It’s a little known fact that kitesurfing started as kiteskiing. But this was back in the early '90s, before skiing underwent its new school revolution. Now that skiers have progressed from the mute grab through the misty flip and into corked 900 territory, it’s time to get back under kite power, take previously unimagined air and slash enormous downwind GS turns.

Images: Damien Girardin and Cody Townsend skiing the Rocket during a 2009 trip to Maui for an episode of Freeski TV.

Cape Hatteras trip, May 2010