Epic Kitesurf Summer Condensed...

Somehow time flys by and a million great sessions on the water, air and even on land sneak by undocumented in the wonderful exciting blur that is our lives. As my knee defrosts a bag of Tia style geen beens to decrease it's swelling, guilt of missed blogs past slaped me up side the head. Ali, Bayless, Alex, Vic,Klaus, Strat and another 20 friends are still up at County Line in solid nine meter winds and fun wind swell "SHMAKIN!" the hell out of the lips. Putting some sort of info bits to the blogisphere was well overdo and here it goes. I got out into the water early to sneak some good waves with the early wind before the dreaded County heat bubble formed and the inside wind got forced out till the evening. Avoidance of jumping has been marginally effective at best and the knee is not happy after the past 50 days straight of non stop water time. Been on and off strapless surfboard rides since the beginning of this sport and that is a great wave to avoid knee trauma but when the wind is really going wth great waves and lots of bump, straps are a must.. Problem is that the water loged brain is always one neuro network short of realizing jumping that next close out set wave won't do that compromised Sponge Bob joint any good... It is all in the moment and adrenalin covers pain well. It's always when you are crawling to your car that jumping remorse sets in.. Mixing constant biking, paragliding, swimming and surfing in still does not get a wind addicted mind out the water consistently when it is blowing four to five hours a day. Diversions are just that, but balance is what kitesurfing longevity will be based on. Yoga, cardio and a full plate of other sports keeps the pasion for all of them alive. One trick ponies don't last long but do smile allot in the short term..

We had a great season of trips to Baja and did almost as much surfing as wave sailing and paragliding. The only problem with deriving all your enjoyment in sports is the extreme reduction in the possibility of a lucrative career plus a lived in back of truck that smells a bit like old socks and brine.

We had a phenomenal trip all the way down to Abreojos with wind and waves at all stops south and northbound. This was an early season trip with five riders of different abilities and styles reviewing this years kite offerings from a large number of brands. After thirty some odd years of traveling down there, the El Rosario cops got me for a double wammy of passing over the single yellow line with three other cars in tow and passing a 5 mph smoking hundai with one tire that held air on a bridge. A hundred dollar fine was all they could extort from me back at the police station. I aquessed thanks to a knowing look from Mo which said," take the deal and run Einstein"...It was half of what they originally asked and the head cop looked like he could use a steak dinner. My part in third world charity. A bit of info from our old bud Clark Merrit at the San Carlos wave and wind shop enlightened us to the fact that local cops can't write tickets on the Federal highway and are limited to five dollar max tickets where as the feds can write tickets on the main highway on banyo paper if they want to.. Clark says those Rosario flat foots had been trying to ticket his ride for years unsuccessfully. Moral to the story.. It was a low price to pay for a lot of years of great times in the Mexico Magic Kingdom without a freak in a mouse suit slapping me on the ass. (Another Disney story) .

The local summer winds here in Malibu have been fantastic and the GK Trix, Peter Lynn Scorpion, Caution Answer II, Ocean Rodeo Rise and the clasic Venom II from Peter Lynn have been keeping our gang's wave motors running non stop. Some big trips to the local islands with extreme sport film guru Klaus Obermeyer and company have been fun and netted some beautiful footage of our sport. MonkeyAir got mug shots on the "MYLA" TV show thanks to a roving reporter and a bunch of kite monkeys in the air. Our new local lifeguard supervisor John Regan is a great guy and old guarding bud and is a great addition to our local scene to back up our local kitesurf org meeting regular and great local guard John Drucker. Thanks for all the help with signs etc. you guys and thanks for cutting the wood and building it to our old lifeguard competitor bud Mark Clevenger.

Summer has been great with fun south swells, wind and 800fpm thermals yanking us far above the earths surface and only a few ocean swims with paragliding gear... DOOOOHHH!!!. We are looking forward to a great winter of kitesurf, surf, paragliding, snow kiting, biking and every other sort of athletic diversion trip possible. Hope you are coming with us... The first tofu scrambler is on me.

It has been fun ushering in a new group of kitesurfers this summer teaching season.. Thanks for the opportunity. Good Winds!!!(and waves)
Traig
Monkeyair.com