kipstar

Rob and James rip....seriously rip; there are some great steep runs on Rose, and when I had the chance to ride with these guys, they tore up all of them. The amazing thing is James rides in these old trashed boots with the back spring mechanism ground off; or at least he used to. No ankle support at all, and he rides...like that!

Well someone not from the Commonwealth guessing cricket is pretty good :-) FIrst up, have to understand that Pakistan and India have massive political disputes already; and both are pretty much only good at one sport - cricket. Cricket is like a religion for these people. For most others, it can be a bit like watching grass grow. I played it, and I think it sucks! But anyway, for Americans and others who don't understand it, here is a slight sidetrack on how the game is played. 2 versions are played, a one dayer (which each team gets 50 'overs' each of which is 6 throws of the ball or whenever 10 of their players (total of 11 of them) are bowled out (the equivalent of striking out) whichever comes first), or a test, which lasts 5 days and each team gets 2 innings (whenever all 10 players are bowled out) to get more runs than the other team. At any one time, the batting team has 2 players on the field, one who is standing at the equivalent of first base, and the other at home plate. Each batter has 3 sticks behind him, called whickets (or stumps), and on the 3 sticks rest two small sticks horizontally, called bails. The aim of the bowler is to try to hit the sticks by fooling the batsman; similar I guess to a strike out. The other aim is to make the batter hit the ball into the air and get caught on the full. The last way is to hit the batter's leg when it is in a direct line before the stumps which is also out and called a LBW or leg before wicket. There is a final way that a friend at highschool would employ; if you can get the batter to knock over his own stumps, he is also out; my friend used to fast bowl (which is around similar speed to a baseball fast pitch) directly into the batter's head or body, and cause him to fall onto the stumps, once concussed. This is totally legal, but not used that often for some reason. The aim of the batter is to either hit the ball all the way out of the ground - a homer in baseball on the full in cricket is worth 6 points/runs, bounced out is worth 4 points/runs, and anything else, the batter must run and swap ends with the second batter. They can do this as many times as they want, but they must be within about 2m of the stumps at their end they are running to when the ball is thrown back; otherwise the fielding team can 'run out' the batsman in the same way as baseball. Each end to end run is worth 1 point/run. There are a few minor other ways to make points, but they are to do with fouls, bad bowling and so on. Now it starts to get a bit more complex, so let's start with the one day game. Coin toss, and a team can elect to either bat or field first; decision is made on the basis of ground conditions/wind/light; there can be a major advantage in being first (or second) e.g. if the ground is rock hard in the morning, then the team might elect to field, as they will be able to hurl super fast bowls (which you would call pitches) to the batter. If the ground is hard enough, they might bowl very very close to the batsman, and reverse spin the ball so it will jump up into the batsmen's face area. They bowl exactly like baseball, fool, scare and so on to drive the batsman bonkers. It is also perfectly acceptable to sledge or verbally berate the bowler. Typically, there are several bowlers in the fielding team out of all 11 players, a few specialist batsmen, and a few allrounders plus the whicket keeper who is similar to the guy at homeplate. They will start with fast bowlers, and immediately try to start tearing up one side of the ball, which must last 50 overs (300 balls) at the most. This is so the ball gets lopsided. As the ball gets more and more damaged, they can bend the ball more in the air, and so the slower spin bowlers start bowling at about ball number 150 onwards. Each bowler bowls 6 balls one after another. At the end of each 6 balls, the next bowler starts and bowls from the opposite end. Then the first bowler can bowl the next 6 after that and so on. The batting team will put their best batsmen up first, and their dregs last, hopeing to get as many runs as possible without their players getting out. The fielding team will try to limit the number of runs and or try to get the batting team out. AFter the batting team have done 50 overs or get bowled out, which takes maybe 3 hours max, then the teams switch after lunch and continue. Like baseball, it is partly physical and a lot strategy; knowing oponents, unsettling them and sledging them (verbally abusing them) into submission. Typically a team might get something like 250 runs, and then the other team comes in, and must score 251 or more to win. As soon as they do, that's it. For the other type of game, the test, it goes on for 5 days. Both teams must have completed both innings (all out twice) for there to be a result, so many teams will just stand around and avoid getting out, and thus force a draw. The team with the most points wins. A team with a very big score can choose to forfeit their remaining players playing (called declaring) and hope to try to bowl the other team out, a team might do this if they had say 600 runs over the first 2 days, and decide that the ground is hardening a lot, and that they can bowl the other team out twice in a row. Weather is a major factor. Most of the games played on TV are not tests, they are one dayers, because in a few hours like baseball there is a result. Tests take days and days, and usually end in a draw. There are some more complex factors than this, but this is a good start point. Confused? Good :-) So am I! Home team has a major advantage, preparing the grass where the ball is bowled to favour their team; Indians and Pakistanis are really good batters and spin bowlers; West Indies and Australia are really good fast bowlers; England are really useless usually (as is the case with most sport) and NZ is right there with them.

