Words: Matt “Phatty” Meyer

Photos: Keith “Tracstar”, Vali Puscasu
As I sit down to reflect and pen a few thoughts on the 1 year anniversary of my first kiteboarding lessons, I feel pretty damn thankful for this awesome community of kiteboarders I’ve become acquainted with. You’ve all provided me with a ton of help and advice as well as countless hours of entertainment on and off the water. I’m certain that I would still be kiteboarding today without this forum, but EastKB has enhanced my enjoyment of this sport/obsession/addiction tremendously, so thanks guys.

One day last April I was sitting in front of Alexandria city hall with my buddy Stepan eating lunch weary of my tendencies toward self-destructive behavior and contemplating my future with my freshly expanded family. I decided that swift action was needed to avert a new Dad crisis. I needed an extreme sport in my life.  Skydiving? maybe - but awfully expensive. Distance running? no way - too boring - not going to fit the bill. Motorcycle? I’d be dead within the year the way I like to drive. Then I remembered a couple years previous laying on the beach in Key West, sleeping it off, when this guy with a bunch of unfamiliar looking gear showed up and proceeded to do what I now know was a downwinder right on by me. I’d seen pictures of the sport in passing, but this was the first time I’d seen anyone kitesurfing live, and it looked pretty damn fun, but I didn’t really think about it again until this “dad crisis” moment at lunch. I figured I’d never surfed but I could sail and I could snowboard, so I’d look into it.

Ten days and many youtube hours later my Ebay trainer kite arrived, and Stepan and I went to go fly it. It was totally fun and luckily I managed to get it out of the few trees and the Potomac that it would occasionally target. A few days later, the Zero to Hero DVD arrived and I watched it like 10 times. By this time, I started hearing wind in my ears, spending my lunch hour at Founder’s Park, lurking on the EastKB forum, and was contacting local instructors, but I got frustrated with waiting for the local conditions and booked a 3-day camp at Real in Cape Hatteras for mid-June. In the mean time i kept that trainer in the air as much as possible. I’d drive to Sandy Point just to fly it if there was no wind in DC, and counted the days until kitecamp.

Matt at Terrapin Park 2008, lens Keith “Tracstar”

I bought some booties, booked a room, rented a convertible, and headed down to the outer banks, which I hadn’t visited since my boogie boarding days nearly 20 years ago. There were 7 of us in the camp, all guys, ranging from 15 to 50. We had wind all three days, and I got on very well with our instructors, especially Scott Laney. I’d waterskied plenty as a kid but never wakeboarded, and I had a blast getting towed behind a ski on a LF Proof 151, jumping the wake, trying to do 180s and ride left foot forward. My first bodydragging powerstrokes with a 12 meter kite were unreal. I had gotten pretty aggressive with the trainer, looping it and such, but feeling the pull of the big kite rip me clear up out of the water, I knew I was hooked. At first, managing the board with the kite in the air was cumbersome. There was lots of cursing at the kite, but by day 3, I was able to get up and riding pretty well and was even trying to do toeside carve turns, as they were the only way I could really visualize to switch direction. Watching Scott ride, I was amazed at how effortless he made it look and excited when his board would leave the water on some small boosts. After the lessons were over, I called the wife to get her blessing and bought gear on the spot. I was an easy sell, shoving the credit card into the hands of anyone with a red shirt who would take it. I got the kite Scott recommended and the cheaper beginner board, stuffed it all into the convertible and headed home wishing I could stay a few more days and practice.

Back home and itching like mad to try out my new gear, Stepan and I went to Terrapin a few days later in some side shore SW wind. I showed him everything I had learned and we did lots of body dragging and kite crashing. Now I had him hooked, too, muah-hah-hah-hah.

The next weekend Stepan and I dragged our women to New Road, where I met Ankur and Lon. I’ve always loved Dewey Beach. Wreaking havoc there during Senior week back in ‘93 are some of my fondest, if rather fuzzy, memories. I never gave much thought to Rehoboth Bay, other than knowing that the inlet sometimes had a way of setting up some decent waves on occasion. But now I was at a novice kiteboarders paradise, lots of shallow flat water.  Lon showed us the ropes: Take your kite upwind. Launch it. Practice your upwind bodydragging for a few minutes. Strap the board on. Fall on your face all the way downwind. Walk all your crap back upwind. Rinse and repeat. We call this circuit training, a tiring process, and Step and I were sharing my gear, but we were totally stoked. It was really amazing to watch the other riders cruising right back to the same spot on the beach and jumping into the air. I wondered how long would it take me to get there.

With our first sessions under our belts and unscathed, we began to explore some other bay spots. I made some of you nervous, at first, and rightly so. The smarter thing would have been to suck it up and drive to the beach more, but when you have a baby and a pregnant wife, time away is pretty tough to make happen. So Stepan and I did circuits at Breezy Point. Then my kite buddy bought his own kite and moved to the midwest.

So I went back to EastKB and hooked back up with Ankur who had been exploring Calvert with a crazy focker named Lesyk (who the fcuk is Lasick?) Together Lesyk and I and sometimes Ankur checked out spots from North Point to Cove Point on and off the kitemap, which turned out to be a valuable resource for us newbs. And sometimes there’d even be enough wind to fly our kites. One of those off-map spots was Brownies Beach. This would eventually turn out to be a favorite.

I’m disappointed to say that I only made it back out to New Road once for more circuits in late July when Stepan was back in town, and that day was a trial by fire for sure, the wind built from 15 to 30 throughout the day and the last circuit on my 14m kite crushed me. I was sucking saltwater faster than my college keg stands with the Hokie swim team. A kindly older gentleman rescued my board for me as I was having very little luck making it back upwind in the gale. That guy was, of course, Warren Fuller, a local legend. After we’d had enough, we were packing up and watching this other guy skying huge airs on his 14 in the heavy wind. He quit soon after, was new in town, and I was encouraged that he wanted to join us for beers. So I led Stepan, Lesyk and this ripping guy, Jeff Gandee, to the Starboard. It was great to hear him talk about technique and gear and I learned a lot.

