what to do on those no wind days, wake kite

[palte]

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... =kiteboard

[Rorke]

I can't wait to see where this is in a few years.
Wearing a tether directly from the boat to the waist harness, and flying a paraglider would work a lot better. The wipeouts would be backbreaking unless the boat could stop on a dime or the tether could auto-release.
Off to the drawing board...

[kris]

this won't even last a season. people will try it once and realise you aren't getting anymore air on jumps than you should without.

unless this is considered a training device on what it feels like to be able to jump? besides your boat speed is now limited

[palte]

check out the video off the site, http://www.wakekite.com/index_main.php click on video at the bottom of the center oval area. the most recent video shows the hangtime of the thing.

personally, I think this thing will be kinda popular if its done right. although it looks like it needs a person sitting in the boat with a quick release to instantly detach it once the person falls, it's seen in one of the website videos. it looks like the kite doesn't respond much to "operator" input, so I think the average joe who can wakeboard would be able to try it, making it have mass apeal, although I dobt it will ever be a mainstream extreme sport. plus, if you think of how much money hardcore wakeboarders invest in fat sacks, towers etc for their boat, buying a kite to have bigger air would seem resonable, especially for those people who don't wakeboard behind a ski boat, as in your average inboard/outboard boat or deck boats, so these people are very limited on the air you can get due to the crappy wake produced (I grew up wakeboarding behind a 4 winns boat, always jealous of people with real rigs). it'll be interesting to see where this goes.