Ole from Blind means landing blind while hooked in, killing the line tension and passing the bar over your head to ride away toeside.
Also called: Ole · Pop to Blind with Ole
Prerequisites
Unlocks
Nothing in the tree needs this one yet — it stands on its own.
Ideal conditions
Flat water. Both IKSURFMAG tutorials specify it: the trick relies on the momentum you carry out of the blind landing, and chop eats momentum. No numeric wind range is given by any source we cite.
How to do it
1. Set up and pop to blind
- Park the kite high, around 11 o'clock, and never lower than 11 or 1, with your front hand centred on the bar.
- Come in on a very gentle edge across the wind; don't come in edging hard.
- Stamp before you pull on the bar; pull first and you'll be pulled across your board.
- Pop up hard and early, release the back hand, and push the bar away as you start the rotation.
- Rotate a touch further than across-the-wind so you touch down pointing ever so slightly downwind, towards the kite.
2. Land blind and kill the line tension
- Land flat with zero edge and your weight over the board.
- Stay tall, standing over the board with just your head turned to look back and down, weight biased to the new tail so the nose stays up.
- Push the bar away as far as it goes, quite literally depowering the kite completely the moment you touch down.
- Drop your weight onto your heels and let the board carve downwind towards the kite to bleed off the last of the tension.
- Give it a beat. Land, find your balance, then start the Ole; the sequence is two separate moves.
3. Ole and ride away
- With the lines slack, push your bar hand upwind, across and in front of your face, to the other side of your body.
- Let your head lead, then shoulders, then hips, until you face the direction of travel again.
- Once the bar is across, get both hands back on it, sheet in, and ride off.
- Shift weight over your new rear foot so the front foot slides forward and you settle onto toeside, or keep the heels weighted and slide the board back to heelside.
Common mistakes and fixes
Mistake
You land blind on an edge and the lines come tight, stalling the pass before it starts.
Fix
Pop a bit harder, approach with no edge and your body upright, and aim the landing slightly downwind on a flat board.
Mistake
You rush it and rotate straight into the Ole from the pop, catching the heelside edge or burying the nose.
Fix
Land blind first, balance for a split second, then push the bar across as a second move.
Mistake
You lean back to force the bar past your face and fall backwards.
Fix
Keep your weight balanced and physically push the bar upwind and past, rather than leaning back.
Mistake
The kite pulls you over mid-pass because you are edging on your toes while blind.
Fix
Settle your weight on both feet, biased towards the heels, before you push the bar.
Mistake
You catch your heelside edge because you haven't depowered the kite enough after the pop.
Fix
Push the bar right out, and if that's not helping, pull on some trim.
Learn this with a coach, not from a page
This guide explains what the move is and what riders get wrong, so you arrive at the session knowing what you are trying to do. It cannot watch your kite, read the gust coming, or stop you committing to something you are not ready for — a coach or instructor can.
Find a certified schoolEducational reference, not instruction. Kitesurfing is a risk sport: the steps here describe what named schools, instructors and technique libraries teach, and the page lists exactly which ones, but real conditions involve wind, gusts, water state, traffic and equipment behaviour that no written guide accounts for. Schools also teach justified variations — where our sources disagree, the page says so instead of picking one. Judge your own readiness, use the safety systems on your kite, and do not attempt a move because a page made it sound achievable. KitesurfingOfficial accepts no liability for the use of this information on the water.
Questions riders ask
Do you stay hooked in for an Ole?+
Yes. The sources call the Ole the hooked-in version of a surface pass: the bar travels over your head from one side of your body to the other while you stay hooked in the whole way.
What should I be able to do before trying the Ole from blind?+
Pop to blind and ride blind while hooked in. IKSURFMAG treats blind as the prerequisite and points readers to its Riding Blind tutorial (Issue 77) first.
What water conditions do I want?+
Flat water. The move runs on the momentum you keep after landing blind, and in IKSURFMAG's words, chop eats momentum for breakfast.
Where should the kite be?+
High. No lower than 11 or 1 o'clock on the approach, then pushed out to full depower as you land so the lines go slack for the pass.
Why doesn't the bar hit me in the face during the pass?+
Because you only pass it with slack lines. Landing flat and slightly downwind towards the kite with the bar pushed right out removes the tension, so the bar swings past your face without incident.
Keep reading
Sources
Every step on this page traces to the sources below. Where they disagree or stay silent, the page says so instead of guessing.