QATAR AIRWAYS GKA KITE WORLD TOUR 2024
Lords of Tram GKA Big Air Kite World Cup France
30 March – 28 April, 2024
Spot: Barcarès (GMT+2)
Discipline: Big Air
Judging Criteria: Three tricks counting from seven attempts, 25-minute heats, 2-minute transitions, 8 minutes between rounds. Riders are rewarded for height and amplitude, technical difficulty, innovation and “wow” factor.
Day three: 17 April, 2024
15.25 That’s a wrap from the Lords of Tram GKA Big Air World Cup 2024. Thanks for joining us.
14.55 Women’s Final: Francesca Maini v Zara Hoogenraad v Pippa van Iersel v Nathalie Lambrecht. That’s Double Dutch at Lords of Tram as Pippa van Iersel takes the win after two years out with injury. A huge win for Van Iersel who got the better of Lambrecht who couldn’t quite match her stellar performance in the semi-final and took second. Hoogenraad was just behind in third, with Maini fourth.
14.00 W Semi-Final 2: J Cho v N Lambrecht v F Maini v A Mensch. Lambrecht takes a big win to go the final after a a bit of a shaky start inthe lighter breezes. Britain’s Maini booked her place in the final with solid scores that outpointed Mensch in third, whose last-gasp double kiteloop was not quite enough to get her through.
13.15 W Semi-Final 1: Zara Hoogenraad v Sarah Sadek v Lana Herman v Pippa van Iersel. Van Iersel goes to the final with a convincing win, joined by her compatriot Hoogenraad. Hoogenraad just edged out the Slovenian rider Herman by a small margin.
12.40 W R2 H2 N Lambrecht v J Avril v A Bouillot v Z Hoogenraad. Lambrecht heads to the semi-final in first place while Hoogenraad takes the second berth, closing oout her heat with one of the few double kite-loops landed by a woman in competition.
11.55 M Final J Burlando v L Casati v E Ulrich v J Overbeek. Dutchman Overbeek gets a big win with a huge performance! Overbeek’s total included a 9.53 and a 9.07 that gave him a solid lead over second place Jeremy Burlando. France’s Edgar Ulrich took the third podium step with his final trick, edging out Lorenzo Casati
11.25 W R2 H1 N Klement v J Cho v S Peters v Sarah Sadek. The Egyptian rider Sadek goes through to the semi-final with the heat win, followed by Jasmine Cho of the US.
10.20 Men’s Semi-Final 2 Josh Gillit v Lorenzo Casati v Jamie Overbeek v Andrea Principi. With a couple of tricks each on the board the wind has dipped and we’re AP postponement flag until the storm passes. Stay tuned. Huge heat with world champion Principi out when he crashed his last trick that left him a fraction of a point behind second place Lorenzo Casati. Overbeek took the heat convincingly and looks like the man to beat at the moment.
09.45 Men’s Semi-Final 1 Josué San v Edgar Ulrich v Giel Vlugt v Jeremy Burlando. Ulrich gets the win by a fraction of a point over Burlando in second and both book their places in the final. Baby Shark just missed out by a point, while Vlugt just didn’t the gusts he needed to complete his tricks to stay in touch.
09.25 W R1 H4 Svenja Peters v Alessa Mensch v Nathalie Lambrecht. Mensch goes straight to thed semi-final with a narrow win and three solid trick scores. Peters takes second, but number one seed, Lambrecht must battle for survival in Round 2 even though she had the biggest scores of the heat, but just two were counting.
09.00 W R1 H3 Sarah Sadek v Francesca Maini v Justine Avril. The Briton Maini gets the win and goes to Round 3 with three solid scores as the wind is gradually building. The Egyptian rider Sarah Sadek scored some big 7-point plus tricks, but in second place must fight for survival, along with France’s Justine Avril.
08.35 W R1 H2 Pippa van Iersel v Nora Klement v Angely Bouillot. Van Iersel back after a two-year injury break wins the heat to advance to Round 3 with a a 7.90 Kite-loop Front-roll. Bouillot fights it out in Round 2 with her second, ahead of Klement.
08.00 Women’s R1 H1 Lana Herman v Jasmine Cho v Zara Hoogenraad. Excellent start for the Slovenian debutant, Herman, to take the win in the opening heat with three 7-point plus scores. The Tramontana wind kicked in during the heat, but it wasn’t quite enough for Hoogenraad, the biggest rider, who took second, followed by Cho, with both going to Round 2.
06.00 Good morning for day three of Lords of Tram. We’ve got another early start today. The plan is for the skippers’ meeting at 07.30, with a First Possible Start at 08.00. A decision will be made shortly on whether to begin with the women’s contest, or head straight to the men. The semi-finals and final to decided who will become the 2024 Lord of Tram. Head over to the GKA YouTube Channel to catch all the action on the Livestream.
Day two: 16 April, 2024
19.15 That’s it for today. The wind didn’t return. We’ll be back tomorrow for the men’s semi-finals and finals and the women’s competition.
16.00 We are going to take a break before the semi-finals so that the riders can discuss the conditions, which are gusty and tricky, to reach a decision on whether to proceed with the next heats today.
15.25 M R3 H4 M Rahnel v E Ulrich v J vd Spuy v A Principi. World champion Principi booked his place in the sem-final with three big scores. The race for second and the other place in the semis was tight, with France’s Ulrich narrowly squeezed out by Van der Spuy.
14. 45 M R3 H3 R Swart v M Jacobs v J San v J Overbeek. Dutch teenager Overbeek gets the win and moves to the semi-final, his biggest scores a 7.90 in a line-up of high-scoring tricks despite the tricky winds. Baby Shark was close behind in second. Jacobs was third, though he had to retire from the heat with an apparent ankle injury.
