Kiteboarding, kitesurfing and snowkiting are quite possibly the closest venture to a "Davincian Daydream" come true where the engineering schematics in gradeschool minds are acutalized in the the most simple mission - To fly a kite, a big one, with the goal of flying one's self, for as long and as far as you care to...
I was on Martha's Vineyard a few weeks ago catching up with Team Whiskey Tango racing partner, Jeff Bartkowski, and having a drink with Best Kiteboarding Team Rider, Brock Callen, when I really started to think about how we got here.
I jokingly call it a Davincian Daydream but I honestly believe Leonardo dreamt of us long before we ended up here on the plains of the Hardangervidda. A lot of us have had the dream, the same drive and creativity that led some of us to jump off the shed with garbage bags or an umbrella or think we invented the idea of trying to breath underwater through a garden hose (we couldn't).
Some of the early schemes and capers of the kite dreamers were close but didn't seem to take. The 1965 film "Skiing the Skyways" captured the concept, but the required human partner and powerful boat (as well as a complete faith that things won't go terribly wrong in an instant) didn't afford it a status more than 'spectacle'.
The oldest pic we've found, which is surely not the first attempt at snowkiting but might be one of the first photos, is of a woman 'being pulled on skis by a kite' in 1924:
Being pulled by a simple kite while skiing seems intuitive and probably seemed like a fantasy on long cross country treks, much like a long haul canoe'r starts to dream about making a sail with paddles and tent-fly's.
I thought I understood the idea of endurance kiting over a long haul during Red Bull's Ragnarok in Norway but learned what it really meant after spending some time with Canadian adventurer Benoit Temblay and going through some photos with Frederic Dion not long after his amazing accomplishment of being the first person to reach the South Pole by kite ski.
While massive undertakings like Frederic's make a permanent footprint on history, armies of risk takers have pushed the limits on water and have provided steady streams of intense footage not only of elegance of sailing (with the kite as the sail and the board as the hull), but of the fun scene and experimental nature of the sport, the gorgeous locales, and the testing of limits with it's own heroes and infamous characters...
So there you have it. The history of power-kiting From Davinci's daydreams to Richard Branson kiting with a naked model on is back. We are kiters, with stories to tell; these stories are still being written and I invite you to participate as this is just the beginning...
Jim Pavoldi
