Beach in Leba

I just came back from my summer holidays in Poland, and I have to say as always I a had great time with my friends and family. But is not what I want tell about.

During my holidays I went to this great summer spot on thr Polish sea side wish called – LEBA. I went with my friends and girl to some camping, sizzling on the beach and of course kitesurfing.
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kite surfers in Littlehampton - East Beach

Fab, Claudio and I had a very enjoyable kiteboarding session in Littlehampton last year but we were later informed that land based traction is banned there. Kitesurfing however isn’t banned & I spent an hour just ogling the kite surfers up. I took my wife to Littlehampton for the day on Saturday and loaded the little pop-up on the off chance that we decided to stay over and camp. No kites came along because she’s quick to point out that all our off-time is planned around my kiting habit.

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Last Sunday saw me and Mr.Strong representing the Fellas at the first Ealing Skyride, a cycling event created by Mayor of London, Borris Becker…. I mean Johnson.
It’s not a serious ride at all and because it’s arranged by a politician, they even close some of the roads on the 11km trip so you are free to concentrate on riding really really slow and flexing your bum cheeks. In the main area, situated in Lamas park, they had all kinds of attractions, including the Fuzz marking your bike thus helping you make your bike less theft prone.
With all things fun, there were some assholes who simply had to protest about losing their much loved free parking spot for a couple of hours and they did so by putting up all kinds of posters in their garden to show their distaste but this only made us more smug and indifferent to their suffering. The highlights for me were a very cheeky but hot umpire who flirted openly with the cyclists and also a drummer who found a very creative solution to combine his love for his bike with his drum kit.
I took a very small clip on my little point-and-shoot Panasonic Lumix because I desperately wanted to share this with some of our “proper engineering shit” boys.

Ealing Skyride bike drum guy from The Westfellas on Vimeo.

Our friend Luke Carter who also happens to be a very serious cyclist took his impressive mini Garmin GPS to plot down our route.
There’s another Skyride happening but this time in the middle of London on the 5th of September for those of you who feel like joining me.

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Hi Fellas and friends.

Summer is coming  and people seams to go in different places and do some crazy stuff. So I was thinking that we cloud go out and do some bowling in Park Royal Tenpin, before we go in four corners of world. This Thursday maybe? I know, I know is thursday, but some of going away this weekend, so we could  come together and have chat, some beers, fun bowling and special games like flying scourer in which so far Carl holding championship and record. If you don’t know what is it join us and you can find out:-)

What you think Fellas???

Fabizio asked that I publish this on his behalf:

Earlier this month Fabrizio and Claudio had the good fortune of being harassed by a pro dog walker in Gunnersbury park. It’s a bizarre story where the dog walker didn’t use any leashes to walk her clients dogs and a whole pack of them set off to attack the pair of them as they were boarding in the distance. When they called to the woman from Dog Star Dogs specialists, she came over and shouted at our boys to get a real hobby ( what like golf? ) and that she makes more money walking dogs. He took a picture of her as she went back to her car on which she advertised her services.
Long story short, Fab logged a complaint seeing as it’s just plain irresponsible and rude to call an Italian the “C” word and to let other peoples dogs attack members of the public when they are entrusted to your care.

This is the response he got back from the council:
I have now advised the dog-walker of your complaint and they have been advised that all dogs should be kept under proper control when in a public place. There is no requirement that dogs should be kept on leads other than in designated areas.
A letter has also been sent.
The Council is at present considering adopting new legislation regarding the number of dogs that are allowed to be walked per person in Gunnersbury Park.
Should you fear attack by one or a number of dogs you should stand still and if possible put your board between you and the dog(s) avoiding eye contact with the dog(s).
Yours sincerely
Norma Mackie
Animal Warden
London Borough of Hounslow

She clearly wasn’t in control of her client’s “best friends” and I find the statement on her website * SAFETY IS PARAMOUNT TO US laughable. Just as well that she is insured and police checked.

Please remember that this article has nothing to do with the majority of dog owners who pick up their dog shit, have their dogs under control (whether they are on leases or not) & the friendly pooches who come to say hi

I’ve never considered the Dominican Republic for anything let alone going there to Kite surf, but damn do they have some pristine conditions & hawties! Aaron Hadlow and Susi Mai presents this little round-up of the PKRA 2010 world tour which also features a rider profile of 19 year old Karolina Winkowska from Mr. Strong’s neck o’ the woods.

