Three weeks ago, while filming in Brazil, Mallory Hersart de la Villemarqué, http://www.malloryprokiter.com called me on skype an afternoon and told me that he had found a good deal to go to Cape Verde and surf Punta Preta. The problem was that the departure was only 2 days after I would be back from Brazil and I had several things to do, but the idea of a trip to Cape Verde and the mytic wave of Punta Pretta was to good to ignore. So, in 10 min, after a quick call to Ocean Rodeo, we booked our flights and were ready for our first real trip together.
Manu Morel, http://www.manumorel.com very talented kite photographer would be part of our trip. I was really exited as I had already met Manu in St Marteen several years ago, and I always been impressed by his work in all the kite magazines worldwide.
2 weeks later we were on our way to Sal island, famous for it's amazing wave conditions at Punta Preta. Mallory and I flew from Nice where he is now studying, and Manu came from Montpelier.
Thanks to Fun and Fly who arranged our stay on the island, we arrived at the Morabeza hotel http://www.hotelmorabeza.com which welcomed us right of the airport. We had a super nice room well located close to a nice Surf spot, a kite spot, the center of santa Maria ( the town) and punta preta where we can see the brakes from the road ! The perfect location for us. You can go out at night, surf and kite the same day.
The first day of our trip, we met Mitu Monteiro, wave KPWT world champion last season, he lives there and knows all the best kite and surf spots, he would be our guide for this nice trip.
After renting a 4 wheel drive to load all our gear, we first went to surf punta preta as the wind wasn't very strong. The right brake is amazing, I 'm not so use to surf rights, but this was a perfect opportunity for me to train and surf backside.
The next days the wind was pretty consistent, and using the same board, strapless, we went out me on my 8 m ocean rodeo and Mallory on his 7. This is when Mitu did the show on the water and showed us what strapless kite surfing means. He was ripping the wave, getting in all barrels etc .... a very impressive rider !
We had a lot of fun the next days, kiting this amazing wave, and scoring some pretty good wipe out.
The next days, to show the full potential of Sal island, we went to explore some freestyle spots and had some pretty good sessions in kitebeach ( the main freestyle kite spot) offering a lot of nice kickers. But the main surprise came from punta lema, a long rock strip offering the perfect flat water spot with sometime nice kickers coming in. It was to tempting not to use my bindings and we went out for a really nice freestyle session.
The next days the wind went down a little so we decided to explore other islands around Sal, so we flew down to Sao Vicente , the whole team together, Mallory, Mitu, manu, me and Alex Caizergues and his girl friend Marie .
We had a lot of fun trying to discover some new waves on the north shore and score a couple nice surf session.
I'm now back in the south of France for few days, I finally got my laptop back from warranty, so I'll be able to sort out all the pictures and videos from this trip.
Thanks to Manu Morel for the amazing pictures and the filming.
Have a look at the web selection of the pictures before to find the exclusive shots on your favorite magazines:
Posted by johnz on February 3rd 2010 |
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New Ocean Rodeo Interactive Video Gallery
Fresh off the presses, check out the new Ocean Rodeo Video page by clicking here or visiting our home page and following the links to Video!
The new page allows for users to watch a host of Ocean Rodeo videos as well as upload their own!
Be the first to share your videos with the Ocean Rodeo Crew!
Enjoy!
2010 La Ventana Kite XPO Wrap Up
Posted by johnz on January 25th 2010 |
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2010 La Ventana Kite XPO Wrap Up
Fresh off the heels of another sucessful La Ventana Kite XPO Evan and I are on our way to the airport now.
After a couple nervouse opening days without wind this year's event finished in spectacular fashion with 2 great days of wind, competition and demos. The 2010 equipment was a huge draw as Evan and I found ourselves inundated with interest in the newest Ocean Rodeo gear. 2010 promises to be an excellent year for Ocean Rodeo riders if pubic interest in our products is even half an indication of the gear's performance.
Having now attended this event 4 years in a row I can say Marina and Tim have their system polished up and tight. This year's event was well managed and attended. Certainly those of you wondering if next year will be worth the trip will not be dissapointed as each year just seems to get better and better, including the local food on offer with a number of new restuarants open this year over last, including sushi and smoked marlin!
The course racing was an awesome public spectacle as was the big air competition, both adding to the enjoyment available to those who came to demo equipment!
Here's a photo of one of the newest raceboards to hit the waters, riders interested in ordering an Ocean Rodeo Custom Race Series Board please contact your local shops! We are taking orders now!
John and Evan from the Baja.
Ocean Rodeo hits La Ventana’s Kite XPO 2010
Posted by johnz on January 23rd 2010 |
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Ocean Rodeo hits La Ventana's Kite XPO 2010
Evan and John reporting in from Ocean Rodeo HQ here isn La Ventana Mexico, aka Palapas Ventana's front deck looking out to the La Ventana Bay.