OK, answer was a local firm who could ship it for $4k USD including insurance; every other firm was $17k USD or more for the exact same thing. Definitely pays to ask around! Outsider: You do not need a barge, it can be loaded onto a flat top cradle and put on top of the shipment of a container ship. I would be very interested to know what they are buying, is it a TP52? They should do the Kings Cup regatta in Dec if so... PM me if you want @:-)

Well i am ethnically 1/2 Chinese, so I guess I can try to answer. I don't think for most snowboarders, they buy because something is made somewhere; they buy based on a price vs. quality trade off. Being Chinese or not makes no difference; although my guess is that perhaps some immigrants might be less likely to buy into the whole 'we got to buy local' vibe. Ironically K2 (which is the number two player in snowboard market through their multiple brands) used to play the 'it is the American ski, and you should support us' line; they make most of their stuff in China, and really pushed that style of production. Most of the Euro manufacturers have been doing the same thing going to Slovenia and Poland and stuff AFAIK for a while since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Places like Cobra down the road here in Thailand are making much of the soft binding type pieces here already. I'd say that almost anything that can be mass produced and is not high on the innovation and development front, and America is going to be not so competitive. Windsurfers, surfboards, sailing boats, the high end custom stuff can be made locally but anything mass produced (and a lot of it can be) will end up in Asia/Mexico/South America. I think people like Bomber, Coiler, anyone at the high end of the value/innovation curve will be more competitive than ever. For the mass producers, well best to try to keep your hand in and outsource the manufacturing to Asia, but keep owning like K2. For the ones who just are outsourcing to a factory, China is going to acquire/steal their IP and do it themselves; IP protection means little/nothing in Asia. The innovation in China and Asia is in figuring out ways to set up factories, logistics, that sort of thing. Not much innovation in design and features. Yet. For alpine boards, at the moment, China will have a problem of getting the quality wood to use for the core. It will also tend to focus on the low hanging fruit first, which means mass production of burton and stuff; bear in mind it is Burton and K2 that are pushing into China to make their stuff. Also, China could be one of the world;s biggest ski markets, there are 200+ ski resorts there most of which opened in the last 5 years. If you don't see the rate of development here in Asia, then it is hard to believe. And China is on steroids. My guess is China has its own decent quality skis and snowboards that reach top 3 by sales volume within the next 20 years. Look at Korea and Samsung.

Whatever, you are probably some phat phuk anyway, eating healthily now probably won't stop that inevitable heartattack from greasy burgers and chips.

both come from Latin right? That everyone speaks one language is great. But I think it is really worth it to be able to speak other languages as well; there are concepts in other languages, and items of relatively more/less importance that are only clear if you speak the other language... So if everyone speaks two or more languages, then everyone has more outlooks and insights on everyone else. Plus, most importantly, girliez dem like da foreign ackent yo. Dat y when I be kickin it Wezt CoaZt style at Mammoth I b talkin like a unedukate like dis yo. Dem girlz like it. but when I am in Compton don't you know, I assume an upper east side intellectual and talk all hi so and so on. And when I be kicking it in Thailand, I talk English. And when I am everywhere else I talk in Thai. But hold on....I am still single!?! hmmmm....something is wrong here......

I recently bought a high performance sport boat in NZ, it is like a sailing dinghy with a keel, 22ft long and weighs (without the keel) about 90kg. I need to get this up to Thailand, and wondering if there are any shipping indsutry experts out there with advice on how to do this? So far, it looks like my best options are: - ship in a 40 foot container at the same time as something else (it weighs almost nothing, but takes up some space) - try to find someone bringing a boat up here by container and stick it on the top as a dinghy SHipping it on its own is crazy expensive, more than the cost of the boat itself... Anyone?

kiting blah blah blah..... Not really my thing, and I prefer the windsurfing vibe; if I kited here in Thailand, I could sail maybe 1/4 the number of days I do now.... and the launch sites are mostly full of trees so the kiters always need help.... I like just getting my gear and going; takes about 3 min to downhaul, carry and go; and same amount of time to pack up; kiting is a bit more. That said... these new blade kites look cool; I heard they will make all the previous kites obsolete and should mean kiting can hit 50 knots really soon. Would be fun in the snow though... like the idea of riding my snowboard :-)

For windsurfers, try windski.com Much better than kiting :-) Sorta.