I got my trampa about a year ago, and ever since I bought it all the Fellas were saying that I should cut it to make it lighter and more “pimp”. But I liked like it the way it was and I put it off it for long time. Then finally the day came when I decided to do it – cut my trampa board my self. I didn’t have any idea how or what to do or how to even start but as usual my friends from Westfellas came to the rescue.

I asked roi about it and he suggested a couple of links to look online for inspiration and see if there are any cuts which I liked and see what other people have, of course after looking at his lovely board (which Fabrizio cut for him). It proved to be a very, very useful tip because I tried to have a look at different boards and I will tell you it not easy to find pictures, it’s almost like people are hiding their boards because they are their precious. Eventually after long search searches I found it – a cut I liked.  Down below are a couple of examples of boards from the interweb and the Westfellas.

I think your first step should be to – decide what you want to do with it, how to cut it, because then you have clear idea and it’s good to stick to it.

Like this

and like this

Board owner: Westfellas – Casinovison

Or like this

Secondly – tools.
To cut my board I just simply used a hack saw, metal filers, elbow grease and that’s it. If you choose to do it this way buy some good blades for your saw, other wise you’ll break blades really easily and you get really angry with it and you would wish never did it this way.
A good metal filer is great idea too since it will make the smoothing and rounding of the corners really easy and also to get in close to your design’s lines. The downside of cutting your trampa board without power tools or the proper setup is that it will take you a long time and will demand lots of nerves and patience.

That is picture of tools I used :

the easiest way is to just use an electric jigsaw, like Casinovision did with very nice results. His tip is to use blades for wood and cut it very slowly. Of course if you have possibility and access to more advance tool just go for it, you will save time and money.

I started by removing all the parts from my board until it was naked.
Then I drew some corners of my design on it like this:

I had problems drawing accurate end points on the board until I decided to make a paper template which I then flipped used on the other side, this way making sure either end is the same.

This is what my trampa looked like after drawing the lines

You will notice from amount of holes in my board that I moved trucks bit more down / closer together so that the deck would be stiffer after cutting. I drilled the holes before cutting board, but I think it doesn’t really matter when you do it.

So, after this initial drawing I started to cut it like this

It was hard and long work and through out this labour of love and at different stages I thought – “what I’m doing” and “I should do it a different way” and stuff like that but you can see why I was slightly freaked out.

After roughly 2h of cutting my board looked like this:

As you can see that is a very rough cut, just because I used a hacksaw and I had to cut it at different angles to get to my design as close as possible, which is brings me to my next important tip:
Cut as close to the line as possible. This means less filing later

It took me another two hours to do it but finely I finished and my board looked ok but I still wasn’t too happy with it. This is what it looked like

I couldn’t wait to put all the bits and pieces together on the first cut to see what it looked like:

But like I said before I wasn’t really happy with the look so, I decide to do some more work on it. When I got my next Saturday, and there was no wind in Gunnersbury park, I stripped off my board again and start to cut and file and also ripped off the old deck tape. After some riding I also wanted to move my bindings.

It took me another four hours to do it but finally I finished – Finally I was happy with it. And here it is, the fruit of my labour, sacrifice and patience.

I know is not the most beautiful board in the world but it is MY cut trampa and I like it. I think that for my first attempt at customising a trampa board it’s pretty good, and some time in the future when I’ll get another deck I will know exactly what do to with it.
My board is made up of:
Trampa deck
MBS F2 Bindings
MBS Pro TI Trucks
Twistar Hubs
MBS Tyres

Below are some pictures of the Westfella’s boards.

From the bottom boards of

1. roirizla
2. Andy
3. Fabrig
4. Franz the man

And here is a link to kitecrowd’s pimped board thread where some guys put their ideas.

A final note on Trampa boards: They are virtually indestructible and you will be surprised with the amount you can hack out of them. Remember that the more you cut off, the more flexible your board will become.

Thanks for reading and if you have any pictures of your board or have any questions, please leave a comment.

Mr Strong

Slingshot produced very nice kite RPM, a lots of options of tuning to your preferences. I would mind to try it on land and water …. only if…:)

Dutch guys enjoying kite surfing in SA:

Redemption from Ruurd Vulink on Vimeo.

I got to meet beboi very briefly during one of the Essex Kite Park summer sessions & I can honestly say I could never have imagined that a guy with such a calm exterior is capable of producing something that kicks so much ass. Ok maybe his obedient Magnum PI style Doberman should’ve told me something. I’m a huge fan of his work and although I’ve never been all that keen on buggies, he sure has a way of making them very appealing. Kudos & respect to Mr. Steel who seem to have the balls matching his surname.

a fistful of steel from beboii on Vimeo.