Vita Amara

Andre: I met Matteo on his very first trip to Brazil. Even then, there was something different about him – but watching his evolution since has been something else entirely. Over the years, he’s grown, not only into one of the most exciting freestyle kiteboarders of his generation, but also into someone with a genuinely unique perspective on life and the sport. He rides with a rare mix of freedom and creativity – never just chasing scores, but constantly pushing expression and style. It’s the kind of riding that sticks with you. The past two seasons in Brazil, we spent some time shooting together, and he ended up being behind some of my favorite images of those years.

Hi Matteo. Let’s go back and talk about the very beginning – how did you get into kiting?

I come from Venice. We lived close to the beach and I would see kiters sometimes and wanted to try. But my mum said I was still too young. The closest thing to kiting was sailing, so when I was six or seven, I started sailing. It gave me so much knowledge about the wind, about coping with different conditions and being relaxed in the water, and about respect for nature. It taught me a lot. But then I reached a point where it felt too static – I needed more action like I got from skateboarding and snowboarding. So at about 10 years old I started to kite, but Venice isn’t very windy and there were no kite schools there. So I would do one-week camps at Lake Garda in the summer. I had so much fun with the other kids on the camps. After a few years my mum could see the positive effect all these board sports were having on me. She saw all the dedication I put towards them and really supported me in following my dream. I started to spend more time in Lake Garda, helping at a kite school in return for accommodation and food. I got this opportunity to train for free, which is amazing because my family couldn’t have afforded it otherwise. Then I started doing my first Italian competitions, getting discounts on kites and eventually sponsored.

Lake Garda is still your main kite spot. How are the conditions there?

We have a proper winter with snow and there is a lot of wind during winter, stronger than the summer. But it’s cold. My favorite season is spring or autumn because we have fewer tourists. It gets really busy with tourists in the summer. Anyway, the lake works with a thermal wind. Every day is the same. In the early morning, you have this strong north wind, then it totally stops and the lake looks like a mirror. Then at 1 pm, the wind turns south and comes in at about 15 knots. It’s crazy! People can’t believe it. Because of these conditions I became really comfortable riding with smaller kites and in chop in the morning’s nuking wind, then with bigger kites in the afternoon. Having two completely different wind environments in one day is awesome for training. I’ve never heard about any other lake like this, where you have this phenomenon.

So different to Brazil where the wind always comes from the same side! Living in a place with such strong wind, why didn’t you get into Big Air?

When I was younger, there were no Big Air comps, only freestyle, so I did freestyle. It’s hard and took me so many years to learn the tricks. You need to put a lot of effort into this discipline to get to a good level. You crash over and over, but I like the learning process, the feeling I get when I’m learning something new. And with freestyle you have way more tricks in my opinion, and loads of different ways to do a trick. That’s why I love it. I have questioned at times whether I should change, but it wouldn’t feel right to me to change to Big Air just because that’s where the focus is now. I do Big Air every now and then for fun. It’s impressive to see the Big Air riders out in 40 knots – what they are doing is crazy – but it’s not for me. At the end of the day, I do what makes me happy and I think freestyle makes me me! Lake Garda might not be the perfect freestyle scenario, but besides kiting we can also go climbing and skating, and I would say it’s my favorite spot.

What were your influences? Because you have a very unique style.

Yeah, I didn’t choose my style, to be honest, it developed by itself. There was a group of kiters here on Lake Garda that I would ride with. Everyone was passing the bar with a lot of commitment, power and energy, pulling the bar super strong. But I didn’t have any power as I was super skinny and couldn’t pass the bar like the others were doing. In the end I figured if I spin faster I don’t even need to pull the bar, and spinning fast came naturally to me. After I realized this, my tricks changed and my style came into its own. I also wanted to change the method to grab the bar – Carlos Mario does it by taking the opposite side which I think they call palm to palm in wakeboarding. But I can’t even grab it, that’s the proof that you can’t change what feels natural to you.

You have to be open to embrace your own style, so you’re not fighting it. In Brazil, all the Brazilian kids from Cumbuco, they try to copy Bebe.

