Alef Arendsen

I recently got my road bike fixed up again and hope to be starting some serious exercise again from this weekend on. That is, when the wind is not going to be any good–so far it looks like it’s going to be only 5 or 6 knots, not even remotely enough for the 14sqm kite.

I came across Ben’s blog entry on his new road bike and one of the comments was just hilarious. It mentioned this blog with advice on what to do if you’re falling down from/with your bike in public. A few tips:

• Stay down. Make it look as though, while you certainly didn’t mean to wind up on the pavement, you’re kind of happy you did. Go into your bag, make a few phone calls, maybe eat something. Or else just fold your hands behind your head, relax, and gaze wistfully at the sky. People respect people who take life as it comes.
• Make it count. Once you realize you’re going down, maximize the shock value. Send the bike sliding for a few yards. If you can, take a few other riders with you. Then get up and finish your bike off like Pete Townshend laying waste to his guitar at the end of a concert. Maybe even take out a car windshield too. Clumbsiness is embarrassing–carnage is awesome.
• Jump right up and shout incredulously. “Holy crap! Did you see that?!?”
• Accost and blame a diminutive, non-English speaking tourist.
• Breakdance!

Dennis Hettema (of OP3 fame) was in town last week and I met with him, Mikky and some others in Den Haag. We had some serious catching up to do. I hadn’t seen Dennis since we did some eating, drinking and clubbing in Oslo back in 2005. Mikky and I don’t exactly see eachother every week either.

We met up in Cloose and had dinner in the place next door called Crystal, neither of which I knew (but then again, I hardly ever visit Den Haag).

Dennis is a sportive guy. He’s been competing in the Vasaloppet twice now I think and after having talked about that for a little while, Dennis mentioned he was going to (try to) compete in the Ironman 70.3 in Monaco. This race (a triathlon) is one of the ways of gaining access to the Hawaii (Kona) full Ironman in 2009.

Dennis told me I should join. Eager as always, I reacted positively and like the saying says: it was a done deal!

Fast forward 5 days: I just got back from another 5k run. My time has improved… a miserable 8 seconds… to a miserable 24 minutes and 57 seconds But then again, 9 months ago my 10k time was somewhere sub-50 minutes. I’m going to have to do some serious exercising thinking before I enter into this race…

I know endurance is something can improve with enough exercise. I also know endurance is something you have to maintain with exercise. I hate that! I just took up running again. I have not ran since the middle of June which is when I did 70km for two weeks in a row. That, combined with two Sunday afternoons playing tennis, screwed up my knees (which I know, is not surprising ).

I tried various times to start exercising again, but each and every time, my left knee starting hurting again. I didn’t try anymore since the beginning of October and that was more because I was constantly on the road and didn’t bring my running shoes with me all the time. I compensate a little with kite boarding (which, to my surprise, does not make my knees hurt at all).

Anyway, tonight I did a 5k run and that’s when it showed. About two-thirds of the way I was already completely exhausted. It’s good I didn’t bring my HRM, because I ignored everything and kept on running, trying to finish the 5k in under 25 minutes. I didn’t succeed: 25m05. Oh well, it wasn’t that bad. But it seems I have to start doing a lot of exercise again before I’m back to my 21 minute time (that’s outside, inside it was better).

–One hundred things to do before you’re 80: go out kite boarding in the cold waters of the Netherlands in December… check–

Kite boarding in the Netherlands is (not) fun. It depends on how you look at it. I came back from Mauritius just over four weeks ago and I had a great time there. Although most of the trip was work-related and I have had to work more than I had originally expected it still was a fabulous trip and I even got to do some decent kite boarding.

The environment in Mauritius is great for kite boarding. The whole island (or, all of the coastline except for the souther part) is surrounded by a big reef. Because of this, the waves do not crash directly onto the shore, but way out. This is great if you do kite boarding, as you can now choose what you want: (almost) flat water, or big waves. I like both (the flat water is great for speed and to learn some tricks), so it was a great experience.

One of the other reasons it’s great there is because of the temperature. The air temperature hasn’t drop below 20 degrees (centigrade that is) the whole period I was there and the water temperature is also at least 23 or 24 degrees. So, no need for a wetsuit at all.

As I said, I came back four weeks ago, and since then haven’t really had any time to get a good kite boarding session done as they say. I was in Belgium, Norway, Italy and Denmark after I came back from paradise, and the weekends I was at home, the winds were too strong. Last Saturday though, the predictions were great. Relatively constant winds, not too gusty and about 20 to 25 knots (see the ‘Wind m/s; measure in the table above and do it times 2 to get knots). Perfect for my 8sqm kite.

