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The Friday Lowdown – 13th March 2020

What’s The Best Cross Training For Kitesurfers?

When I first started training people to get fit for kitesurfing, I was all about slow movements and big weights.

It took me a few years to realise that to train for a sport as nuanced as kitesurfing isn’t just a case of going and throwing weights around in a gym or smashing out a few classes of Crossfit.

To efficiently train we must do it at the speed of the sport we are training for, using optimal weight for that sport.

At about the time I realised this I also discovered resistance bands. Portable, much less likely to cause injury, able to be utilised in any direction (not just against gravity) and providing equal resistance throughout the entire range of motion of the exercise (meaning you get MUCH more bang for your buck).

They also allow us to train with the speed and explosiveness we need for kitesurfing and you don’t need to be stuffed in a gym to use them, they’re also cheap as chips! ?

All this makes resistance bands THE perfect tool for training kitesurfers when they’re OFF the water.

And they’ve quickly become my #1 favourite tool for getting people into shape to kitesurf quickly.

I’ve put together an entire kitesurf specific, resistance band workout for you here in this video so you can get fit for kitesurfing with our resistance band workout and exercises. Designed by kitesurfers for kitesurfers.

Here’s a round up of everything you might have missed this week, including the resistance band workout:


How To Learn To Kitesurf 3 x Faster

One of the questions I get asked all the time by people just starting their journey into kitesurfing is, “What’s the fastest way to learn to kitesurf?”

In this second part of a series of videos I start to answer this question giving you some great tips for how to get up and riding in less time with less frustration.

Click here to watch the video.


The Quest To Become A Kick Ass Kitesurfer – #3

Following my quest to become a kick ass kiter…

Genetic testing has opened up whole new worlds to those of us in pursuit of optimal human performance (or just those who want to be better kiters!). For the first time ever we can understand our underlying genetic predispositions and design our nutrition, our exercise, our lifestyle around them and thus radically upgrade our performance nearly over night…

In this video, using me and my results as an example, I show you how I’m going to be using it over the next year to massively improve my kitesurfing and how you can too.

Click here to watch the video.


Kitesurf Specific Resistance Band Workout

No gym or expensive equipment required and build specifically for kitesurfers.

This one’s a doozy!

Click here to watch the video.


Have a great windy weekend!

Sam.

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P.S. Whenever you’re ready… here’s a few ways I can help you improve your kitesurfing:

1. FREE Kitesurf Specific 4 Week Workout?
Most people don’t realise it but the way they are currently working out is probably ruining their kitesurfing. Workout for kiting the right way – Click Here

2. Ride Upwind in 30 Days
Knock weeks (if not months) off your time learning to ride upwind and save hundreds on your lesson costs — Click Here

3. MASSIVELY Improve Your Kiting When You’re OFF The Water
Get our kitesurfing case study “How to Kitesurf More Often, Stay Out Longer, Progress Faster & Have More Energy On The Water”Click Here

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The Quest To Become The Best Kitesurfer

I’ve been kitesurfing and teaching kitesurfing now for 15 years and have a confession…

I’m not actually that good a kitesurfer.

As I’ve been teaching all the time, I’ve always been working when there was wind and after 9 hours at the beach teaching the last thing you feel like doing is going kiting, so I have never really progressed to the level I wanted…a source of constant shame for me!

So a couple of things have changed this year and I have a bit more time so I have decided at the age of 38 to spend a year really seeing just how good a kiter I can become, with the eventual goal being to hit up some of the biggest, baddest waves on the planet.

So where am I now?

As I make this video this haven’t been on the water for 8 months and am probably in the worst shape of my life.

I’ll be making a few videos detailing the backstory to this for those of you interested in the juicy details, but in a nut shell over the last few years I’ve faced quite a few health and lifestyle challenges, that have led to this current predicament.

As a kiter I’m ok, I can do basic freestyle stuff and can hold my own in small waves but for someone who has lived in Tarifa for 12 years…I’m AWFUL.

Now those who have been following me for a while will note I actually tried this before…but got interrupted by bad health…again more on this in the backstory.

So the plan is to create a diary journaling all the different things I do both on and off the water over the next year and to be your kitesurf case study.

The idea being to give you a toolbox of things that work which you can use to master this awesome sport.

For the full low down check out this video:


Join Me On The Journey

Click here to join me on the journey on our Facebook group


Week 1

Day 1 – 18th April 2018

Day 2 – 19th April 2018

Fully broken this day after an amazing session yesterday…couldn’t even lift my arm to record the video!

Day 3 – 20th April 2018

Day 4 – 21st April 2018

Day 5 – 22nd April 2018

Day 6 – 23rd April 2018

Day 7 – 24th April 2018

Day 8 – 25th April 2018

Today no wind, so sprint training. Felt AWESOME after the ice bath!

Day 9 – 26th April 2018

Recovery day, no wind. Though did sneak in a cheeky game of paddle at the end of the day!

Day 10 – 27th April 2018

Really feeling it today. Sleep was awful and body not recovering well. Had a “Cold bath” at Playa Chica which is about as cold as my ice baths at this time of year and then spent a lazy afternoon basking in the sun on the beach in an attempt to let my body recover.

Day 11 – 28th April 2018

Another awful night’s sleep, which when you consider this is crucial for recovery learning and so many other things, including feeling great, has to be something I fix. As a result there’s no way I can exercise today so another rest day it is…despite being a great Poniente day!

Day 12 – 29th April 2018

Back to the drawing board!

Day 13 – 30th April 2018

Spent the day planning and preparing myself for the new approach. Feeling a bit sorry for myself as I took a walk in the afternoon and saw all the kites up…being a bank holiday there’s literally hundreds of people on the water! Tried to share the stoke by continuing my GF’s lessons so at least I could be involved…and she managed to get up and riding for the first time! Which made up for it all and made me more motivated to crack this and get back at it!

Day 14 – 1st May 2018

Day 15 – 2nd May 2018

Day 16 – 3rd May 2018

Day 17 – 4th May 2018

Day 18 – 5th May 2018

Day 19 – 6th May 2018

Join me on the journey

Click here to join me on the journey on our Facebook group