Happy Chinese New Year!

We at Jettribe would like to share our insight of a huge holiday from a foreign land about 10,000 miles away. It is called Chinese New Year/Lunar New Year (Tet). This year of the Rabbit begins on February 3rd and ends about a month later! The Chinese New Year has been celebrated since the 14th century, that's over a thousand years! This holiday isn't just a 15 day celebration, but it is also a great time to gather around the dinner table with close friends and family. Not only do the Chinese/Vietnamese celebrate this holiday, this is an event that is celebrated all over the world, from Australia to London and even here in the U.S. Hey, you could just check out Little Saigon in Southern California. They are really whooping it up like it's 1999!

Chinese New Year has a lot of importance and traditions. But at Jettribe, the biggest significance is that our production and sampling will stop for a month or so. Jettribe owns, runs and has operated our production facility for the last 12 years. And it should not come as a big surprise that when Chinese New Year comes around the end of the year and tradition dictates a huge yearly "cash" bonus! This bonus and payroll is a killer...ouch! But seriously, our Jettribe/Vosh Asian staff work their butts off all year with unsurpassed dedication, and they deserve every bonus and time off.

This is a great time of the year for our Asian staff, a long vacation plus a pocket full of bonus cash! During this time they party like it was "Ho Chi Minh's 100th birthday." The drink of choice is "Rudei," a very strong rice wine that could probably power a jet-ski across the finish line, right after Rob Flores the Pro Ski Racer.

Usually during this time of year the Jettribe USA HQ takes time to plan new products and plan for the upcoming race season.

Happy Chinese New Year from the International Jettribe Family!

Black Star Motorsports Signs With Jettribe

National Guard / Black Star Motorsports
For Immediate Release - January 20th, 2011
  
The National Guard / Black Star Motorsports team is pleased to announce we have signed with Jettribe for the 2011 season. We are very excited to represent Jettribe this year.

Not only does Jettribe offer some killer casual clothing and riding gear, it's one of the few apparel companies that fully supports our sport. We have a lot of respect for Tony and the rest of the Jettribe crew. In the PWC industry, when other apparel brands have moved on focusing on other water sports, Jettribe has stood strong. They still continue to innovate new products and gear. Jettribe, like their moto is a "Core Watercraft Gear" company. If nothing else you have to respect their dedication to the pwc industry riders and racers. That's why we are very proud to represent them this season.  We are working very closely with Jettribe this year to develop some very cool products. Keep an eye out, its going to be a great season!                                                                                                                               

For more information about the team and Jettribe products, please check out http://www.blackstar-racing.com/

Louis Milone's Take on the King's Cup

Jan. 20, 2011

Kings Cup 2010, from the eyes of a Crew Chief..


I have not come up for air since returning, and there is so much I want to share with the community, but I genuinely cannot find the time. Here I am at 10pm, I have not fallen asleep yet, so I am going to do a 1/2 way crumby job at giving some insight to the trip.

Team Jettribe USA / Team Mean Racing, believe it or not had not even made the commitment to attend Kings Cup until Sunday (race day) in Lake Havasu.  This was for a lot of reasons, 1 being that our Turbo GTI was just not running right, and 2 our RXPX limited had dropped a valve in practice, and we rebuilt it on a picnic table with mostly used parts. It just did not seem right to send this pile of stuff 1/2 way around the world. On top of that, we had no other commitments for the 40 foot container ride over, and the financial burden was just more than our small group could handle. 

We wanted to go badly…Ok that's obvious, and if you know Jeremy, Christine, Chelsea, or Derek, you know just how badly...Well the Rxpx was now running great, it finished every moto, and the health check on the motor led me (the only mechanic in the group) to give it a thumbs up.. The GTI was another story.  It was just not making power. It came down to Saturday night at about 11pm when we found the major part of the problem, and anyone who was anywhere near the race site at that time... yes, that was us that did the full power pass in the dark.. Of course now we had back tracked so many other things, the setup was horrible, but we had no time to dial it in… We simply raced it on Sunday (Pro Runabout Open) the conditions got rough, and Jeremy hung on passed a lot of boats and got into the top 10, and we made the decision that with a little bit of time we could finish it… That time would have to come in Bangkok... holy cow?!?

Ok, we made the commitment with Tony Vo, owner of Jettribe… (by the way in my opinion Tony is the most supportive and enthusiastic individual involved in our sport right now). We still really didn’t have the funding all in place, but we were in Lake Havasu, only a few hours from LA where the container would be loaded…  LET’S DO IT!!!  We can worry about the money later... Our great friend and Team Mate Ken Waddle drove the truck to the Jettribe Headquarters, and Tony took it from there.  The Logistics were quite overwhelming, but we got a few breaks right at the last minute.  We were able to fill the container with a few other boats and bits that were for export, Hot Products came in with some sponsorship, and it just started to click.

