Preface
As you advance your riding, you may be looking for a way to add in more style and technicality.
Look no further than grabbing your board, it is an easy way to step up your game!
Why grab your board?
Style
One of the main reasons to implement grabs into your tricks is to start building your own style. Using these grabs and holding them correctly will make your tricks look cleaner and more controlled.
Competition
While this will not be for everybody, there will be some who find this as valid advantage to implementing grabs into their tricks. In competitions, adding in grabs will boost your scores dramatically as well as add to your overall impression.
Creative Freedom
With so many different grabs and tricks that work together, you can combine these to expand your bag of moves infinitely! There is no limit to how many grabs or variations you can do in one trick so go for it, get creative! Kiteboarding is all about progression and having fun, grabs will only add to both of these.
Different types of grabs
Front Hand Grabs
- Melon: front hand, heelside edge, arm behind front leg and in-between feet
- Lien: front hand, heelside rail, front section
- Mute: front hand, heelside edge, between feet
- Seatbelt: front hand, tail of the board
- Slob: front hand, toeside rail, front section
- Nose: front hand, nose of the board
Back Hand Grabs
- Crail: back hand, toeside rail, front section
- Indy: back hand, toeside rail, between feet
- Nuclear: back hand, heelside rail, front section
- Roast Beef: back hand, heelside rail, arm in front of rear leg in-between legs
- Stalefish: back hand, heelside rail, arm behind rear leg and between feet
- Tail: back hand, tail of the board
- Tailfish: back hand, heelside rail, back section
- Tindy: back hand, toeside rail, back section
Reference this Complete List of Kiteboarding Grabs
How?
Prerequisites
Before attempting to grab your board, you will need to have mastered the jump and feel comfortable with your kite control as well as body control while in the air.
Stretch! In order to make that reach to grab your board slightly easier, routine stretching is a great habit to get into. This will especially help as you get into more technical grabs that require more reach.
Start with jumps
After mastering the jump, you will be able to implement these grabs easily. You should also try taking one of your hands off the bar whilst in the air to get the feel of keeping control of the kite in this situation.
First Grab - Tail
The easiest grab for most people is the tail grab. As you can see from the list above, the tail grab is using your back hand. This is often the best option to start with because your front hand will keep the kite moving you in the same direction and bring your kite down if you had sent it to 12 during the jump.
Step by step
- Approach the jump with medium to higher speed
- Don’t send the kite too much
- Pop hard, but keep your legs controlled
- Lift your board up to your torso as you go up
- Remove your preferred hand from the bar
- Let the bar out slightly to decrease your steering input.
- Spot the tail of your board, and grab it!
- As get close to landing, remove your hand from the board rail
- Bring both hands on the bar
- Gain control of kite
- Spot the landing
- Ride away!
Bring the board up, don't reach down. Reaching down to the board will throw off your balance in the air and it will be harder to stay controlled. That is why it’s advised to lift your feet up to a level where you can grab before reaching for the board.
Board grabs can be implemented into both loaded pop tricks and tricks where you send the kite to 12. With each of these, there are some things to consider. Using the kite to jump, you will have to keep an eye on the kite and keep control of redirecting the kite while you are grabbing the board. On the other hand, using a loaded pop, you are able to use the direction of the pop and your core and focus on the grab because your kite is stationary.
Key points to take to the beach
- Stay Positive
- Get Excited
- Don’t reach down, bring the board to you
- Keep hand close to middle of bar
- Start with the tail grab, then try some others
Hopefully one of these grabs or variations we reviewed will add some style and steeze to your riding! Keep us posted on your progress and feel free to reach out to ask questions!
Our Favorite Grab:
Nuke! (Nucelar)
We want to hear how your progression is going! Find us on social media and tag us, use #nextlevelwatersports to be featured!