State of The Industry Feat. Damien Girardin | Episode # 429

Summary

Kitesurf365 – State of The Industry Feat. Damien Girardin | Episode #429 (March 16, 2026)

Episode Overview

In this insightful episode, host Adrian Kerr sits down with renowned designer and Readin co-founder Damien Girardin. Together, they dissect the current state of the kiteboarding industry, discuss innovation and the evolution of equipment, and tackle major issues such as fun in kiteboarding, the impact of competitions, and the sustainability of the business. Damien also teases an upcoming board release aimed at redefining the rider experience. Throughout, the conversation is energetic, honest, and packed with thought-provoking commentary about where the sport—and the industry—are heading.

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Main Themes and Key Discussion Points

1. State of Kiteboarding and Growing the Sport in the US

• Damien and Adrian discuss the abundant potential for kiteboarding in the US, referencing opportunities for youth and the untapped, windy coastlines across Texas, Florida, and California. (01:17)

  • Damien: “There’s so much potential for kiting in the US it’s unbelievable… we just gotta grow the sport.” (01:31)

• Complexity of kiteboarding compared to skateboarding and surfing and how that can be a barrier for new participants.

  • Damien: “[Kiting] is a little complicated compared to surfing... These surfer guys making fun of kiters and foilers, they're funny because they're like, oh, what, you need a screwdriver to go? You need a pump to go kite?” (01:54)

2. Finding and Bringing Back the Fun in Kiteboarding

• Adrian raises concerns that recent years have leaned too hard into Big Air at the expense of the broader fun.

  • Adrian: “We need to find the fun again in kiteboarding. ... I feel like we've lost that.” (04:23)

• Damien underscores the importance of fun and how disconnect is setting in, even for veterans.

  • Damien: “When I talk to average kiters, they don’t understand what’s going on anymore… I’m getting disconnected, even myself.” (04:46)

The New Board Concept (A Major Episode Highlight)

• Damien discusses the motivation behind designing a new Readin board that can both jump and ride waves—eliminating the need to switch between a twin tip and wave board.

  • Damien: “I need to make a board that you don’t need to switch, you know, and you can go out and jump like a twin tip and come in and ride waves like a wave board… I did succeed.” (06:32)

• Damien’s excitement after first using the prototype:

  • “That’s when my brain exploded. I'm like, no way. It’s working... I've never touched my wave board or my old school 20th ever again.” (07:21)
  • His friend’s reaction: “The thing was so much fun, but I'm twice as exhausted as usual because I kited for two hours. I feel like I kite for four hours.” (08:41)

Timestamp: [04:46–09:11] — Key segment on fun, disconnect, and the new board concept.

3. Innovation and the Maui Mindset

• Adrian draws a connection between Maui's rich environment and the high rate of progression and innovation.

  • Damien: “Three years on Maui is like 30 years of kiting somewhere in Europe... That’s why new sports always happen over Maui, like the winging, the foiling, the sup.” (09:29)

• The philosophy behind Readin’s approach: “You don’t need to change your kite to change discipline. And so now is this board. It’s the same idea.” (10:48)

4. Competition Formats & The Future of Events

• Damien critiques the current Big Air format and suggests a “slope style” run-based approach, blending jumps, wave riding, and creative transitions.

  • “It’s not fully packed… imagine you’re not on the strapless board. So when you do your turn on the wave, you can do airs like you’ve never done before. You can land to blind, you can do like 360s in a way...” (12:40)

• Damien describes running his own experimental competition with a one-minute combo-focused format.

  • “In competition... your goal is to get combos… Kevin was so good at it. He jumps a wave, boom, lands on the next one.” (17:32–21:56)

• Adrian raises logistical concerns over space, judging, and trick tracking but is open to seeing new formats tried.

5. Innovation vs. Copying and Industry Frustrations

• The complex balance between innovating and being imitated by larger brands.

  • Damien: “The industry is copying you, and then they sell way more than you did… It is frustrating.” (25:33)

• Difference between copying, remixing, and being inspired.

  • “Copying to me is just you send a kite to China and you, you take it apart and, and then you get the same. That’s copying.” (29:04)
  • “Innovation just to innovate... has never been my motivation. I need something better.” (29:36)

• The importance of organic, rider-driven product development.

6. Working with Ralph – Collaborative Design

• Adrian explores team dynamics between design legends.
  • Damien describes a positive, mutually respectful collaboration, leveraging each other’s strengths and honest feedback.
  • “The relation is insane. I absolutely love it… We end up with better than what he wanted and better than what I wanted.” (31:38)

7. The Current State of the Industry – Business Realities

• Impact of COVID, overproduction, and brand battles (e.g., Norse vs. Borzano groups) negatively affecting brands and shops.

  • “We’re still living through the aftermath of COVID... too much production... too much closeout, there’s going to be no more innovation, no more new product.” (36:10–38:45)

• The dangers of excessive discounting: “If you can buy a closeout kite for 60, 70, 80% off, of course you would... but that’s not healthy for the industry.” (37:15)

8. Risks of Over-Technical Progression

• Lessons from windsurfing: when gear became too advanced, the core user base shrank.
  • “I don’t think windsurfing got killed because of the price for the gear. ...the gear became better and better but harder and harder to use.” (39:31)
• Similar risks looming in kiteboarding if competition gear becomes inaccessible to average users (e.g., Big Air on foilboards).
• Maintaining accessibility and inclusivity in kite design, ensuring products like the Master Model remain suitable for a wide skill set. (41:10–42:00)

9. The Challenge of Fragmented Competition & Public Awareness

• Too many disciplines/divisions prevent mainstream hero-making and fandom.
  • Adrian: “If you go down to any beach, ask them who the world champion is, they have no idea.” (45:03)
  • Damien: “There’s what, six different disciplines to get work that we have six different world champion every year… at the time because there’s one champion, we had heroes.” (45:51)

10. Rider Feedback, R&D, and the Team Dynamic

• Value of feedback from average kiters as opposed to constant pro input.

  • “I love actually testing with genuinely average kiters... tell me in your words what you’re feeling about this kite. And it’s always interesting, right?” (47:46)
  • Pros can bias feedback by their own agendas and day-to-day performance fluctuations.

• Small team structure at Readin fosters a 'family' vibe—close relationships and support for up-and-coming talent.

  • “I like that we grew together. ...I love to see them grow.” (50:38)

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “If you like it, usually people like it. So in most of everything I design, it’s very selfish. I want it for me. I’m excited about these things. I want to make one that works.”
  — Damien Girardin [02:54]

• “I've lost my mind since first prototypes.”
  — Damien, reacting to his new board concept [07:04]

• “When you see a good guy doing it... just 40 seconds of him riding and you’re like, okay, I get it.”
  — Damien, on the flow run competition format [17:32]

• “Copying your best, you have what people had last year, you know.”
  — Damien, criticizing brands who just follow [27:50]

• “We have amazing athletes at the top. We have a great sort of support group of people who love it, yet both parties don’t know about each other.”
  — Adrian [45:29]

• “Long term, we’re in the right industry because I hate to say, but global warming... means there’s going to be more wind and more water. So, you know, more wind, more water is more kiting.”
  — Damien, dry optimism [61:24]

• “What are you gonna do? Not everybody’s got 25, 30 knots every day. … If you have jobs, you have families… It better be windy. And if it’s not, what am I gonna do?”
  — Damien, on making the most of any session [64:21]

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Notable Timestamps

• 01:17 – State of US scene, barriers to entry, and opportunities
• 04:23 – Have we lost the fun? Big Air obsession
• 06:32 – Damien introduces new board concept
• 09:29 – Maui’s role in innovation and “three years feels like 30”
• 12:40 – Blueprint for new competition format, focus on combos and flow
• 25:33 – Frustrations of innovation vs. industry copying
• 31:38 – Working with Ralph, dynamic of collaboration
• 36:10 – Post-COVID market imbalances and effects
• 39:31 – Windsurfing lessons, dangers of over-specialization
• 41:10 – Master Model, inclusive kite design objectives
• 45:03–46:56 – Fragmented world champions, lack of “heroes”
• 47:46 – The art of feedback, importance of “average” testers
• 50:38 – Team/ambassador culture at Readin

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Conclusion

This episode is a deep dive into both the technical and human sides of kiteboarding’s evolution, blending candid critique with hopeful outlooks. Damien Girardin champions fun, accessibility, and honest innovation, sounding a call for both industry reform and new ways to inspire participation. He delivers optimism that, despite turbulence, kiteboarding’s best days might still lie ahead—especially with fresh ideas on equipment and competition to revive stoke for all levels of rider.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the kitesurf 365 podcast.