A little over a month later the Team arrived in Thailand, and I got the time and the water needed for the much needed tuning that the GTI required, and although we never got the Launch control just right, Jeremy rode it like a true pro, and the competition was spectacular.  Christine and Derek shared the Limited RXPX in Expert limited and Am Vet Open respectively, and both did great.. Christine even got an inside holeshot in the second moto and led all the boys for a few corners... if they only knew she was racing with a torn ligament in her elbow against Dr. orders, and is having surgery next week !!!  Wilson and I did have to tear back into the RXPX engine to fix some band aids from Havasu, but it was all taken care of before the motos started.  I want to take a sentence to thank Les Cooke and Kylie Elmers as they helped out in my crunch with a few bits and a tool or 2… They are the class of the sport !!!

Beyond that I have to take a few sentences to mention Motor Field. Motor Field is a power sports dealer in Bangkok, and Sam and his Dad (and family) run the business.  They are the Thai importer of Jettribe products and are very good friends to Tony Vo of Jettribe. Basically these guys were our hosts.  They made available a fantastic facility to work in, fed us, and transported our equipment to and from the race site...which by the way was a 6 hour ride each way.  I still don't quite know how we can ever repay the hospitality.  Next I have to mention Eddie.  Eddie was a friend to the MF guys as well as Tony, and he was basically our personal tour guide.  Eddie got us to and from the race site every day, made sure we were eating, worked out hotel mix-ups, the list goes on and on.  Eddie was the guy that when you said you needed a "whatever", 30 minutes later he came back with exactly what you needed.  Eddie even got the team Thailand souvenirs as he realized that we had never found the time to get anything on our own, and we had an early flight out of Bangkok! 

Simply amazing!! In general the people of Thailand were just incredible, and mark my words Team Jettribe USA / Team Mean Racing is going back, and next time we will be better prepared!!

The list of experiences goes on and on..... 

We gave a team shirt to the Princess!!!
We vacationed in Vietnam, ON the South China Sea
We camped out on the floor in the Jettribe Manufacturing Facility...

I hear people say all the time that our sport is dead or dying..  That is not true, that is simply an opinion..  We did not win any motos, and we collected no prize money as a team, but we found a way to pool our very limited resources, and make it fun, affordable, and created memories that we will never forget… Our sport is only dying in the minds of those that are not trying to keep it alive. 

Attached are some photos… I took over 2000, Derek another 1600, and our friend John took another ...Who knows… This is just a sample…

I look forward to seeing everyone on the road in 2011, and if you want to hear a good story look for one of us...

Thanks Tony....  You were the driving force...

David Cabrera... you have to heal up, because we needed and missed you there badly !!

Big Team USA Thank You's to:

- TiAl Sport - Gregg Jones
- Tony Vo - Team Jettribe
- Hot Products
- Chris Maccluggage (loaned Chelsea his spare steering cable)
- Less Cooke and Kylie Elmers
- WRT - Allen Walker – RXPX magic
- Champion Motorsport
- Tai'd Up Graphics
- Motor Field, Sam, your Dad, and Eddie
- The Team Flamingo guys that helped pull the boats out every day !!!
- my apologies to anyone I missed

Jettribe Daytona Free Ride Update Part 2

When Saturday rolled around the jettribe crew Tony, Doan, and Derek Correll were pretty worried that Daytona was hit with some pretty cold weather! Man it was 38 degrees! For us Southern Californians that is dang cold, plus the wind was blowing also. But these freeriders are totally hard core! Despite the cold weather they showed up in the masses! We think there were at least 400 skis there and they were all riding and having a great time.

Being at the Daytona free ride was especially cool for our Jettribe crew, we had a chance to hook up with our team USA again, the last time we have seen Louis, Derek, Christine, Wilson, and Jeremy from 10,000 miles away in Asia after the King’s Cup. It was a nice reunion. We all had a chance to hang out and plan for the 2011 race reason. It will be awesome!

One of the folks that Tony from Jettribe had a chance to chat with was Arnold from Hydroturf and we all view him as one of the PWC industry's icons. And having chance to hang with Johnny and Scott from Blowsion was priceless! Spending time like this is worth the trek from California to Florida; emails and phone calls can only go so far.

Many thanks to Nick and the city of Viola for greeting us hard core PWC fans with warm welcome.

See all of you next year...........

Jettribe Daytona Free Ride Update

The Jettribe crew rolled in and flew in from all corners  of the country. Tony flew in from California , Doan drove in from Maryland, and Derek Correll hauled the Jettribe II trailer from North Carolina. Friday morning we all met again for the first time since the King’s Cup in Thailand and some we have not seen since the World Finals.
As we set up our Jettribe booth, familiar faces started to appear from last year, it was such a cool site to see our Jettribe gear on all of these free riders. And before we knew it we blew out of all of our cool tour coats! We are not sure if the freezing weather was the deciding factor for the quick high sales or the kick ass designs and unsurpassed quality?

