Los Barriles is great! It is kitable 5 days a week December through April. The El Norte wind gradually picks up each day, and by 11:00 it is usually good. It shuts off dramatically around 4-5. It blows sideshore, and the swell curves in for a bit of break in some spots. The shore is sandy or pebbles...

The most insightful analyses by far in this thread come from JS. I just wish I could get together with OR Sales and JS for a discussion over coffee, and then get out for an awesome 30+(not 50-60) sesh .

At our beach, nowadays we talk about "9m day", "7m day", "12m day", and "foil boarders". That is really good enough for anybody: medium, strong, weak and ridiculously weak wind There has to be to be a middle ground between complex formulas and graphs and rigging the same as everyone else. I rig for...

Thanks for that impressive graph, alamos kiter. I believe a basic straightforward graph could easily be obtained for a kite by measuring the force with a standard weight experienced kiter on a standard board cruising perpendicular to the wind on smooth water with the kite parked, and using a site wi...

Isn't there a way to measure kite power specs and publish those instead so we can objectively compare kites? It seems that using tensiometers on lines and wind sensors on the leading edge to measure apparent wind speed would be straightforward. Measuring in a steady state position is what I would li...

I added tennis racket grip to thicken the bar to relieve tennis elbow (inflammation of tendon attachment to outside of elbow that hurts when you squeeze fist) I think was partially caused by too thin of a slingshot bar. Too thin of a tennis racket handle is a well-known cause of tennis elbow for ten...

I disagree about wind range, even for the newer Fuels. They still have to be pumped vigorously on the low end to just keep moving when a similar size Rally will start boosting. Their sweet zone is sweet indeed, but narrower.

By far the most important feature of a light wind kite is relaunchability, but that is often subjective. Someone should do a side-by-side review of various kites in identical conditions, preferably at borderline wind speed for relaunching.

Planning a January vacation to Baja, and debating LV vs LB. We've done LB several times, even getting in on the Lord of the Winds a couple times. But we've never been to LV, even though it's only an hour farther drive past LB. We had good wind every day and followed the advice: "Never leave wind for...

I have a 2014 10m, 12m and 14m and a 2013 8m. I weigh 190# and ride a 135 TT. All good kites for high boosts and long hang times with soft landings; good for double/triple rolls and other tricks where long hang time is beneficial. Turning/looping is decent but not like an RPM or Fuel, and the range ...