LeonL

Well, good or bad it seems that I may be the oldest guy to frequent this forum. Should I act my age and quit skiing and quit reading about it, or act my maturity level and just keep making a fool of myself. Any future posts that I make, feel free to disregard as the ramblings of senility.

I'm coming up on 64 in June and ski with a guy who's older. Never skied very good, but last season came within 1/2 buoy of 6 year previous tournament personal best. Ain't dead yet!

usaski1,

 

I've been away and without internet access. However still haven't seen a PM. Contact me a leon1989 at bellsouth dot net and let me know how to get 4 10" ones.

usaski1, I'd like 3-4 of those. Let me know how to get'em.

I think the "if mirror in place, no observer required" is good, but I want to tell a little story.  Good friends of mine husband and wife, National level trickers were tricking on a private site, as is the norm, no vest.  Husband doing toes, catches an edge and actually breaks his pelvis.  Wife comes back, to pick him up, he gets on the platform sits there for a few seconds and passes out, falls back in the water.  Wife jumps in to hold his head above water (no vest for her, as she was just driving) boat floats away out of reach and they both nearly drown.  She yells for help and a slalom skier on the other lake (2 lake facility) when dropped at the end miraculously hears her. Goes to show that stange accidents can be tragic.

SteveP, your best bet for guides is Polyform.  They're a bit more than costly than foam, but very durable.  Granted I have a private site, but I have Polyform guides that are over 10 years old and still in great shape.  As I have posted in the past, the yellow fades but you can dye them using common Rit brand dye and they look almost like new again.

For $60 I'd give it a try.  Some people liked them; not many ,due there not being many of the Outlaws making the market.  The above sentiment about CarbonWorx in general fits with the experience of a guy who skied at our lake.  Back in '04 he ordered one and took forever to get it.  They had a return policy (money back if it didn't work for you) well he got it and it wasn't bad, just not quite as "Goode" as what he was using.  He tried and tried to get his money back, they put him off with every excuse one could think of.  He finally shipped it back and went to VISA and had them cancel out his charges which they did after he explained the situation to them.  I think they got in a real financial bind about that time.  At the Nationals that year, they had a big presence at the vendor area and had a daily drawing for a slalom ski giveaway. 

I was shocked to find out recently that the Ky State Fish and Wildlife has jurisdiction to enforce any and all laws and regulations related to boating even on private sites.  This means that they can enforce CG approved vests while one is tricking, for example, plus a multitude of other regulations.  Contrary to "normal" law enforcement, they may go onto private property without any "probable cause" at their whim, under the provison that fish and wildlife are everywhere. 

We let promo guys have free entry at our site, however I know there is one site in our state that doesn't.  Most sites comp the entry for appointed/chief officials, and in my opinion promo guys deserve comp entry more than officials.  They just have to show up, while a promo has a 50K investment and towing involved.

Maybe I didn't do it right, but instead of an expected "submit" it has a "login" box.  I clicked it, entered my email and BOS PW and got a "login failed".

Bud Man -- My experience with flourscent orange is fading to near white in just a few weeks.

One of the requirements within the protcol specifies that the T & B format must be supported by all the chief and appointed officials.  This will eliminate our site from T & B this season, as a couple of the most vocal opponents from last season are officials that we have to depend on.  We also have a promo guy that we depend on that complained about his boat getting extra hours due to being used in the second round. But what the hey, we'll ski anyway.

Contact Traci Baylon on that one.  She can be reached via email tbaylon at usawaterski dot org. 

OK, after a flurry of emails with Traci at USAWS, she cleared up the waiver thing.  She stated that all active members have a waiver on file at USAWS that will cover sanctioned practices. (assuming you did the electronic waiver when renewing) Event specific waivers for tournaments and clinics will still have to be signed.  Retention of waivers by the LOC is only required for Guest Memberships (per Traci Baylon just now)   Thanks to Traci for prompt,detailed info on this subject.

east tx skier -- no longer required to maintain logs.

There I go, taking assumptions again.  I kinda thought there would be one form that all members would sign as opposed to the standard tournament waiver form that is one per.  It still says that "a waiver must be on file with USAWS" then down a couple of bullets it says that the LOC must retain the waivers.

I stand corrected.  After perusing the online sanction request form, I see that I can put in a date range and not individual dates.  My question now is from where do I download the required waiver forms.  The guidelines also state that the LOC must retain the signed waivers.  Will I need them in duplicate?

