For all of you who don't know anything about the KTA, The Kiteboard Tour Asia is a new competition series created to showcase asian kiteboarders and locations to the rest of the kiteboarding world. The KTA tour consists of 5 stops in 5 different countries between September 2009 and March 2010. The events all hold two disciplines (freestyle and course racing) which are open to all riders, professional and amateur.

So I have been over in Boracay, Philippines for 3 months now training to improve my level. All has been going super good apart from tweaking my knee again in January leading to a few weeks off the water. Alot of friends are all taking part in the whole KTA tour and said I should join in Boracay since I was here anyway.

The competition arose with not the best forecast. Knowing that the island always puts up good wind, normally enough everyday to get at least 2 hrs riding, we signed up and got ready. With some wind blowing and a bad forecast ahead we started the event early on registration day. This was going to be the first KTA event with professional riders. Mallory de la Villemarque was here with Florian running advanced clinics so they were going to be competiting also. My first heat was not going to be the easiest since i hadn't competed in a year or so. I was drawn up against Turkey's no.2 rider Tanner Aykurt, after a sketchy first heat i managed to win with a variety of passes. The first day held many memorable heats and then 2 races.

The second day brought a small bit of wind enough to complete the singles anyway. I was lucky to pass through my first heat of the day against Philipino brother Ken Nacor, having my kite slightly lower got me the win however Ken showed a great variety of powered handle passes and stylish moves, one being grabbed KGB. We saw many good heats in the single elimination with great consistency and moves from Kerem Balik, Doque Delosantos and Yo Pudla. Advancing on past Ken i met Doque, Anton and finally Mallory before finishing on top spot of the singles. I believe putting down consistent heats was my successor, however i drew a card of good luck when competiting against Mallory. In the first minutes of the heat he crashed into the coconut trees, causing him to miss a few minutes getting another kite ready. The KTA event was also holding a new event here as a one off, Speed. I thought id give it a go to see what it was all about, with the wind not blowing much over 15-17knts it wasn't the fastest times but was a good laugh. That night we were off to summer place to model for the billabong, ion show. Something i've always thought as a bad idea, but with all the ion Philippines team doing it i had to also. A couple of tequila bottles down the line and we were all amped to go out on stage and had a good laugh..

The event didn't continue until the 4th day due to no wind on the 3rd. I had a relaxing morning waiting for the rest of the double elimination to finish before my heat, i went off and done a few more speed runs managing to take joint 3rd with Bobo all on my 11m Flexifoil Hadlow pro, stoked. A kite for all riding! The heats went on with all of the usual suspects competiting to get as high as they can. We saw Sedat Celenk make it all the way into 4th place after coming up against Florian, international Naish rider. He put down a good heat, landing all his moves, however it wasn't enough to beat Flo's powered style. My time to ride again finally came with Mallory holding his spot in the final. The wind was now lighter than before, but with me holding first place anyway we went out to see if i could keep it. I was fortunate in this heat to have more power in my kite than Mallory which meant i could stay inside the competition area, managing to land 313, lowmobe, blind judge, back to blind air pass and some surface passes, i held onto my top spot to win my first KTA event. Super stoked!!

Everyone had a great event and i like to say many thanks to the KTA team for running the event. Also my sponsors Flexifoil, Adrenaline sports, Ion Philippines, Vanworx and my family at home for making this possible.