rocky beaches or hate cutting your feet getting into the water, these are the boots for you! Despite the things I don’t like I will keep buying and riding these bindings because they work way better than any other solution I've tried:)

If you got something better, let me know!

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Close up of the Marek boot and System binding

Update: Just dropped by their website and saw they had released the 2012 model. Only change I saw was the toe cap, and I expect the new one will work a lot better… Liked the colors of the old boot better though

Last Updated on Friday, 30 September 2011 08:46
 
Kite trip to Rhodos PDF Print E-mail
Monday, 08 August 2011 03:39

My girfriend and I recently went on a vacation to Prasonisi, Rhodos to kitesurf. Definitely the best spot I’ve ever been to (when there weren’t too many windsurfers and German swimming tourists:P). 30+ in the water, wind almost every day and perfect flatwater!

Here are some images from our trip:D

Click image to open!

Last Updated on Monday, 08 August 2011 07:47
 
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Andreas Toverud - Flexifoil Team Rider, Powered by Flexifoil!