WA Surf Kiteboarding & Foiling Blog

Welcome to 2014! Hot off the press, we've come up with what we believe to be a pretty sweet deal, and something that we are pretty confident to say we're the first and only ones offering this guarantee.

Always striving to give our loyal customers the best possible service we can, we are proud to introduce our brand new, 30 day guarantee on EVERY board we sell. That's kite twip tip, directional wave board or stand up paddle board.

The Guarantee

If you aren't absolutely frothing on your new board, you can bring it back to us within 30 days and swap it for ANY other model we have in stock, up to the same value.

The fine print:

This offer is limited to once per person, per board purchase.
Original board can be swapped for a new board of any model held in stock, up to the same dollar value. If the new board is of a higher dollar value, the difference must be paid between the original purchase price and the new board's original value.
The board must be in "reasonable" condition for it's age. That is, what we classify as normal wear and tear. If it's broken or has been damaged in any way, we reserve the right to say "no, sorry".

If you're not happy with that, then you're a very hard person to please!

I've now had a few sessions on the 2014 Airush Varial X and figure i've got my head around this kite well enough to let you know what I think.

So the kite is a 3 strut, 4 line "supported leading edge" C kite. It's marketed as the high performance kite in the Airush range that will do it all - surf, freeride and freestyle.

On first inspection, the kite's quality is right up there as you would expect. The SmartBar is clean and works; centre lines are covered in plastic so they won't wear through, above the bar depower is your webbing/toggles setup that works well - this is the only part of the bar i'd change to a pulley system but that's just personal preference. The safety is small, clean and simple and the bar ends are small with just enough size to wrap the lines up cleanly. The bar is comfy in the hands, perfect diameter and plenty of grip

In the air, the kite has absolutely no "dialling in" period. Everyone who we have had ride this kite has been able to jump on and be instantly in tune. I wouldn't say the bar pressure is heavy, but there's enough there to ensure that you know exactly where the kite is at all times.

The Varial X is quick. Turning is really direct for a bridled kite so you can throw it around the sky with confidence. The kite is also quite fast through the window.

This kite is great for freestyle. Unhooked it obviously doesn't give you as much slack as the Razor, for example, but you wouldn't expect it to. It has absolutely zero back stall while unhooked. I was wearing a pretty average harness that was making hooking back in a mission, but not once did I have to think about the kite stalling out while trying to hook back in. Plenty of pop and enough slack to land any trick under the sun.

Boosting the Varial X is great!! It still gives you that instant rip off the water similar to a full blown C kite but the hangtime is amazing for a hybrid-C style kite. It simply doesn't want to put you down.

I haven't used the kite in the waves yet, but it seems to drift well enough to keep most of us happy in the surf. It has plenty of depower in the bar throw, so wiping off power when dropping in to a wave won't be a problem.

Relaunch is a no brainer, the kite sits on it's wingtip waiting for you.

Low end power is pretty good. I was out today in a gusty 15-20; plenty of other riders were on 11 & 12's while I was happily on the 9m Varial X with a 2014 North Jaime 136 and at 76kg I was never under powered even in the lulls. On the other hand, we flew the 8m in 30+ knots and with the depower all the way on, the kite was manageable (and boosted to the moon!) so the wind range seems respectable for a C shaped kite.

I would highly recommend to put this kite on your list if you're looking for a kite to start unhooked tricks or general all round kiting with a c-kite feel without having to commit to a 5-line c-kite. We have a 9m available for demo, if you'd like to take it for a spin just get in contact with us :)

Drew

Here at WA Surf we're always wanting to stock what we truly believe to be the best kiteboarding products from around the world. We've now teamed up with the good folk at Airush to bring you yet another stellar line up of products.

We'll have heaps of demo gear available very soon. If there's anything you'd like to check out, come and see us!

A fresh set of eyes always brings new ideas and improvements.

We were both pretty stoked when in June, we were the proud new owners of WA Surf. It was a fairly long process but when the deal was finally done, we were pretty pumped to push WA Surf to the top of the list as far as kite schools, stores and locations go. No more having to pass ideas through our respective bosses, it was time to do the things we'd always dreamt of.

Most of you will have noticed the new website! We're hoping that the fresh new look and a whole lot more information will help you fly around our virtual world with ease. You'll also notice some pimping new products like GoPro, Pro-Tec , Pat Love and a bunch of others.

We've had hundreds, if not thousands of students pass through the WA Surf Kite School in the past few years. Our plans are to turn this school into the most professional, and student focused school in the country. To make life a little easier, students can now book their own lessons online! Stoked about that.

So far we've been to the beautiful Stradbroke Island, off Brisbane, for the North Kiteboarding, Fanatic SUP & ION accessories dealer meeting. So far, you can check out the new 2014 North Rebel & Trust Bar's.

On August 20th, North will release a new kite to their line up - we have been testing this kite pretty extensively and we must say; we're pretty impressed!

Come kite with us, and if you're in the neighbourhood, drop into the shop and say hi. 

Cheers

Andy & Drew