[B]

Welcome back to the show. I hope you all had a great weekend. Today I'm joined by Damian Draarden and we talk about the state of the industry, bringing the fun back. And he dropped some golden eggs about a new product coming up from Readin. It's always great to catch up with Damon and every time I talk to him I always think we should do this more often. Don't Forget to follow Meitzer365 for all the latest episodes. Ladies and gentlemen, Damian Jardin. I just think that the states have so many more opportunities for younger people. Whether it's skiing or snowboarding or skating or surfing or. You know, maybe Parker can inspire people.

[A]

You know, Parker is hopefully inspired people. Zach also is. I hope these two kids were inspiring the guys. I mean there's a scene in Hood River. The thing is like you say there's. If you want to get into action sporting in the US the industry is here for skateboarding, snowboarding, surfing and potentially you get the money, you get the sponsors in kiting industries in Europe. So you're not going to get the sponsors and you're going to be seen. I mean the main media is in Thailand, right?

[B]

Well, just, just based, not so much focus.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, but Europe is where it's at for kiting. That's, that's a, that's a fact. The thing is there's so much potential for KITING in the U.S. it's unbelievable. There's so many spots with consistent, consistent wind. You know, all the way from Texas, Florida. The whole east coast is windy. Just like Europe, if not better. I mean the southern part of the east coast, you know, North Carolina and South. It's like almost like trade winds, quality of wind like all, like all the time compared to anywhere in Europe. And then, yeah, I mean east coast is storm based, but it's quite windy. And then like I was just saying, like California all the way to Oregon. The whole coast is windy. It's insane and there's waves and there's no crowd. But we just gotta. Yeah, you gotta grow. We gotta grow the sport. I think it's, you know, also Americans like their motorsports. You know, they like it, they make, they're the country of making things simple. You know, that's why we have the big trucks here, because it makes your life easier. That's why we have the drive through banks, you have the drive through pharmacies and all that stuff. And kiting is a little complicated compared to surfing. You know, when you look at these surfer guys making fun of kiters and foilers, they're funny because they're like, oh, what, you need a screwdriver to go? You need a pump to go kite? It's. It's so boring compared to me putting my board shorts on.

[B]

You'd know that more than ever with your. Your kid. You know, we. I think you and I spoke last time about skateboarding, you know, and, you know, you can buy a cheap skateboard. He's a skateboarder. I know, I know Your. Your boy's really into skateboarding, and I mean, in a big way, right?

[A]

Yeah, big time. He's definitely chasing some big dreams.

[B]

Why are you in San Diego?

[A]

I've been based in Hawaii. But, you know, funny enough, I have three kids, right? And the second one's going to college year, and we just followed him and luckily it was not Colorado. Otherwise I would be stuck in the mountains. But I'm not here so much. I'm here part of the year, only most of the year, I'm gonna be either in Europe, in Cape Town, on Maui, or in China. So I'm here, just here and there. And when I'm here, I appreciate being here. I have a lot of very lightweight, and I'm. I'm lucky that I was here in a way because that motivated me to work on Whisper Model with Ralph. You know, I was like, I need a kite for here, dude. So we worked on it, and I don't think too many designer in the world before had such a motivation like me to actually get into designing something that would work in no win. It was like a necessity for me. And, you know, it goes back to. It's funny because I was talking to some other kids, the other that gets. Gets into design, and I was like, the key is to design stuff that you really want for you because you're going to love it enough, you're going to put enough energy in it that you're going to do a good job at designing it. And if you like it, usually people like it. So in most of everything I design, it's. It's very selfish. You know, it's like, I want it for me. I'm excited about these things. I want to make one that works. It goes for everything I design. Boards, kites, wings, foils, anything. You know, it's all. It's all based on like, I need something for me kind of thing, you

[B]

know, Damien, it's funny because at the start of this year, you know, we sat down as a team and you know, like, we were thinking, you know, what. What do we want to bring across to the industry through the media? And I think all of us sort of sat down and realized that we need to find the fun again in kiteboarding. You know, I feel like that kiteboarding's lost that. I think we focused a little bit too much on Big Air over the last few years. You know, we want to bring the fun back. Where do we find the fun?

[A]

Dude, you, like, you took the words out of my mouth. Seriously, I so agree with you. I think the focus on Big Air has been amazing, but it's been maybe a little too much. When I talk to some average kiters, they don't understand what's going on anymore. I have seen, definitely, you guys at the podcast have been pushing it heavily. You're so into it, which is great. I mean, it helped these team riders become famous. It create a scene for them. It create, like an audience and everything. But in a way, we're kind of getting lost, you know, compared to average kiter. And I'm not necessarily average kiter. I've kited so much, but still, I'm getting disconnected, even myself, you know, and to me, the fun, it's something. I don't even know where to start because I don't want to be doing a commercial right now.

[B]

But, you know, go for it.

[A]

I've been working on something since April last year, but actually it started, like, couple years back, but I never finished my project. But I went from a simple analysis of what we're doing when we're kiting, we're either trying to be bigger kiters or trying to jump anyway. So we're on the 20 board. We go out, we look at waves. They're not really waves, they're just kickers. And we jump him. Then we turn around, come back to shore. These waves are breaking. We don't touch them. We don't even look at them. We're just cracking upwind back to shore, right? That's what, 70, 80% of kiters, 90%, probably 10% of the kiters, we're on a strapless board. On a directional board. We go out. If we're Airton or some of these guys, we jump the waves. But we barely jump the waves. If the waves too big, we actually can't even go over the wave. We have to turn around and wait for the set to go to go away, and we go out, and then we ride the waves coming in. And that's when the fun is. So if you look at what I just said, feels like we're both wasting 50% of our time on the water. And also there's that frustration of you're like, you're on your 20 if you're like, oh, man, I wish I could ride these waves because they look good. Or you're on your wave ball. Like, ah, I have to take my twin tip because it's actually fun jumping today. So I was like, I need to make a board that you don't need to switch, you know, and you can actually go out and jump like a twin tip and come in and ride waves like a wave ward. And I'm happy to say that I did succeed. Dude, I. I've lost my mind since first prototypes.

[B]

Is this a new product coming?

[A]

That's a new product. We're about to launch.

[B]

Exciting.

[A]

And. And I mean, the first day I used it, it was last year in April. So about a year ago, and I was on Maui. It was the. That's a day was. The waves are big because it was the last jaw sway of the season. So it's pretty big out there. You know, Joswell, it's like 10, 12, 15ft waves Hawaiian. So you had some set, like, maybe, I don't know, five, six meter faces at my kite spot. And I have both my wave board in my hand, and I have the new board, the other one in my other hand. And in my mind I'm like, okay, I just got the prototype finished. I'm gonna go out, do a little session on it. Then I come in and I get my waveboard and I go out, get a few jumps. I'm already like, whoa, I like that thing. It's working. And I go get a wave, and it's a pretty big one. And I do a kind of a chicken bottom turn, top turn. I'm like, whoa, it worked. And then I'm gonna. I'm going like, okay, let's. Let's do a proper one. And I do a proper one. I lay my hand in the water, I go like full on, lean into the rail. The wave's big and I go bottom turn. Just the board hold all the way. I do a top turn. And like, at this time, that's when my brain exploded. I'm like, no way. It's working, you know, and not only I never came back that day to the shore to get my waveboard, but that was 11 months ago now. And I've never touched my waveboard once since April last year. But I've also never touched my old school 20th ever again. And that's me. I'm very excited. I always, I always look forward for things to come and I'm always. I like being on different stuff than everybody, you know, because it's cool. I have a board that doesn't look like anyone else and everybody comes to me and asks me, oh, dude, what are you doing? How do you do these things? So I'm excited about east, but like, really now I've seen over the past several months that it's, it's clicking. A lot of people are understanding the thing. Like, wow, finally you don't have to choose one board or the other, you know. So I'm like beyond stoked it, like, and that brings so much fun. Like I say, it's twice the amount of fun on the water. I had a friend of mine, he tried to board, he called me up that night and he's like, dude, the thing was so much fun, but I'm twice as exhausted as usual because I kited for two hours. I feel like I kite for four hours.

