Phil Broder can fly, and he says you can, too. Kites, that is.
Broder, editor of the quarterly magazine “Kiting,†says anyone can learn enough in half an hour to fly a kite in competitions such as sport kiting – which he describes as sort of like figure skating in the sky – and kite fighting, where competitors seek to knock each other’s kites from the sky.
He talked about kites and kiting at the FlyNY 2010, the second annual international kite design showcase and flying event held recently on Riverside Park South’s Pier 1 in New York City. Throughout the day, there were free kite making demonstrations and an array of creative kite designs sailing through the blue sky, some competing and others just catching a breeze.
Broder, whose magazine is packed with information on kite festivals, kite design plans, and kite news, was at the event promoting the American Kitefliers Association.
Review Fix: Can you tell me about the American Kitefliers Association?
Phil Broder: The AKA is the largest kite club in the world with close to 4,000 members in America and dozens of other countries. And it’s a hobby club for people who are interested in flying kites and building kites and competing with kites and learning about kites and doing anything they want to with kites.
RF: Are there kite flying competitions or design competitions that take place around the world?
PB: There are lots of different competitions. There’s sport kites, which have more than one line. They’re maneuverable so they compete in events that are a lot like figure skating where they’re flying to music or they’re flying figures. There’s kite-making competitions where we take hand-made kites and judge them on their beauty and their flight and their design. There’s fighter kites, which is a big Asian tradition, where two kites compete against each other and try to cut each other down. There’s a Japanese style, Rokkaku battle where you fly these big Japanese fighting kites and it’s like wrestle-mania and everybody tries to knock each other down. So there’s lots of different kinds of competitions.
RF: Have you ever been involved in any kind of competition?
PB: I’ve been in every kind of competition. I was a national sport kite champion in ‘98 and a national kite-making champion in 2007 and I’m still competing when I can.
RF: What determines a winner?
PB: It depends on the competition. You know in sport kites where you’re flying in figures they give you figures out of the rule book and you have to sort of trace them exactly in the sky with your kite. So if your lines are straight, if your corners are square you have a better chance of winning. In kite- making competitions they’re judged on visual appeal and flight and craftsmanship and structural design. So if you have a really well put together kite that flies really well, but it’s ugly, you’re only going to score well in three of the four categories. So you have to build a kite that’s good all the way around.
RF: What was the biggest kite-flying event you have been to?
PB: The event that I was at in India earlier this year had fliers from 32 countries invited. And we flew for two days and then they have a holiday where traditionally everyone flies kites from the rooftops. So I was part of a festival that had 4.5 million people flying kites from their roofs. Which I guess would probably be the biggest I’ve been to.
For more information about the American Kitefliers Association visit their website at: www.aka.kite.org/
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