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Hi Everyone,
We had the 3 rd race in the Series of the Naish Kiteboard Races at Kailua Bay on Oahu.
Kailua is a fantastic place for the raceboards! Kailua has much lighter winds than Maui and it was perfect for the new designs of raceboards to show how they can perform in light breezes.
As many of you know this is the birth place of modern windsurfing and the hometown of Robby Naish who led the charge of modern day windsurfing and now kiting as well.
There were many kiters in attendance at the event and lots of fun was had by all. I think Kailua is going to be a great place to race these boards in the future!!
Thanks to all the Naish Crew for getting the race together and all the participants.
Here is a clip from Neil McClure showing the speed of these new race boards in about 8-12 kts of wind and a tack thrown in at the end.
This is with a 13m CB and hit a top speed of 26 knots this day on the downwind leg from Mark #1 to #2 with my GPS

seems more windy than 8/12

Well watching Alex A and Walsh the day before the race in the glassy NO-WIND conditions really showed how well the boards handle light winds. There is definitely a lot of skill involved in the apparent wind generation, and keeping the speed in the kite.
(these are shown in MPH...Alex A is talking about Knots...so 8-12 would be 9.5 - 14.5 mph)

Here are some pics from out in the water. He is not kidding when he talks about the light winds...no white caps...
Kailua is pretty easy to spot the wind strength by watching the water...see these pics (I realize that pics can to some extent lie)...

...also check out how happy people look...which is why I think having events like this is so much fun...

Here is the wind for the day before when Alex A (Cab.) and Walsh (Naish) were testing the boards and kites....
They were cruising up wind..in good speeds.

Incredible....

Btw: I posted the results here:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2365885

Congrats to Alex A winner of the course race series