[B]

You know, let's not talk too much about that because I don't want to spoil the release. I think that's a super interesting thing. You're like, you're channeling your inner Lou Wayman. You know, Lou Wayman was always up on the coast riding a variety of different boards. Maybe there's something in the water up there that makes you want to create different types of boards and different types of craft.

[A]

I think something about Maui, though, that makes people move on to the next thing. Of course, because we get to write so much, you know, we get. Seriously. I have a friend, he falls, he rides 360 something days per year. Like he's close to every day of the year because we get win all the time, with conditions all the time. We have waves for six, seven months out of the year. So, you know, when a sport, when you're, when you're a kiter, in three years on Maui, you kite every day. You're going to be pretty much as good as you'll ever get. You can have all the sessions you can ever dream of. You'll have the best wave you ever, ever have in your life. And you never get any better. So eventually it's like three years on Maui is like 30 years of kiting somewhere in Europe, somewhere where you kite when it's windy only. So we get to move on pretty quick. And so that's why the new sports always happen over Maui, like the winging, the foiling, the sup, all these things because people get tired of it. They're like, well, I had it. I want to move on to something new. So maybe Maui did that to me in terms of this board. Um, but also, it's my way of kiting, you know, like, I kite kind of like Kevin, we've always said that, like, you know, I ride waves, I write twin tip. I ride a foil. Sometimes I like to do everything when I kite, and I don't like to limit myself. And, you know, that was the philosophy of our first kite. You know, a supermodel was like, one kite, you do it all. And I always believed in. In the fact that you don't need to change your kite to change discipline. And so now is this board. It's the same idea. You know, it's like, I want to be at Hokipa and jump the wave going out, not have to go back to shore, get a twin tip so I can jump, you know, because jumping Hookeepa is so much fun. I mean, we had King of the Air there, and it was unbelievably fun. I mean, I remember, like, the vision of jumping at Hokipa. The crowd on the. On the hill watching you. It was so much fun. And then not riding waves would be a bummer at Hokipa because the waves are so much fun, too. So this spot makes sense. But then it turned out every spot's like that. You know, know, one of our. Our men, or warehouse guy, lives in la, that's on the. I don't know how to call it, I think is in, you know, Holland. It's a big kind of lake. Not a lake. Don't. Don't tell him it's a lake. Yeah, that thing. Don't tell him I said it's a lake.

[B]

I think it's damned, isn't it?

[A]

Yeah, it's a Dutch thing, right? It's. It's a big lake. They don't want to call it lake, but anyway, there's not much wave on it, but same thing. Suddenly you ride a board that's made to ride waves, and you're like, actually, there is waves on that lake, and you can do turns on everything. Like I say, every wave is a kicker, but every kicker turns into a wave. So you do little turns, your transitions. And it also takes me to what I've been even thinking when I started making that board is also what you're saying about big air. Where are we going is bigger? I mean, I love watching King of the Air. Don't get me wrong. It's insane, right? The level of what these guys are doing, the height, the distance, it's insane. But look what they're doing. They have like, what, 10 minutes run, and then they go. They do one huge jump, and then they go back a point because they went so far downwind, and then nothing happens, right? You wait for them to go back a point, and then they wait for another wave. So it's not fully packed. And you talked about me looking at skateboarding, but I look at snowboarding too. When I look at what they do in slope style or in a skateboard competition, it's a run, right? They go and. And it's just. You do a jump, I mean, ollie or whatever, you do a rail, then you do a jump, then you do a rail. You have 45 seconds, a minute, and then that's it, done. Boom. And it's not one on one. I always had the issue with the one on one thing. You know, looking at Lorenzo last year doing this qualifier, this Red Bull qualifier, and you're like, what a bummer for the guy that gets against him first heat because he may have been second if he was against Lorenzo in final, but you know he couldn't win, right? And so you're like, oh, bummer. This guy could have, maybe, but he's not. And you know, all this, you know, wind surfing is the same. So many sports are one on one, and it's cool, but then you. You rely on the. On the drawing, on the jaw. And I get it, it has to be fair because the win has to be consistent, you know? But let's say you could do something like that in competition. Let's say you do a competition, and I'm saying that I've already done it. I've done a try already. After I've tested it, you do a competition where it's a mix of everything, everything you do on the water. So you go out and we start counting. You go one by one, right? You have a minute, you look at the ocean, you decide when you go. You have a little time window of like, let's say a minute for you to start. When you start, when you touch the water, it starts from shore. Touch the water, we start one minute. Then you gotta link jumps, landing, riding waves, and then doing transition in between. But anyway, so you have a competition where you like linking everything. Just like a snowboarder will link his slope style, and suddenly it's one minute of action. You start kind of like upwind, do your jump. Ideally, you land boom in a wave and you do multiple turns, some rotations, and imagine you're not on the strapless board. So when you do your turn on the wave, you can do airs like you've never done before. You can land to blind. You can do like 360s in a way. And then when you do your transition, you're not just turning around. We give you points for how cool the transition is. Like how many of us love doing little kite loops to turn around or little one footer or just little something rather than just turning around. But in competition you have to be efficient. Usually bigger, you want to keep going upwind, so you never do a quick transition. So you have a whole thing of like for one minute you just non stop riding for watching from the shorts. Pretty cool. Because it's non stop. You have one minute, boom. Next rider, one minute. Next rider, one minute. You take top, whatever, four, either final. Then everybody get maybe two runs in one minute and then you get a ranking. And like I say, I've done the test already and seriously, it was, I thought it was really awesome. It was really cool. So I'm, I'm really seeing a new format of like a kiter that would be well rounded because right now we have a guy that does freestyle, we have a guy that does bigger, how do you call it? Bigger folding. We have a guy that does freestyle on the strapless board where the guy does bigger on the twin tip. But you look, you know, when Lorenzo does bigger on the strapless board, he's also the best anyway, right? So the board doesn't matter to him, he's just good, right? And I bet in strapless wave riding is also one of the best anyway. So it's like guys like that could be so good, you know, look at a Kevin. He can be the best on the wave, he can be the best on big air. He can be the best in transition. And he's not the only one. I can think of a list of riders that'd be insane, a kid like Parker. I mean, look at Parker riding waves on Oahu. He's insanely good. He's insanely good on twin tip. Bigger. Well, maybe there's something there, you know, and, and when you look at what we like to do, kiters, I mean, it's funny, a lot of people I talk to, they're like, I'm like, do you, do you have a right waves? They're like, no, I don't. I'm like, oh, why don't you? And they're like, well, good question. And you're like, yeah, I guess your board doesn't let you ride waves. They're like, yeah, I just don't have a wave board. So if we had a board that could do both and we all be riding waves, you know, and I've seen it. I've learned this board to people and people start riding waves right away. It's, it's super fun.

[B]

Just talking about the competition. I mean, I've heard people, people talking about, you know, this run type competition before. It's not like a new thing to me. It always comes down to the logistics of it, especially if you're going to start off the first trick being a big air trick. You know, you, you lose, you can lose 100 meters straight away, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The issues that I heard people talking about was like, I mean, I heard people talking about like having a kicker in the water and you know, like big air track with a rail or whatever. Just combining a lot of the disciplines. I think logistically it always is a nightmare to, to organize. But I, I'm open for, I'm open to see something new. I mean, how much space do you need for your concept? You think? A minute. If there's a minute and it's completely, let's say downwind. I think you need a lot of a big box. You know, you need a huge box.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

400 meters, maybe we had.

