2008 Kiteboarding Nationals End With The Pros Taking The Mantle Back

Course racing is a fairly new variant to the kiteboarding sport.  It was brought to life by a San Francisco Bay area group steeped in the sailing world that felt they could combine their new passion with their lifelong hobby.  With the first course racing, or was then called upwind racing, taking place four years ago, it was a sport initially relegated to the 30+ year old set, that enjoyed the tactical nature of the sport, and required less of the physical demands of the aerialists doing freestyle.  There was still a physically demanding aspect to course racing that involved strength in one’s legs, but this was a very different requirement to that of throwing oneself 40+ feet up in the air while doing 2 or 3 tricks before coming in for what would hopefully be a smooth landing.

Last year was the first U.S. Kiteboarding Championships in the San Francisco Bay, and it brought a larger number of competitors who had not participated in this type of event before.  Anthony Chavez, local San Francisco rider, managed to run away with the first place finish for 2007.  Jeff Kafka, another local Bay area rider came in 2nd place.  However, over the past year, the PKRA has picked up on course racing and now many of the pro riders are getting a lot more exposure to this version of the sport.  In this year’s race, it showed.  The top three finishers were all well known riders in Damien LeRoy (Cabrinha) taking 1st place, Sean Farley (North) taking 2nd place, and Sky Solbach (North) in third place.  These riders, along with former Maui rider, now riding under the St. Francis club banner, Sean Richman (Waiman), Jon Van Malsen (North), Jon Modica, and Kent Marinkovic, all joined Anthony Chavez (Naish) and Jeff Kafka (Cabrinha) in the top 10 finishers this year.  With the exception of Jeff, all of these riders are under 30 years old.  Oh, what it’s like to be young :)

You can follow this link to see the standings for the 2008 U.S. Kiteboarding Championship.

One of the things that was really fun was seeing all of the competitors with their beaming smiles at nearly every turn and every break.  Everyone was really out there having a great time.

(Shawn Richman, Jon Modica, Sky Solbach, Damien LeRoy, Kent Marinkovic)

This year was also one for many advances in technology.  In the first year of racing, twin tip boards were being adapted to racing with riders applying bigger fins to gain the upwind advantage.  It didn’t take long for most riders to move to directional boards, either in the form of surfboards, or custom boards with a surfy look to them.  Now we’re beginning to see a whole generation of boards.  Many look like sawed off windsurf boards with large outwardly angled fins.  Here are some examples of what we saw out there:

Tech was definitely in, and lots of folks were experimenting with different styles.  What struck me most however, which is also a testament to the great riders in this sport, is that everyone traded boards between races, so they could feel how the differences between these models.  It was great to see this spirit of sportsmanship where no one is trying to keep secrets, just trying to advance the state-of-the-art.  A gracious group indeed. 

With that, another great of racing here in the San Francisco Bay area, and it was great to see and cheer this illustrious group of riders along.  It’s not yet clear where next year’s race will be held, but as with any Nationals event, it will take place in a different city.  San Francisco has been the inaugural host and is now happy to let the show go on the road.  Next year, SF hopes to host the World Championships.  Should be fun!