Kite surfing

AKA kitesurfing, fly surfing, and kiteboarding,

use a power kite to pull the rider through the water on a small surfboard, a wakeboard, or a kiteboard.

A kitesurfer stands on a board with foot straps or bindings, and uses the power of a large controllable kite to propel himself and the board across water. However, this simplicity also makes kitesurfing challenging. Your body is the only connection between the kite and the board and you have to control them both at the same time: piloting the kite in the sky, and steering the board on the water.

Learning and Training
Kiteboarding can pose hazards to kitesurfers, beachgoers, bystanders and others on the water. Many problems and dangers that may be encountered while learning kiting (some of which may not be immediately obvious) can be avoided or minimized by taking professional instruction.

Kitesurfing schools provide courses and lessons to teach various skills including kite launching, flying, landing, usage of the bar, lines and safety devices. The usage of kitesurfing equipment can be misunderstood, so it is essential for beginners to take instructions from a certified kitesurfing instructor. A good course should include basic kite setup, operation, maintenance, kite size and type considerations, and operation of all safety systems. It could also include weather planning and hazards, launch area selection, body dragging upwind to avoid board leash use, solo launching and landing, emergency landing, self rescue, safety gear, kite tuning, water starting and how to stay upwind while riding.

An early learning technique is to fly a small kite on a beach to learn how to control the kite within the wind window.

Once good kite flying skills are obtained, the next progression is bodydragging, where a larger kite is flown and used to drag the student's body through the water. The effect is similar to bodysurfing, but with an upward lift component. Bodydragging is also a self rescue technique in the event a kiter loses their board and needs to get to the shore.

The next progression is to lie in the water and attach your feet to the board (i.e. through the foot straps) with the board downwind. The kite is then flown left and right with its pull balanced against the board's resistance by matching the pressure with alternate legs. For example, pressure on the left of the control bar is balanced against pressure applied by the left foot to the board, and vice versa.

Getting Started
Generally, the first step of kitesurfing is to fly one's power kite into neutral position, in which the kite is overhead at the edge of the wind window, and therefore generating little pull ideally which can be balanced against one's body weight.

Turning
A beginner can turn by putting the kite up into neutral, stopping, sinking backwards into the water, then turning the kite in the opposite direction and starting again.

Jumping.Controlled flying is possible and one of the biggest attractions of the sport, but more difficult and dangerous.