[A]

Yeah. About these, but probably about 400 meters. And, and then we did it. And I did three minutes because I, it was a trial first and I was like, oh, three minutes. And then turns out three minutes, you, you kind of had time to go back upwind and there was a downtime of going upwind and it was kind of a bummer. So that's why I'm thinking one minute. And obviously condition is going to dictate what you can do. But what I was saying is like, it's. The idea is like the combo. Right. You know, I love in like snowboarding, skiing, right. They do, I don't know, like a 540, boom, land on the rail there. You can do the same. You do a kite loop, board off, put the board back, land on a wave, Boom. You're riding the wave. This to me, I was telling the guys, this is combo. This is like you're going to get in the excellent score. You're going to be. We were doing the score from 0 to 100. I was like, you're going to get above 80, close to 100 if you link these two and imagine you're riding a wave, get out of the wave and boom, you link a Kite loop, board off again. Then it's like combos every ways. So you can think of the amount of time and logistics, but it worked. It was not super windy when we did it. I did around myself. I was on an 8 meter. I was pretty, pretty powered. So it was, you know, a normal Cape town day, probably 25 to 30. I would say maybe, maybe a little more, let's say 30 knots. But. And it was, it worked. And, and when you see a good guy doing it, obviously, you know, Kevin won the little competition we did. When you see him riding. Yeah, but dude, just 40 seconds of him riding and you're like, okay, I get it and know. So it could be a minute, it could be two minutes. But I'm really excited to see potentially this becoming something new, you know, Are

[B]

you guys going to do this? Is this something you're thinking of doing?

[A]

I'm still thinking about it in my head. I'm like, yeah, I'd love to do some. I've talked to one event organizer already to potentially have one. We see if we can do it. But, you know, I'm also thinking we can make this very gorilla. Like I did in case Cape Town. I. I just did it. I had, I called what, 12 or 10 of our riders. I had a little sign on the beach, two flags, one flag upwind, one flag downwind, a red flag for stop. You know, started the heat and down for down the heat. We like, we're taking turn judging each other, so we didn't have any judges. And, and it worked. And the thing was quick. You know, we. We wrapped it. Wrapped this up because. Because Kevin had to go pick up his kids from school at whatever time, and then we had a photo shoot after. So we wrapped that thing in like two hours or an hour and a half, you know, from start to finish. So it's. It's not that complicated. I'm always very optimistic about how easy things are to do are to make, but it didn't seem very complicated to me, you know, by the way, I

[B]

love when people put combos together in like King of the Year. When they hit A, they hit a kicker, they land and then hit on the way out, they hit the next kicker. The problem is, I don't think you see that very often because number one, A, they get so far down in the box after the second jump, and B, I think that's an opportunity for a trick to be missed because, you know, the judges are looking at one trick to the next trick and like putting the trick callers and Judges under pressure. If you go kicker to kicker, I think maybe might not be the smartest move.

[A]

Yeah, but now it's one guy on the water only right now it's one guy, so they can't miss the full one minute, or let's say two minutes, if you want.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

They're following you the whole time. Right. So your goal is actually to do combos, and then you don't necessarily. Again, I haven't thought this through so much about the distance you travel downwind, but you don't necessarily have to do a trick when you go so far downwind because you know, your score is about the whole flow of your whole run. Right. So maybe you don't need to jump this high because, you know, if you jump at the proper height, you then. Exactly. In a wave, you're going to be doing two air reverse with whatever on the wave behind, and you'll get a better score than one bigger jump that you land without a combo behind. And that's kind of like. That was kind of my idea, as I was telling the guys and the girls, like, the goal is to get combos, you know, like, so look at. And Kevin was so good at it. You know, he's just. He knows. He jumps a wave, boom, lands on the next one, and. And it's. I mean, to me, it was insane. Or even jump the same wave. He just, you know, jump, do whatever, back roll something, land in the same wave, and boom, start running it.

[B]

I mean, I've seen Kevin doing wave competitions and straps. And when I used to ask him about it, I said, why? And he's like, man, I love it. You know, I love. You know, Kevin always had the straps on his board. Right. He enjoys that. But I've seen what you're talking about where he jumps off the wave and, you know, has, you know, whether it's a front or back rotation, doesn't matter, but lands back on the same wave. And that looks super cool. It looks fun. Yeah. I mean, it's all about going back to what we said at the top. How do we bring fun back to the industry?

[A]

And that's the thing, you know, like, you just talk about kite surfing. Surf competition, first of all, we call it surf. So we're trying to be surfers, right? And I feel like a lot of the guys have been pushing, like, for, oh, don't use your kite. So you want to look like surfers. And I'm like, well, that's cool, but we're not surfers. We have a kite that Gives us so much power, might as well use it. And also we also, we have a wave board looking like a surfboard inspired from surfers, right? How about we get a proper kite board? You know, it's. And actually I have a, I don't know if you know this story, but you know that, that surfer guy, that surfer shaper Tomo is pretty famous. He's the one that came up with our architect surfboards from today. The square nose board, right, the no brainer type of board. So these guys from Ohio, his idea of making this board is funny because he was looking at the kiters in Mokulea at the time, Twin tips, you know, wakeboards, whatever. And he was like, wow, these guys can actually do turns. And they do like top turns with this board. Like I don't even know. So he came up with the surfboard that looks square looking at us. And then our industry, the kite surfing industry suddenly see this board, like, oh, it makes a lot of sense for us to ride waves, but it was just a full circle. It was a surfer looking at us. And suddenly because it was coming from the surf industry, we're like, oh yeah, that's cool, we can do it right? Instead of like believing are in ourselves, you know, like, because of course we're that tiny little industry and surfing is so much bigger. I'm, I'm the first one to think that surfers are, you know, super cool and the surfing industry is awesome. But I found it funny that we're just looking around and, and, and we with surfing, kite surfing competitions, going strapless and not use your kite. It's kind of a bummer. I mean, I love, don't get me wrong, I've been riding strapless for 15 years already and I love the feeling of a perfect top turn that you link perfectly. But it's hard. Like you need to spend so many hours before you get good, you know. Well, if you could ride well with the board I'm talking about, see if you know how to ride twin tip, suddenly you know how to ride this board and you're gonna be riding linking turns right away you're gonna be feeling like you're Airton doing frontside airs without spending the 10 years that Airtone spent riding Cape Verde perfect waves every day when he was a kid, you know. So to me it's like suddenly it makes wave riding accessible for everybody. And then we're just going to finally notice that we were just wasting waves without even noticing, you know, because we don't even think about it, you know? It's. You go to Cape Town, you go to most places. People are on twin tip. They just want to jump. That's what we want to do because we don't even think about the waves anymore.

[B]

Damien. I mean, I want to start talking about the state of the industry, but you brought up something interesting there. And DK always says to me, you know, everything's a remix. You know, how do you balance being an innovator versus maybe copying other trends in the market? Because I think that's an interesting position that you as designer, and dk, as a designer, always has that fine balancing act. When do you copy, when do you innovate, when do you remix? I mean, that's. It's really, as a. Is a difficult thing as a brand.

[A]

Well, you know, I feel like I definitely have some frustration with the way some of the brands are. Just especially when you're like the underdog brand, you're the smaller brand, and you can't push as much product because you don't have, you know, such, you know, power to push it. And you have. You launch a product and then the industry is copying you, and then they sell way more than you did, where you're like, well, that was my idea. And then you were dumb enough not to make a patent because you're like, I'm not going to do a patent because whatever, you know, so it is frustrating. Frustrating to see bigger brands kind of like just almost copying everything that you do. But sometimes, I gotta admit, you know, sometimes, you know, like I said, innovation sometimes is just right here in the air, right? And we feel it. And because us, the people designing this product, we always come ahead of the general people because we're like, for example, this board I'm talking about, I've been writing it for a year. So people joke. They're like, oh, Damien, you live in the future already because you've been writing this for so long. But things are in the air, right? And you just catch it, right? There's ideas in the air. You catch it. So sometimes people maybe not copying you, but they have the same idea. I'm okay with that sometimes. But, yeah, I mean, for sure, we all look at what we're doing. I don't spend too much time looking at other people. Like I said, I kind of design things for me. And I also have a lot of respect for someone that comes up with an idea and I don't want to copy it because I'm like, this guy spends time. And it's not just time, you know, it's like, for example, you know, when I came up with our auto twist bar, I always have the joke is it took me 20 years and six months to come up with this solution. For 20 years I've been designing bars and I never, never got it working. And then suddenly I'm like putting my head down for six months on a new design and I want to solve it really bad. And eventually, boom, I found the solution. And next thing you know, ah, the whole industry just has it. And you're like, okay, you guys, cool. That's my idea. I should have put a patent. I didn't do it. I mean, actually I had some of the big brand pressuring me, threatening to attack me with patent things. What I knew I was not infringing, but they were just like, yeah, okay, prove that you're not infringing. Bring some lawyers. And they knew I had no money to do it. So of course, business side, that made sense for them. And you know, after that happened, I was like, ah, this guy is clever to say, to say nicely. So, yeah, I mean, and then, yeah, there's people copying and I don't have much respect for these. And there's people that somehow just want to have a brand and they just go to China and they're like, give me the same thing that these guys have. Here's my logo. And I've never had any respect for these. I mean, I, I'm like, why do you have a brand if you're just bringing a product already existing? You know, for me, if I'm bringing a product, it's because I'm convinced that this thing is not already on the market and this thing is better and it's going to make people have more fun than anything else, you know, and that's my motivation, right? I want to bring something that is better than anything that's on the market. And I'm not going to get there by copying. And no one's going to get there by copying. Because copying your best year, have what people had last year, you know.

