The PKRA 2008 World Tour in Matanzas, Chile wraps up a second successful day amidst the gloomy wind and wave forecast for the week ahead. The sky was cloudy to overcast in the morning but turned to a bright, sunny afternoon during the freestyle elimination rounds. Since the wind forecast for the coming days is not looking good, the organizers are keeping up the momentum to finish the games as fast as possible while keeping the excitement level to extreme.

The wind in the morning was mostly light, averaging only 8 knots. The mandatory skippers meeting started at 10:00 am followed by the drawing for the single elimination ladder. Since the wind was still building momentum, race director Eric Troostheide decided to delay the start until conditions were at PKRA standards.

Finally around 11:30 am, the wind was acceptable enough to start the men’s heats but since the wind on the inside was still lighter, most of the competitors headed out on their 8 to 9-meter kites. By the time the second round of the men’s elimination started, most of the riders had switched down to their smaller kites.

The wind stayed strong for the rest of the event, wrapping up another extreme kiteboarding day at 4:00 pm with a small awarding ceremony on the beach for the single elimination winners.

Day 2 Highlights

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The PKRA 2008 World Tour is about to close another successful year with the last Tour stop happening in Matanzas, Chile but not without a grand finale. The 10th and last leg of the World Tour is currently being held in the remote but magnificent Playa de Matanzas, a small village on the western coast of Chile. This far-flung community is a famous surfing and kiteboarding spot because of its big waves and strong winds. It will be the home of 24 extreme kiteboard freestylers from 17 different nationalities for 8 challenging days and will be joined in by another 24 wave riders who will be competing for the 2008 PKRA Wave World Championship.

The Freestyle competition dubbed Movistar Kiteboard World Cup 2008 is the culmination of this year’s Tour which will run until the 11th of October. A win here by Kevin Langeree would tie him to current Tour leader Aaron Hadlow for the World Championship crown so this last Tour stop will be an interesting event to follow.

Day 1 Highlights

Today’s events started at 11:00 am. Clear, bright skies dominated the first day while the air was cold at 15° Celsius but felt much colder because of the 17-20 knots side shore wind that blew particularly during the afternoon. The waves ranged from 2 to 3 meters with only the larger set of waves bringing in the 3-meter heights.

Kicking off the competition were the wave riders who ran the entire day’s event. The competition ladder for the wave riding is a dingle format where the first round winners will automatically advance to the third round while the 2nd and 3rd place finishers of the first round would compete in a second round elimination. The winner from the second round will then advance to the third round and compete with the 1st place winners of the first round. From there, the competition went man on man and the winner advanced to the next round while the loser will be out of the game.

In the first round elimination, Fernando Paraud (Best, PER), Sky Solbach (North, USA), Kevin Langeree (Naish, NED), Eduardo Carrad (No Stress, BRA), Jeremy Eloy (North, FRA), Guilly Brandao (Mormaii, BRA), Roberto Nascimiento (Best, BRA), and Etienne Lhote (Fone, FRA) all defeated their respective competitors and advanced to the third round. This same batch of winners also emerged victorious in the third round with the exception of Lhote who lost to Dreu Beavis (North, AUS).

In round number four, Paraud defeated Solbach while Langeree defeated Carrad in the 17th heat runs. Eloy lost to Brandao and Beavis was defeated by Nascimiento in the 18th heats.

Race Director Eric Troostheide decided to have a 10-minute break immediately following the semi-finals before running the finals.

It was a Langeree-Brandao fight in the finals while Paraud met Beavis for the third podium spot. Although the wave competition was completed, the results will not be released until Saturday for the awarding ceremony. The judging criteria’s were basically a point system with the best two waves during a heat which counted to their overall score. The competitor with the best wave selection and ability to ride it would score the highest.

All the heats of the day ran for about 12 minutes with a 2-minute transition time. The final two heats were 15-minute heats to allow the competitors extra time to show the judges and crowd why they were the best.

The day wrapped up at around 6:00 pm with dying winds and waves while tomorrow’s skippers meeting is set for 10:00 am with a first possible start half an hour later. If there is enough wind and waves, there might be another dingle round for the waves before the competition will switch over to the freestyle.

