Olympic Games

Andy: While YOU may know pretty much everything there is to know about kiteboarding, the rest of the world doesn’t. That’s the beauty of kiting making its debut at this summer’s Olympic Games, because it has the potential to open up the sport to a huge global audience, most of whom might never even have seen a kiteboard in action, let alone tried it out for themselves.

With the Formula Kite equipment being used for the Paris 2024 Games, the riders will be foiling across the water at speeds up to 70km/h. Does this make kiting the fastest sport of the summer Olympics? Quite possibly yes, with the exception of a few gravity-assisted alternatives like downhill biking or high-board diving which could boast higher peak velocities. Certainly the kiting will be the fastest spectacle on water, and even when you’re a seasoned spectator of Formula Kite events, that sense of speed never gets old. I’ve been a full-time sailing journalist for the past 25 years and reported on or commentated at pretty much everything across the conventional sailboat racing scene, from the Olympics to the round-the-world races, to the grand prix events like the America’s Cup. The thing that consistently takes my breath away more than anything else is kitefoiling. The simplicity of the equipment… for a man or woman to hover half a meter above the surface and travel at speeds multiple times faster than the wind that’s powering them along… that beautiful simplicity is impressive in itself. But then the physical courage required to push, push, push as hard or even harder than your rivals just a few meters away from you, it’s awe-inspiring.

I’ve been intimately involved in the kitefoil racing scene since the end of 2021, not long after the world was re-emerging from the COVID pandemic. I can still vividly remember standing on the beach in Fuerteventura as British rider Connor Bainbridge launched his 21m kite into the air. Even now, standing on a busy beach, surrounded by athletes getting their kites, bodies and minds ready for the battle to come, it really gets the blood pumping. And it’s not just me. Whenever I’ve been at international regattas with all 10 Olympic disciplines represented – from simple Laser dinghies to foiling catamarans like the Nacra 17 – the one discipline that really draws the crowds is the kitefoiling. You don’t need to understand the sport to be wowed by what you’re seeing.

Especially when the wind is strong and/or gusty, and blowing offshore, there’s a strong scent of adrenalin in the air. There’s inherent risk in the rigging and launching process, and things can go wrong very quickly. I’ve witnessed some pretty nasty accidents when a kite suddenly gets out of control. Injuries on the beach and on the water are commonplace, which is pretty horrible. If there’s a silver lining, speaking selfishly, the injury count has always meant I’ve had some highly-qualified experts sitting alongside me in the live commentary booth while they’re sidelined from action and going through the rehabilitation process. My first ever co-commentator at that 2021 Kitefoil World Series event in Fuerteventura was the reigning Formula Kite World Champion of that year, France’s Théo de Ramecourt. Others who have been out injured but been able to join me for the commentary have included Lorenzo Boschetti who came close to qualifying the Olympic spot for Italy, and the aforementioned Connor Bainbridge who will be representing Great Britain at the Games.

Of all the different parts of the wind-powered sporting world that I’ve covered, the kitefoiling is up in my top three, possibly my absolute favorite. Part of my love for the sport comes from the speed, the thrill, the danger. The other part is the sense of community and camaraderie in this special group of young athletes. When I first met this traveling band of kitefoil racers, it was immediately clear how tight-knit and friendly they are. I was expecting them to be a bit cliquey, but they’re not. The kitefoilers are very welcoming to anyone who shows an interest in their passion, even for someone like me who’s at least twice and in some cases more than three times their age. This is a young bunch of athletes, the majority in their late teens or early twenties, where a veteran like German’s Flo Gruber, only recently turned 30, is looked upon as one of the grand daddies of the fleet. This bunch have a really good time training, racing, traveling, eating, drinking and sometimes sleeping with each other. It’s an addictive lifestyle that had them hooked long before the lure of an Olympic medal came along.