This time of year there are two big differences between Mauritius and the Netherlands, weather-related that is. I’m not counting all the other things such as the fact that on Mauritius there’s palm trees and not here…

The air temperature here is at least twice as low as on Mauritius. Last weekend, the temperature was 10 degrees (which is rather mild for this time of year). On Mauritius There the temperature is about 3 times as high (today it’s about 28 degrees centigrade).

That’s not the worst thing that can happen however. The other big difference is the water temperature. On Mauritius I think it must be about 24 or 25 degrees centigrade right now, which is why you don’t have to wear a wetsuit there. In the Netherlands however it various between 6.5 and 9.5 degrees right now! That’s also about three as little as on Mauritius. The images by the way have been taken from the site of the Dutch weather institute (here that is).

So, instead of just some board shorts and a lycra, after I arrived, I put on my 5/3 wetsuit, my hoody, shoes, gloves and went to rig up (look at the most charming picture ever to see what I looked like I look like some Ninja kiter). It was cold, but I hadn’t gotten into the water yet. The water actually was surprisingly pleasant. I could keep on going for about 2.5 hours and then it got dark. But I didn’t really feel cold at all. A friend of mine didn’t have any gloves, when he came out of the water, his fingers were literally blue.

When I got out of the water things became cold really quickly, so I was glad that after changing clothes, I could get into my warm car which a friend of mine had pre-heated a little bit for me This is definitely not the last time I’m going to do a little session this year (or at least this winter).

p.s. as you can see, it would be better to go kite boarding way out at sea, because the water is 3 or 4 degrees warmer there… Would be fun with all the waves and such…
p.s. By the way: ‘Vandaag’ in the table above was last Saturday (1st of December).

I’m fortunate enough to live in Holland. When you like kitebaording, Holland is a great place to be. There is lots of wind, we have a lot of coast line, but there are also a lot of lakes so you do not only get the surf, but also flat water. Simply great. There is one drawback though: the water is awfully cold. On an average basis, I think you can probably go out on the water without putting a wetsuit on maybe 10 days a year.

Today I had my first session (although it was a really short one, but I’ll tell you about that a little later) in kiteboarding paradise. Now you might say: hmm, that’s must be the Dominican Republic (Cabarete) or maybe Cumbuco. All wrong: I’m on Mauritius at the moment. I’m here to train a group of software engineers on Spring. We had to reschedule things a bit today which meant I could go back to my hotel a bit earlier in the afternoon, just enough to be able to get a small session I hoped.

When I arrived at my hotel, I asked around a bit. The wind was blowing a constant 25 knots, I heard! Wow, that’s probably the best wind I ever had. I think I also had some really good winds at IJmuiden, but the thing there is, the surf is really difficult to get through, and I’m not that good yet.

I took out my kite (8sqm Gaastra Jekyll, which seemed enough) and board and geared up on the beach. Somebody helped me launch but it seemed I had made a little mistake with my lines, so I had to redo them and then go off to the water. In the water (the bluest I’ve ever seen with coral reef shining through it at some places) I set off and seriously, that was just one of the best experiences ever. I’ve done my fair share of wave surfing, but honestly, this is just so much more fun! Not having to ware a spring suit or full body wet suit is just fabulous , let alone the combination with palm trees on the shore, a constant 25 knot wind, coral reef, big waves of over 6 meters out near the end of the lagoon, hardly any chop because of this lagoon effect and just a few kites out there. No some say Caberete is great, but seriously, it’s just great to be out there with only 10 or 20 people and a huge stretch of ocean / lagoon all for yourself.

Next week, I have 6 days of kite surfing ahead of me (originally I had planned one whole week, but I’ve schedule some more meeting with clients, while I’m here anyway).

More later… hopefully including some pictures…

By the way, the beach right out front (I’m looking at it while writing this) is Le Morne, if you’re a kiteboarder, you might know this. I’m not staying in the same hotel for the rest of my stay, because I’ve booked a different hotel for the second week. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing, with the amazing beaches out front here…

I just got back from a nice game of soccer. Of course we lost, but then again, we did have fun and the weather was great. It’s mid-October and I have been waiting for weeks for the winds to pick up, but so far, no luck. This means no kiteboarding for now. I have to leave tomorrow for Stockholm and won’t be home (or at least, not for longer than a day) for the next four or five weeks, so I guess I’ll have to get my shot of kiteboarding somewhere else… Oh by the way, of course when I’m gone, the winds always pick up…

I promised some pictures from my kite boarding session from last Sunday. Marc just zipped them up for me today, so I can finally put them online! As I told earlier, Sunday we had a really good session at Wijk aan Zee, which is a little North-West of Amsterdam.