[Source: PKRA]

Wrap Up video of the 9th tour stop in Brazil, PKRA 2008. Evandro Da Silva climbed up the ladder to the second place and Tomas Texeira took the 5th place.
Aaron Hadlow wins the event and gets closer to his 5th world title.
On the women side, Bruna Kajiya won the event over Gisela Pulido still leading the title for the year.

[Source: ExtremeElements.tv]

Day 5 - 28/9/2008

[Source: Morlima]

Day 3 - 26/9/2008

Day 4 - 27/9/2008

[Source: Morlima]

Day 1 - 24/9/2008

Day 2 - 25/9/2008

[Source: Morlima]

It’s the final day of Kite-XTreme Brasil 2008, the second to the last stop of the PKRA 2008 World Tour and then it’s off to Chile on October 4. A typical Brazilian day - bright, sunny weather and strong winds provided for a perfect setting for the Big Air/Best Trick competition. The sun was in full force, literally heating up the event site to a 36° Celsius but the side-onshore wind which averaged between 16 and 18 knots provided a slight cooling effect.

The crowd at the beach was delighted to see the top PKRA athletes perform once again for a spectacular event of extreme kiteboarding competition for the Big Air/Best Trick contest, where the kiteboarder performs a jump and then be placed according to best trick. The performance is judged according to height (80%) and technical difficulty (20%) so it was all about going big.

Most of the competitors rigged their 9-meter kites and performed extremely well with the strong winds and moderate waves setting up perfect conditions to boost some amazing aerial tricks giving the locals a great show. With a rising tide, building wind and kickers, the riders went bigger and bigger towards the final.

The whole event started at 12:30 pm with 4 rounds for the men and 3 rounds for the women. There were four people on the water at a time with the top two finishers advancing into the next round. The day concluded at 3:00 pm which was followed immediately by an awards ceremony on the beach.

Big Air / Best Trick Results

Women:
1st – Gisela Pulido (Slingshot, ESP) with a high handle pass front mobe
2nd – Bruna Kajiya (Best, BRA) with a high handle pass
3rd – Susi Mai with (Cabrinha, GER) a big board off
4th – Carol Homsi (BRA) with a handle pass

Men:
1st – Ariel Corniel (EH, DOM) with a huge sent double handle pass and front spin
2nd – Kevin Langeree (Naish, NED) with a huge double handle pass
3rd – Evandro Da Silva (Naish, BRA) with a big sent double handle pass and front spin
4th – Sebastien Garat with a high double handle pass

Freestyle Overall Results

Men:
1st - Aaron Hadlow (Flexifoil, GBR)
2nd - Evandro Da Silva (Naish, BRA)
3rd - Kevin Langeree (Naish, NED)

Women:
1st - Bruna Kajiya (Best, BRA)
2nd - Gisela Pulido (Slingshot, ESP)
3rd - Joanna Litwin (Nobile, POL)

The 2008 Kite-Xtreme Brasil 2008 was organized by the GEST Group thru the able leadership of General Director Erich Steffen and event coordinator Eduardo Piloni. The event was sponsored by the Brazil Ministry of Tourism, the Local Government of Piaui, Brazil, Piemtur, Banco do Nordeste, Nova Schin, Radio Lideranca, Planet Kiteboarding and Aimbere Eco Resort.

Kite-Xtreme Brasil 2008 is on its third day, continuing with the double eliminations after an action-packed second day that saw Aaron Hadlow winning his first freestyle single trophy in Brazil. The double elimination event promises to be yet an even more exciting competition to see whether Kevin Langeree could keep up his bid for the world championship title and beat Hadlow in the finals.

Yet another impressive day greeted the crowd at Parnaiba today, with clear blue skies, warm weather with light winds in the morning. The mandatory skippers meeting went right on schedule. Although the competitors were ready to go at the scheduled starting time, the wind was too light to start an event so the heats were postponed from the planned 12:00 noon start until 12:30 pm. The first heat was started only to cancel it since the wind was very inconsistent and fluctuated in intensity. Finally at around 1:10 pm, the first heat of the double elimination got underway after the wind finally gained strength and stabilized at approximately 17 to 20 knots. The men rigged their 10 to 12 meter kites while the women were on their 7 to 9 meters.

