Kite boarder lands on world stage

For a bloke who spends most of his time leaping over stuff and taking to the air, perhaps it's not so much of a surprise Marc Jacobs has landed near the top of the world.
The Papamoa kite boarder had a career-defining finish on the PKRA world tour in Thailand this week, finishing second in the freestyle event.
In doing so, he took out current world champion Australian Andy Yates early in the heats and was only beaten by a whisker by Netherlands rider Youri Zoon in the final.
"I'm so happy, I just can't put it into words," Jacobs says. "I've put a lot of work into getting to this level and I didn't expect it to come so soon, but it means I can really focus on performing well on the rest of the world tour."
The result is especially sweet given the sacrifices he's had to make.
"This summer it was pretty hard for me to train how I would've liked as I had to work all Christmas and New Year's just to pay for rent and things like that. I decided to just take a gamble, so I sold my car and trained solidly for two months over summer, just because I knew I had to do it to step up to this level."
Jacobs, the New Zealand kite boarding freestyle champion, has had significant national achievements in the sport over the past six years, since taking up the sport, and boosted his hopes by finishing fourth in a PKRA event in New Caledonia late last year.
He spent much of last season off the tour but a winter of training at the Mount provided him with enough impetus to kick on.
The three-time New Zealand national title winner also picked up sponsorship from Bay of Plenty-based company Switch Kites, who provided Jacobs with the means to get back on the world tour.
Switch Kites director Daniel Kajavala said this week's result was a boost to Jacobs' hopes of becoming world champion.
"We are so happy for Marc right now and very proud of his achievements, and we hope that Switch Kites can encourage and support more talented young Kiwi's like Marc in the future," Kajavala says.
Jacobs will now head to Morocco and France for the next two events in the world tour and hopes to pick up enough sponsorship to compete in all 10 rounds of the freestyle division.
"The way things are going, I'm pretty confident I'll be doing the whole tour but I'm just so stoked it's a perfect start for me."