The direction of the wind was perfect. With SSW it was almost completely sideshore (a little onshore even). The wind was about 25 knots (which is about 6 Beaufort I guess). This is good enough for my 8sqm Gaastra Jekyll. I was quite happy to be able to use my smaller kite, not only because it’s a lot more fun to fly, but also because the bigger one I have currently is out of order a little bit. In a little accident I had at Workum beach (Friesland) the weekend before, I lost my chicken loop. This is the part (see below) that you use to connect your kite (or the bar and its steering lines) to your harness so that you don’t loose your kite. Loosing it is a little stupid, because that normally shouldn’t happen. I guess I just pulled safety and unhooked my chicken loop or so. Anyway, I can’t use the Cabrinha until I have a new chicken loop, so that’s another reason I was really happy that it was blowing about 25 knots.

I had also never really been in such heavy surf. Especially near the end of the day there were waves of about 1.5 meter (I think they were even bigger, but hey, let’s not exaggerate huh). Getting out to more quiet waters was hard, but riding back in, towards the beach is great fun, overtaking the waves, putting the kite in the air and while depowering it a little bit, simply enjoying the power of the waves for a while.

I almost got to enjoy a very short session today but there was a heavy traffic jam in between me and the kite boarding spot I wanted to go, so that was a bit of a pity. I’m hoping for some good winds this weekend, but so far I guess I’m out of luck. The predictions so far are not so good–just about no wind at all on Saturday and about 10 to 13 knots on Sunday. When things get a little better, I might be able to do a small session on Sunday, but then I really have to have my 12sqm fixed and I have to leave for Denmark around 5′ish, so it won’t be a long one.

I’ll keep you up-to-date.

I couldn’t be any more perfect. I got back from London last Friday evening and had a few beers with a couple of friends of mine. I hadn’t seen them for quite a long time, because of my crazy schedule the last few weeks.

Today, I had a wedding anniversary of my grandparents yesterday (they have been married for 65 years now, what an achievement). Normally wedding anniversaries aren’t all that exciting, but this was actually pretty good, as I hadn’t seen most of my family for quite a while. So it was good catching up with them.

After getting back from that party (it was in the afternoon), I drove from Elburg to Amsterdam to go to the Tuschinski cinema to watch the Bourne Ultimatum, which was a great movie. The newspaper apparently had some raving reviews. I didn’t think it was that good, but all-in-all it was entertaining. I like watching movies in the theatre (I kind of have to do that anyway, because I don’t have a television anymore). It always has this great atmosphere, especially in a nice theatre such as the 85-year old Tuschinski in Amsterdam.

The weather forecast showed some excellent winds (up to 25 knots or 6bft, and good temperatures, around 20 degrees).

I first had a soccer match early in the morning, which we unfortunately lost (it was the first match of the season and we haven’t had a lot of practice since we started two or three weeks ago). I won’t be able to to join the soccer team all that much do, which is a pity. I’m going to be abroad a lot in the next few months and frequently have to fly on Sundays, which means: no soccer for me anymore.

After the game I went to Wijk aan Zee to meet with Lars, Pyke, Marc and several others. The wind was great and the waves were very big. It was only my second time out on the sea with lots of waves (I’ve ben out of the sea a lot already with my kite, but the places I went usually were bays that protected us from getting pounded).

I just love my 8sqm Jekyll (from Gaastra). I have two kites, the 8sqm and a 12sqm Cabrinha, but the Jekyll is so much more flexible and quick to steer, but yet very stable.

I should have some pictures soon by the way as Marc’s girlfriend took some. I’ll see if I can post them up here or so…

You might have noticed (from my Road Trip Europe post) that I took up kite surfing a couple of months ago. So far it’s been an excellent experience with nothing but fun. Some might argue that kite surfing is a dangerous sport and I guess it a more dangerous sport than say playing tennis, but then again, skiing isn’t that safe either, according to several statistics that are reported on sites found at Google when searching for accidents skiing statistics.

Anyway, that aside… I started kite surfing a couple of months ago and immediately bought a Cabrinha Switchblade model 2007 kite. It’s 12sqm and it’s a bow kite. Together with a Naish Haze board (133cm) I had a lot of fun. Recently I also bought a 8sqm Gaastra Jekyll 2008 kite and first used it last weekend at Brouwersdam. This is kite is simply awesome compared to the 12sqm. Its turning speed is magnificent. That same day I also flew a 9sqm Cabrinha Omega (2007), but flying the 8sqm Jekyll makes a world of a difference.

Anyway, a while ago when I was kiting at Muiderberg, straight after my sesh’, I discovered a small tear in my kite. I completely forgot about it and went on kiting the next day (glad it didn’t tear any further, you never know). While deflating, I asked the guy I was kiting with for a good address where I could have this kite repaired. He gave me the address of www.kitereparatie.nl in Laren, which is actually really close to where I live. I dropped by there tonight and the guy fixed my kite in 10 or 15 minutes or so.

I think this guy deserve a little extra attention, so here goes: if you ever need to repair a kite or change a 4-line setup to a 5-line setup, this guy is pretty good and offers excellent (and speedy) service.