As a breed the kiters are not as intense as some of the other Olympic fleets, who can be more serious and more po-faced about what they do. The newer beach sports like kiting and the windsurfers on their foiling iQFOiL boards work hard but also seem to play harder too. As the prospect of Paris 2024 and the Olympic Regatta in Marseille drew ever closer, however, I did wonder if that sense of fun and camaraderie would survive. In most respects the sense of fun is still there, but with a harder edge to it. In October 2022 on the final day of the European Championships in Nafpaktos, Greece, we witnessed a significant moment, a real turning point that would bring a new level of seriousness to the competition. It arose from a fierce battle between France’s Poema Newland and Spain’s Gisela Pulido to determine which of these riders would earn a place in the four-rider final. Following a touch of kites on the start line, Pulido protested Newland for what up until then was considered a minor transgression of the rules. Everyone in the fleet accepted that you let a ‘touch of kites’ go, a live-and-let-live attitude that had everyone rubbing along quite nicely.

But not on that day, not for Pulido. “When we are on the beach we are all friends,” she told me afterwards, fixing me with an unwavering and slightly intimidating stare. “But when you are on the water, in the race, if you can you swim out with a knife in your teeth and you cut their lines, you do it!” She meant this metaphorically, I hasten to add. But it was clear that Pulido had no hesitation in doing whatever she could do to win within the written rules of the game. Newland, her emotions never far below the surface, took a long time to forgive Pulido, who took a lot of heat on social media for playing such a hard game. But it’s inevitable that things were going to move this way, especially when you consider that there’s only one place per nation up for grabs at the Games, as well as the battle for funding from national sports federations. It’s a dog-eat-dog world.

The one-spot-per-nation has been especially hard on the French who have displayed enormous strength in depth. At this year’s European Championships in March, in Mar Menor, Spain, three French women dominated the podium with Jessie Kampman taking bronze, Newland silver, and gold to Lauriane Nolot. As winner of most major events over the past two seasons, including back-to-back world titles, the tall and ever-smiling Nolot has rightly been chosen to represent France on home waters. She goes to Marseille as hot favorite for gold, but if Newland and Kampman had been able to line up alongside Nolot, they could well have blocked out the whole Olympic podium. As it stands, however, Nolot’s strongest threat for gold comes from Great Britain’s ever consistent Ellie Aldridge. Having converted from a conventional sailing background six years ago via the RYA’s highly successful Kite4Gold talent-spotting scheme, Aldridge has turned herself into a regular podium finisher at nearly every major event.

What has become clearer and clearer over the past few seasons is that higher body weight translates to higher speed. One of Nolot’s biggest weapons comes from her straight line speed, capable of traveling higher and faster upwind compared with her rivals. She’s tall and has a body type that is capable of gaining weight, whereas try as the slight Briton might, Aldridge just cannot gain extra body mass despite every effort to stuff herself with calories and put on extra muscle in the gym. It has been a similar body weight challenge for Daniela Moroz of the USA. Up until two seasons ago, Moroz was the standout favorite for winning gold at Paris 2024. Having won six world championships and every event on the international circuit for an unbroken five year period, the rest of the world was working hard to close the gap on the determined American.

Despite still being only 23 years old, Moroz is one of the pioneers of the sport, getting into kiting and kitefoiling in the very early days out on San Francisco Bay with the likes of Johnny Heineken, who has since moved on to wingfoiling. Her raw speed and natural feel, along with a fierce work ethic, carried Moroz a long way for a long time. But even if she’s representing one of the wealthiest nations in the world, minority Olympic sports are poorly supported by US Sailing compared with many of the European nations like France and Great Britain, or even China, Australia or New Zealand. Nolot and Aldridge have become as good as they are because they’ve had to fight their way up to the top of some very strong national squads, while Moroz has had to pretty much do it on her own. Nevertheless, Moroz’s experience should stand her in good stead and she remains a strong prospect for the Olympic podium.

There are plenty of others who could threaten for the women’s podium including Australia’s Breiana Whitehead, Poland’s Julia Damasiewicz or Pulido from Spain. But the one that the leading lights are fearing the most, a recently emerged dark horse, is Switzerland’s Elena Lengwiler. From barely being able to execute a consistent gybe at the start of 2023, the Swiss rider has made huge progress in the past year and a half, finishing fourth at this year’s Europeans and sixth at the Worlds. She’s the heaviest rider in the field and even Nolot fears Lengwiler’s

straight line speed. The reality of Marseille and all the madness of the Games, however, is that it will take more of an all-rounder than a pure speed demon to get to the Olympic podium.