Yeah but you shouldn’t do this, because you are you at the end of the day. You should be stoked about having a good session, not just because you achieved something that somebody else did. I can’t do a Front Blind Mobe even though I’ve been trying forever. I recognize what I can and can’t do. In the end, you just need to do what makes you happy. I improve if I’m enjoying myself and am happy in the water, but if I’m stressed or not with a good crew, it’s harder. Enjoyment is why we learnt kiteboarding to begin with.

What about outside of kiting – is there anything that inspires you? I can tell if a rider is influenced by wakeboarding or snowboarding, and I know you like skateboarding.

Yes I’m really in love with skating, I skate a lot, and probably got into kiting because of it. I would take my skateboard to school and grew up with this crew of about 20 kids skating on the street. But it’s hard and I quit for a while as it’s painful. I even broke my teeth! You can do so many things with a skateboard, and there is a real community with it. People encourage each other and swap tips. I think there is a lot of respect. And I really enjoy skateboarding videos. I don’t watch kite videos as much as I used to, but there are so many good skate videos it never gets boring.

I shoot quite a bit of skateboarding as well – in a way the freestyle sessions in Brazil are a bit like a skate session because you guys ride the same little section of the lagoon – it feels a lot like a skate park.

Yeah, that’s why I love it. In Taiba we are super close to that mood, but I’ve been mulling over it while injured – I feel like in kiteboarding we are still missing a bit of the camaraderie that exists in skateboarding, everyone seated together, watching one person doing their tricks. I love to crack a joke when kiting but I feel like nowadays there is so much focus. Everyone should be more chill!

In Lake Garda, it looks like the wind is better in the middle of the lake, so everyone is doing their own thing, not stopping to chat mid-session.

Yeah, it’s harder to have a crew vibe but we do have this boat in the middle of the lake, so you can jump over the boat and create a vibe that way.

Let’s talk about the vibe at the Kite Park League events in Brazil.

I love the Kite Park League, whether it’s the normal comp or the team battle. I love the spirit of it and the fact that it’s organized by riders. They saw that no one was organizing an event they wanted so they just went and did one. I think more people should do the KPL although I appreciate not many have the opportunity to train on features. I’m so bad at features, but I love to do it! The team battle in Brazil was epic because you ride all together. There is this connection with all the riders. It’s about the team working together, and not only you. It’s not about the best trick – in a way it’s about who had more fun and that’s what shows in the footage.

Yeah, I think you put it perfectly. That’s the same way I feel shooting the team battle. While in Brazil you also did the GKA Freestyle World Cup and came second! How was that?

You actually helped me a lot. You said something right before the semifinals that I’ll always remember: “Nothing more, nothing less than what you do every day on the water.” Every comp, I think I need to do more, that I’m not good enough. I’m always thinking too much, comparing myself to the other rider and trying a trick just because they did it. But at this event, I realized that mindset wasn’t working, that I just need to do the tricks I can perform well. So I changed my strategy and it paid off. Then the energy was crazy. I had my mother on the beach and that gave me so much motivation to show her what I can do. I really want to make the people close to me happy, I’m doing it for them – for my girlfriend, my friends, my father, my coach. That’s what really inspires me. I do love the feeling of competing but the results are just a bonus. I’m sure that if I was looking to win, it wouldn’t be the same. Anyway I came back to the beach and my mother was crying tears of joy. That was the best feeling. When I was on the podium, I wasn’t thinking that I finally made it. I was just thinking, damn, I did something good, maybe I’m inspiring somebody.

Tell us about your videos, Vita Amara part 1 and 2, that you brought out last year.

Well, I bought a camera, a very simple one, something that I could use to film my friends and the things I want to film. These days, video are 15 seconds or less and I’d rather do longer videos and I know the vibe I want them to have. In my opinion, a video doesn’t need to be all about crazy stuff because at the end of the day you need to inspire somebody. I like to show all levels, not just the gnarliest tricks. I don’t want to make it look unreachable. When I see anyone trying a new trick, even just a simple trick, I’m stoked to see them practicing and getting out of their comfort zone. When we are filming, anything goes. I prefer to see a nice raley to blind than a dangle backside nine. Anyway, we took the van to south Italy, found some spots, met with Cocco, just training and filming with my friends. Making a video on your own is hard, but doing it with your friends is fun!