Nando

Got mine today- nice rope- thanks, Joe.

To combine 200 and Carbon Pro production in a ski boat-only division with combined R & D? Might make sense... Might not make any money, though, then what?

thager, no one wants to see me trick- EVER. As for the Saucier tricks, mine were stolen years ago, along with one brother's Kahuna slalom and another's Kahuna wide trick and a bunch of other classic skis (Connelly Wide-Trak, EP Wingtip, Saucier slaloms, etc.) we had locked up at the lake over the winter.

Hey! Those are my brother's ski buddies. I've skied with Chris a little and he's amazingly perceptive. Compulsive about coaching during the set, but really gets the details. Cool to see these guys here. Maybe I should study and get the old trick out again- more than twice this year...

I remember going to the '78 Nationals, too and one thing I remember is Bruce Jenner was there doing an interview about his skiing days. Some things change more than others...

I couldn't be the only one waiting to see if Horton stopped before he crashed into the neighbor's boat lift... ;)

Well, it looks like it will be comfortable, at least until the surprise ejection. It will definitely give him the freedom to continue his OTFs. Unless that front buckle relocation is just a little too restrictive...

What happened to the mini pickle-fork bow??

skidawg said it- those O'Brien ones seemed like such a good idea, but they sure didn't fit me. I use a Sheik belt under my vest and would go for a built-in, if it was comfortable.

Wow- painted to match the water to halfway up the curtain?!? Is that cut as late as it appears?

Edbrazil, you must remember the '87 St. Paul tour stop where Sammy refused to jump on our blue jump. I was your local flunky and was a little shocked when I returned from the scuba shop to find you painting it. A couple of people weren't too pleased, but once it was painted and waxed, what could we say- it was Sammy...

Rivvy, the homeowners association has a permit to treat with chemicals, but as much as that, we've been mowing them out with a couple of inboards and skiing. There's a lot of incentive not to fall. During the lake's tournament days, we did moonlight canoe rides with a sprayer of Aquathol hanging out the side, but we're trying to play by the rules and stay within the limits of our permit for spraying. Ed and 6balls, I recall that the boat wakes at Keller were kind of a mixture of brown and green, with lots of salad flying. The island that was at the north end of the slalom course there is reputed to be a kind of semi-floating bog- just a mass of vegetation that's more or less anchored by its roots. When Drew Townes (??) was scouting locations for the tour, he and I paced out the course on the ice in the winter. There were matted weeds in the ice, but I don't think he noticed- making the thing work was Ed's job...

Public access...

yardsale, you're not kidding- I was out there on a friend's pontoon (from Kohlman) and it's nasty. Where the tour course was seemed thick enough to walk on. But, Island was almost as bad and we're getting it under control. Skiing helps, but falling in that stuff is kind of nasty... I used to ski with a guy that regularly put in a portable on Keller- that would be a mess on some of these weed-infested lakes.

dchristman- I've used both G and J and don't find much difference. The Pres of Polywater is a high school buddy and he gave me a half-dozen bottles of J, which was nice. They claim it's biodegradable. I don't use it much since going to a Reflex and retiring from jumping, but keep a a bottle in the boat.

Cable pulling lube- Polywater, if you can find it. Their formulation was originally for pulling on them old neoprene wetsuits, so it's easy on the skin and rinses off completely, unlike soap.

MS, they had one on the river too- ran Dr. Drillandfill's Malibu into a wing dam and pushed the prop and shaft right through the hull. I forgot about the one on Keller. There are two of us living on the lake and we've been skiing quite a bit. We found the surveyed course and plan to get it back into shape. We've discussed getting a tournament there again.

Ed, I think you've got two extra tour stops in there- I worked the '87, '91, '92, and '93 stops, but don't recall any later than that. There was a WOW stop around 2002 on the Mississippi River. I recall that in '87 Sammy refused to jump on our blue-surfaced jump so you stripped all the wax off and painted it red for us. Then we ended up with a 40 MPH crosswind for the jump event... Back on topic, there are a few other sites besides Trophy Lakes 3 on the east side of town. A couple of us committed to getting the old primary tournament site in the metro area, Island Lake, back into tournament shape this spring.

The Reflex Road Warrior version...

When I was about 15, my cousin's family had a 14' Crestliner with a 55HP Chrysler. I bet him I could stop it while slaloming behind it. (I had no idea if I could, but...) Sure enough, pulled out, made a big turn and the pull caused it to cavitate so bad it came off plane and the noise made him shut it down. I don't think we put any money on it or anything, but I won.

My cost is in buoys and materials, otherwise $0 for three courses, all on technically public lakes, though one has no access and only two Nautiques for boats. One county here requires you to indemnify them on course permits, but the permits are free.

Give ThomasAlive a shot- give somebody else a shot!

My first boat actually titled to me was a '73 Nautique bought from my friend's dad in '80. My friend's brother was going to grad school and had an identical one with slightly fewer hours, so the dad bought that and sold me the other one. This was back when the graphics were painted on with Rustoleum paint, which was all faded, so I stripped it off, buffed out the whole hull, got stencils from Correct Craft and had a neighbor who has a body shop re-spray it in Imrom paint. We put a lot of hours on that boat before it was replaced, but we couldn't part with it- it's still in the family; I sold it to my brother last summer. To this day, the hull looks better than when it left the factory.

MS, that sounds like a money-making opportunity for the right individual...

thager will remember the hordes of B-Men skiers. In my second tournament, I finished 14th out of 114 skiers by running my opener and I think two buoys on the second pass. Must have been at least 50 guys who wiped out around the one ball. Tournaments were a ton of fun in the dark ages, but 36 longline was a tough nut to crack.