In the men, it’s hard to look past Singapore’s Maximilian Maeder. At just 17 years old he looks set to become the youngest ever winner of an Olympic gold medal in a sailing event. Mature beyond his years, Maeder is meticulous about his preparation and is leaving nothing to chance. There are few riders in the men’s field who believe that Maeder is beatable. Like Nolot in the women’s fleet, the teenager from Asia has won almost every major event over the past two seasons of the men’s circuit. If there’s one rider that looks capable of rattling Maeder it’s Vodisek from Slovenia, a mercurial performer who is capable of being either unstoppable or way off the pace. If you’re familiar with your Formula One history, there’s something of the nerdy Niki Lauda versus the playboy James Hunt about Maeder v Vodisek. If the fun-seeking Vodisek can get his head in the right space for Marseille, he could well threaten the more studious Maeder for gold. Not to be discounted is France’s Axel Mazella who emerged as the best of a very strong national squad and brings the confidence of having won the Olympic Test Regatta in Marseille exactly a year before the Games. Others to watch include Germany’s Jannis Maus, Italy’s Riccardo Pianosi, Brazil’s Bruno Lobo and Valentin Bontus, the Austrian who has made a remarkable conversion from class clown to serious player in the past year.

Coverage of the Olympic Games can be over controlling and doesn’t always allow the media to really show you how the athletes are, what makes them tick. There are some really interesting characters and personalities in the kiteboarding fleet, and I hope we’re given the chance to see them for who they really are. What we are guaranteed to see, though, are some high-speed thrills and spills in what could provide one of the defining images of the 2024 Olympics…

Lauriane: I’m not going to lie, I’m starting to feel the pressure of the Olympics, but I’m also really excited for the Games to start and am feeling focused. I have been working with a mental coach for three or four years and I will treat the Olympics like any other event and just give my best on the water and enjoy it. The training has been going well and I’m happy with everything we’ve achieved so far. I’ve been training at a center in Hyères, southern France, run by Ariane Imbert, the coach for the French team. My brother and father got into kiting before me and encouraged me to take lessons, then we all took up foiling so we could still go kiting even when the wind was light. We would go foiling in Hyères and I ended up doing race training at Ariane’s center and really enjoyed it, so that’s how my race career started.

I tend to do six or seven events a year – there are the Formula Kite World Championships and European Championships, the KiteFoil World Series, as well as other regattas and national events in France. It’s been great getting to know the other competitors at all these events. I love how there is such a good vibe between us. We’re all aware it’s a dangerous sport so we all look out for each other. It has become more serious than it used to be but I think that’s a good thing; we are all growing as the sport progresses and we are professional athletes so have to behave as such. At the Olympics I will need to watch out for Daniela, Elena and Ellie who is a rocket on the water! Doing all these events can be tough as it can involve a lot of traveling. Luckily for me, this year quite a few events were in France and Spain. With the Olympic excitement ramping up a level, I think I’m lucky to live in France as I have been able to escape and go home for rest days.

Whatever happens at the Olympics I will carry on competing afterwards. First I will take some time off to spend with my friends and family, and to reflect on the work I’ve done for the past three or four years. But then I will do some World Series events and other competitions at the end of the year to test new gear. I ride for Levitaz and Flysurfer and we have already been working on gear for the next Olympic cycle. My relationship with Levitaz started three years ago when I attended a World Series event in Austria where they are based. They invited me to join as, at the time, their only female rider was Daniela. We all clicked and I loved their gear. They’ve done an amazing job with the development of the R6, a new foil for the next Olympic cycle which I think is going to be the best foil, so I’m excited to continue the story with them. I only joined Flysurfer last year. Before that I wasn’t with any brand as I preferred to choose whichever I felt were the best kites. In the end I felt Flysurfer’s were the best so was using just them, and when they saw I was getting good results they invited me to join them. I was really excited about this and have since been involved in testing the VMG3 for the next Olympic cycle. I’m sure this kite is going to be freaking fast and the weapon of choice!