Anyways, seeing Arnold from Hydro Turf and having a chance to chat was priceless. It is strange that in California Hydro Turf and Jettribe are only about hours apart but meeting in Florida is cool too.
Justin from Wet Racer stopped by and dropped off some of his new issues featuring the Jettribe race team in Thailand how cool is that? Josh and John Block stopped by to say hi which was also great.

More to come tomorrow!

Jettribe Welcomes Kylie Ellmers to the Team!!!

Jettribe is very excited to announce the newest addition to our Jettribe family. We are now the very proud sponsor of one of the world’s top international riders: Kylie Ellmers!

Kylie was born in New Zealand and has been one of the best racers in the world for many years. Kylie dabbles in both runabouts and stand-ups, consistently taking home top 5 and top 3 finishes in some of the most challenging races around the world. And, as if racing jet-skis wasn’t already challenging enough, Kylie also holds her own against some of the top male racers.

While over in Thailand for the King’s Cup, Kylie took 4^th in Pro Ski Open and an impressive 3^rd in Pro-Am Ski Open. We were so delighted to see her always smiling and friendly face while we were in Thailand, and we were so excited for her great finishes.

Congratulations once again Kylie, we’re so happy to have you as part of our team!

Jettribe Team USA Thailand King's Cup Highlights

One of the many faces that the Jettribe Team got to see at the King’s Cup was that of Bill Chapelin from R&D Performance. R&D Performance is an aftermarket performance company and has supplied the best products to many of the best racers in the world. The 2010 King’s Cup Team USA, sponsored by Jettribe, was honored and stoked to have Bill stop by our Team USA pit area in Thailand. We felt like the best and brightest talent had joined our booth.

One of the biggest headaches that we experienced during our time at the races happened the day before the races started. We were absolutely devastated because our SeaDoo RXP head was blown. Thanks to our highly skilled mechanic, Louis Milone and the team we were able to get it running for the races the next day. Many thanks to Nok for driving 600 km from Bangkok to the race site to bring us what we needed. Team USA could never have done it without our local Thai friends!

Another headache that we experienced was on race day Friday morning. Tony Vo, a non-racer, decided to take the SX-R 800 out for a spin, but after carving a few buoys the steering cable snapped. With only 3 hours before the Chelsea’s started we were left without a steering cable, with the nearest jet-ski parts shop 400 miles away! Thank goodness Chris MacClugage bailed us out by giving us his heavy duty steering cable. Within hours Derek and Jeremy got it working and running before Chelsea’s race. Many thanks to Chris and his team for bailing Team USA out. We owe you one!

When Team USA arrived at the race site in Thailand we felt out of place. But when Carson Bachelder, fellow American and staff member at the King’s Cup, walked up to us and welcomed us we felt like we were right at home…even though home was 10,000 miles away!

New Zealand-born Pro jet-ski racer Kylie Ellmers was also one of the faces that we were extremely happy to see in Thailand. Jettribe is proud to have such an amazing racer and person on our team! She is from SeaDoo Centre in Australia and still manages to race. She is one of our biggest racers. Kylie finished 4^th overall in Pro Ski Open at the King’s Cup.

We were also honored to have Less Cook as part of the Jettribe team. We were stoked to have Less from SeaDoo Centre in Australia walk up to our pit in Thailand and hang out. His highly respected knowledge is always welcome in our booth! We feel like the brightest people have embraced our team. 

We would like to extend a special thanks to the Prime Minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva and his wife, Pimpen Sakuntabhai for taking the time to meet our team at the opening ceremony of the King’s Cup. We would also like to thank them for their sponsorship of the event and great hotel accommodations.

We can’t thank Sam and his family enough for all of the support that they gave us during our stay in Thailand. Thank you so much for adopting us not only by taking us in as part of the family but also for feeding and sheltering us. We couldn’t have made it without you guys! Thank you so much!

It was so cool to have Scott from the IJSBA hang out with Tony Vo from Jettribe. They had some good quality time in Thailand. How funny that even though they are both located in Southern California they have never gotten together to plan future events. It took a 10,000 mile trip to get these two together. Well they seem to have some pretty cool ideas for the betterment of the industry.

It was also cool to see Scott from Hot Products, a company that makes performance parts for racing as well as repair parts and accessories. It seems like all the industry’s greatest talent finally decided to get together. And what better place to do it than in Jettribe’s booth in Thailand?!

The racing team from Thailand also proved to be a big help to us throughout the racing weekend. Jettribe was more than happy with the help from Sam from Motorfield and to Mr. Sataporn from Yacht Technology Co., LTD who made it possible for Team USA to wear Jettribe gear while the team won races.

Jettribe Team USA was also given the opportunity to be the only race team to personally meet Princess Ubolratana Rajakanya and present her with one of our team pit shirts. We were so honored to be given such an amazing opportunity. The Princess was very nice and spoke to our team for several minutes. What a great way to end our trip in Thailand!

Keep an eye out for more updates from Jettribe!