I have the same XCEL wetsuit and I found just rolling the cuffs up an inch works pretty well.

I had the same problem with my Xcel Hyperflex.
I thought it was bc of the low quality of the wetsuit, but it turned out to also be the case of my new RipCurl F-bomb.

I'm gonna try the advice of cutting some holes with a saudering iron.

thanks

BTw, are there special wetsuits for kiting that avoid this?

All ION suits have 3 small (not 1cm) holes on the inside of the legs....works perfect even with ankle straps

seriously, the soldering iron works and takes less than a minute to do once the iron is heated up. Just set it to high heat, plunge the iron through and let it sear, repeat three times for each leg and you are done! It works unreal, no tape or velcro to carry around. If you don't an iron, a hot coathanger would work too. This is such a simple and elegant way to solve this problem.

NPX have drains at the ankle

My Mystic Crossfire had an "aquaflush" that worked perfectly, but the quality of Mystic suits suck unfortunately.. That's why I bought a new one! I got the chance to switch it for a new O'neill RG8 5/3, hope it doesn't have the same problem as Xcel, but if it does I'll use the iron, thanks for the advice!!