Now in their third revisions, both the Best Kahoona and Nemesis HP kites have gone through significant design and performance changes over the years. Best Kiteboarding’s designer, Peter Stiewe, answered our questions about these two new kites.

New for 2011, Epic is introducing the Renegade Infinity, its first light wind specific kite. The Infinity is in the same family as the rest of the Renegades, but it was designed a little differently and larger to take advantage of light wind options.

Have you ever been on a long downwinder and have something break? Ever been on a kite vacation where the nearest shop is hundreds of miles away? Sometimes gear breaks and you just don’t have the resources to fix it the right way. Here are a few quick fixes to get you back on the water, or at least to get you to where you need to go.

Ignorance may be bliss, but not at a heavily kited beach or reef break where everyone knows and expects a lot from each other. Wave etiquette is what maintains the peace and maximizes the fun for everyone. The rules of etiquette are rarely written and are usually implied but they most definitely exist, and failure to figure it out before you jump in can get you into some trouble.

You can find kiteboarders all over the world. It seems like virtually every ridable place has been conquered and written about either online or in print. Our signature is on every continent and in almost every country on the planet. We have kited exotic places like Alaska, Korea, Cambodia, New Caledonia, and even Antarctica, so it’s hard to imagine that a location with warm water, steady wind, pristine beaches, and long consistent waves with a mix of reef breaks and soft sandy bottom barrels has so far been home to only a single kiteboarder.

Sporting dreadlocks and a goatee, Amery Bernard blends in with the typical kiteboarders on the beach, but when he looks at a kite, he sees all the details the rest of us miss. Amery’s path to becoming Slingshot’s Kite Designer was not a typical one – if there even is such a thing in this industry.

Today, it seems like almost every kiteboarder out there owns a GoPro camera and an assortment of mounts, which has made it possible for anyone to capture interesting photos and video while they ride.

*TRAVEL: 2011 La Ventana Classic and KiteXpo *INTERVIEW: Slingshot Designer Amery Bernard *RUM CAY: The Best Kept Secret of the Bahamas

The first thing we noticed about the 2011 Ion is its heavy duty construction. Every possible area of the kite seems to be beefed up to take abuse and even the fabric that makes up the kite feels more sturdy than normal.

The Vision is a brand new kite from RRD and we were able to get our hands on the first Visions to land in North America at the 2011 La Ventana Classic. According to RRD, the Vision is supposed to fill the gap between the RRD Obsession (freestyle) and the Religion (waves).

We continue to be impressed with the attention to detail on products from Wainman HI. Boards come with all hardware, a board bag, and even a screwdriver to put everything together.

Our first impression when unrolling the Spitfire is that this kite is built to take a beating. It’s a five-strut one pump kite with a compact bridle. Both the front and rear bridles use one pulley per side, but Caution uses a unique molded block with no moving parts.

The F-One Bandit, the original Delta kite, is now in its fourth generation and it has undergone a major redesign for 2011. It is now a three-strut one pump kite with square wingtips.

For 2011, the largest change to the Slingshot RPM is the addition of Spitstrut, which means that the struts are now integrated into the canopy as opposed to being attached to the bottom of it.

The Evo is a five-strut one pump kite that shows North’s usual attention to details. This is a bridled four-line kite (it can also be flown as a five-line) with a very compact and simple bridle.