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Over 200 kiteboarders, including a four person New Zealand team, will descend on picturesque Cagliari, Italy over coming days for the 2012 Kiteboard Racing World Championship.
Kiwis Dave Robertson, Matt Taggart, Ben Turner and Justina Sellers are in Italy for the regatta which runs from the 3rd-7th October with racing on the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th.
“Organisers are aiming for three races a day for all fleets. With over 200 competitors this will be a handful!” says Dave Robertson, currently preparing for competition.
“Races are essentially trapezoid courses or windward/leewards with the option of slaloms at the ends of the downwind legs. The target time however is only twelve minutes so races are very intense,” he continues.
USA kite board racers made a clean sweep of the podium in 2011 so are expected to be at the top of the leader board again. Other countries that have been racing kites for a few years include France, Clombia, Great Britain and other nations around Europe.
No kiwis have raced a regatta of this level before. In fact we have all only got into the race boards this year,” explains Robertson. “But we have had organised training camps and lots of organised racing to prepare for this event. All the preparation and focus has been our on water skills and speed as that is where we have the most to gain this early on.”
With kiteboard racing set to debut in Rio 2016 as an Olympic event, the small crew of kiwis are in Cagliari to get a measure on where their international counterparts are at, and to garner some knowledge.
“We have come here to throw ourselves in at the deep end and learn as much as we can. We will be analysing everyone’s equipment and learning what it’s going to take to be competitive in kiteboarding in the future.”
“We want to understand all the competencies required to get to the top and make sure that we can build a strong long term plan for kiting in New Zealand.”
Follow the regatta website here.
Banner image: Roberto Foresti