As most of you who are listed as a contact for AWSA affiliated club probably did, I received an email telling me that now I can sanction practice online.  This after dutifully (about 5 weeks ago) filling in all our requested practice dates on a hard copy form and sending it in.  I have received no response as to a scanction approval/number.  I emailed Traci this AM asking if I will have to do the online thing.  I certainly hope not.  If you take a look at the online process you will see that you have to select a date and time, click add and then do it again, over and over for 150 or 200 or however many days you want to practice.  Am I missing an easy way to do this?

A little tough to do but here goes.  Looking at a blank HO the front most pair of holes are 5 7/8" wide, then the next pair are 3 7/16" back and are also 5 7/8" wide.  Then 6 3/16" back from those are another pair that are 4 9/16" wide, then 2 3/16" back are another set of holes that are 4 1/4" wide.  Now it gets tough as I don't have bindings only the blank ski to look at.  Moving back 14 5/16" there are three holes the that the rearmost bindings holes mount to.  Since they are not straight across it's hard to measure.  Someone with Wiley's or HO bindings will be able to give you better figures, but maybe these will help.

What is a going rate for a slot?  Are the slots hourly?  How many hours does the average "principal" own?

I've never given the "time slot" method much thought.  It would seem to cramp the style of our members.  I much prefer that people be able to come whenever the mood strikes them and stay as long as they want.  BTW we have (as of last season) 2 families of 4 skiers each; 1 family of 3 skiers; 1 family of 2 skiers, and 6 single memberships for a total of 19 skiers.  If everyone happened to be here at the same time there would be a long time between sets, but that never seems to happen.  We ski by boat rotations, so for the family of 4 it would take 4 rotations of everyone skiing before they got all of them a set.  Out fee schedule is $700 for individual skier and head of household, with $75 for each additional skier in the family, living in that household.  We once had an option for a discount if one was willing to help with grounds maintenance, but that caused more problems that it was worth.  (complaints about "he's not keeping up his area" or "he didn't mow last week".)  Also I've discovered that I spent more time maintenancing the equipment than it does for me to do all the mowing. People just don't take care of equipment very well.  Obviously I'm not in it to make a profit, just meet expenses and try to make a few improvements along the way. I have a few rules, and for the most part we don't have many problems.  Had a few last year and I need to crack down a bit this season.

I would think that whether or not its on a check list, the CJ at Nats or Regs would check for correct prop as tested as a matter of course.  BTW my '08 196 consumes about 1.2 gallons per set.  Usually 6 but sometimes up to 8 passes. We log sets skied and fill up out a bulk tank with a meter, so it's pretty accurate.

Skidawg,  The ONLY real insurance provided by USAWS is in the form of liability, and then I'm sure you'll have a tough time getting any help.  OB obviously was able to garner some benefit from the liability coverage provided.  We'll have to do whatever we can (or can afford) to protect ourselves in the event of a catastrophic accident.  Don't want to go losing my lake!!  

Guys, reagardless of what Brandon or Traci says, here is word for word of what their documentation says.  I take what is written over verbal info in a situation like this.  I couldn't cut and paste from the document, I'll just type it out. About 1/3 the way down the page of "Sanctioning Requirements" it says:

"A safety official with a minimum rating of Safety Coordinator must be present at each sanctioned practice if guest members are allowed to participate." (emphasis added)

Guest member, to my interpretation, is a non member of USAWS.  Guest member further defined at the next to last check mark on subject page.  I choose to not allow guest members to ski at our lake per above.

It appears that you can indicate, on one form, the times/dates that you want to sanction.  It does require that a safety coordinator be on site, and his/her name be listed when sanction application is submitted, if you ski guests. A member of the sanctioning club be on site at all times that sanctioned skiing is going on.  For you guys that have sites where year round skiing is possible there seems to be a caveat -- practice schedules submitted with " all dates circled will not be accepted".  Roger, what will WPB do?  I guess you can just leave off tournaments dates. It does say "all" dates, so if you leave off one (1) annually it will meet the letter of the law.

 The following quote does indicate that this is new for 2011.  I haven't looked into just what all this entails yet, but does seem to be considerably more that in the past just logging in all details for practice.  Keyword being formally.  "Beginning in 2011, affiliated clubs will be required to formally sanction ALL club practices and exhibitions through USA Water Ski and adhere to the requirements outlined below."