The Myth that Kitesurfing requires too much strength!
There is a huge misconception generally held by women interested in learning kitesurfing that you need to be very strong to practice or to learn kitesurfing. This is often cited as a reason for not ever taking those first steps to discover kitesurfing and in my opinion is one of the main reasons that the number of women partaking in the sport is so low. The number is currently increasing at a steady rate but not nearly as fast as it should be
given that the simple truth is this is a lie!
Many women look at people kitesurfing and think that you need huge amounts of upper body
strength to hold down the full power of the kite. If that were true I’d now have arms like an orangutan, fortunately for me, I don’t. Because you are attached to the kite by way of a harness strapped around your waist all of the pull of the kite is delivered through your core…great for toning up those abs! (but again not requiring a 6 pack to handle). This means that the whole weight of your body is counterbalancing the pull of the kite and by simply leaning back you can control this power flowing from the kite. This reduces the pressure on the bar to practically zero..meaning you can fly the kite with one finger of each hand..easily.
Compared to a sport like windsurfing the level of fitness and body strength required to learn how to get out on the water and ride, is a lot less. Of course once you’re up and riding you can control exactly how much effort you put and it can become an extremely physical sport…if you want it to be. On the flip side I have seen 70 year olds cruising up and down all day with no problems. So if you’ve always fancied getting into kitesurfing but always thought it looked a little too physical then now I’ve given you the perfect excuse to start. The sport needs a great many more female ambassadors.
So go on give it a go, you’ll be surprised how easy it is to learn kitesurfing and how quickly you progress once you have!