[B]

Is there a balance though from if innovation is the main focus at some stage, there has to be a little bit of percentage of copy as well, right? Like let's say you see an idea, you want to improve on it. Is that copying or innovating? Even if you see an idea somewhere else and then go to improve or is that remix?

[A]

I think that's getting inspired, right? Copying to me is just you send a kite to China and you, you take it apart and, and then you get the same, right? That's. That's copying. Or. Or like, I getting going to the factory and say, I want the ring bar is my logo. I call that copying. And. And, you know, and my bad for not having protected some of my things better. But then, yeah, you know, innovation. But the thing is, what you're saying is, like, innovation just to innovate. Feel like this. Something's never been my motivation. You know, I. Somehow we've been innovating. I've been innovating over the years, bringing new things, and the motivation was always like, I need something better, you know, and how do I do it? But it was never like, oh, I need to innovate. I need to come up with an innovation. What's my innovation? You know, you can't put that as a goal. You can't say, we got to bring three innovations next year, because you're like, whoa, what am I going to innovate about? You know, it all comes very organic to me, the way we come up with new product. And I'm pretty sure a lot of people in industry, when they come up with innovation, it doesn't. The motivation is not to innovate. It's. I mean, maybe some are, but at least for me, it's not. You know, for me, it's. I want to do something better. I want. Like, I'm kiting. I'm like, oh, this is not good anymore. I need some better. You know, like, it's. It's like when you're done designing your kite or your board and you launch it, and by the time you launch it, you're still convinced it's as good as you can do it, but give me two months. And I'm like, ah, that's not right. You know, I got. I got to fix that. I got to do this better. And it's always the same, you know, I always give it 100% when I do a design, and I'm like, I always feel like I'm dry by the end of the season. I'm like, okay, you guys, that's it. I don't know how to make it any better. And slowly, you talk to writers, you talk to clients, you talk to friends, you talk to shops, and then, boom, everything starts, you know, getting together in your head and you have your new plan for what you want to do, you know, so. So. And sometimes we come up with innovation. It looks like a big innovation to the. To the eyes of the public. And sometimes it's just an evolution of what you've been doing. Depends on what your Brain took you where your brain took you through that journey of trying to make your thing better. Right?

[B]

How does that work with you and Ralph? Because you know that when we all heard that you and Ralph were going to work together, we're like, that's a really interesting combination. You know, two big legendary designers, clearly with their own ideas. How did you guys find that, you know, comfort, space to work together? Is it. Or is it a bit of just respect that helps draw those lines?

[A]

Look, I think at first I felt a little weird. I was like, wow, really? That's kind of weird. I'm going to show him what I've done, but he's also show me what. What he's done anyway. But to be honest, the relation is insane. I absolutely love it. I mean, he. He's just. He's super smart. He knows so many things. He's so into it. He's so into detail. He's so focused, and. And he just. He's got his ideas. He comes up with something, and then I put my little grain of salt here and there, and then we come up with something, and it's always, we end up with better than what he wanted. Better what I wanted. So it's really awesome. And, you know, you were talking about innovation earlier. He's also that kind of guy that just doesn't barely even look at what others are doing. You know, he's just. He's just on his own path, and he knows and we discuss about what we want to do. And he's got his kind of like, you know, he's got his portfolio of things he's done before. I have my portfolio of things I've done before. So I'm like, oh, yeah, I did. I've done this bridal before. It worked. We adjusted this way. And then same for him. And then, yeah, the relation goes, man, it's. It's really good. I. I really love it. I mean, I. I would say maybe I frustrate him sometimes because I am a little more Latin and he's a little more German, so I'm a little less organized and anal on things and less on deadline than years, but when we spend enough time together, it's. It's always a great time, you know, it's. And. And we have. We're funny because we're senior. If. If. If I make a kite and you try it and you tell me it sucks, or you tell me, oh, this not perfect, blah, blah, I'm gonna be bombed, right? But I'm not bumped. Bump for very long. I'M bummed for maybe 10, 15 minutes. And then I'm grateful. I'm like, thanks, because I didn't see it, and now I see it. I'm gonna make it better, and then give me 45 more minutes, and I got it better. And he's kind of the same, you know? Like, a few months ago, a few weeks ago, we're in Cape Town, and I got to his through Langeban Museum, and he's got these kites. He's like, they're the best ever. And I already kind of tried the kite, and I'm like, yeah, that thing is great. But then we tried more, and I'm like, look, it's not there. So I called him. Mike's not there. And I show up at the beach, and we're pumping up kite dud. He's not talking to me, and I'm not talking to him because I know he's bummed. And we go out, we start fixing bridles, and then we get to where we want to be, or where I wanted to be. But he also thinks it's better now. And suddenly, like, there's no more attention. He's all smiling, I'm smiling. We're just having a fun time on the beach. And I. And I looked at him, I'm like, yeah, I know exactly the feeling. So I think we're very much the same. Like, even our first conversation ever was funny. It was kind of like we knew of each other for 20 years, and I never knew his story. He probably never knew my story. But our story was so similar in so many ways. I mean, different, but similar. We both work for a big brand. Both are frustrations. Both kind of learn everything ourselves because there's no book or no one to learn from. So it was. It was really cool, you know, it was like we had this pair of lives together. And I even learned that he actually worked for Nash at the time for two months. And he couldn't stand. He couldn't stand staying there. But when I worked there, I always heard about the German guy, and they never gave him a name. Yeah, the German guy came. Oh, they always complain about him. And then when I talked to Ralph, I'm like, dude, that was you. The German guy was you. So that was. I thought that was, like, super funny. But he stayed there for, like, I don't know, maybe a month or two. He hated it. He said so, anyway, yeah, it works really well. Sure. There's the thing of, like, how much I'm teaching him, but I'm looking At, like, how much I'm learning, how much time I'm saving because we're working together and how much better my products are getting because we're getting together and, you know, and always, I think maybe compared to the other brands that work with him, I still get to spend a lot more, put a lot more of my own touch in it. We test with our team riders, we test with Kevin. I spend a lot of time myself. And we always go back to kind of like what I'm looking on the kite. Looking for on the kite. Right. In the end, it's, you know, it's our kite. It's a reading kite. It's not a Brainchild, Ralph Kite. It's a reading kite, made a brainchild together with some input from Ralph. That's kind of like how it is. So it's. Yeah, it's working very well, to be honest.

[B]

Where do you see the state of the industry right now? I mean, Brainchild has, you know, firmly sort of leveraged its place into the. Into the sort of newer age of the industry. Is Kite building in a good place right now?

[A]

I think the industry is. The brands are a little struggling altogether. The shops are struggling. I think we're still, you know, like other industries in the outdoor. We're still living through the aftermath of COVID you know, the. Or not enough production, too much production, believing that you're a rock star. So you order more at the factories and then you order. You have too much, you close out. So. And then also we've had the, you know, the. The big. The big battle. The. The Norse group trying to take down the Borzano group. And that has probably hurt the industry a little bit. Like when Nike got into surfing, you know, they pumped up too much money into the industry. They. They made everything become too expensive. Like team riders got more paid photographers getting more money. So they raised the cost of everything. And they were also trying to, you know, push so much product onto the market that in the end they push too much product, you know, so they've really hurt some of the brands, you know, namely the. Some of the two original brands are really struggling. But now I think it's, in my opinion, it's getting cleaner now. It's getting nicer. I see. In our case, we don't have any closeout issue. We're not really pushing a closeout. We have products that have enough demand that people want to buy them at full price, and they're not waiting for a closeout. And we don't produce close out. So we don't have any. But I know some brands are not in this position and that's kind of a bummer because they're hurting the whole industry. If you can buy a closeout kite for 60, 70, 80% off, of course you would. I mean, I would do it as a client. I want to do it. It's maybe not as good as the brand new shiny one that some of the brands are launching, but it's cheaper. The problem is there's not a million. I mean, there's a finite amount of clients. So once a shop is sold 20 closeout, it's 20 kites that are not being sold at full price. And its clients are going to be set for like three years with kite. So this is not good because the brand is losing money, the shop's not making really good money, and then you end up with shops that are struggling and brands who are barely making it. And that's not healthy for the industry. We need, you know, we need an industry where, like, the brands are actually making enough money that they can keep on pushing innovation. Paying team riders, sponsoring tours, sponsoring events, you know, sponsoring demos and all that stuff, because that's what, you know, that's what the sport is all about, being on the, on the water. And I can see that, you know, from client perspective, someone may say, well, it's nice, I can buy kites for cheaper, for sure. But how long this brand can survive doing it, you know, and how long the industry can survive doing it if, if there's no more, you know, if there's, if there's too much closeout, there's going to be no more, no more innovation, no more new product, no more, you know, no more, no more money to pay medias and all that stuff that actually are making the industry leave.

