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Pat is at King of the Great Lakes Test Fest with Ty from Slingshot. They're checking out the new V4 Slingwing for 2024. Pat: Ty, what's new this year? Has there been a bit of redesign? Ty: I love the Slingwing V3 and think it's an amazing wing, but for V4 we narrowed the profile down a little bit, which tightened up the canopy. The marketing term we use is "high tension high performance", and you feel it when you pump because there's so much more efficiency in this tight canopy. However, …

Aaron has caught up with Daniel Ware from Cabrinha at the King of the Great Lakes Test Fest to chat about some new harness offerings from Dakine. Aaron: Daniel, what have you got for us, buddy? What are we talking about? Daniel: I've got a new product from Dakine that we're really excited about. This is the all-new Connect bar. This is a brand new spreader bar system from Dakine for 2023. It's a fully modular system. The kite bar has a fully molded hook with no welds, so it's supe …

What's new in the Slingshot foil line for 2024? Pat's with Fred Hope at King of the Great Lakes Test Fest to find out! Pat: What do we got, Fred? Fred: We've got two new front wings and two new stabilizers for 2024. One of the front wings is the G 1007, which is our light wind high-performance front wing. It's 1,700 square cm, so if you're coming from the E Series and you want something that gets you out in light wind like we have today where you'd want a downwind SUP board with a …

Pat is at King of the Great Lakes with Fred Hope from Slingshot, checking out the new bars for 2024. Fred: Thanks for having me! This year we brought out a whole new bar, and we changed from the white lines to the new SK99 lines. They're a little thinner and a bit stronger. You can really notice it in the air because they have a lot less drag through the air and you don't have that wobbling from side to side feeling like you have with the square lines. These are perfectly round, so …

Pat is at King of the Great Lakes with Fred Hope from Slingshot. They're checking out the new 2024 Ghost V3. Fred: The Ghost is our one-strut kite for the new year. You tried it today, right? Pat: Yeah, I got out and had a nice foil session on it today. It's a pretty grunty kite, actually, with good sheet-and-go power. It's really quite fast-turning, and the relaunch on the thing was amazing. I was in really crappy, gusty offshore wind, and the kite just wouldn't stay on the water …

MACkite's Pat Taylor is at KoGL with Fred Hope of Slingshot, checking out the new 2024 Slingshot foiling lineup. Fred: We've got the brand new UFO for this year. This is my baby: the no-strut kite. It's the weirdest-looking kite on the beach because it just sits flat against the ground, but it's the best-looking kite in the air because of how different it looks when you're flying. There's no skeleton to the frame other than the leading edge, so it makes it really light and responsiv …

Tucker meets up with Billy from Manera and F-One at KoGL to chat about the new 9m Strike CWC. Wait... a 9m wing? Why not! Tucker: This is the behemoth, the big lady, of the range. Billy: Yes, we have here the 9m CWC. Tucker: 9 meters of goodness... that is a lot of wing! Billy: We've brought it to the right place to test the low end, and we've actually been quite successful here. Tucker: It's pretty sick. It doesn't look like a 9m. Billy: It definitely has the low en …

Cabrinha's Daniel Ware chats with Aaron from MACkite at King of the Great Lakes Test Fest. Together, they tackle the most common questions about the Fusion Foil System. Daniel: Thanks for having me, Aaron. Aaron: Yeah dude, welcome. It's always good to see you. Daniel: It's flat and straight offshore, but we had some fun winging yesterday and got some pumping around behind skis today. Aaron: You milked every little bit out of that. It's nice to be able to show people what i …

Pat is with Kevin Wade at King of the Great Lakes Test Fest, checking out the new 2024 GT1+ Wing from Eleveight. What does the "Plus" mean, and is it right for you? Kevin: We have the Plus Series now, including the RS+ kite and the Process and Master C+ twintips. We're building out a comprehensive upper echelon line to highlight which products have a little bit of extra special sauce and higher quality materials. If you're looking for the top of the top in terms of performance, the …

Pat from MACkite catches up with Kevin Wade at the King of the Great Lakes Test Fest to chat about the new 2024 V7 RS kite from Eleveight Kites. Kevin: It's so good to be here. It's always a good time. It almost looks like the Caribbean out there with the water color. It kind of tricks you into thinking it's tropical, but it's a little colder. It's great weather and I'm stoked to be here and tell you about the lineup. Pat: So you've got the new RS for this year- the V7, right? K …

Derek Sproul from Naish takes a few minutes to chat about the 2024 kiteboarding lineup with MACkite's Jake Mitchell at King of the Great Lakes Test Fest. What's new? Is there a must-have coming for your quiver?Jake: We're super stoked to have you all the way here in Michigan.Derek: The sun is shining and it's just so beautiful here in late September. There's nowhere I'd rather be. It's awesome.Jake: Amen to that. So you brought some new gear?PivotDerek: Yeah, we've got a bit of everythin …

Tucker from MACkite is with Billy of F-One and Manera at the 2023 King of the Great Lakes Test Fest checking out some hot new gear for foiling. What is it? Is it for you?F-One Rocket SUP Downwind Series FoilboardBilly: We have our new Rocket Downwind Series board, available in a few different constructions and different widths. We already have the CNC custom boards, handmade, vacuum-bagged, and full carbon. We also are going to offer a bamboo collection, coming soon.We've got three diffe …

MACkite Test Fest 2017 - Sunshine to beat the band, warm water, lots of beachgoers, and still no wind. On the other hand, with 2017 being the year that all of our brands decided to produce and bring out foils, the no-wind factor worked out darn near perfectly for us. With 3 watercraft on hand, we had loads of people up and shredding on the new foils. With the birth of almost 50 new foilers and plenty of additional experience for the veterans on the force, things are shaping up to be foil-friendl …

Save the Date: MACkite KoGL Test Fest - September 23-25, 2016 If you're not hospitalized, getting married, or dying, we'd best see you all at the beach for the annual King of the Great Lakes Test Fest. KoGL has been growing since its inception several years ago and shows no signs of slowing down. Hosted at the Grand Haven City Beach, the event will run the weekend of September 23-25. This year's event will see all of our kiteboarding brands represented at the beach, each with a quiver full o …