360: the basic figure of the Revolution Indoor

This lesson is the foundation of the whole school. It comes from the Cramayailes indoor 4-line school, restored by QuadKites.org. The text is Thierry Bressure’s, in the first person, translated from French. The video commentary is in French.

Prerequisite: the warm-up.

This is the basic figure because you cannot fly backward forever. You therefore need to be able to fly in circles!

An easier variant, because it needs less backward movement: with the revo slanted, you increase lift. It is also the revo’s natural flying position.

This lesson is the foundation, and the practitioner must not take it lightly. Plan several hours for it, and rework it at every session.

Behind the 360 there is mastery of movement, of hand and body position, of altitude (flight level) and of the revo’s attitude (upright), by working the brakes. Do not move on to the next step if this is not mastered!

When the kite goes right, the pilot describes a circle by moving backward to the left. When the kite goes left, the pilot describes a circle by moving backward to the right.

The first goal of the lesson is to launch the revo into a 360. Start with the kite resting on its two wingtips against a support. Step back fast enough to keep the revo standing. A faster step and/or a slight upward movement of the arms launches the revo.

As soon as the kite rises, use the right brake to point the leading edge (LE) to the right (or the left brake to go left) and, at the same moment, start moving backward in a circle to the left (or to the right).

The revo naturally takes a tilted LE, because that is its most favorable position: the one with the greatest lift.

Getting it upright, that is, with the LE vertical, requires more pressure by stepping back faster and correcting the attitude with slight brake adjustments.

Do this exercise for as long as your legs allow. To change direction, land the revo and start again from the beginning. Do not try to make a turn: that comes later.

Outdoors is like downhill mountain biking: there is no need to push because the slope moves the bike forward. With an outdoor revo, the wind is there and you let it press the revo to the back of the window. Indoors is like road cycling, where you have to adjust the gears and chainrings.

The revo flies steadily when there is a balance between backward speed, lift (through compensation, or by starting the glide position by slanting the revo) and the brakes. Everyone uses their bike’s gears according to their physical ability on the same terrain; with the indoor revo, everyone likewise has to find the backward speed, the amount of brake and the compensation that let the revo fly 360s without tiring. That is the comfort zone.

To find it, you have to chain 360s for hours spread over several sessions. A 360 must be a resting position, like the LE-sideways stop outdoors.

To fix ideas: if 100% is the maximum backward speed you can sustain without getting out of breath and 20% is the stall speed (the revo does not stay upright and falls), the comfort zone should be between 50 and 80%. With more experience, the pilot will have a lower comfort zone, which increases their endurance.

The comfort zone is neither at 100%, nor too close to the stall, because you must be able to slow down and speed up without too much effort. A ballet lasts several minutes!

Altitude management is the next stage of the lesson. From the comfort zone, you can correct altitude by increasing backward speed or adding compensation. The higher the comfort zone, the more effective the compensation. With a low comfort zone, compensation may not be enough: you then just need to give a small burst of relative wind to make the revo climb.

The ultimate step is a perfectly straight flight along a perfectly horizontal line.

Outdoors, you pick a reference point in the scenery, such as the treetops. Indoors, the scenery turns and there may be no reference point. One mistake is to look for a reference in the background: the eye cancels the blur to find a reference point, you take your eyes off the kite and momentarily lose control. You can also get dizzy, because you are mixing physical movement with visual stillness or movement.

The technique is to use an imaginary fixed reference in front of you and make it coincide with the center of the kite by moving the kite. Your eyes do not move. You only adjust the position of the center of the revo (the Revolution logo). Your eyes must not look at the turning background!

The next lesson is the turn.