[B]

Are we sort of following the same trend as windsurfing went through? I mean, you've been based in Hawaii, you would probably see, you probably would have seen that firsthand, where the gear just got crazy expensive and sort of suffocate and drowned. It's almost drowned itself is probably the best way to say it. Right.

[A]

I don't think Windsor feed got killed because of the price for the gear. I think Winterfit got killed because of the fact that the gear became better and better, but harder and harder to use, you know, or more dangerous. Not the right word. And, and I think I hate to say it because I have so much respect for, you know, the bigger kite folder guys, right? It's insane what they're doing, but I Don't think it's very healthy for the future of the industry if suddenly to win King of the air, you need to be on a foil board because guess what? Already people are getting scared by bigger. But imagine now the amount of people in the world that could actually do a bigger jump on foil. That's very limited, you know, and if this become the trend and if the Parker and Lorenzo and Andrea and all these guys start being on foils, is that what people have to look up to? Then we're gonna. I mean, the industry is going to choke because, I mean, I see people folding here in San Diego. It's hard. People like those people have been falling for years. They still cannot do a tack or a jibe. You know, it's technical. Folding, kite folding is not easy. Wind folding is pretty easy, but kite folding is not easy. And so there's a danger here that I see similar to windsurfing, when they started making boards smaller and smaller where people had to do water start. So people were like people that were windsurfing. They thought it was so much better. But suddenly beginners could not start windsurfing anymore because the gear was too technical, you know, and, and eventually some brands did, did a good job at trying to bring back the easy, easy boards. But I think the damage was done already. You know, like people had moved on.

[B]

Aren't we getting there a little bit anyway with the kites? I mean, for example, is the master model the kite to learn on? You know, is that a kite that someone would learn on? You know, it's interesting because, you know, like, if you go back to, let's say when the pivot was winning king of the air, the pivot was a great do it all, all round kite, a crossover kite. You could watch Kevin winning king of the air on it and then you could go and do a lesson and you could be taught on it. I don't think we're there anymore. No one's teaching anyone on the master model or, or a high end Alula kite. It's just not happening.

[A]

No, I get it.

[B]

I mean, too fast as well, I think just too fast for a beginner. Also beginners, they need something that's a bit more slower, a little bit more controlled. You don't want to sort of grab the wrong side of the bar, you and go look for your board and then the kite in the water. And that's what these quicker kites can do.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, this is definitely something we always keep in mind when we make kites. Is to make sure they're still accessible to your normal kiter. You know. And that, that was probably the biggest designs objective when we were doing master model was like it needs to be the kite four. You know, I had this guy in mind. The, the guy that goes to Cape Town vacation is like it's got the same color hair as you or the same amount of hair as me. So he's in 40s to 50s. Well what I mean is like it's, it's not the young 20 year old that's going to be doing kite loop board off like crazy but he still wants to jump high, right? So the goal was like we need a kite that's going to be easy for these guys. And of course I always had in mind like Parker needs to do good at king of the air with it. You know, that was the thing where like I was not telling the guys because I was telling. Yeah, this is the marketing. It's going to be, you know, this is the goal. Sorry. The goal is like it's, he needs to be accessible for your average kiter. He guide needs to be jumping as high as possible. But steam will be fast enough that it's fun. That if that same guy wants to somehow ride a wave, it's not like a kite that just stuck there and cannot turn. Right. So there was a mix of things and it was kind of like needs to work for these guys but also needs to work for Parker. Needs to send him to the sky and let him do the do these tricks. But what's funny with this thing is like same thing you said with Kevin winning king of the year at the time on the kite was that it was not meant for him. But the goal is like make it easy. And because it was so easy, he found it easy too. And with Mastermind it was the same thing. You know, they always know what the kite is in the air when they're, they're hand upside down. Because we really worked on like this is the bar feel we need. You need to know where the kite is all the time. It needs to be very, very predictable and very stable. Right. So these things, you do it for your average guy and the pro is they don't ever tell you this is what they need because they're like, they always come up with whatever they need. Oh, I need the kite to shoot further forward in the window. I need when I do my down heavy loop, it needs to go this way. They have these very specific things and you listen to that but at the same time you're like, yeah, I need to make it easy because when I'm upside down underwater, like you say, I'm grabbing the bar. I want to know where the kite is. I want to feel what it's doing. And in the end, the pros, they don't ever tell you, but they're like, oh, the kite works great. Damien, how come you're like, yeah, well, because we didn't just took your input, you know, we put a little more into it. So. So that's what, you know, that's what we're trying to do. And I'm definitely like, you say I've. I come from windsurfing. I windsurf when I was a kid until I picked up kiting 20 something years later or whatever that was. And I've seen the evolution. I mean, I got into windsurfing when it was already going down and I was on short boards already. But I've talked to the older guys and, you know, and. And I know this is what happened. We lost contact with. With the average guy. And then when I talk to dealers today, like, you started there already. Like, Big Air already is getting far from what your average kiter thinks or sees. You know, like, they get scared. They see a picture of a video of a guy too high, they're like, whoa, I don't want to do that with my. With my kite down.

[B]

If you go down to any beach, ask them who the world champion is, they have no idea. They have no idea. You go to a tennis club and ask them who the. Who won Wimbledon, and they'll know every single winner of every single major. And that's something that, you know. His name escapes me, but was in one of the how to get paid series, and he said kiteboarding is the sport that never took off. And it's such a great statement because it's like. It's like it has all this potential, but it never really fulfilled it. Sort of like. I mean, we all love the sport, right? But maybe we're blind to that love. I can't think of the word. But it's crazy that we have this amazing sport. We have amazing athletes at the top. We have a great sort of support group of people who love it, yet both parties don't know about each other.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. I mean, you mentioned it earlier, like, you talking about the state of competition. There's what, six different disciplines to get work that we have six different world champion every year, right? I mean, I'm saying six as a. As a kid. Guess but there's like, bigger. Bigger strapless. Strapless in the waves, bigger foiling. They added the park. You know, I got a lot of respect for what Ewan does on his. On his. On his rails. I mean, it's unbelievable. But realistically, very few people are doing this. Very few people are kite foiling. Big air. Very few people are doing strapless big air. And maybe, you know, like you see in tennis, it's pretty simple. There's only one game. And maybe I'm not trying to say I solved everything, but if we have one discipline, it may be easier to have a world champion. When. When Kevin Aaron were battling peak area at the time, it was one discipline. You know, it may not have been what people were doing already. We were wrong. We were trying to be weight boulders while we're kiters. So that was wrong. But at least there was one. One tour. One title. I mean, there was a. There was another tour. What was his name? The key Kick.

[B]

I forgot.

[A]

Kpw. No, KPWT or something. I'm talking, like, PK Area times. You're too young. You don't even remember these days. But what I mean is, at the time, because there's one champion, we had heroes, you know?

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I understand. It's a good point.

[A]

Yeah, go ahead. Sorry.

[B]

That's a great point. I. I want to go back and ask you about the testing of, let's say, the master model. Do you have. Because I remember Luke McGillowy saying to me, it's important to have testers that don't really have an agenda. And I'm paraphrasing here because, you know, if you. If you're giving the kite to, like, Parker all the time, Parker wants something that's highly tuned to what he needs. Do you have other testers that give you regular feedback or come back and saying, hey, this is what I'm feeling, rather than saying, I want this?