A total of four rounds for the men and one round for the women were completed during the day which wrapped up at 5:00 pm.

Day 3 Highlights

The first round of the men’s double had two elimination heats. The first heat was between Andy Yates (Slingshot, AUS) and Eli Zarka (F-One, ISR) whose first run was cancelled due to a lack of wind. The second time around, there was enough wind to go so the day continued on. Yates landed a regular and switch slim, 313 5, blind judge, front mobe, kgb, mobe 5 and late pass mobe, defeating Zarka with an advantage on variation and technical difficulty. The Israeli rider landed a front mobe, slim, blind judge 3 and 313. Victor Adamo (Naish, BRA) defeated Bobo Corniel (EH, DOM) in the other heat to advance to the next round.

In round two, Alberto Rondina (Cabrinha, ITA) managed to out-style Tom Court (North, GBR) in a solid showing of kiteboarding talent, landing several regular and switch moves. Court also landed some nice moves but lacked the switch tricks.

Evandro Da Silva (Naish, BRA) took out Yates in heat #23 with four regular and switch moves and a double back mobe 5, winning with a higher technical difficulty level and trick variation. The next heat saw a very tight battle between two Brazilian riders. Silvio Villarim (Kiteloose) defeated Tour regular Reno Romeu (North) with a regular and switch variation of front mobe/back to blind air pass/mobe, a blind judge with air pass, and slim. Romeu landed a kgb, blind judge with aerial handle pass, front mobe, regular and switch slim, kiteloop handle pass, late pass mobe, mobe and 313. Villarim won with a 3-2 decision for switch variation and power.

The third round started with another super tight match up between the Cabrinha riders, Alberto Rondina (ITA) and Petr Tyuskevich (RUS). Rondina landed more powered moves and switch variations (kgb, slim, kiteloop handle pass, blind judge with aerial handle pass, 313) against Tyuskevich’s (slim, front mobe, back to blind air pass) and got the edge over the line for a decisive 5-0 win.

Alvaro Onieva (Best, ESP) also had his share of a tight battle going up against Tom Hebert (Airush, New Caledonia) in heat #27. The two style masters went against each other trick after trick but Onieva got the upper hand in the end with a little more technical riding for the double pass moves to win via a 4-1 score. Onieva landed a regular and switch kgb/front mobe, slim, mobe to wrapped, kiteloop non-inverted slim, indy grab, blind judge with air pass, and a front side 5 off one of the small kickers rolling in. Hebert landed a regular and switch indy grab kgb/mobe, slim, kiteloop slim and hasselhoff.

The Dominican destroyer, Ariel Corniel (EH) took down Rondina in heat #28 with high flying moves and two double passes for a 4-1 win. Rondina performed extremely well with regular and switch variations of blind judge/313/non-inverted slim/kiteloop handle pass/kiteloop slim/mobe, a shifty 5, s-bend to blind and kgb. Corniel landed a mobe, slim, 313, mobe to wrapped, kiteloop non-inverted slim, blind judge with aerial handle pass, kgb, front mobe, backside 360, double s-bend to blind, s-bend to blind air pass, front mobe to blind and kiteloop backside.

On the women’s side, local rider Carol Homsi defeated Audrey Meyer (EH, FRA) in the first heat of the ladies event with a 3-2 score. Homsi landed a single handle pass against Meyer’s raley to surface pass, kiteloop frontloop and back to surface pass.

Susi Mai (Cabrinha, GER) defeated Laura Fernandez with a raley to blind, raley to wrapped, front to blind and kiteloop winning with a higher technical difficulty score.

Tomorrow’s skipper meeting is set at the same time at 11:30 am with first possible start at 12:00 pm.

[Source: PKRA]

Presentation video of the 2008 PKRA in Piaui, Brazil, Praia do Coqueiro by Susi Mai.
This event was held between the 23rd to the 28th of September.
Reno Romeu presents the local riders that attended to the competition.

[Source: extremeElements]