Terminology
air time: the amount of time spent in the air while jumping.
apparent wind: the kite's speed relative to the surrounding air. When kitesurfing in a straight line, the kite's apparent wind is a combination of the wind speed and the speed of the kite and rider over the surface, but since the kite is highly steerable apparent wind can vary widely depending on how the kite is being flown. Most ways of increasing power from the kite involve giving it a higher apparent wind somehow, i.e. diving the kite, riding faster, or riding at a greater angle into the wind.
body dragging: being pulled through the water without standing on your board.
boost: to suddenly become airborne
chicken loop: a hard rubber loop attached to the middle line which has been fed through the control bar. It is used to attach the control bar to the harness so the kitesurfer can produce tension in the lines using their entire bodyweight instead of using purely arm strength.
chicken bone: a hard rubber "tongue" attached to the chicken loop which the rider feeds through the spreader bar hook to prevent the rider from becoming "unhooked".
de-power: to reduce the kite's power (pull), generally by adjusting the angle of attack of the kite. Most kites and control bars now allow you to rig a kite for a number of different power levels before launching, in addition to powering the kite up and down "on the fly" by moving the bar up and down. Depowerability makes a kite safer and easier to handle. Some new kite models, especially "bow" kites, can be de-powered to practically zero power, giving them an enormous wind range.
DP: Dawn patrol; a very early morning session.
donkey dick: same as "chicken bone".
downwind: the direction the wind is blowing towards; to leeward. When you are facing downwind the wind is at your back.
downwinder: a kitesurfing "trip" (could actually be as short as a few minutes) where the rider starts at one point and ends up at another point downwind of their original position. This is a good way to learn; park a vehicle a mile downwind and you can concentrate on tricks or learning or waveriding or just jumping and not have to worry about walking back or tacking upwind.
edge: tilting the board with its edge into the water. Used to control the direction of travel. Learning to edge properly is critical for learning to tack upwind. Edging is one of the fundamental skills of kitesurfing and is one of the ways kitesurfing is different from windsurfing or wakeboarding. While windsurf boards have daggerboards and/or skegs to steer the board upwind while lift and planing is provided by the board itself, generally kiteboards actually combine both functions and the bottom of the board lifts the rider and steers simultaneously. Kiteboard fins are generally much smaller and are for keeping the board in the water (see "tea-bagging"), but are not essential.
heel side: the side of a board on the edge where your heels are. "Riding heelside" is riding with your heels down. Heelside is the normal and most comfortable riding position.
Handlepass: while unhooked, passing the control bar behind your back while in the air
kiteloop: is a group of tricks that you loop the kite while spinning through the air
kitemare: a kiteboardsurfing accident or dangerous mishap. Kitemares can be deadly.
lofted: to get lifted vertically into the air by the kite by a strong gust of wind. A very dangerous occurrence that has resulted in several fatalities when kiters on or near land have been dragged into obstacles. Can be avoided my minimizing time on land with the kite flying directly overhead, and by not kiting in overpowered situations.
luff : when the air flow stalls around the kite. It may then stall and fall out of the sky. Like sails, a luffing kite has rippling and flapping panels. When launching the kite, if the kite is luffing, the rider should move farther upwind, or the person holding the kite should move downwind.
Mobe: A back loop with a handlepass in the middle, while keeping the kite below 45o
offshore: wind blowing at the water from the shore. Never ride in offshore winds without some means of recovery, i.e. a chase boat. This is somewhat less important in smaller bodies of water, of course.
onshore: wind blowing perpendicular to and directly at the shore from the water. A challenging condition for beginners, especially if waves are present.
power up: when the kite's power increases (suddenly), because of wind gusts or the kite's movement.
power zone: is the area in the sky where the kite generates the most lift (pull), this is generally between 0 to 60 degrees arc from the center of the downwind direction.
Send it: To move the kite aggressively up through the power zone.
Schlogging: This is riding extremely underpowered. You have no power to plane and definitely not enough to jump. You and your board bounce from planing on the surface to being dragged in the water.
side shore, winds blowing parallel to the shore. Usually the most desirable direction for kitesurfing.
side onshore: wind blowing between sideshore and at a 45 degree angle towards the shore.
spreader bar: A stainless steel bar that attaches to the rider's harness. It has a hook that holds the "chicken loop" when riding hooked in.
tack: The direction which is being sailed, normally either starboard tack or port tack. In a starboard tack the wind is coming in from the rider's starboard (right-hand) side, similar to sailing a boat. In normal riding, the kitesurfer takes a heading which is as close to into the wind as possible, and in any event leads at some angle slightly upwind, sometimes as much as 45 degrees; jumping or wave riding usually results in traveling downwind, so the net result is to maintain relative position. Alternately, see "downwinder".
toe side: the side of a board on the edge where your toes are. "Riding toe side" is riding with your toes down.
underpowered: the condition of having insufficient power from the kite. Can be a result of insufficient wind, choosing a kite that is too small for the current wind, rigging incorrectly, board too small, water current in the same direction as the wind, not riding fast enough, etc. A rider who is continuously diving the kite and sending it back up in a sine-wave pattern is usually underpowered.
unhooked is a term used to describe when a kitesurfer is riding while the chicken loop is not attached to the rider's harness.
upwind: the direction from which the wind is blowing; windward; into the wind.
VaS conditions: Victory at Sea; very rough sea conditions, generally with overhead wind waves causing severe shore break.
wind window is the 120-180 degree arc of the sky downwind of the rider in which the kite can be flown. Roughly one fourth of a sphere's surface. If the rider is facing downwind on a flat surface, like the ocean, the wind window consists of roughly all the area the rider can see, from the rider's peripheral vision on one side, along the horizon to the other side, and then directly overhead back to the first side. If the rider somehow puts the kite out of the window -- for example, by riding downwind very quickly and sending the kite directly overhead and behind -- the kite will stall and frequently fall out of the sky.
zenith the location in the wind window directly over the kiter's head. This is the neutral position where kitesurfers can place the kite to stop moving or prior to movement.

Equipment
Power kites
Leading edge inflatables - Leading edge inflatable kites, known also as inflatables, LEI kites or C-shaped kites, are typically made from ripstop nylon with inflatable plastic bladders.
Foil kites - Foil kites are also mostly fabric (ripstop nylon) with air pockets (air cells) to provide it with lift and a fixed bridle to maintain the kite's arc-shape, similar to a paraglider. Foil kites are designed with either an open or closed cell configuration; open cell foils rely on a constant airflow against the inlet valves to stay inflated, but are generally impossible to relaunch if they hit the water, since they have no means of avoiding deflation, and quickly become soaked.
Kite sizes - Kites come in various sizes ranging from .7 square meters to 21 square meters, or even larger. In general, the larger the surface area, the more power the kite has, although kite power is also directly linked to speed, and smaller kites can be flown faster; a tapering curve results, where going to a larger kite to reach lower wind ranges becomes futile at a wind speed of around eight knots.

Other variations of using kites for propulsion include kite landboarding, snowkiting, kite buggying, kite jumping, and using kites to propel sea kayaks.

Clubs and associations
IKO International Kiteboarding Organization
PKRA Professional Kite Riders Association
KPWT Kiteboard Pro World Tour
AKSA Australian Kitesurfing Association
APKITE Portuguese Kitesurf Association
BKSA British Kitesurfing Association, Great Britain

AAK Asociación Argentina de Kitesurf

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