UPDATED WEEKELY OCEAN RODEO REFLECTS ON THE WEEK OF WORK, WHAT LIES AHEAD AND HOW TO CHANGE THE WORLD ONE RIDER AT A TIME.
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.
Stefaans Viljoen and Ocean Rodeo win Cabrinha Race series in San Francisco!! Congrats!!
Posted by Andrew Galbraith on October 15th 2009
Stefaans Viljoen takes the crown in the 2009 Cabrinha race series in San Francisco on the OR Rise, OR Session harness and OR Race Board.
After 11 nights of fierce completion it all came down to the last night.Series leaders Chip Wasson and Jeff Kafka were away on a kite trip in Fiji (hard to feel bad for them) and the penalty points they picked up put them out of the running for 1st.Going into the last race it was a tie between Stefaans and Geoff Headington (Ozone) and whoever won this last night took the season trophy.
With dying winds only one race was run and it was neck and neck between Stefaans and Geoff the whole race.After starting a bit behind Geoff and Mike Gebhardt (Ozone) Stefaans slowly clawed his way back to beat Geoff to the line.
The top 5 for the season were: Stefaans Viljoen (OR), Geoff Headington (Ozone), Chip Wasson (Ozone), Jeff Kafka (Cabrinha), and Eric Due (Cabrinha).
Stefaans was one of 6 riders in the top 15 to be riding both the Rise kites and the OR race board. In fact, he was the only rider in the top 5 to ride a production board. Other Ocean Rodeo riders finished: Chris Brown (8), Andrew Galbraith (10), Evan Stolze (11), Eric Geleynse (14), Allen Chung (15), and Erin Loscocco (20).
Thanks to Steve Gunn, Cabrinha, The St. Francis Yacht Club, Ozone Travel and Adventure Sports Miami for their sponsorship of the series.
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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:
Sorry, but the last two weeks I haven't been able to update the site with pictures or anything else, the Internet in Egypt wasn't the most reliable and I couldn't really update the site from there. I tried to keep you informed on twitter or facebook, so if you didn't already do it, join and follow me by clicking on the small logos on the menu bar of my site !
Egypt was a very nice trip, together with Linn I flew from nice (south of France) to Paris and then directly to Hurghada where we stayed in a hotel close to the Colona water sports, the kiteschool and main kitespot there:
The Colona water sports is a very nice kiteschool offering a full range of services for the kiters, with rescue service, lockers, a bar, etc at a super nice price for the time of your stay, and the staff is very nice and helpful. http://www.colonawatersports.com/
We went to Hurghada to film the next Rise kite Ocean rodeo video and shoot tonnes of nice pics of the 2010 gear.
The day we arrived the wind was already blowing strong, so I went out on my 8m diablo and had the chance to be kiting with dolphins jumping around for more than 30 minutes, they were showing of their own tricks (kind of Sbends) to remind me they are the locals there ! hehe, it was amazing, the red sea has a rich animal life and beautiful clear waters, perfect for a nice trip.
The Italian Ocean Rodeo dealer Jose and his girlfriend was staying in the same hotel as us, and with them we took some very cool kite pictures, I can't post them online yet, but I'm sure you will hear about those shots pretty soon.
The weather there is amazing, you get a clear blue sky and over 35 °C temperature all day long, the water is warm and the only thing you have to worry about is to drink enough water, what the local can't do during the Ramadan in which participating Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, etc ... from dawn until sunset.
The people there were very nice and Egypt is definitely one of the top kite destinations for anybody looking for good wind this time of the year. In fact most of the European kiters chose Egypt as one of the main kite destinations for their holidays because of it's proximity and good prices.
So Egypt was a success, with amazing pictures loaded in the hard drives, several video tapes to work on and edit, I 'll be staying here in France for 10 days before to fly back to Cumbuco in Brazil and spend 3 months training and shooting with Linn.
Right now, the wind seems to be good here in the South of France, and hopefully I'll be heading to Italy for a surf and SUP session tomorrow very early.
You can have a look at a small photo gallery from the trip here:
Davey has just returned from Binhai Weifang China where he was attending China's first ever international Kite Surfing competition. As usual it sounds like their Chinese host rolled out the red carpet for all the international competitors as they hosted 20 international and 40 chinese riders for 3 days of kite events. Davey was joined by Ocean Rodeo rider Karl Soulos of New Zealand.
A typhoon before the event had stirred up weather patterns but the wind did pick up just enough on day 1 for them to run a course race. With 40 kiters lined up for a water start, Davey blasted out of the blocks and placed 2nd overall. Karl was involved in a tangle at the start but still managed to place mid pack.
Day 2 and 3 unfortunately never saw the wind pick up enough but all and all the response from the Chinese fans was overwhelming.
Congrats to Davey and Karl!
Ocean Rodeo Team Rider Thomas Dehaene 9th Place KPWT.
Posted by KevinM on August 19th 2009
Congrats to Thomas who finished 9th in freestyle at the 2009 KPWT Dunkerque in France. Thomas has also made the cover of Swell magazine and features in a 6 page article.
Nice work Tomas!! Can't wait to see you on top the podium soon...only a matter of time really.
philippe alengrin on the new video of ben wilson…+ news of my next trip ...
