I can almost hear the screaming already, but having talked to a number of people about putting on competitions, especially in light of the recent liability watershed, it appears that it is potentially costly, not to mention a huge pain in the arse, to put on kiteboarding competitions. So, I have done a bit of research here in Christchurch about how people put on events without getting prosecuted and having their major organs repossessed.

Basically, the council can do all the ugly stuff for you, and pay for it too.Obviously this comes with its own problems - dealing with a bureaucracy of any sort is a nightmare plain and simple. But, if we wanted to have to 2005 nationals in Christchurch, we have to make a case that meets a number of criteria (most of which we do already) and it solves some of the real showstopping problems. Essentially, the council gets their 'event managment' team to organise the whole thing. The downside is an inevitable loss of a degree of autonomy. The upside is that autonomy starts to look overrated when sitting in jail after some dickhead ignored the safety instructions. And, obviously, it would allow us to have a really big flash profile raising event (read: more sausages)

I think I can make a case that get around the problems we have, like a lack of an overarching national governing body, the fact that kiteboarding has not been around since the dawn of time (although my suspicion is that Moses was on a wave tray) and get us a look in.

Before I do this though, I want some feedback - esp from Shaan, but also everyone else, about this idea. Is this even worth considering? Do you want the council involved in anything that doesn't involve walkshorts and roman sandals? Can people handle the prospect of another nationals in christchurch? Anyone feeling territorial?

I have ages to think about and plan for this.... the date for applications os June next year, but I will need to put together something spectacular before then, so keep that in mind and type away!

You know, this lack of over-arching National body thing keeps popping up all the time, and now that we aren't teamed up with the pole-boarders anymore it seems to me that we ought to do something about it.

If we want a National Body then why don't we just make one. Here seems as good a place as any to start

SO....

I hereby call for nominations for presidents, secretaties and treasurers for the New Zealand Kiteboarding Association for the following areas:

Auckland
Bay of Plenty
Taranaki?
Hawkes Bay
Wellington
Nelson\golden Bay\Marlborough
Canterbury
Otago\Southland

From there we can sort out a National president and stuff.

Get the word out on the rest of the forums, maybe the Wind and Kite guys can spread the word too, and once there have been sufficient nominations and such maybe Shaan can run a pole for a month or so.

See guys, was that really so hard???

If you can convince the local bodies to front up and sort it all out and at the same time remove any and all legal issues .... go for it !!
As the plans for 2004 seam to have stalled re the afore mentioned "legal issues" - (alough i did hear from a little birdie it might have something to do with a bad joke between two friends getting a little out of hand and "legal issues" seamed to be a safe out at this point in time - PLEASE correct me if i am wrong - no doubt someone will!) - feel free to take over on this side of things too, as i have a gut feeling the odds on that event ever going ahead without intervention are about as high winning the power ball on Lotto!.

yes, regional councils can and do get involved in sorting out red tape for events. every council is different but when an event is in their interest, or appeals to a large community, they can apply their resources to making things happen and happen safely etc.

in my opinion, losing autonomy is neither here nor there if the objective is to stage an event. a regional council isn't going to try and tell kiteboarders how to kiteboard, or how a contest should work - their mandate is to provide a venue and make sure a contest doesn't negatively impact the environment, and other people's enjoyment of it.

no-one is against having contests in christchurch - they have always been successful at getting people out on the water and getting results. the locals are efficient at organising contests because there is a loose knit community that communicates with each other and shares responsibility for running events.

kinawera: your lead time on this project seems about right!

guest: no one has mentioned legal issues as a factor in the organisation of the proposed event - insurance maybe - but that can be easily overcome with or without council support.

your 'little birdie' seems to be even less informed than yourself.

as i've said, my other commitments have not allowed me to devote enough time to this project at this stage - this may well change. at least 20 volunteers have approached me and are keen to work with my team. preliminary discussions have been held with council etc.

manno: unsure where you'd like me to run my pole?

on a lighter note, after a superb NE sesh at orewa yesterday with 30+ other maniacs, a small posse of slingslaves; gavin, mike (nana's new squeeze) and myself had an adventure today experiencing the delights of port waikato's river mouth in a NW.

we 4x4'd up from sunset beach (about 2 klicks) to the river mouth which has west coast waves on either side and plenty of silky water behind sandbars with boost-assisting current etc.

the river mouth (approx 500m wide) is very exposed to NW and we scored some sensational riding on the outgoing tide. including the beach drive, the spot is just over an hour from auckland and well worth the trip.

besides exhaustion, our only grievances were relations with a few fishkillers who claimed we scared their fish away and hadn't gav apologised and set up a defensive perimeter around his truck, would have done some violence to our possessions (while mike and i ripped around downwind, blissfully unaware of the drama).

i would wager we are the first trio to kite this site - has anyone else had a crack at it?

