WELL DONE RHYS

Congratulations to Rhino team rider and super grom Rhys Poulton. He has just returned from competing for Wales at the European Junior Surfing Champiosnhips in Lacanau, France. He finished 9th in the under 18 category which is a solid result when you consider he was competing against the best surfers from France, Portugal and Spain. The result was despite him hitting a sand bank just days before the competiton and damaging his neck ligaments and then on the morning of the competiton he suffered a further head injury from his fins, which required stitches at the local hospital. This must have provided him with the determination he required, as he powered through to the quarter finals. The Gower based surfer commented that the two weeks training he managed to bag with GB Coach Lloyd Cole in Lacanau in preperation for the event was really beneficial. Well done Rhys and congratulations from the Rhino team

Update From Our Pro Kiteboarder, Dave Ibbertson

I have been out training hard right over the winter mostly in the North East with an exceptional run of Northerly winds and swell, the NE reefs have been firing hard and I have been missioning to find new reef and point breaks thats haven't been kitesurfed and some that that haven't been even surfed.
As the swell died off I hit Cape Verde for a week to get some training in for the upcoming season and comps and altho Ponta Preta wasn't firing at its best I still got some great conditions and hit up some lesser know spots on the Island in search of the swell.

I most recently returned from Cyprus which had looked like it was going to be good, but the weather didn't play ball for kitesurfing but the surf was good and had 4 days of solid 3/4 ft.

Over the next few months I am teaming up with North Kiteboarding and Supersaturated to do some filming and am heading out to Ireland for the KSP World tour and to road trip the NW filming and photoshooting for SS and for kitesurf/kiteworld magazine.

This year I have several comps upcoming with my targets firmly on the Wave Masters at the end of the year and also a trip to Indo or Fiji but my main focus is on kite surfing more of the remote and unheard/know breaks in the north East, Scotland and further afield. Its going to be a busy year.

Batty in Cali

Team Rider Ian Battrick with his boards in California

Rhino Team Rider Jem Evans In Mantawais

Jem Evans has managed to break up the monotony of one of the worst Summers
on record for waves, with a trip to the Mentawais in late July. "We sailed
from Padang into the biggest Indian Ocean swell to hit the islands this
Summer. I've spent a lot of time in Indonesia, but have never been to up to
the Mentawais, we were all pretty interested and nervous to see what would
greet us on our arrival! The first couple of days ended up being a great
warm up, with 4' to 6' waves in the Telescopes area; it's amazing how much
swell these breaks can handle.
We then headed south as the swell started to ease, surfing all the better
known spots like Lance's, Maccas, Green Bush and Thunders, but also scored
empty waves at some lesser known spots. Initialy I had prepared myself for
surfing relatively crowded waves, but, in the end, actually surfed on our
own most of the time- a particular highlight was surfing Maccaronis, the
funnest left on the planet, on my own for an hour.
It was un-nerving seeing first hand the devastation caused by last year's
Tsunami. Whole islands, and most of the exposed points have had the jungle
wiped clean from them. John McGroder, the owner of our charter, helped with
the aid and clean-up process last year and had some pretty horrific stories
to tell of what happened. All charter boats now usually cruise to a safe
anchorage back behind a few islands every night, to reduce the risk of being
hit by a Tsunami, quite a sobering prospect.
The trip was an excellent opportunity to test some new SX models from JP
Surfboards, these boards go really well in any conditions, especially more
pokey reefs and points; with bigger fins I still managed to ride my 5'9" and
5'11" most of the time, your main problem over here is slowing down!
It's always amazing to surf new spots and the Mentawais is well documented
as having plenty of these, it's the kind of place where you can never spend
enough time, it also makes you realise how much you can learn at any stage
of your surfing life. Can't wait to go back......"

Ian Battrick shots Indonesia

Ian has been jetting arround the world with photographer and wavelength editor Tim Nunn. This is some of shots we got back.

Rhino blog is born!

Thats right peeps, Rhino now has a blog to keep you all up to date with whats going on in our world.