[A]

Oh, absolutely. And I mean, I'm always. I'm actually always asking for people to give feedback. Feedback and not suggestions. You know, whenever team riders start saying, oh, that guy's great, but he needs two more struts, I'm like, dude, why? Like, tell me what you're feeling. Right? So I love actually testing with genuinely average kiters, but I'm going to take even like. And Rs the same, too. We love to go. And we're like, there's a guy on the beach that we've never met. You're like, hey, try this guy. Tell me, what do you think? And the people usually like, oh, I'm not a good kiter. I don't know. And I'm like, exactly. Just tell me in your words what you're feeling about this kite. And it's always interesting, right? So you learn. You learn a lot from. From these guys. You know, obviously, I test. You know, we test when we're in Cape Town. We had the whole crew of all the employees, all the company was here, and we had a day with super fun. Like, everybody went on the kites and everybody had a different way of describing whatever prototype we're working on this day. And, you know, some of them, I couldn't understand what they meant. Their. Their language didn't make sense. Not the English, but, I mean, the words they were using. I was like, I don't get it. But talking to everybody, then you're starting to understand what the other guy was saying, because these guys sing in a different way. So I learned a lot from these guys. Almost more than the pros. The pros can be frustrating because these days, they don't land their big trick. They're going to tell you the kite's not good, you know, and the next day you're going to tell them, hey, I fixed the kite per what you said. And then they land their trick like, cassie, I told you it's way better. And then you're like, yeah, I didn't change the kite, but okay, just the wind's different today. And so. And. And I've done that to a lot of the big names in the industry and tell you that a lot of the guys I worked with over the years and it's. And I respect that because I'm the same too. You know, I try kite. I'm like, oh, man, that thing doesn't work today. And then the next day it works. You're like, okay, it was me the other day. I just couldn't make it work or the other way around. I thought it was great. Try it again. Like, actually, it's not good. So, you know, different days. That's why you need to put a lot of time testing, because just one day of testing is not gonna. Not gonna do it. But more people. Absolutely.

[B]

I mean, but also, like time on the kite and filming the rhythm of the kite, then you can feel those differences. If you just jump on something you don't know or it's completely fresh, you are starting with a blank state. Right. A blank slate. Right. I want to just dive into quickly the team. You know, obviously, you've got a great team led by park are sort of your sort of main rider there. Marius. I mean, I really like the sort of team dynamic you have. Marius, in the last podcast, talking about going to do the fitness challenge, and I remember seeing that Instagram, and I thought, oh, Kevin's going to love this. But you, you do have a great setup of not just team riders, but ambassadors. Well, because I think it's fair to say you. You've got a great little ambassador program as well. You must be super happy with that sort of family feel, being a smaller brand. You can sort of. I feel like you can keep that sort of family feel without getting too corporate.

[A]

Absolutely. I mean, the crew we have, I really like every one of them, you know, and we have the up and comer. We have Nick from Cape Town. He's absolute ripper. We have David from the. I call him from the Arctic Circle because he's from the very north of Europe. And we have, you know, a bunch. We have a lot of girls are really good, too. Rose from Tarifa is ripping. And I like to keep it small like that. You know, it's like, yeah, we can't maybe afford the big team like some of the big brands. So, you know, it's like some of the guys, some people approach us and I'm like, well, we just cannot. Because I want to. I want to keep that vibe. I want to be able to still spend some time, have the time to talk to Marius on the phone, talk to Parker, spend some time with, you know, our guys one on one. And if you have too many, like, you just don't have time anymore for it. So I really like this relation, the relation we have with these guys, and I see in them, you know, like, I can see where they're going to be. Like, I think, you know, Parker more, but, like, we have him pretty much since we started the brand. When I started, I gave him kites. It's not like we could afford giving kites to anyone at the time. So I gave him gear and I knew he was going to get there. You know, I knew he was going to go to King of the Air. I mean, he's not done yet because in my eyes, he's capable of winning it, and I know he can, but so he still has to finish this first and then probably hopefully win some more. But I like that we grew together, right? And same with Marius. He joined us really early on, and he became such a better pro than he was at first. At first he was. He didn't see, you know, probably got inspired for by watching a Kevin. You know, the way Kevin eats and trains and he's serious and, you know, is on time on things and photo shoots, very well organized. I. I can see Marius has been learning so much. I mean, Marius is such an athlete now, and he's such. He's so much more pro than he was, and I love to see them grow this way. So, yeah, I'm very, very, very proud of the guys we have. I mean, I just spent a week on Maui. We. We had Postparker and River, our. Our main wing rider. And he's also super young. He just turned 17, and I love to see that. You know, I was so proud to actually being able to fly into Maui. And he stayed, you know, stayed at my house and we had time together, we rode together. And like you said, if the team is too big, you cannot do these things. So I really like that we have that close team and I'm hoping that, you know, they appreciate it too. But I really enjoy it whenever I get time to spend time with these riders. Being a session or just, you know, a dinner or like trying to go to the gym together, it's. It's always great. Or even the kite surfing competition I was telling you about. The, you know, we. It was just all team riders and it was super fun because it was like a competition, but also all together. So, yeah, it was. It's great.

[B]

If you haven't checked out that last. Last week's interview with Maris, definitely go check it out. Because it's just a really open and honest situation of his position in kiteboarding. And it's like, great to hear. Like, you know, one times he says, you know, he says, I've always been on that fringe. You know, I'm either in or I'm just in on first reserve. I've never prepared properly. And he said, it's something that I'm trying to work on. And I love the fact that kids can be like that. I mean, it's actually very mature for him to say, you know, like to speak like that. It was pretty impressive.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah, it's definitely frustrating to see him, like you said, just on the verge because I know he puts the time and he knows, he knows he started a little too late, you know, when. Discussion with him a long time ago. He's like, I remember my dad told me when I was younger to be more serious, but I only started being serious too late, you know, he competed

[B]

in the very first heat with Andrea. Him and Andrea did their first competition together back or 20, 21. Which is kind of crazy. Hey, I'm going to jump back. You were talking about Sports Evolution and I was speaking to Martin Vari. Martin Vari was obviously talking about the first time. I think it was. I want to say Machu. I think it was either Machu or me, too. It might have been both of them. Came down to a place in Chile. Martin, world champion kite surfer, had only ever thought. Thought about riding this break and straps, thought it was too dangerous. He said, these two guys came down. He said, that was the Clara Sports Evolution oversaw because they just tore this break apart strapless. And then he realized that, you know, the game has just changed so much. I mean, he was just, like, hanging around with these guys, and he was just blown away by the way those guys approach strapless riding. And it's sort of what you're saying, you know. You know, with you and Kevin using straps or not straps or boards or different types of boards. You know, the sport does evolve constantly.

[A]

I mean, I had the same feeling when I. When I. I flew Ian Aldridge. I don't know if you remember. Of course, yeah, flew him to Maui. And I was blown away because before that I had seen people riding strapless. And I think that was pre. Me too, I want to say. And no one made it look good. Everybody was just sucked at it. You know, they were wasting wave. I was like. I remember a friend of mine was riding strapless every day because he had seen Ben Winston. And I was like, dude, you used to ride waves. Now you just go straight and you barely do anything. But Ian definitely, in my eyes, is the one that's starting the strapless hooked in revolution. Because before that, people were unhooked and he was just too technical. And yeah, sure, he opened up a lot of eyes, but in the end, he converted. Me too, you know, he converted. I remember Kai. Kai Laney started riding strapless two, and then Kai, and he went back to straps. Because Kai is not the kind of person that's going to follow trend. He's going to follow what his heart says and how he can write, have the most fun on the water, you know? And I think Kai was right. You know, it was just too. It was just too hard for most people. The prime is like, sure, me too. And Machu, Cape Verde, they get what days and days of wind and waves, perfect in board shorts, perfect conditions. But let's say you live in northern Holland or Holland anywhere. It's so choppy. There's so much current. It's. The board is not comfy. It's hard. You lose your board. The waves are not that clean. It takes forever before you get good. So I'm not saying strapless is wrong, you know, I'm just saying I think it's too hard for most people, you know, and. And even for someone like me that's been riding strapless, I'm not bad at strapless. I'm pretty good. I can do some jumps. I can. I can ride waves and hokey by like big waves. But I'm having now way more fun being on that new board where I can jump, I can do airs, I can do 180s, I can do 360s, I can do things that I could never do strapless, like I said, you know, like Airtown. And me too can do it, maybe, but it's because they have so much more time and average kiter doesn't have the time to become that good, you know, Like, I mean, you see the. You see the crowd of people doing downwinders in Cape Town, and they're strapless. Some are strapped, man. They don't look like they're riding so well, you know, when you watch videos of strapless riding and you watch them. But then on the other hand, you look at the average twin tipper in Cape Town and he's pretty good. So twin tip with footstep is definitely a lot easier, right? I mean, there's so many rippers when you're in Cape Town. So many kids I've never heard of. I don't have no idea where they're from. And they do this bold off kite. Looks like. Like it's just me doing a beach start, you know, so. But strapless, it's not the same. Even the guys that put hours there, it takes time before you get good.

