BKistler

 Nice. I liked the emphasis on family and the fact that multiple generations can participate in the same event. 

Large L shelf supports work well. I slide sections of bike inner tube over the support for padding. 

Nice. I knew the whole crew back in the day. 

You’re right, it’s snowing in Crested Butte!

Kidding aside, each year I threaten to retire from competition and what do I do?  I buy a new Aira. Oh well.  

@LarryG is correct. There’s not enough info to act on. A federal ban seems unlikely to me and a bill at the state level would affect only that particular state. NASBLA is legit. They were a good group when I rubbed shoulders with them back in the Stone Age. 

I drive by the old ski factory several times each week. Memories every time. 

It’s amazing to see how clunky the wood skis were. Uncle Ricky had to drag them kicking and screaming into using fiberglass. 

Just for the record , the post above attributed to me did not come from me. Maybe Horton used it as a test?

I was on the Graviton this year and wrote a review of it. The concave is fantastic for sticking landings on wake tricks but the same feature makes it a little sketchy for surface tricks. Got a new  D3 this fall and I’m loving it.  I’m on a one ski quiver for the first time in years.

This is a test. Horton is awesome. Everyone should send him money and skis.

@aupatking not sure how my name got associated with this thread but you’ve got the wrong guy. 🤔

The odd thing, of course, is that water skiing had already had its turn as a demonstration sport at Kiel, Germany. 

Although AWSA was not yet a member of USOC by the time I left, there were financial and public relations benefits. I presume that is still the case. 

@Stathis Ventouris has it right. I was there from the beginning and that was always the reasoning that I heard. 

Don’t know if Hank Longo is lurking here. He’s the best source if you can get ahold of him. 

I’m lucky enough to have known both Wayne Grimditch and Joel Poland. Plenty of inspiration there. 

@Than_Bogan Thanks for calling attention to Wayne Grimditch. Younger Ballers may not know that ‘Ditch won the ABC Superstars competition on national television against elite athletes from many other sports. He had thighs like tree stumps and not an ounce of crush on a 6- foot ramp. 

Saw @Broussard and @LeonL today. Sitting with my old rival Gordon Gay, Anna’s grandfather. 

Need I mention that Joel posted his amazing score on Friday the 13th?  The haircut was good luck. 

They have been extremely lucky today. Lines of showers that have been training through the state have missed Travers. An hour south in Winter Haven we’ve had continual and often very hard rain. 

At least Saturday for trick finals. Maybe Thursday. 

Awkward moments at Matt Rini’s: “Sorry Joel, can’t pull you with the Nautique.”

🙂

To @ETskier’s point. It doesn’t cost anything to thump the event on the website. 

I am a fossil from the ancient days. In the ‘70s we had a staff of 6  or 7 including secretaries and mail room help. The editor of The Water Skier doubled as PR man. His task was to feed info to local news outlets. He could not guarantee that they picked up on the feed. We had no advertising budget to promote events directly.

USA Water Ski is an affiliate federation of IWWF and the US Team is its property, so there certainly should be a motivation to promote the event.

Visit Central Florida has been an event sponsor in the past and promoted the event. Ironically, Visit Central Florida is a creature of Polk County government and the event takes place in Lake County. Might be one reason why advertising is limited.

Thanks. Found it as soon as I posted.