13.45 M R3 H2 E Klijn v A Hadlow v J Burlando v L Casati. Burlando takes the heat win to go to the semi-final. A 7.93 for a Contraloop Backroll Boardoff helped him get the better of Lorenzo Casati, who also goes forward. Hadlow was sent out after just falling short, along with Klijn.
13.05 M R3 H1 J Gillit v A Guillebert v Leo Casati v G Vlugt. The heat is suspended as the wind dropped and we’re waiting for it to return. Vlugt won the heat comfortably after almost an hour-long heat. Gillit from South Africa squeezed out the second place when he just got the edge on Leonardo Casati, the 14-year-old first-timer.
12.25 M R2 H4 J Huynh v M Tullett v A Hadlow v R Swart. Five times world champion Hadlow landed every trick and comfortably advanced. But the young Australian Swart pulled it out of the bag to get his nose in front and take second with his last trick. Britain’s Tullett finished a fraction behind and that was the end for him, along with Huynh.
11.55 M R2 H3 N Texier v V Garat v M Rahnel v A Guillebert. Guillebert used all his experience to land a solid last trick that gave him win, with the Estonian 15-year-old debutant Rahnel taking the second spot and advancing. That as the end of the road for the French duo Garat and Texier.
11.30 M R2 H2 E Ulrich v J Gillit v S Mul v C Huot. A really tight heat as the riders fought for survival. Ulrich’s couple of 7-point plus scores helped him squeeze out the win, with the South African rider Gillit in second. Huot just ended in third and is out despite one of the highest scores of the heat, 7.70. Mul was fourth by only a fraction.
11.00 M R2 H1 E Klijn v S Tasbary v M Jacobs v L Gramstrup. The New Zealander Jacobs takes the win and advances, along with Klijn. That ends the run of Tsabary in third and Gramstrup in fourth.
10.35 M R1 H8 Ruben Swart v Valentin Garat v Andrea Principi. The Italian reigning world champion Principi takes the win, leaving the young Australian Swart and Garat to fight for their lives in round two.
10.10 M R1H7 Nathan Texier v Aaron Hadlow v Jason vd Spuy. Van der Spuy gets the better of Hadlow who has to settle for second, with Texier in third.
09.50 M R1 H6 Max Tullett v Arthur Guillebert v Jamie Overbeek. Overbeek wins the heat comfortably, leaving former Freestyle world champion Guillebert and Tullet to fight it out in Round 2
09.28 M R1 H5 Martin Rahnel v Julian Huynh v Josué “Baby Shark” San. The young Brazilian “Baby Shark” gets the win with the biggest heat of the comp so far. His total of 24.33 included a massive 9.50 for a Double Kiteloop Frontroll Boardoff put Estonia’s Martin Rahnel in second and Huynh in third.
09.00 MR1 H4 Shahar Tsabary v Clement Huot v Lorenzo Casati. The Italian former Red Bull King of the Air, Casati, gets a comfortable win without having to pull out too many stops. His Double Kiteloop Backroll Boardoff earned 8.07 to take his heat total to 22.44, put Huot in second and 15-year-old Tsabary in his first competition, in third.
08.35 M R1 H3 Evan Klijn v Stino Mul v Jeremy Burlando. Burlando takes the win with a big heat. His 7.93 Contraloop-Frontroll-Boardoff was 24 metres high. Klijn gets second with an 18.94 heat total, with Mul just behind in third.
08.10 M R1 H2 Josh Gillit v Lucas Gramstrup v Gile Vlugt. South African Gillit takes the win in a tricky heat where the riders struggled with their landings in the chop downwind. Vlugt finds himself second, going into Round 2 fighting for survival. Gramstrup was third, also heading to R2.
07.40 Men’s R1 H1 Leonardo Casati v Edgar Ulrich v Marc Jacobs. Casati, one of the youngest riders in the competition at 14 wins the heat in his first international event. His three 7+ scoring tricks gave him a good win over former Red Bull king of the Air, Jacobs, in second and Ulrich just behind in third.
07.20 We’re going to start 07.40. The plan is to push all the to get through as much of the competition as possible.
06.50 The skippers’ meeting is about to begin at 7.00.
06.00 Good morning. The forecast looks mental for today. We’re planning to get things underway early, with 07.30 as the FPS. It’s going to be a long day on the water with sunset at 20.32. We plan to get through as many of the nine women’s and 19 men’s heats as possible today. Stay tuned.
Day one: 15 April, 2024
18.00 Unfortunately that’s it for today. The wind never returned. We start bright and early tomorrow with a great forecast.
16.40 Competition is on standby as we wait for the wind to come back.
16.10 Women’s R1 H1 Lana Herman v Jasmine Cho v Zara Hoogenraad. Herman is out of this round with food poisoning and will go straight to Round 2. The heat was abandoned when the wind dropped out.
15.35 Next FPS is 16.10.
15.16 Our next FPS is 16.00.
15.00 Next FPS is 15.45 for Women’s R1 H1.
14.53 The next FPS is 15.30.
14.00 Our next FPS is now 15.00.
13.28 Still waiting. Next FPS is 14.30.
12.36 We’re on hold still. Next FPS at 13.30.
11.50 We’re still waiting for the wind to build. The First Possible Start is set for 13.00. Stay tuned.
10.15 Right now the competition is on hold as we wait for the Tramontana wind to build. It looks good for the afternoon and we’re hoping to get four hours of competition later.
10.00 Good morning. We’ve just had the skippers’ meeting and we’re ready for action in the first round of the GKA Big Air Kite World Championships 2024 here in Barcarès. Stay tuned for updates shortly.