Yes, good point. I had heard the modern forms of karate have lots of sparring and stuff.... It is just whenever I hear about standing around outside in hot water, or doing physically onerous tasks as training, then I understand that Muay Thai has none of that (other than running for about 2km a day in the morning to warm up). Oh, it does have not drinking beer as training, that was the bit I could never do :-) I think since Naikanomdom beat all those Burmese to win Thailand's freedom like a few hundred years ago, all Thai soldiers have to learn Muay Thai, and in the provinces it is played as well; a bit like soccer. GOod fun :-)

Maciek All training is all good fun :-) But anyway, I think you cannot compare Karate, Kung Fu and so on with Muay Thai. Muay Thai is like boxing; it is a sport. The other ones are a philosophy, so you use your mind and thing. For Muay Thai, you just get used to controlling the pain because you do the same thing again and again, so gradually you don't really notice that it hurts; and also kicking the bag and pads or even sparring is not as painful as a real shin on shin fight. Don The Dragon Wilson fought one of my friends in Thailand (who now lives in NZ) - Fanta. Fanta used to fight as a lightweight and is like 5 ft 5; he administered a severe beating the bigger Wilson; actually he is a bit of a joker, and had to pretend to get hurt and stagger around just to keep the crowd entertained. I think Don Wilson had to apologise at the end. In pretty much all the karate and kung fu fights, the Muay Thai guys just can tear about the other sports. If you look at K1 which is like slow motion Muay Thai, most of the winners are muay Thai influenced. http://members.aol.com/thaiboxing2000/muay.html It all just comes down to training. You do things enough (and in EVERY session of knee sparring you get kneed in the groin pretty much) and it becomes second nature. No mind over matter, just practice :-)

I actually think all these $50 boards are one of the reasons for the market dying so bad. Because the 2nd hand glut of burtons and oxygens were dumped on the market starting in the early 2000,.... this has made the price of the gear unrealistically low to the point that you can get high performance alpine gear for less than cruddy free ride junk. Good to get a few more people into the sport, but it has wiped out a large chunk of the infrastructure with board makers, retailers and so on unable to carry product because they keep getting undercut by all the old model boards dumped on the market. My proof is in the board collection I have at home, which is the biggest it has been and I think the most i paid for a brand new board was $200. Bindings never went through quite the same problem, because there weren't any really good binding companies in trouble like that. And so you see some decent range of bindings now. I've looked at the numbers of boads people have and the jobs; we have the money to be paying more, but we have been spoiled with this dumped gear which has done our sport few favours. I for one will be happier when the price of the gear settles after the dumped gear runs out, so that the board makers and retailers and so on can actually make at least something from the gears. EXCEPT that I will have my own secret way of getting cheap gear....and then selling it to all of you at the 'market price'. :-) I think everyone is happy when the market price is high, so long as they don't have to pay it.

Very funny :-) OK, I guess that means time for the world biggest paragraph :-)))) The MMA is like no holds barred is that right? I think they would have the same problems that most of the non grapplers have; while Muay Thai has some element of grappling in the knee clinch, a good on the ground grappler can take them down and after that they have no experience to do anything. The modern generation of Thai Muay Thai boxers also tend to have much better hands than before; punching is still considered a lower scoring blow, but since becoming a gold medal contender in the olympics, a few fighters end up doing both. The technique to protect for elbows tends to open yourself up for punches though; my hands are quite a bit better than the Thai guys I trained with BUT that is only until elbows are allowed, at which time my technique leaves me open to elbows, which are the most lethal part of mauy Thai. For knees, that is a strong point of Muay Thai, BUT against a grappler on the ground that is useless. So I'd say MT has torn apart most of the other striking martial arts in ring conditions like MT; I think wingchun would be one of the few that would be as useful as MT on the street but for sure kungfu and the older styles of karate can't handle the kicks and knees and are too sweeping and slow. They used to fight these styles here in Thailand in the 70s, and the crowds stopped going because everytime the MT fighters would win against the champions of these other styles (bear in mind it was in MT ring conditions). On the street MT is more practical than a grapple, because on the ground you don't know who else is aruond to kick you or something iMHO. BUt in the UFC type conditions, grappling one on one MT has no chance to win I think. The odds of a knockout from MT are not any better than boxing before the grappler has you like Neo in the matrix :-) OK...one paragraph :-))))) 3 days?!!! wTf are yuo doing down there?????!! Stop listening to drum and bass and get riding!!

