We thought long and hard about what to bring you with our 500th product — something everyday-useful? Something that’ll revolutionize your computing style? Something shiny with lots of buttons and flashing lights and sound effects? Nah, let’s keep it fun… the sort of fun that promises to let you fly over water in multiple, thrusting bounds (nevermind that it’s nearly winter, let’s think long people!).

Ok, so it’s not exactly flying on water, but a whole lot like bunny-hopping along the surface on the wacky contraption known as the AquaSkipper. When you need to get from one side of a lake to the other, take the fastest route and hop straight across on this human-powered hydrofoil. Bouncing on the spring-mounted platform moves the angle of the back hydrofoil up and down in the water to generate lift and speed (90% of your power is going to come from this hopping motion), while a handle up front manages the second foil and keeps you pointed in the right direction.

The video of the AquaSkipper in action is pretty out of hand, made doubly great for any of you Seal fans out there by a CRAZY soundtrack.

The Skipper’s designers assure that anyone can get the hang of the movement within half an hour, but you may need to give yourself a bit more time if the hand-eye coordination’s a bit rusty. Once you’ve hit the foiling groove, you’re ready to break some waves at 17mph.

Made of aircraft aluminum and fiberglass, this lightweight skipper (only 26 lbs.) is available from JumpUSA for $499.

Don’t let that chill in the air keep you from golfing — it may get a little too crisp to lug your bag around 18 holes, but it’s always the right weather to set up stakes in your back yard and work on that swing. The Extreme Challenge Cage Net (at least it’s not “X-treme!”) lets you work on nearly every aspect of your game from the comfort of your own private green, and is tough enough to take on the kids’ soccer and softballs as well.

The 13-foot driving net comes with a removable 18-hole chipping tarp, two chipping baskets set at different heights to keep things interesting, expandable poles and ground stakes for easy set up, two background tarps and a nylon carrying bag for the golfer on the go — set it up for practice during those extended football half-times at your buddy’s house and you’re one step closer to creating your own drinking game. Available for $129 from Frontgate.

If you spend considerable time riding around on your bike, you’re probably always wondering “how far did I go? were the hills really that brutal?” There are a myriad of online mapping systems that let you plot your journey by points on a map (provided you can remember every twist and turn you took), but that doesn’t tell you with any great amount of accuracy how many miles you traveled or calories you burned. So get excited: Garmin has a handlebar-mounted tracking tool that will do all of the work for you, and even help you find your way back home from a wheeled adventure.

The Edge 705 is a GPS-enabled cycle computer with the works — it can monitor your heart rate, speed, distance, calories burned, altitude, climb and descent, and cadence, give you turn-by-turn directions, process power data, all the bells and whistles available on a water-resistant wireless color display. The Edge comes with a built-in basemap with a microSD card slot for adding map detail and storing your workouts, courses and rides for easy exercise monitoring on your home computer allowing you to track your progress and time on the road over months of outings. Even better, if you have a riding buddy with the same equipment, you can easily send them your latest course and let them try it out for themselves with simple point-by-point navigation via a worldwide network of cyclists through Garmin Connect.

A true must have for any cycling enthusiast, the Edge 705 is now available for pre-order (packages starting at $389) at Buy Reliant.

Ever get boat envy? You’re on vacation, or maybe up at the lake, and sitting shoreside watching lifevest-clad revelers skimming across the surface, smiling and laughing, and just wishing you could be out there too. But unless you live on shorefront property, or don’t think much of paying hourly rates for dinghies that can’t take direction, getting out on the water isn’t as accessible as you might want it to be. Until, of course, you strap a catamaran on your back.

The MiniCat is a uniquely innovative two-person catamaran that packs up into a single 35kg bag that you can carry with you rucksack style to anywhere you want to go — the beach, local lake, or some hidden hole of water tucked along a hiking path. And with such an easy to handle storage size (1350×280x280mm), it tucks away nicely when you’re not using it, instead of taking up a corner of the backyard or precious garage space.

Here’s the best part: assembly is a doddle. Yes, I said a doddle — it says so right in the description. And by doddle they mean that one person can throw the whole thing together in 30 minutes without any tools — unroll, inflate, snap together, raise your sail and you’re good to go!