[B]

What's your thoughts on unhooked strapless?

[A]

I used to do that. It's awesome when the wind is perfect. On Maui, it was a little hard because the wind is super gusty. On Oahu is awesome because the wind is super steady. In Cabarete, it was very nice because the wind is steady. In Brazil, it was nice because the wind is steady. But in south of France, in west of France, in Germany, in Holland, in all these places where the wind is not steady, waves are not clean, man, it was really hard. And. And that was also something that was like cutting us from the average kiter, you know, because no one could do it, you know, I mean, you had one turn, it was awesome because you're so free. You have no connection, no harness. It's. It's perfect, but really hard. And then where do you jump? You know, when you go out, you just cannot jump. So, yeah, to me, like you say it's an evolution, and I think I'm seeing something new into the. In. In this sport. Like, the future is gonna be different, hopefully, you know, when. When people start seeing this board I'm talking about, they're gonna get on it and they're gonna be like, oh, wow. And I can't wait to see what people are gonna be doing with it, you know, like already just giving it to a few people. You're like, oh, wow. I didn't think about this. You know, everybody's using it the way they want, you know, like, some guys gonna maybe use it going backside. To me, the beauty is suddenly you can go switch, you know, like, that's the thing with strapless, dude. If the wind's blowing on your unnatural stand side, it's a pain. I mean, I'm a. I'm a regular footer. When I go to Cape Town strapless, man, I look like a freaking beginner. It's so annoying because I cannot really ride. And I go backside and it's hard. I mean, everywhere. I mean, I've been to the. To the proper spots, you know, I went with Kevin to where he rips and it's hard if you're not. It's not your. Your sense, you know. But now with this board, I can go switch all day long, no problem. I can go goofy footer front side. When it's onshore, I go front side both ways. I go in Hood river on the river that I was at the hatch where everybody's folding, and I'm going frontside, top turn, front side, the other way. Top turn, front side, the other way. I do 10 in a row, you know, and then I do a big jump. Jump over all the wingers and go back up where all the foyers are starting, and I do it again, and the foyers are like, well, that looks fun, dude. You know, like Cash Burzel. I was on the water one day. I was on the. On the board, and when I got out of the water, he's like, hey, uncle, you won the fun matter for sure today over everybody else, you know, So I was stoked to hear that because he could see I was just having more fun than anyone else on the water. So, yeah, to me, that's. Yeah, that's. That's the future. That's for sure. That's the future.

[B]

Well, Damien, thanks as always for your time. It's Always great to catch up with you. We, we should do this once a year, mate, to so you can, you know, pass on your wisdom of the knowledge of the industry. It's great to hear, you know, your take on the state of the industry. I know a lot of people are worried about it. It's great to hear you're so positive. And I agree, man, we need to bring the fun back to kite boarding because I do feel like most people on the beach are out there having fun, but at the level of the industry that we work out, it's becoming stale and repetitive and, and I think big air, you know, is bit. Dude, I'm with you. Big air excites me. I can't wait for Lords of Tram. I'm super bumped for Parker, by the way, not making the Lords of Tram fleet. And it is awesome to watch, man. I can't wait to watch the competition. But I do think that as, as a general, we need to find the fun again.

[A]

But yeah, and I mean, I'm pretty excited, like you said about the future and then, and, and think about it long term, we're in the right industry because I hate to say, but global warming, we're not going to stop it, but it means there's going to be more wind and more water. So, you know, more wind, more water is more kiting. It's going to suck for a lot of things, it's going to suck for the winter sport industry. But for us, we're in the right industry. So long term, I think we're looking good. It's a quite long term. But I think even for now, you know, if we keep our passion, like if we keep designing product, get people psyched, you know, then they're going to, they're going to be, they're going to keep on kiting and they're going to bring their friend kiting and they're going to bring their kids kiting. And I think, you know, I don't know, I think we're looking good, you know, for sure.

[B]

I think the key, Damien, is you need to be on the water. We love the sport because when we're on the water we feel good. And I always, you know, don't be afraid to go and learn to foil or wing foil or try some downwind stuff because I think we've got to that stage where if it's not like 20 knots, we don't go, you know, so we need to, we need to sort of be more flexible, get out and ride and enjoy the, enjoy this amazing sport. Yeah. Yeah, now you're in San Diego,

[A]

dude. I swear, I'm looking forward for seven not so win now. It's crazy. People don't believe me, but, like, it's fun. Like, I can remember my first ever session a year, and there was a guy folding, and I'm going on the twin tip. He's looking at me like, what are you doing? And then I go out and I'm like, I'm totally loaded. I'm doing back rolls, I'm doing jumps, I'm doing kite loops. And the guy's looking at his phone and he's really wondering, why is he on the foil? And it changes the whole thing. This kite just changes the whole thing to me for lightweight. And sure, it's hard to do demos because no one goes to a demo when it's blowing 10 knots, right? So no one's really trying it at a demo. But it's starting to spread and people know it. People trying it, they're like, oh, that's. That's insane. And, you know, we. We have, like, people like this guy doing. How do you call that? Boat trips in the Caribbean or something. And they love it because they have a lot of days where the trades are really light and now they can kite all the time in. I mean, I was in Cape Town with Kevin. I had. I bought a freaking wind meter. Just. Just to know. We had downs, we had lows down to like two and a half knots. It was probably gusting to eight knots. I'm on the beach. Sure, there's more wind in the air, but it's always the case, right? And Kevin is going back and forth. He's the only kiter on the. On the whole coast of Cape Town. Usually when there's any wind in Cape Town, there's What, at least 500 kiters, right? And there was. And I did the same the year before. Last year. Last year, like, remember Kevin had a barbecue at his house because there's no wind, and I'm just kidding. In front of his house just to prove him my point. And he was laughing. He's like, dude, okay, I got it. And yeah, you can kind of in the wind. So these light wind days, you can go back to Dubai, dude, you could kite every day now. I swear.

[B]

Oh, I don't want to go back to Dubai. Jesus.

[A]

Just kidding. But, you know, I know the wind's light over there. That's. That was my point. But, yeah, we have something that really, like you say was the motivation was just to be on the water more because what are you gonna do? You know, not everybody's got 25, 30 knots every day. And then a lot of us, we have jobs, we have families. Hey, I have Saturday from 3 to 7pm or whatever to go kite. It better be windy. And if it's not, what am I gonna do? And yes, yes, you can foil, but foiling is hard. It's gonna take time. This thing, you go on a twin tip, no prime, or you go on our new board. Even more fun because you can ride waves too now on the same, same board. So, yeah, sorry, you were doing a little. And I got back into it, but I'm too excited, dude. I'm too excited. It's, it's just, it's just too much fun.

[B]

Yeah, awesome. When am I going to see you next, dude?

[A]

Whenever you want them. Anytime. Happy to be here. You want to, you want to do it? You say once a year? I feel like once a year we, we, we could do a little more than that. We can do a little more than that.

[B]

With the current restrictions in the Middle East, I think my only option is to fly towards the US Like, I don't think I can fly through the Middle east at the moment. So maybe I'll, maybe I'll come to Hawaii and, and check out the scene there.

[A]

I'm over, dude. It's good. I tell you, it's good. Especially like this time of the year, like March and April, man, it's as good as it gets. We get wind every day, we get waves every day. And it's. Yeah, it's nice.

[B]

Perfect.

[A]

It's good. It's solid.

[B]

Thanks, brother.

[A]

All right, see you, dude. Thanks so much.

[B]

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