Well Mr 1708; I am trying to catch up to you in another way... you post short and sweet but many times. I post a few times, but bore the pant off people when I post because I write an essay each time :-) Anyway, I am still angry at you; you been doing mammoth sessions while I am stuck here slaving away in 30 degree heat (celcius yo!). I be well jealous!!

Muay Thai guys do not cruise around kicking wooden ladders like in the movies, that is just hollywood crap! For muay Thai, you kick with your shin, and you block kicks with your shin. But the shin block pretty much hurts a lot at the beginning, and then gradually you lose the feeling of it hurting a lot...it isn't mind over matter or anything, it is just repitition and eventually you get used to blocking that kick of your guy in the gym with your shin. I can assure you that the hardest kickers in Muay Thai are for the most part Thai, and they all employ the exact same blocking techniques ; you block a low - mid kick with your shin, and you block a higher kick with your arm; there are a few variations of catching and sliding to the side, but pretty much that is how the sport works. You block, then to win the point you try to beat the guy's leg back on the same side and land a kick to him. For many westerners they lose fights here because they get kicked in the same spot in their thigh 3-4 times, and they can't continue. The first batch of Chinese kung fu guys were exactly the same; I think the first 1970s battles not one of them lasted beyond a minute when they first came up against Muay Thai at Lumpini. But with training, you get used to blocking, and also your thighs toughen up; however if you don't know how to block then for sure you can break your leg, I think the guy Dennis Alexio something or rather had his leg broken in a first round fight - he was the guy in the movie kickboxer that played the brother in the wheel chair (a truly rubbish film). I think whatever art you learned is maybe different to Muay Thai; but re-read what I wrote; I am not talking about pain overcoming everything, but if you are wearing a cup, the pain of a direct hit to the groin is bearable, paticularly if there is a Ali style slide to the side or back to remove a little of the force. AFAIK kick boxing in USA is more like a karate/kung fu. Muay Thai is practised in a water down form for K1, and also in a no-elbows format around the world, and now increasingly in the full on muay Thai form. Dutch, Australians, NZers and some Europeans are ready good in the heavier weights. and a few Dutch very good in the lighter weights too. Roy Jones Jnr won in one of his great fights with a sprained wrist; he just used his other hand the whole fight. Muay Thai for the most part is a sport just like boxing; it doesn't have any philosphy like Kung Fu, Karate etc - but anyway you get used to overcoming some elements of pain (like the shin on shin impacts) just by doing the same thign again and again in sparring. Unlike most martial arts, most muay Thai training is either guy with bag, guy with pad man - therefore it is all done at full force. The only time we go easy in training is in sparring, and even then we go fairly hard on certain days; we use shin guards and headgear and big 16 ounce gloves mostly, and the sparring days are the 'days off' where training is for speed and not power. But with pad man and on bag, everything is pretty much full power. For training kicks, one of the drills is at the beginning of every round with a pad man to throw 25 kicks rapid fire with each leg THEN start combinations after that. So after doing like hundreds of kicks every training session, it becomes second nature to just throw kicks and combinations.

I actually have a set of those exact bindings.... I've snapped/cracked several boards, but never broken the plastic bits of the binding; I have broken a couple of the wire bit of the bail, but never the plastic bit. The bindings actually have a better thought out toe clip than most other bindings, because the toe clip clips on the wire of the binding and locks. It doesn't rely on the leverage against the boot (which IMHO is a poor design idea) like the snowpros and the older TDs and cateks. So you don't get that release on jumps and compression (which i used to get with other bindings). That said, I now have some fancier bindings in USA waiting for me, but my plastic fantastics have done me proud for about 200 days without breakage of the plastic bits themselves. ;-) Old oxygens I think they are, or could be fristchis; same same.

I think the reason is a company called Monsanto, who are pushing all this GE food; they always claim that they are going to feed the world's poor, but note that they never seem to be investigating anything that would do that; rather they spend their time on rich people's crops like wheat and corn and stuff to increase yields. I know NZ has already got significant cross fertilisation problems now. My worry is that these guys will do things like patenting the DNA of some crop that breeds ultra fast, then go and infect some area (e.g. Thailand) and then claim IP and royalties on the crops.... It is in Monsanto's interest to keep feeding you guys their stuff, so why would they want you to know about it? Oh ho... conspiracy theory :-)

OK, so this last weekend I went windsurfing, and the guy who is a major player in windsurfing, and is telling me that the whole kiting industry is going to change to blade kites, with a lot less curve in them, and a lot more efficiency. As way of example, he said recently in Australia, they were doing a short course speed test 150m, and the top kiter and windsurfer were equal at 47 knots. The world record on water is windsurfer at about 49 knots. So... have you guys switched to blade kites yet, and are they much more efficient like this guy say?