Having organised a few events with council involvement - unless you have relatives on the board you will not have a shit show.

kiteboarding is too low profile - seen as too high risk and in the same way the guy with the pen in his top pocket and nice roman sandals won't sign off on the deck that might fall over and cost him his job and possibly a term in the nick (as all council workers are now liable for their approval - cave creek changed a lot of govt. workings.)

As for insurance - you might get someone to cover damage to property but no one will cover personal liability.

best option is keep it low key, cross your fingers no one gets hurt or if they do they don't sue you - if you wanna do it totally by the book - talk to the guys at redbull and see how many loops they had to jump through.

There is good reason why they were held up north and only local access was by boat

Worst option is some half arsed effort to have a local/national event that the local council gets wind of because of a poorly presented proposal and they put it in the hazardous basket from that point on.

Once again there is a clear need for a national organisation - that removes the competition wannabes before they do damage -both in competitions and also general communications

For example - there a death or an injury at the local beach and a kiteboarder is involved- no national body representative at the council hearing - and some noddy - like some the simpletons who write in this forum rock up and gob off - the result is obvious
Some local body councils are just looking for a reason to close some beaches to kiteboarders.

The need for a national body is important for competitions but there are far bigger issues at stake

earth calling jack...come in jack...please respond and return to your spacecraft.

what events have you organised with council involvement? anonymous wowsers with weak arguments bleating about things they know nothing about in the park 03?

as for insurance, you certainly don't have a grasp on what is available. there are very comprehensive insurance plans that are used every week in this country for sports far more dangerous and 'low profile' than ours. there are whole firms of brokers who specialise in insuring every concievable aspect of sports events.

thanks for your contradictory advice: "best option is to keep it low key, cross your fingers" - then, worst option is to keep it low key, cross your fingers (paraphrased).

then a remarkable bit of self analysis: "some noddy" (that's you bud) a simpleton who rocks up and gobs off - with obvious results.

why don't you do something instead of advertising your lack of wit on the internet? if you see the clear need for a national organisation, then get involved with the others who are trying to do something about it - maybe they will also be able to find jobs for your relatives. unfortunately, you might have to drop the jack tag and reveal your sad identity, before you can get voted onto the 'no more soggy biscuits at meetings subcommittee'.

jack for president i say! hell, even the self styled 'greatest nation on earth' gets by with a complete cretin at the helm - maybe the nzka can too?

Perhaps I should have spelled it poll

Just a quick thing before I have to get back to work - haha.

No-one can contract out of negligence in NZ - this means that you can insure yourself for something, but no-one can 'sanction' an event beyond liability, not the council, a national body, or even god herself (personally, I think Ms Clark needs a smaller board, clearly suffering a bad case of overpower)

I'm pleased that the discussion about a national body has come up though - I suspect the kite community is now for a size that this could be aviable. I will endevour to find out what is entailed.

Shaan wrote:
"I would wager we are the first trio to kite this site - has anyone else had a crack at it?"

Probably the first trio. I was a lonesome figure when I had a sesh at the Waikato mouth in '98, flying a small C-quad, that still count? Sailed down from the road end in a cloudy rainy cranking NW. The river 'side bay' that fills at high tide looked good too.

yeah, good on'ya sailor. gavin and i have been in the river before at the town end but it was kind of tweaked out and too westerly - there is a huge flat bay that fills in at high tide like you say.

a couple of other times we've scored the main beach - mike holland was with us for one of them - good glassy waves that time but gav and mike were too lardy too get the best of it. until the other day, all the times have been westerly but NW is fully the go.

it would have been rad to see you out there on your C-quad back in the days before rock and roll!