I haven’t even entered the water, and already I’m getting cold feet. It is a chilly October day, and I’m looking out over London’s Docklands. My exposed toes have gone bright pink. Marc Corcoran, a watersports expert, is tightening the strap of my helmet. His colleague, Christopher Lambert, is clamping my feet into a space-age “flyboard”, intended to propel me up to 10 metres into the air with power from a 260-horsepower jet-ski engine. I look into the misty firmament, and know that there’s no going back.

Flyboarding, the biggest new craze in watersports, was invented a year ago by a jet-ski champion called Franky Zapata. He posted a video of it on YouTube, and it was viewed 2.5 million times. The first flyboarding championships have just taken place in Qatar.

And now you can do it here. In June, Marc started a company calledFlyboarding.co.uk, which has been a roaring success. Both men and women have been trying it out all over Britain, and it has been hired for birthdays, stag dos and corporate events. It may not offer any fitness benefit, but flyboarding is the next big thing. Which is how I ended up connected to a jet ski in the rain.

It’s going to be very simple. Marc and his colleague, Jason Fox – an ex-Army professional fireman – will ride the jet ski. When Marc opens the throttle, water will be sent through a hose into the board on my feet and spurt out at high pressure, giving me a powerful propulsion. Jason, sitting on the back, will prod me away from obstacles with a large foam spear. My job is to harness that power, balance on a cushion of water pressure – and fly.

I take a breath and plunge in. Immediately I find myself being thrust at high speed through the waves, a sock in a washing machine, gulping for air. Marc turns the jetski off and sighs. “Just relax,” he calls, “and keep your body straight.”

After a few long minutes I have established a degree of control, and find myself circling the jet ski like a shark. “Now,” shouts Marc, “take off.”

I try to stand and, to my amazement, London rises around me. I reach an altitude of about six feet, then lose my balance and belly flop. After several more tumbles, something finally clicks. I am surfing the air like a comic-book villain. This, I think, is almost worthy of James Bond. Continue reading on the Telegraph website