Over here in Thailand, most of the road pick ups (and Thailand is the world's second biggest market for pickups after you guys) are diesel, so the King of Thailand has been pushing bio diesel. I think they use palm oil and coconut oil. He actually invented some process to do it with coconut I think. Here, they also have stuff called gasahol, which is petrol also using bio degraded stuff at about 15% and 85% normal petrol. And we also have NGVs at the moment. Traffic here is pretty bad, so the smog and gases are chronic (and that is not Dr Dre ChRoNiC) Both better for the environment, although natural gas I think is better again. In fact if you wanted to really look after the environment, I suspect that a natural gas vehicle is probably the best and only requires the installation of the tank,but then what to do about filling it if there aren't filling stations? So.... how come the restaurants will give you the cooking fat to do this... because here most of the cooking fat gets collected and recycled into something or rather.... do you get that bit for free? I might have to teach the village to do this, as it would save some money, especially for diesel generation.....

what is the shock absorber that looks like a bottle of drink on the front? Is that standard, or is that what the racers use these days?

Yep; even I have been hit full force in the cup from a knee; you just suck it up (and also give up on having sex for a few days afterwards ;-( and pee blood for a while. I can recall on of Ray Sefus main training partners, a really classy ultra quick big guy who was a southpaw cruiser weight, Mike Angrove; that guy got a full on kick to the groin; the ref was willing to give him a no contest, and he just grimaced and proceeded to knock the other guy out a round later, then gave in to the pain.... A lot of it though is Ali style subtle movements which disapate some of the impact though; tiny movements just before impact. And Muay guys kick really hard but they are only up to 67.5kg (welters) and there is a huge difference between a welter's power and a heavy weight's power. I've seen a few Thai vs. farang fights where the Thai took an accidental full power knee to the groin, and immediately retailiated with a monster blow (hit, not, er, blow job, this is not Brokeback mountain after all) as punishment; then after the bell was rubbing and in pain, but managed to suck it up. Gotta be tough; the hits to the groin when knee sparring and fighting and pretty inevitable, and it may not get picked up by the ref.

thread a screwdriver head or something into the toe area, and gently with a hammer hit the foam enough times intil it packs down. you might want to put some tape on the hammer head so there are no burrs. It saves 15 days of packing out, the toe area is not critical anyway. Also...food beds should help too. BTW if you have step in bindings, then ski boots aren't going to help either. YOu need the step in heel.

this is one of a series of ads promoting real viagra, because there are quite a few clone drugs here too. In another one, the guy take a full on kick to the groin right at the beginning. And starts moaning to the ref; see if you can find that one, it is even better. The reason is that the word used for impotence is also the same word as a knock out/knock down in muay Thai. 'lom' Incidentally, just for anyone interested...most of the muay Thai guys be well tough. THey are wearing a cup, so a full on kick to the groin is no big deal, they don't stop. Ditto for a knee to the groin.

I agree about the sacrifice bit; mo' respect goes out to the olympic hopefuls, who dedicate 4 years to going, and don't even make it there due to not being selected, broken leg, etc etc. I am not sure there is any evidence that not having snowball fights etc would make American more competitive against Swiss or anyone else. I know Thai boxing team for instance has heaps of joking around and laughing and stuff, and with gold medals from last 3 summer olympics it seems to work for them. All blacks tried the all serious approach in rugby world cup last time round, and everyone disliked them, and they lost. Horses for courses. But anyway, if someone doesn't think Olympics is a big deal and is a sell out, they should be a man like Terje and stand up for what they believe in. And then they step aside and let someone who considers it a big deal (and there are lots) to compete instead. Seems pretty selfish to go all that way stopping someone else to go, then not care. Well, Thailand only has 1 athlete in the winter olympics ever, so maybe I can be the second one :-)

Same same in Korea; a lot of hardbooters as a total proportion of riders. I think it is at least partly because there is a decent racing circuit, so a lot of the riders are racers; at least that would explain their 'style' when they ride :-) I had heard that the snow in Japan is well suited to soft booting though, whereas Korea/NZ is gets pretty variable and hard, so hardbooting makes more sense. Good news! Did you like the Moss? My brother still has his 1990 Moss (or thereabouts) - super skinny, well ahead of its time....