After that, in early August, I got in a couple more Terrapin sessions where I got to meet many faces. (I brought beer, and it worked.) It was great to meet some of the people whose forum posts I’d been reading. Most everyone I met was super nice and happy to share the stoke with a novice. Around then, a guy named Lost had the brilliant idea to use windless thursdays to start getting kiters together at a place with which I was intimately familiar, the bar. I got a chance to compare my learning experience with those of others who had been at it much longer. I began to realize just how much I was benefitting from the latest innovations in kite design and safety.

Then in mid August, I flew sans family to Boston for a wedding. I decided to take a day and get the return flight on Monday night rather than Sunday afternoon with the rest of my college buddies. Hey, it’s a cheaper ticket. After a bit of research on kitebeaches.com, I decided to spend the money I was going to save on a room at the Econo Lodge near Hyannis on Cape Cod. This turned out to be a very good idea. I kited West Dennis all day. It clicked. I started riding right back to the same spot on the beach. I was riding out and back like everyone else. Maybe it took being on my own in an unfamiliar place. At the end of the day, I was sunburnt and ecstatic. Afterward, I even had some beers with a cute female kiter (At that point, I had no idea they existed anywhere but the magazines). She was transplanted from San Fran and had been buzzing by me on an ‘05 SS Fuel. She was surprised I had only been kiting for 2 months. I was beaming with pride. I felt like a real kiteboarder now.

If I had thought I was hooked before, now I was hopelessly obsessed. Luckily my work schedule is pretty flexible. In the fall, I’d get to the bay whenever there was wind predicted. Weekday morning? Sure! I’ll just cram 2 hours of work into an extra hour beforehand or afterward. No problem! Occasionally, this meant that I would have to be out there solo, so having become comfortable with the drift launch and self rescue was key. I’d stay away from shore and I’d learn how to handle a misbehaving kite. Its just so important to get comfortable and know what to do when your kite is in the water hauling you downwind or flapping in the breeze and you need to get it to the beach to “reset.”

With winter approaching, I noticed the water was starting to get a little cool. Some kiters hibernate in winter, but I knew that wasn’t going to work for me. One fall session, stand-by-me crew member, PDiddy graciously offered his wife’s farmer john suit to keep me from freezing my nads off. (I should probably get that back to them.) This illustrates the attitude we have going here. You people really want your friends to ride, and that’s really cool. In fact, here’s a list of all the crap I’ve mooched in the last year:

Wetsuit - PDiddy’s lovely wife (Do chicks pee in their wetsuits too?)
Boards - Jeff, Vali, SteveS, Lesyk, Ankur, Dunci, Hristo, PDiddy, Christian, Timmay, and others I’m forgetting.
Kites - Ankur, Lesyk, Jeff, PDiddy, Vali, Hristo, Christian
Drysuit - Lesyk
Booties - Lesyk
Leashes - Christian
Impact vest - Vali
Board reel leash - Vali (a good thing to have at the Ohio Drive “launch”)
Homemade Ukranian Liquor - Lesyk
Ibuprofen - Lesyk
Beers - too numerous to list…

Now that’s a lot of mooching. I think the only thing I haven’t borrowed is a harness. Never forget your harness!!

Spring has been good to me. I’ve probably been out 20 times this spring, and its allowed me to develop a modest bag of tricks. The great thing about this sport is with all the riding styles and conditions that are possible, you can never get bored. You just gotta get out there with some friends and keep trying new stuff. If your friends are better than you, that’s even better because it gives you inspiration.

More highlights and words of wisdom from a now intermediate rider:

- Don’t lie to your wife about going kiteboarding. Your boss, that’s fine.
- Always listen to more experienced riders. 99 times out of 100, they are right.
- Your stance is everything.
- Summer booties don’t work in December.
- January is for snowkiting, but good luck doing it around here.
- Land boarding is OK. Snowkiting is more fun. Neither of them compares to riding on the water.
- You need a drysuit or plane tickets in the winter.
- Old drysuits are not comfortable.
- If its blowing 40 and gusting 50 at Terrapin, its blowing 30 but still gusting 50 in Little Round Bay.
- 40 is too much wind unless your Ruben Lenten or Rob Lavis.
- You can’t hide from the gusts.
- Same goes for Comfort Point and New Road.
- The rangers at Fort Smallwood and the mayor of Chesapeake Beach think kiteboarding is super cool.
- If the water feels slippery, thats the bacteria.
- Kim’s Beach is not a beach. Its a sewer. There are no beaches on the Potomac.
- The internet can tell you when its windy, and it can teach you new tricks.
- If you can ride upwind, pull your back hand.
- Ride WTFO (Way The Fcuk Out)
- The onshore wind at Terrapin can drag even the most experienced riders straight toward danger.
- Spectators are great, but not better than safety. Don’t hit them with your kite, they will be significantly less impressed.
- Go out of your way to help other kiters. We’re all in this together and you will need help too sometimes.
- Drinking does not add to your riding enjoyment. It adds to your enjoyment on the beach afterward.
- Don’t be a litterbug. That’s gay. Pick up other people’s trash. Chicks think that’s sexy.
- Bring your camera. People love it when you take their picture riding.
- Wear sunscreen.

Matt front roll at Brownies 2009, lens Vali Puscasu, edit JB007

This sport has become a great source of exhileration and pride for me. I’m so glad to be there everytime I ride. See you on the beach.

~Phatty