April 5th: Ewan Jaspan - Update from Dahkla/Hawaii

Great to hear from Kite Republic Team Rider Ewan Jaspan as he follows the PKRA World Tour around the world. Hope you enjoy hearing about his travels as much as we do!



Ewan and Alex Pastor, the current world #1


The 2013 PKRA world tour season was a dream start for me. I ended up coming 5th in what was the highest standard competition I have seen. The trials featured about 45 riders with only 16 making the main event.


Coming into the event after seeing how tough the trials were I was pretty nervous. You had to win your first heat out of 3 people to make the main event, otherwise it was a near impossible task as only 3 of the next 25 riders would make it. Luckily I had a great heat and won over Hugo Guias (Takoon, FRA) and a local Moroccan. This put me through and took a whole load of stress off my shoulders.


Next was the main event, I had a great run passing through Nico Suriel first (Liquid Force, DOM REP), and then soon after, my biggest win to date last years number 3 Alberto Rondina (Cabrinha, ITA). I also had a great heat against my mate Christophe Tack (Liquid Force, BEL) which put me into 4th position, where I lost to the event winner Alex Pastor (Airush, ESP).


Overall I couldn't have asked for a better start, and am stoked to do so as a Naish and Kite Republic ambassador! Travelling has been great, its only the start of the year, and I cant wait to see more and compete more, but its always great to come home and catch up with the local crew, already looking forwards to that! I hope to be able to push the new KR Grom Squad to new levels and share some experience, so we can get some top class riders coming out of Melbourne, hopefully a buddy to travel with out of Australia! When I was younger it really helped to have a mate (Lincoln Reeves) kiting with me and pushing my level, we gained experience together and I dont think I would have really started competing or getting to a competing level without our sessions.


Ewan with a big KGB in Dahkla

Now I find myself regularly riding among the worlds best such as Youri Zoon and Alex Pastor. Even just sitting on the beach and watching them throw down helps my riding to no end. The amount of power Youri rides with and the tech and style Alex has, always keeps me thinking of what to add to my next tricks and how to improve my heat. The best and almost only way to improve is to ride with riders who are better than you, otherwise your riding just becomes stale.


I think what helped me improve at Dakhla was the new judging format and how I trained towards it. This year you have 12 attempts and your 5 best tricks count, whereas last year was 12 and 7. This forces you to ride with more risk and shows quality over quantity. This meant you have to bring something different to the table to win. I decided to do this with toeside take off tricks. These scored well and are something different that you dont often see on the PKRA so the judges rated them highly. I would encourage any young rider to start learning these, they aren't as hard as they seem once you have your toeside edging down, and can be very handy in competition where it is too windy or not windy enough to go big, you can show more technicality.


Ewan flat 5 (we think)!


Now I am in Maui about to begin photoshooting the 2014 gear and the new boards we just released. I am riding the new DUB now, its a new board to the Naish lineup with a sick outline, graphic and bottom shape. It provides a nice medium/heavy rocker line which means it has nice smooth pop with soft landing and it rides through chop amazingly. When I am back in Melbourne I am looking forwards to getting out there and giving the club members a ride on it to see what all the fuss is about, I'm sure Chris will have some Demo's soon as well.


Anyway, its windy and I'm in Hawaii so I better be off, cant wait to get home and catch up with the crew, hope all is well and you get some of those winter northerlies cranking through soon!