The price of sailing on the fly? A cool £2500 (roughly $3,455). And by cool we mean yikes, but if you’ve got the cash and a seafaring heart, this may be the best of both worlds — accessibility and convenience, a match for any lifestyle.

Let’s face it, a golfer’s worst nightmare is the annoying hunt for golf balls when they slice one out into the trees and their buddies are sitting pretty waiting for them on the fairway, but it may not be impossible to find those lost balls any longer. The Visiball “Golf Ball Finder” Glasses are a golfer’s dream tool. There have been plenty of technological devices do the trick, but none are as cost-efficient as these. While I am not exactly a great golfer, I do enjoy playing on the weekends and I must say that I do shank the balls every now and then and it is quite frustrating when looking for your balls in a DEEP rough…AKA the woods.

At around $40.00, you really cannot go wrong with these glasses, they do just what they say they do. When you put on the glasses, you will notice that there is a bit of a change in the way your surroundings look, so they might take a little while to get used to. The technology developed by two nuclear engineers in Canada allows the glasses to highlight the golf ball by filtering out the darker surrounding colors. Once the glow comes into the picture, you can grab your ball and be on your way to the next hole. Set aside from the fact that these glasses are very handy for a golfer, they are also very stylish. All in all, Visiball has done a great job with their next-generation product.

This year’s ispo BrandNew award winner, the Easy-Glider, is a very cool motorized twist on the old Bronze Age horse drawn chariot design. A bunch of tree hugging do-gooders out of Switzerland are the masterminds behind this new eco friendly form of personal mobility which can take you up to 13 miles on a single charge.

Easy-Glider can be used as a stand alone hauler that will pull you on a set of rollerblades or a skateboard at speeds up to 12 MPH. For those of you who are not so athletically inclined, you can simply clip on the optional trailer and enjoy the ride.

This is really quite an engineering achievement and a nice step in the right direction towards eco friendly personal mobility but I worry that this kind of technology is going to be a cancer on already lazy Americans. Are we to the point that we can’t pump our legs for a nice trip on our rollerblades or simply kick a foot to glide along on a skateboard?

Sweet video clip after the jump… Read More »

Who needs friends? (Kidding — don’t be a goober, you know you need good buddies.) But in a pinch, when there’s no one around to throw you some balls in the backyard to perfect your batting style, the Electronic Pitching Machine is ready to stand in — and won’t require heavy lifting or multiple credit cards to pay off.

Pitching balls every ten seconds, the pitching machine lets you adjust the pitching height and comes with a 27″ collapsible plastic bat and 8 safe, plastic balls for practice in the backyard or on your next camping trip. For $29.95 at the Discovery Channel Store, the battery powered Electronic Pitching Machine is a great step up for your T-ball superstar, or whiffle ball champion in training.

Summer 2007: No Wipe Outs! They look a bit like skates on steroids, but who am I to question Olympic champs that dance on TV?

LandRoller has created a new skate with Ohno’s help (yep, red was his choice) and are making full use of his Dancing for the Stars win to capture new enthusiasts ready to upgrade their Rollerblades. Why the crazy wheels though? Turns out their “radical wheel configuration” is exactly what’s going to keep you from curb checking as often as you do — the larger wheels minimize road vibration, increase your stability, and make it easier to brake without falling backwards. Plus they’ve dropped a speed lacing system so you’re in and out in a flash. Act fast, though — The Apolo Ohno models (checking out at $269.99) have been made in limited quality, and you’d hate to have to lose out on translucent red tires, right?

The Scarpar is a concept off road snow-surf-skate like motorized board. There is no terrain this hybrid beast can’t conquer from snow to pavement to dirt, nothing gets in its way.

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We all know there is nothing cool about riding around bleeding profusely from every major extremity so, grab your helmet pads because the Scarpar is said to shred at speeds of 35 mph. They say nothing is set in stone yet but, after 5000 hours of engineering the makers of this juiced up board say you should be able to go about 20 miles between fill ups.

Keep an eye out for the Scarpar at your local ATV dealership “sometime in 2007.” What, you want a launch date set in stone? Come on, these guys are building a frickin tank tracked skateboard that could have a top speed of 50 mph when all is said and done.