Home Park: TerHills Cable Park in Belgium.
Country: Netherlands
KITESURFING MAGAZINE: WHAT MAKES YOU SO ATTRACTED TO PARK RIDING?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: There are so many different tricks to do and you can get really creative with the set-up. After doing mainly freestyle for a few years I was looking for a new challenge and park riding opened a whole new world. Park riding is inspired by other board sports more than any other discipline. What I really enjoy as well is combining park riding and freestyle. In Brazil I would do an air trick and without hooking back in I would hit two more rails in a line. There are really just so many different lines to do and it really pushes you to go switch and spin both ways since it doesn’t look good to switch stance or change your leash in a line.
WHAT MOTIVATES YOU ON THE WATER?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: Progression. Since I started kiteboarding I had this drive to learn new things every session and I still have that. Progressing is so much fun and there are always so many little things that you can improve to make your riding look better. Progression is not only about learning new tricks, but also learning new grabs, grabbing longer, pressing more on the rails, going biggeroff the kicker, being more locked in on rails and so on.
WHAT IS YOUR OFF-THE-WATER TRAINING LIKE?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: When I’m not kiteboarding I try to stay super active and mostly I still try to do other sports on the water. At home I like to wakeboard when it’s not windy, surf when there are waves and when there is light wind I still go foiling most of the days. I also like cycling, running and doing workouts on the beach and when it’s too cold outside I go to the gym. I also stretch everyday after doing sports.
TOP BOOK RECOMMENDATION?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: I would recommend everyone to read We Are Our Brains by Dutch physician and neurobiologist D.F. Swaab. It is an easy to read book and it explains so much about why people are how they are. I think if everyone would read this book people would judge each other less, accept each other more and understand each other better. People would be more open minded and there would be so much less racism.
WHAT INSPIRES YOU?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: What inspires me the most are other athletes: whether it is in kiteboarding or other sports. I love to watch videos of not only kiteboarding but of pretty much all boardsports. Watching women kill it in their sport is definitely inspiring since it can be more relatable.
WHO DO YOU LOOK UP TO?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: There are a lot of different people that inspire me and that I look up to. I look up to a lot of athletes and there are so many women killing it at the moment. Like skateboarder Lacy Baker, wakeboarder Anna Nikstad and snowboarder Anna Gasser are just a few examples! They are all amazing at what they do and make it look so good. I love to look at their riding and it influences my riding as well!
WHY DO YOU LIKE COMPETING ON THE KPL?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: I have always liked to compete and I have been competing in freestyle, big air and slalom racing for quite some years before I started to compete on the KPL. Competing is an extra motivation to progress and to make sure you can do your tricks in any condition and under pressure. Before and during the competition you are riding with the best kiteboarders in the world so whether you perform good or not, it definitely motivates you to improve even faster. I really like to compete on the KPL because the tour is really pushing kiteboarding in the direction that I want to see the sport going. I agree with the judging criteria, the stops are hosted in really good locations and last but not least the vibes on tour are really good!
WHERE DO YOU HOPE TO SEE WOMEN’S KITEBOARDING TAKE YOU?
ANNELOUS LAMMERTS: Kiteboarding has taken me all over the world and that was something I could only dream of when I started kiteboarding. There are still so many tricks I want to learn, not because other women haven’t done them yet, but because I know women can do them. I still want to film a big video part and keep competing with the best kiteboarders. I guess all these points are not really specific to women’s kiteboarding, but I think if we all keep pushing the sport we can inspire more and more women to start kiteboarding too.
Website: https://www.annelouslammerts.nl
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/annelousl/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/annelous/
As Featured in Kitesurfing Magazine Issue #12, Summer 2019. Special thanks to Sensi Graves for compiling the Women of the KPL tour article.
