This video explains in detail how to ride upwind
– looking at body position, kite control, common mistakes and angles.
Let's start with basic body position. You should already be confident waterstarting
and stopping on both sides, without crashing yourself or the kite.
Begin with a comfortable water start. Riding mostly upright, with your front leg straight,
to turn the board slightly downwind. Heading a little downwind at first, will help
you gain speed and start planing. Once you are planing, gradually lean your
shoulders back into the harness. Leaning back will press your weight onto your heels. The
heelside rail will press into the water, which carves upwind.
Let's have a look at that on the left side. Comfortable water start. Left leg straight,
pointing board down wind. Once planing, progressively drop shoulders back.
Leaning back further will carve the board more upwind. Although, leaning too much will
create drag and slow you down. To be able to ride upwind, you must be maintain
a medium board speed. If you ride too slowly, the board sinks
into the water and has too much drag.
If you ride too quickly, your board planes
higher, until you have little contact with the water.
You can see here the rider is going so quickly the board has very little contact.
If you maintain a middle speed, however, the
board is high enough to not drag, but low enough in the water to hold your edge. When
you get it right, you should see about half of your board cutting in nicely like this.
Maintaining this medium speed, begins with kite control.
If you watch closely you will see experienced kitesurfers making lots of adjustments to
the bar as they ride. If they're a little fast, they push the bar
out. If they're a little slow, they pull the bar in.
If they're very slow and about to sink, they steer the kite up and down to fly it further
into the power zone. Aiming the board back downwind, for a while, also helps to regain
speed.
As well as controlling your kite's power, it is also important for beginners to keep
the kite at a forgiving angle when learning. A lot of skilled kiters happily keep their
kite low, but this is usually a bad idea for learners. If you fall with the kite this low
to the water you will hit your board or get levered over it. Equally you shouldn't keep
your kite too high if you want to ride upwind. If you leave your kite near 12 O'Clock for
too long, you will loose momentum. Beginners should keep their kite 45 degrees from the
water while planing. As well as board speed, there are several
others easy mistakes to make when trying to ride upwind.
A very common mistake is trying to go upwind immediately. Many people who are becoming
impatient, try this. They water start and then forcefully turn the board upwind.
You can see that a lot of energy is wasted, the board never planes, and there is no chance
to ride upwind. Don't try to turn instantly, rather think of turning upwind as a smooth
carve or arc – then your board will plane and cut into the water efficiently.
The poo stance is a very common and amusing mistake. The poo stance oringinate when people
try to lean back upwind using their waist rather than their shoulders. Things then get
worse, as this causes the harness ride up toward your armpits. You then have to lean
your shoulders forward to control the kite, and the poo stance gets worse.
Stop for a second, pull your harness down, and make sure to lean upwind with your upper
body. Now we'll take a quick overview of angles
involved when you ride upwind. At this location, the wind is blowing directly
on shore, but the rider is managing to head against the wind and away from the beach.
This is possible because because the kite pulls in this direction, across from downwind.
If you did not edge the board, obviously you would start to head this way. But with your
heel edge cutting in the water, you force yourself across from the kites pull.
As you lean back further and turn the board further from the kite's pull, you can head
further upwind, but you will create more resistance. You can actually use this to help slow down
quicker. On the other hand, if you want to speed up,
you can angle the board towards the kite's pull. There will be less resistance and this
makes it much easier to regain your speed. This is why we turn the board a little downwind,
whenever you water start or need to speed up.
Good luck learning to ride upwind. It takes a lot of effort and determination, but once
you master it, your level will improve quickly. Subscribe for further kite tutorials.