Weather here in Ventana for the last 2 days has been, well, dissapointing. The paddle boarders have been loving it, that's all that can be said for the complete lack of sailable winds. However, as I type this I am enjoying a Palapa Ventana coffee breakfast looking out towards the Ventana Island and have just watched a fleet of pongas set sail accross the straight to drop off the participants in this year's island crossing event. Held in conjunction with the Kite XPO each year the La Ventana Classic is a mash up of an island crossing race, course race, beer bong fest, big air competition and - of course - an opportunity to raise money for the local school and hospital. Last year's event raised a little over $18,000 and this year seems to be even better attended, so hopes are high.
Demos should be running this afternoon if the north winds return and will be on for sure tomorrow with the forcast calling for strong north winds all day. It would have been ideal for this weather pattern to have pushed off a few days earlier but that is the nature of our sport! Plenty of time to soak up a tan and chat about the gear in the mean time!
We will blog more as the event unfolds and will be back in the office early next week with a warm glow of baja sun and knowing we've helped raise money for the local school and hospital and shown the world - again - just what amazing gear Ross and Richard have dreamt up for us all to enjoy!
John Z
Photo gallery from Brazil + Brand new canon 7D !
Posted by jeremie tronet on November 15th 2009
Photo gallery from Brazil + Brand new canon 7D !
Hey guys, what have I been doing this past month here in Brazil, Cumbuco ? Nothing constructive! hehe
I have spent my days chillin in some of the nicest apartments in Cumbuco and training in the Cauipe lagoon offering a nice flat water spot. So life had been pretty easy for us the past 2 months as I had done most of the 2010 Ocean Rodeo product shooting in Egypt before we flew down here to Cumbuco !
I now have a really nice buggy with a cool sound system to annoy everybody sitting around the lagoon every day with some cool Caribbean tunes !
But the lazy time is now over ! But what's taking place is even better, I just received my brand new Canon 7D. This camera is insane as it offers a great full HD filming feature allowing us to shoot with all my photo lenses.... The photos are also very nice with the new sensor and the 8 frame /secondes ! And no I'm not sponsored by Canon, but stoked to start shooting with this camera. Hopefully my next videos will benefit of a better filming quality.
Tom Court http://www.tomcourt.com and Susi Mai both pro riders for North (Tom) and Cabrinha (Susi) have spent 2 weeks with us in the apartment on the beach. We had a super great time all together with Linn, working on a Brazil travel story for kite magazines and some video shooting for my next video projects.
We came up with some sick shots and I think the story will come out really good.
Stefaans Viljoen & Ocean Rodeo Win Cabrihna Race Series In San Francisco!! Congrats!!
Posted by Administrator on October 20th 2009
Stefaans Viljoen took the crown in the 200 Cabrihna race series in San Francisco on the OR Rise, OR Session harness and OR Race Board.
After 11 nights of fierce competition it all came down to the last night. Series leaders Chip Wasson and Jeff Kafka were away on a kite trip in Fiji(poor little fellas)and the penalty points they picked up put them out of the running for 1st.
Going into the last last race it was a tie between Stefaans and Geoff Headington(Ozone)and whoever won this last night took the season trophy.
Ocean Rodeo Kiteboarding New Breathable Pyro Pro Drysuit !!
Posted by KevinM on September 30th 2009
Ocean Rodeo Kiteboarding is stoked to roll out its new breathable version of the ever popular Pyro Pro Drysuit.
Race report 9/17 – OR rider Stefaans Viljoen takes 1st on the Rise 14m and OR race
Posted by Andrew Galbraith on September 18th 2009
A brief update from the world of racing.San Francisco's Thursday night racing has been sporadic since the intense 5 days of racing for the World Championships.We've had some races cancelled due to light wind and many competitors are race weary.
Last night we were back in action with Stefaans and OR taking the top spot, on his birthday too!
We ran 2 races in lighter wind, with all racers on 12m-14m kites.With season leader Chip Wasson doing race committee the field was open for someone else to claim top honors.
Stefaans took a bullet in race one and 5th in the second race to take 1st.He was followed by Jeff Kafka (Cabrinha) and Geoff Headington (Ozone) in the top 3.
Other OR riders finishing well are as follows: Chris Brown 6th, Andrew Galbraith 8th and Eric Geleynse 9th.
Unfortunately I haveno new photos from last night, but I just wanted to let you know that the OR race board, with the Curtis hammer fins, is still a winning design.
Thanks as always to the St. Francis Yacht Club, Cabrinha and Steve Gunn for hosting the races.
The 2009 sponsor video series - Four new HD videos !
Posted by jeremie tronet on September 11th 2009
Three new HD videos : The 2009 Sponsor video series
After our trip in Los Roques and in Venezuela I had enough images to edit 3 individual videos for each of our sponsors than Ocean Rodeo instead of making the usual video with all the logos at the beginning.
There are few similarities but each of the video try and show the product and some kiteboarding action straps and bindings.
I'll be working on a longer Los Roques video this week and also the next Ocean Rodeo promo Rise kite video.
All videos ate available in HD on YouTube:
Jeremie Tronet sponsor video series - Ocean Rodeo session II harness:
I also worked on my YouTube video channel where I will be uploading all of my videos, so you can subscribe to receive the latest videos as soon as they are uploaded:
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